Henchgirl (Dakota Kekoa Book 1)

by Rita Stradling

  Bobby led my sisters, mother and me to the center of the room where I had a clear view of my grandfather standing on the dais, behind him my uncles and cousins made up an almost solid line of muscle. The one exception was…

  “Bobby,” I whirled on my uncle, who was accepting a glass of champagne from a tray laden waiter. “Bobby, what the… what is going on?” I pointed to the front, so outraged and shocked, I finally felt the prick of tears.

  “Dakota,” Bobby said as he looked directly into my eyes, no trace of humor touched his expression which made the sharpened teeth of what he said next bite down all the harder, “I know you have it in you to take this change with dignity.”

  But I did not. Dignity was the last thing I could muster as I looked up at the dais, where my cousin Ashley stood in my spot pretending not to be smirking directly at me.

  Ashley, why Ashley? Of all the cousins I had, why would grandfather pick her to replace me? Ashley was more prim and proper than a human nun, yeah the kind of nun that beat misbehaving children. We had once been close but then she inherited her aspects and she pretty much became a sadistic Miss Manners.

  I mean, sure, in raw power she had quite a punch, she had two aspects. Like my brother and sister, Ashley inherited supernatural beauty, but she also inherited the ability to control other people’s bones; yeah, it was good for torturing people, but it was a parlor-trick beside my power. There was no subtlety, no art to it. To add torture to injury, her adopted mother, my aunt Glenda, stepped into my line of sight and made a busy-bee-line for me.

  I looked around for an escape, bathroom, maybe, but my champagne toting mother stepped back and put her arm around my waist.

  “Stephanie, Robert, ladies,” Glenda said. Her high and girlish voice was always the most disturbing thing about my quarter dragon aunt, and that was saying something.

  “Glenda,” My mother said a bit stiffly, “How lovely of you to join us. I should probably thank you; Stacy tells me that you are very diligent in her lessons.” My mom says diligent like it means something awful, which I’m sure it does.

  Glenda smiled a chilling smile at Stacy, and Stacy stepped behind my mother. “I expect to have all your daughters, soon, with the recent changes.” She smiled at me and it was probably supposed to be a sweet expression, but she reminded me more of a giant spider sizing up a particularly tasty fly. “I’ve been waiting for so long and finally father will give me permission to train you, Dakota.”

  I swallowed. My Aunt looked like she would be at home hosting a cooking show, matronly as they come; but her soul was a dark spindly thing, a hungry mass of cords always trying to ensnare more into her web. And my grandfather gave her all but free reign over us dracon-wives in training.

  Glenda turned her attention to my mother, “Oh Stephanie, doesn’t my Ashley look right on the dais. Ashley is finally getting the favoritism she deserves.” The emphasis she put on the word ‘she’ left no question as to her meaning.

  “You’re right,” my mother said, “This view makes your daughter’s puckered expression almost pretty. Don’t you think so, Dakota?”

  The surge of pride I felt for my mother in my heart made me reckless, so even though Glenda was the scariest dracon I knew, I tilted my head to the side and said, “Yeah, I can see it, her chin looks shorter and her nose looks less…you know.” I smashed down my nose with my finger.

  It was ridiculous, really, like so many of my cousins, Ashley’s birth father was Lorien and birth mother was some human; Ashley looked so similar to Clara and Deagan that people had mistaken them for triplets more than once. However, though they looked nearly identical, almost everyone agreed that Ashley wasn’t as beautiful as Clara, something that irked Glenda to no end.

  My mother tapped my back, smiling too-widely at Glenda. My mother said the next question as calmly as if she was asking about the weather, “So if Ashley is working for your father then who will be torturing your students?”

  “I am perfectly able,” Glenda said then she gave one more hungry examination of my sisters and me. “I should probably take my place at the front of the reception center before the guests of honor come. Robert, Stephanie, girls,” she said, nodding to each of us in turn.

  “I always feel so honored, big sister,” Bobby said and mockingly raised a glass. When Glenda turned her back, Bobby said, “You just can’t screw with that level of creepy.”

  My mother nodded and whispered so low I could barely hear her, “If that psycho touches my baby again…” She trailed off. But I knew what she would do if Glenda hit Stacy again, or any of my sisters: nothing.

  My mother squeezed me as she tipped up her champagne flute and drunk the whole glass in one gulp. Her soul tucked tighter into herself, and for some reason it looked shameful and obscene.

  I felt an immediate need to look away.

  The excitement that hummed through the crowd was physical, a current that I could not stop from soaking into me. When one emotion was so thickly emitting from all the souls around me, it was almost as though I was swimming through it, and even if I was trying not to, I always felt it.

  “Do you see Deagan?” My mother asked while she tried to peer over shoulders, “He should be standing with us when we meet the guests…”

  I had seen him slipping past us to go stand with a group of my cousins, but I pretended to look around for him anyway. “No mom, maybe he’s late…?”

  “Your brother never arrives late,” my mother said, sounding offended by the very idea. She sighed. “He’s probably looking for us, but it’s too late now because the guests have arrived.”

  A pulse of fear smacked into me, but it was not my fear. I glanced at Bobby, his soul buzzed with alarm, but with magnificent speed, Bobby extinguished the fear.

  My grandfather sighted Bobby like a shark sensing blood in the water. The look that passed over his face was quick and terrible. If I had not sensed the fear, I would have missed the entire interaction.

  I staggered. My stomach squeezed and my teeth clenched. I did not need to turn to know what kind of creature had entered the reception center. I had only been in the presence of one of them once before, but I would never forget what being near one of those felt like.

  My head swam as I turned to realize that one of the most powerful beings to have ever walked this world was less than a hundred feet from me. And this dragon was immeasurably more powerful than the one that had ripped my life apart five years ago.

  Chapter Seven

  There was nothing else in the world comparable to a full-blooded dragon, and I had been in the presence of almost every creature out there. When I turned all I saw was its soul, so big and dense, it literally pushed aside the souls of the wait-staff that stood by the reception hall’s open doors.

  I blinked over and over again, but my sight just became blearier by the second. Air resisted being dragged into my lungs and my head immediately pounded with a headache.

  I had only ever seen one full-dragon before, but I immediately knew this one was not just any dragon; this one had to be dragon royalty.

  “Give it to me,” Bobby whispered, “Give me what you’re feeling now.” I turned to realize that Bobby was literally holding me up. He wanted me to give him my… what? My emotions?

  He did not get it, I wasn’t swooning from fear, it was more just the immensity of the soul. If seeing my grandfather’s soul was like stepping into the sun, seeing this dragon’s soul was like standing in an inferno. Looking at the being was like trying to comprehend every thought that every dracon in this room was thinking at once; it was threatening to disintegrate my sanity.

  I squeezed my eyes shut trying to numb myself to his soul, to let the power settle as it always did with my grandfather. With shaking fingers I reached down into my purse, fishing for my dampener, but fingers grabbed mine and squeezed so tightly it hurt. Bobby’s voice whispered close by, again saying, “Give me what you can’t handle—”

  He still did not get it, and he wasn’t letting me put
on my bracelet.

  Bobby placed his hand on the back of my neck and gently pushed my head down, so I was bent forward, probably thinking I was going to throw up or something; a few seconds later he lightly guided me back up by my shoulders.

  It took me—I don’t know how long, but I settled into the power of the dragon, adjusted to it in slow increments like I did with my grandfather; staying afloat only by struggling above the waves of his power. When I had the courage to open my eyes the dragon was not where I had last seen it, he had walked up to the dais to stand beside my grandfather.

  He wore an enormous fur coat, and above the folds of fur I saw luminous white hair. The dragon stood talking to Ashley and my grandfather, and beneath the dragon’s outstretched arms were two half-dragons I recognized.

  Wrapped in the embrace of the being that had almost unintentionally ripped my mind into shreds were Braiden McCormick and his ‘friend,’ Vern.

  Vern was craning his neck over his shoulder to look straight at me.

  If I could manage confusion or shock, I would, because the expression on Vern’s beautiful cold features as he stared down at me was loathing. I could not care enough to even wonder why he would glare at me with such hatred in his gaze. The first chance I had, I planned to run to pray to the black marble throne in the ladies room.

  “I think I’m going to be sick,” I whispered, to no one in particular.

  “What’s the matter?” Clara turned to me, a smile dropping off her face in confusion. She did not know; it really had not occurred to me that probably almost no one else recognized what the thing that just entered our midst was.

  The dragon wore a heavy fur coat on a warm day, which might be a dead giveaway for some. However, if the winter garb did not expose what he was, most would probably assume he was Vern’s brother. He was colder than Vern, less human and more predatory, but otherwise they could be twins. And even though the dragon looked like a teenager, there was no doubt in my mind that this was Vern’s daddy.

  “She’s fine,” Bobby said, unconcerned-sounding as he pinched me hard on my arm. He smiled as if nothing was wrong while flagging down another glass of champagne. “You’re fine,” he said. He gave me a meaningful look.

  I rubbed my pinched arm. “Yeah, sure,” I said.

  About two years ago, my grandfather flew me over to the island Waibibi for an assignment ‘convincing’ his prize were-rat fighter, Carlos Lamente, not to quit. The situation was simple, Carlos had a contract, he wanted to break it, and I needed to convince him otherwise.

  It was an easy ‘in-and-out’ job; I entered with a group of middle-school athletes from schools across the island who were touring the Coliseum. When I shook Carlos’s hand I opened my ring and let massive amounts of fear that my grandfather had stored pump from the ring through me into the rat man.

  I had smiled up at him and said, “My grandfather is a big fan, he would love to see your career continue for some time.”

  The were-rat, a man who looked like he took a sledge hammer in the face and liked it, stared down at me in terror and grunted out, “I’ll do anything you say.”

  As ordered, I had left the fear in him, knowing that he could not digest it; however, over time the fear would dissipate.

  The job had been executed beautifully and I had been feeling pretty smug until the school bus I had boarded with the middle school students was hit from the side and ran off the road into a cane field. As the class and I escaped the bus we found ourselves surrounded by nine were-rats. Eight giant rats circled me and the students, flashing their five-inch fangs from all sides. Standing facing the group was the only were-rat in his human form; I immediately recognized him from the pictures Glacier showed me: Jonathan Mitchell the self-proclaimed ‘rat king.’

  As was protocol for retaliatory attacks, I had pumped all my emotions into the ring which alerted my grandfather that there was a situation.

  The ‘rat king’ had lined us up waving a gun wildly. When he talked his voice was quick, fevered, like he had just drunk his weight in coffee, “Which of you belong to the grandfather dracon? Who knows? I can kill one of you, or all of you. You better tell me.” His gaze darted around until it found me and stuck, his lips formed the words, “You.”

  I drew contingency and shot him three times, none of them kill shots, before he could point his gun hand. I had disarmed him by shooting through his hand, and then I took out one knee and a shoulder. He slumped forward and I aimed at his head.

  “Everyone who isn’t a rat, get in the bus,” I shouted, I did not need to give the order twice.

  Glacier’s rented car raced up the road and jumped the curb, speeding directly toward where the gathered giant rats stood completely still and stared at me. The rats scurried out of the way and the car screeched to a stop feet from the ‘rat king.’

  The moment Glacier stepped out of his rented car all the other were-rats fled deserting their king. The king was stuck, already half healed, but unable to run.

  Before I left the ‘rat king’ to whatever fate Glacier had planned for him, I asked him what had given me away. He had smiled, and jabbered out, “Your face!”

  Apparently, I had been easier to read than a two-story billboard.

  It was harder than one might think to remove all expression; you needed to be completely aware of every muscle on your face. I had practiced daily for years after that.

  Feeling Vern’s gaze on me, along with the pressure in my body about to explode, I channeled every ounce of stoicism I could muster.

  “Bobby,” my mom said, her words a little slurred as she accepted another glass of champagne, “Can’t we move forward, over there, I would like to go stand with my son.”

  “No, we have to stay here. Don’t worry,” he said, “they’ll get to us, introduce us to the guests of honor and then we can go talk to whomever.”

  And no wait would be too long, I thought. But as we just stood there, watching Bobby and my mom compete for who could drink champagne flutes into the triple digits first, the wait went from a relief to a growing insult, quick.

  It was weird. I was so used to being introduced fourth, always just after Reaves, Bobby and Glacier. My grandfather would say, “This is Reaves, my right hand, my youngest sons, Bradson and Robert and my favorite grandchild, Dakota.” We were presented in that order every time.

  But my grandfather introduced my least important uncles and showed no hint of heading our way. If he was making a point, he could stop, I understood. I had fallen way out of favor.

  After thirty more minutes of waiting, my mom figured it out too, she set her most recent flute down and slurred out, “Deagan wouldn’t stand with us because of what you did, Dakota…” She looked at me. “You embarrassed him. He was introduced with some other people a long time ago. When this is over, Dakota, you are apologizing to your grandfather.” She staggered into Bobby, who might have matched her glass for glass but caught her with little effort.

  Bobby started joking with my mother about something that I could not make myself listen to, effectively distracting her from lashing out at me.

  I glanced over at the group slowly making its way through the crowd, first was my grandfather and the dragon, then Vern and Braiden and two dracon women. I recognized the beautiful arm-breaker from the beach and there was one other I had never seen before. Besides the clothes, Vern looked the same as he did at big beach, his white blond hair tied back, his gaze scanning the crowd.

  As if he felt my stare, he turned, met my gaze and openly glared at me; he scowled at me as if I just scuffed his ‘drake serpent leather dress-shoes’ or something. I noticed today he was wearing a different pair of them.

  I turned away quickly, focusing on my own purple shoes.

  Seriously. What was his problem?

  After an hour of just standing, waiting, I simply wanted the introduction to be over; everyone else was dancing or eating or socializing, and we were just standing there waiting for my grandfather to get to us. The only thing I
could be grateful for was my mom seemed too drunk to talk by the time the group finally approached.

  The slow approach must have helped settle my stomach, as all I felt was a little acid in my throat when the dragon stopped within arm’s reach of me.

  When they paused and turned to examine my little family, my grandfather said, “These are some more of my granddaughters.” He moved from us before he had completely stopped and said, “I have some cigars; let’s head out for a smoke.”

  All I wanted was for the interaction to be over, but the introduction was so dismissive, I felt a physical sting right above my stomach. I glanced up at my grandfather, thinking maybe I would find something warm, some tenderness in his eyes, but he wasn’t even looking at me.

  I did not think I could be more insulted by him, I was wrong.

  My heart dropped as my mother stepped forward and tried to slur something that sounded like, “Lorien should...” But Bobby immediately ushered, or more like dragged, my mother toward a passing waiter and gave me a signaling nod, saying with his gesture, ‘let’s go’.

  What, did he think I was going to make a scene? Did he think I was going to demand my grandfather acknowledge me? Did he think I would scream like a child deserted by the people I thought would always cherish me?

  This wasn’t the first time I had been betrayed; it wasn’t even the worst.

  The group was walking away when Braiden McCormick paused a few feet away and turned to me. He said, “Hey, we know you.” His voice sounded as if he was startled by recognizing me.

  I looked up into Braiden’s face, and he smiled broadly, dare I say ‘wolfishly.’ As if he expected me not to remember him, he insisted, “From the beach, remember us? I am so sorry. Is that boy okay?”

  The dragon, who had before seemed happy to overlook my siblings and me, spun on his heel landing his attention directly at me. The moment I saw his beautiful aristocratic features I had to blink, this close I was sure that he had nearly the exact same face as Vern, but where Vern was chiseled, the dragon was sharp. Where Vern’s expression was cold, the dragon’s appraisal of me burned down me like ice wanting to peel back my skin. In that moment, I realized there was nothing more cruel or burning than a dragon’s gaze. His soul threatened to overwhelm me again, but I held it back, buried the terror.