Paranormal After Dark: 20 Paranormal Tales of Demons, Shifters, Werewolves, Vampires, Fae, Witches, Magics, Ghosts and More

by Rebecca Hamilton

  She gently wrapped her fingers around his forearm. “I believe you.”

  Dallas blinked. “You do?”

  “Yeah.” Her head bobbed so forcefully a smile curved his mouth without his permission. She squeezed him once before letting go. “I’ve never had a huge part in the Hunter world, but it doesn’t make sense they’re leaving me and Seren and the baby to be protected by dragons.” She shrugged. “It’s weird.”

  He was so pleased with her answer and the assurance he wasn’t losing his mind, he kissed her.

  * * *

  LILY TOOK ONE look at the massive oak door with the dragon’s head carved into the wood and promptly moved behind Dallas, blocking her from view of whoever opened the door.

  His light brown brow quirked as he glanced down at her from over his shoulder. “What are you doing?”

  “Besides getting ready to walk into the dragon’s lair?” She glared at him. “Hiding. There are dragons in there, and I am a dragon hunter.”

  He chuckled quietly, then turned around to face her. He crossed his arms over his chest and took his time letting his gaze roam from the tips of her pink-painted toes to the top of her head. “Unless you’re hiding weapons somewhere I can’t see, I think we’re safe.”

  As the door slowly swung open behind him, Lily lifted a fist to rub over her nose and muttered under her breath. “Two days ago, you thought I was a murderess.”

  A beautiful blond woman, who stood an inch smaller than Lily and was dressed in dark skinny jeans and a plain white T-shirt, blinked at Dallas in astonishment before she grinned and threw herself into him. “I knew you couldn’t stay away. You missed me, right?”

  The only thing that kept Lily’s raging jealousy at bay was that the woman was Daniel’s mate, and Dallas couldn’t look more uncomfortable as he awkwardly hugged her back. But still, the feeling was a new one for her, and she wasn’t sure she liked it.

  Shelby kissed Dallas’s cheek, then pulled back to grin at Lily. And in that second, Lily knew exactly why the woman was an award-winning actress. There wasn’t a single hint of curiosity on her beautiful face. Not about why she was with Dallas, or why they were there. Instead, she hugged her. “So you’re the reason Daniel called a time-out in our honeymoon.”

  Guilt slammed into her belly. “Shelby, I’m so sorry—”

  “Don’t be.” The newly crowned dragon queen grabbed her hand and Dallas’s and pulled them into the large, stunning castle-slash-mega-mansion. “My mate promised me a week, wherever I wanted to go, as soon as this all settled down.”

  Dallas snorted beneath his breath. “Good luck with that.”

  Lily tried to glare at him around Shelby, whose smile was brilliant. “Oh, I’m not worried. If he ever wants to have sex again, he’ll make the time to go with me.”

  “Shelby.” Dallas visibly winced as he extracted his hand. “There are some things I don’t want to hear, and anything to do with my king’s sex life is one of them.”

  Shelby led them up a double-wide set of stairs to a loft-style office. Daniel Ashborne, the king, was huddled over a laptop approximately the size of one of his ginormous hands, his dark blond hair pulled back into a low pony tail. Without looking up, he continued to hen peck at the keys while muttering under his breath. “Remind me to have Broderick thrashed for sticking me with this thing.”

  “What are you trying to do with it?” Lily asked. When he let out a frustrated growl, Lily slipped between the queen and The Destroyer, moving over to Daniel’s desk. “Broderick updated mine, too, so I get the headache. Can I help?”

  “Please.” Relief flashed through the king’s silver eyes as he reached for her hand and held it as he pleaded. “I can beg.” When Shelby snorted, Daniel grinned. “Not very well, maybe, but I can’t work this damn thing. It’s too goddamn small.”

  Lily gaped at the king, trying to reconcile the moody, grumpy, non-smiling bastard she’d always heard about with this teasing one. She shook her head and turned the laptop toward her the slightest bit. She nodded. “It needs your password.”

  “Ryuu,” he snapped. “I know that, but my damn fingers are too big. How am I supposed to do anything on a computer that I can’t type on?”

  Behind her, Dallas coughed. Lily suspected it was to hide a laugh, though at the dark glare his king sent him, she doubted anyone bought it. She cleared her throat and bent over the laptop. With a few keystrokes, she pulled up an on-screen keyboard. “Try this. It might help.”

  Daniel’s eyes narrowed at her before his look softened into one of relief. “How did you do that?”

  She shrugged, smiling a little as she carefully moved back toward Dallas. “Like I said, Broderick likes to play around with mine, too. It’s either pay very close attention or never be able to use my computer again.”

  “I’m still going to kick his ass.” He dragged a hand down his face, then stood up and braced his feet while crossing his arms over his chest, leveling a look at Dallas. “Do you want the bad news or the really bad news?”

  When Lily’s stomach pitched, Dallas found her hand and wrapped his around it. The king noticed the action with the slightest lift of his brow but didn’t say anything.

  Dallas visibly braced himself. “Bad.”

  “Two Hunter brothers, a Caleb and Rafe Shaw, are demanding to see Lily today. I tried to hold them off and bought you a few hours, but that’s it. They heard about her building and aren’t taking ‘no’ for an answer. They want to see with their own eyes that she’s all right. Technically she belongs to them, so there wasn’t much I could do.” Nodding at the snarl that formed on Dallas’s mouth, Daniel continued. “Broderick’s been looking into them, and while he can’t find much info, word on the street is they were trusted by Cage.”

  Dallas snorted, but Lily squeezed his hand and nodded. “They were—are. They’ve been a part of my life since Adrian adopted me.”

  Aware of Dallas’s gaze narrowing in on her face and Daniel’s focus turning slowly toward her, she fought the urge to step back. Daniel cocked his head. “Then where have they been for the last month?”

  Helplessness flip-flopped in her belly. “I don’t know. Probably looking for my brother.”

  Dallas pulled his hand away from hers and wrapped his arm around her neck, hauling her into his side. The motion was oddly comforting. Even if he wasn’t sure how to take care of her, it had her heart stuttering that he was trying. His turned his attention to Daniel. “Now give me the really bad.”

  Suddenly, Shelby was at Lily’s other side, the queen’s arm hooking around her waist. When Lily frowned, her insides twisting up in fear, Daniel blew out a breath and leaned against his desk. “An ice dragon has appeared in Los Angeles.”

  Dallas blinked, looking as confused as Lily felt, but Daniel continued on. “It gets worse. Rumor hit us this morning of a Necromancer surfacing.”

  Her blood ran cold, and Dallas’s growl tore through the cavernous space. She took a step closer to him as he snapped, “Get to your point, my lord. You’re scaring her, and I don’t fucking like it.”

  “The Necromancer explains the phone call I got from Dragan this morning. There are rumors in the underworld that Porter Trowbridge, Lily’s stepfather, is alive and has a bounty on her head. To be brought to him dead or alive.”

  Without moving, without so much as breathing, Lily gaped at the dragon king, sure the weird, obnoxious buzzing in her head had prevented her from hearing right. It was the only explanation. And it was the only one she would accept because her nightmare was dead. Adrian had killed it.

  Suddenly, sure she was going to be sick, she wrenched out of Dallas’s and Shelby’s arms, desperate for release. “Bathroom.”

  Sympathy tears welled in Shelby’s pretty eyes. “Across the hall.”

  Lily bolted without even nodding her thanks.

  * * *

  DALLAS’S HANDS FISTED at his sides, ready to go up against his king for the first time in their long-ass lives. It would cost him his head, but a
t the moment, Dallas was certain it would be worth it. The sound of Lily’s dry-heaves were ripping his insides apart, and the need to kill something to make it stop settled over him with a familiarity that shook him.

  Death was something Dallas understood very well. It was something he was good at. But with Shelby staring at him expectantly, as if waiting for him to go to Lily and say some useless words to try to make her feel better, he had the sinking, disturbing feeling he wouldn’t be able to kill anything yet.

  Ignoring Shelby’s pointed look for the moment, he snapped at his king. “How sure of this are you?”

  “Dragan wouldn’t have called me if he hadn’t confirmed it. She’s tough.” Looking exhausted, Daniel leaned back in his chair and scrubbed both hands over his face. “She’s going to have to be, and you can’t be naïve about this. An ice dragon, a necromancer, and her stepfather all appear a month after her brother disappears… It can’t be a coincidence. Something fucking huge is coming after that female.”

  Snarling under his breath, Dallas started a slow prowl in front of the king’s desk. “She stays with me.” He knew it was the least of their concerns at the moment, but it was number one with him. He still wasn’t sure he liked her, let alone trusted her, but she trusted him, and he wasn’t asshole enough to walk out on her when all signs pointed to her life imploding.

  “The Shaw brothers might have something to say about that.”

  This time, Dallas snorted. “Fuck. Them. If they were so goddamned concerned, they’d have her under protection already.”

  “I’m not disagreeing.” Daniel leaned forward again and spread his hands. “But at the moment, I’m wondering why Lily, and why now? Nobody is going to convince me that timid little female has enemies. That leaves me thinking that not only is Cage still alive, but they’re using Lily to force his hand on something.”

  Dallas stopped pacing and turned around to glare at his king. If he took a swing at him, his life would be forfeit. That knowledge was the only thing that stopped him from laying the bastard out. “She’s not fucking timid. And even if she was, she has good goddamn reason to be.” Without another word, Dallas turned his back on Ashborne and walked over to the bathroom. He knocked quietly. “Lil, babe, it’s me.” When she didn’t answer, he opened the door and sunk to the floor behind her, sitting sideways so he could pull his knees up and rub her back while she sat on the floor, staring blankly at a spot on the wall. “I need you to know none of this means anything. If a building collapsing couldn’t stop me, nothing else is going to keep me from protecting you.”

  Without looking at him, she turned and buried her face in his chest. “I believe you.”

  Chapter 11

  DALLAS’S GROWLING STARTED again the second they were out of Daniel and Shelby’s home and Lily reminded him that she still needed clothes. His growling lasted all the way through their non-adventurous trip to the neighborhood Big Box store.

  It would have been kind of adorable if she wasn’t so worried about his sanity.

  His home was cozier than she’d expected. His apartment took up the entire fifth floor of a charming brick building, and while it was done in dark leathers and woods, it wasn’t completely soulless.

  As she followed him into his tidy bedroom, his arms loaded with bags, she immediately noticed the fire escape. It was one of those things Adrian had taught her—always know your exits.

  His bed was the surprise. A huge, hand-carved four-poster bed took up nearly all the space in the room. The comforter was dark green and looked even comfier than her big, fluffy one, and it was piled with pillows.

  After Dallas dropped the bags onto his bed, she moved to stand in front of him.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose. “What?”

  “You about scared that poor lady to death back there.”

  “I regret nothing.”

  “She sneezed, Dallas.”

  He snorted derisively as he went to his dresser, pulled out the top drawer, and dumped its contents on the bed. “You can put your stuff in here.”

  Whoa.

  This was not how she’d imagined this moment in her life. Being given a drawer was supposed to be a huge deal, wasn’t it? Wasn’t that how humans sometimes asked their mates to move in—permanently—with them?

  Reading the question on her face, he tossed the drawer on the bed. Grabbing one of her bags, he upended it into the drawer before grabbing the next bag and repeating the process.

  “Okay, fine,” she muttered, putting herself in front of him again and spreading her arms out. “I’ll take the drawer. Just stop dumping my stuff all over.” When he looked confused, she laughed out loud. “I’m a girl. I fold things.”

  The uncertainty on his face moved into his eyes. “Why?”

  She opened her mouth to explain, then moved into him instead. Going up on her toes, she only meant to kiss his chin and tell him thank you for everything he’d done for her, but when his soft green eyes clashed with hers, she forgot everything but the need to feel his mouth on hers again. Taste him again.

  Tangling her hands in his hair, she fisted the soft strands and pulled his mouth to hers. The hunger slammed into her out of nowhere, leaving her shaking and breathless. Determined. He responded instantly, the rough sound of need that tore out of his massive chest fueling her, urging her on, and without warning, he had her hitched up and then on her back on the bed.

  His mouth was greedy as they fought to bare and taste naked skin, their hands desperate as they tore at clothes. She barely had time to grip his shoulders and hold on before he lifted her hips, closed his lips over the tip of her breast, and drove into her.

  * * *

  DALLAS’S BODY SHOOK so hard from the aftershocks the bed trembled beneath them, and he was having a damn hard time trying to catch his breath. It took every ounce of strength he possessed to clear the orgasmic fog out of his head so he could try to figure out what the hell had happened, and where the hell he’d gone wrong.

  That was round number two.

  And then her slight, perfectly curved body arched beneath him. His gaze dropped from where he’d been trying to glare a hole in the wall to her beautiful face, and he knew exactly what had went wrong.

  Lily. It was all her fault. She melted his brain. Muddled his thinking. Twisted his insides until he couldn’t tell which way was up any longer. All he knew was that every time he touched her the nagging voice in the back of his head that chanted “mine” on repeat had turned into a full-blown savage roar.

  Leveraging himself off her, he meant to get out of bed and away from her, but he’d overestimated his body’s ability to move or follow commands at the moment. Instead, he landed face first on the mattress next to her and tried to fit the pieces of the puzzle together in his head in some semblance of order.

  He must have let his guard down while doing all that domestic shit couples do together. He’d never gone grocery shopping, or any kind of shopping, really, with anyone else, and planning meals with Lily, while making sure they were stocked up on the essentials, must have mellowed him out to the point he’d gone brain dead. It was the only explanation. Then Daniel had scared her, and every protective instinct in Dallas had reared its head.

  He turned his head and glared at her. “This is your fault.”

  Despite the confused haze covering his brain, he couldn’t help the grin when she pulled the sheet all the way to her chin. Considering she’d been the one to seduce him—again, that much he was sure of—it was damn cute the way she turned shy after sex.

  She lifted her arms above her head and stretched. “I only kissed you to thank you for being so wonderful today. It’s not my fault things kind of…well, blew up from there.”

  Blew up was right. He remembered her sweet kiss, the press of her perfect breasts against his chest, and the leash on his need snapping free. He snorted and finally managed to turn himself over. It didn’t occur to him that he was naked and should cover himself.

  It did occur to him, however,
that he should be pissed, and more importantly, scared shitless that he had no self-control when it came to this woman. He was in more fucking trouble than he thought, because all she had to do was kiss him and they were naked. He tried to stop his brain from going all psycho-possessive as orgasm aftershocks ripped through him.

  Along with the terrifying thought that they should be doing this a hell of a lot more often.

  Which was bullshit. One more time, that was all it would take, and they would be stuck together for eternity, until death literally parted them, with no chance of turning back or changing their mind or finding someone else. Sex with her the first time was worrisome enough, let alone it happening a second time. It had rocked his fucking world, which after all the sex he’d had in his two thousand years should not have been possible.

  He stared up at the ceiling. Maybe that was it, why he’d jumped blindly into round number two with her. He’d been sure the mind-blowing orgasm from the first time had been some fluke of nature, so the second time was to be sure of it, for his own peace of mind.

  But it hadn’t been a fluke. This time had been more intense. He didn’t understand it, and if she hadn’t been staring at him, waiting for him to say something, he would have admitted it scared the ever-loving hell out of him. At this rate, his body was already climbing the walls, impatient to be inside of her again like a damn junkie jonesing for his next fix.

  “Dallas?”

  The hesitancy in her soft voice jerked his attention back, and he growled quietly as he turned his head to look at her.

  She looked nervous. “What?” She rose to her knees, carefully keeping the sheet around her. “Do you think we should talk about this?”