Eric's Savior (Paranormal Nanny Services Book 2)
Page 5
“I don’t understand what I did,” I say.
“You didn’t do anything,” Eric says.
“I hardly know him. I never led him on…”
Eric kisses me, and I kiss him back. He brings me inside and starts to make coffee. We both know I won’t be sleeping for a while. I sit at the kitchen island and hold my hand up in front of my eyes so that I can see it shake. I look back to Eric. He’s still in his boxers, tapping his fingers on the counter as the coffee slowly drips. He’s upset. He’s angry. I think about what I saw in his eyes, and it makes me suddenly think of something Brad and Samantha said the other day. We were talking about Eric. His birthday is coming up, and they wanted to get him something. They wanted to make him birthday cards.
“He really is the best daddy,” Brad had said, and then he went on. “Even when he turns into a-“
His sister touched his arm then, and he snapped his mouth shut. “Turns into a what?” I had asked him.
“Nothing,” Brad said quickly.
“He can get mad,” Samantha said, and for a wild moment I had thought maybe they meant Eric had hit one of them. “Not toward us,” Samantha said quickly, young but old enough to know the weight of those sorts of words. “He’s just… a tough daddy. He doesn’t like to be picked on.”
“What can you turn into?” I ask. I don’t even realize I’m speaking. I don’t mean for the words to come out. Eric turns slowly and looks at me.
“What do you mean?” He asks.
“What can you turn into? Brad said you can turn into something.”
Eric shrugs his shoulders. I try to read his face, but I can’t. I can’t tell if he’s hiding something or not.
“You know kids,” Eric says with another shrug. He’s shrugging an awful lot. “They can get weird ideas. I’ll tell you one thing, we need to call the police in the morning. They need to know about this guy. If he ever comes here again, I’ll…”
I didn’t know what Eric was going to say. Kill him? Kick his ass? I nodded though. “Yeah, the police are a good idea.”
11
Eric
Eric
I’m sad to say that after three months had passed without any more incidences from this Nathan guy, I sort of forgot about him. Work was hectic, we were making great strides toward wrapping up our project, but that meant a lot of crunch time work. Angel had left her job at the nanny service and was still living with us. She wasn’t our nanny any longer, she was my girl. I had been thinking about proposing, but I was worried she would think I was crazy. It had all been so fast, we hadn’t known each other for even half a year yet. Well, maybe half a year, it was close.
Every time I tried to focus, I thought of her. Work was good though, even being as busy as it was. Hugo had kept his promise and moved his family clear across the country. Everything was good.
Which is why the frantic phone call I got filled me with dread, and anger. It was Angel.
“He’s here! Nathan is here! He broke in!”
“I’ll be there. Call the cops!”
“They’re on their way. We’re hiding, locked in the bedroom and he can’t get in, I don’t think.”
“I’m coming,” I say, and fly for the door. I rethink the situation just as I get there. No, there’s a faster way. I slam the door shut and begin to change. My clothes shred, but I don’t care. I beat my black wings and take to the sky.
I hurtle through the clouds towards my home. While I’m flying I can hear the shrieks of sirens, but I leave them behind. I bet they’re going to my house.
I slam down onto the roof so hard I create a hole and fall into the top floor. I bound down the hall. I know he’s there, the little shit stain threatening my lady, threatening my kids. I come around the corner just as he turns around to see me, his eyes go wide. I noticed that he had just managed to get my bedroom door open. He’s holding a knife, and Angel is there as well, she screams.
“Shut the door!” I roar.
Nathan turns and hurtles into the next closest room slamming the door shut. I don’t care and pound right through it, but he’s already scrambled out the window and dropped to the ground below. I force myself out of the window behind him. Nathan has picked himself up off the ground now and is halfway to his truck. I swoop down after him.
He beats me by a foot, throwing his door open and diving in. I slam into the side of his truck, and I hear the little bitch scream in a high-pitched voice. My claws grip his door and as I’m pulling it completely off the truck, he manages to start the engine and go racing off.
I take off into the sky as he races down the street ignoring stop signs and traffic lights, dodging in and out of traffic. He’s heading for the highway, I can tell. I keep him in my sight and move as quickly as I can, high above him.
Nathan makes it to the highway with his foot to the floor. He’s dodging in and out of traffic, and I hear the squealing scrape of metal as he sideswipes a red sedan. The police have found us too at this point as I hear their sirens in the area. I’m going to have to make this quick. I make my move.
I fold my wings against my body and dive down toward the highway. I spread them again when I’m a foot above Nathan’s truck. I reach down and hook my claws into the roof of his truck cab, peeling the metal away like it was nothing. Nathan stares up at me with pure fear in his eyes, I reach into the truck and pull him up and into the air. Below us, his truck goes flying into the ditch and slams into a tree. I make sure it doesn’t hit anyone, and then I’m wheeling away toward the forest with the screaming Nathan in my arms.
“Who are you?” he keeps shrieking. I would have thought he’d be asking what I was. Not many people know there are shifters like me out there.
Soon we’re soaring over the tall evergreens of the forest, and the sound of modern life disappears into the background. No sirens, no cars, it’s just us and nature. I land in a small clearing and dump him to the ground. He doesn’t even try to get up.
I wanted to kill him, and six months ago I might have. But I think about Angel, and I think about what she would want. Even with this little shit coming into my home, threatening her and the kids with a knife, she wouldn’t want me to slit his throat, or bite his fucking head off.
Still, he must know I’m serious.
“Don’t ever come around us again. Leave and don’t ever come back.”
I give him almost the same speech I gave Hugo. But I don’t think it’s enough. I grab Nathan’s arm and I crouch over him. His eyes go wide.
“No!” He says as I put his hand in my mouth and I slap my jaws shut. His hand lies on my tongue, severed from his arm. His blood is hot as I spit it and his hand on the ground.
He howls in pain. I spit hot fire on the end of his arm, cauterizing it and saving his life. He screams more.
“Leave,” I roar, then take to the sky.
12
Angel
Angel
Eric and I don’t talk about what I saw until later that night. The kids are in bed, and we’re in his room, sitting on the edge of his large bed.
“You’re a dragon,” I say finally, after we’ve been sitting in silence for some time. He laughs.
“Sometimes,” he answers. “Yes.”
“How?” I ask.
He looks to me. “Runs in the family,” he says. “Sometimes, again.” He laughs. I feel angry suddenly.
“This isn’t funny.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What did you do to Nathan?”
“I took him out into the forest and left him there. I told him to leave.”
“He might die out there,” I say.
Eric shrugs. “He might.”
I looked at him for a long time, and eventually sighed and stood up.
“I need a shower,” I said, stripping on my way to the bathroom. I left the door open and turned on the shower. I let it get hot before I step in and let the hot water wash over my body. The bathroom is filled with steam now. It helps calm me. I can’t even get my thoug
hts in order, so I try to push them from my mind instead. All of it, it’s too much. Someone came to kill me. My boyfriend is a dragon. It all makes me sound like some sort of lunatic, someone who could sell her story to those trashy black and white magazines they sell in the checkout lanes.
The glass shower door swings open, and Eric is standing there. I step out of the way so he can climb into the shower with me.
He leans in and kisses me. I hesitate at first and he senses it, pulling his head back while holding me in his strong arms as he looks me in the eye.
“Are you okay with this?” he asks me.
“With what? You turning into a dragon? You killing my stalker?”
“I didn’t kill him. I wanted to, but I didn’t.”
I close my eyes. “He got what he deserved, however it turns out.”
“I bit his hand off,” Eric says to me, and I open my eyes.
“Are you serious?”
Eric laughs softly and nods.
“You better kiss me before you start saying anything else,” I tell him, and he does just that.
I close my eyes again and taste him. He’s hot, as usual, and his mouth tastes like a campfire smells. It turns me on. He has a heat inside him, a heat I could always feel, and now I know what it is. It’s a dragon.
13
Eric
Eric
I stand alone, and I know all eyes are on me. It feels strange, but she’s there with me, and that music is playing. She looks so amazing in her dress that not a single eye is on me anymore. Angel walks down the aisle to me, her father on her arm. He hands her to me right before I hug him. We’ve come to really like each other in the year since I met him.
My son stands beside Jim and my own father, and then both stand to my side. Brad’s my best man. Samantha is Angel’s maid of honor. The kids are beaming.
Angel is standing right in front of me, more beautiful than she’s ever been. I can hardly hear as the ceremony goes on, my own blood is rushing and it’s audible in my ears. I get through it okay though, and then it’s over, and we’re man and wife, and I can relax. I stare at Angel through the night, like I’ve never seen her before. The fire is there, inside of me, the same way that I somehow know a baby is there, inside of her, before she’s even realized. But the fire isn’t the same anymore. It’s not so much rage, it’s passion. I look at Angel, and I know I’m going to spend the rest of my life with her.
More from Jadyn
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