Fire & Ice

by Alice Brown

  “Yes, it is called a wedding. Two people find each other attractive, usually date, getting to know one another for a while, and if they fall in love, then eventually they get married and start a family.”

  “Okay. See, our ways are not that much different. Our dragon spots our mate, we fall in love with them almost instantly because we know they are it for us. You are my other half.”

  “Wait a minute!” she interrupted as she held up her hand. “I said two people find each other attractive and date. All I am hearing from you is you and your dragon. Where do I come in? What about my feelings?”

  The dejected look that crossed his face surprised her. Gone was the easygoing manner which he had displayed for the last several hours. Suddenly he looked as if he had just had his favorite toy taken away. “You do not find me attractive? You do not care for me?”

  What? Whoa! We just met a few hours ago! Why does he look like his life is suddenly over? And yet, the desolate look that seemed to be taking over his entire body made her quick to reach out. Now it was she placing her small hand over his much larger one. He turned his hand over and entwined their fingers, as if he were afraid she was going to walk away from him forever.

  “That is not what I said at all. I would be crazy not to find you attractive. Hell, I would venture to say every woman on Earth would find you attractive. As for caring for you? I just met you. I will admit there is a mysterious pull to you that I can’t explain, but I am on new land and know nothing of your ways. All I am asking is that you give me a bit of time to learn not only your culture, but also get to know you.”

  Suddenly the bartender was at the table, holding the biggest platter of food she had ever seen in her life. It took up the entire table. “Oh my goodness, there is no way we can eat this much!” she exclaimed.

  Both men grinned. “The lass has yet to see a dragon eat,” the bartender chuckled as he walked away shaking his head.

  Angel looked at the table covered with food and then up to Zen. “You can eat this much?”

  Zen shrugged, as he picked up what looked to be a large yellowish-green pepper. “Here, try this, it is a house specialty.”

  Angel allowed him to guide the food to her lips and bit off a small piece. She had expected to be eating some type of pepper since that was what it resembled, but the flavor bursting over her tongue told a different story. What surprised her was that it had an almost grain type flavor, reminding her of a spiced rice dish from home.

  “Umm, that is absolutely delicious!” she raved as she watched him devour the remainder of the piece of food.

  They spent the next hour making their way through the huge platter before them. She allowed him to feed her, bringing each morsel of food to her lips with his fingers. She soon found herself relaxing and chatting in between bites, as the bartender brought a neverending supply of drinks over to their table.

  Angel sat back in her seat and sighed, rubbing her very full stomach. She glanced down at the now almost empty platter before them, shocked the two of them had been able to devour that much food. Even though Zen had only given her small bites of everything, then made short work of eating the remainder, she was still amazed she had eaten so much.

  But over the last hour she had grown more comfortable, even going as far as to lick a bit of sauce off the end of his fingertip as he had fed her a tender piece of meat. She had watched his dragon rise and shine through his eyes, giving her the first real glimpse of his beast. Of course, the neverending supply of drinks arriving at the table was helping to boost her confidence, too. She thought the drinks had helped both of them relax and loosened their tongues as well, because by the time they were ready to leave, they had both told stories of their childhood to each other. It was only when they went to get up from the table, when Zen’s quick reactions kept her from face-planting on the floor, did she fully comprehend his earlier warning regarding the drinks. Now as she stood next to the table, and leaned heavily on Zen, she wondered how she was going to be able to walk out of this place.

  Zen leaned down to his very drunk mate and whispered in her ear, “Baby, trust me, I will never let anything happen to you.” And with that her world suddenly tilted as he leaned down and picked her up, bringing her to rest securely against his chest.

  He confidently walked out of the eatery with his mate in his arms, chest puffed out in pride that she was allowing him to take care of her. He surmised it was only because she was too drunk to walk, and come tomorrow when she sobered up he would probably catch hell, but tonight he was going to enjoy her compliance.

  About halfway back to the castle he heard a strange noise coming from her and looked down to see her fast asleep. Her mouth was open slightly, and his dragon fed him a picture of her mouth around his very hard, very aroused dick.

  'Not now, Q. We must win her trust in us first.'

  His dragon was practically purring from just having her body up against his. 'Oh, I know we must wait, but she is so incredibly soft. And pretty. And smart. And…so…our mate.'

  Both man and dragon sighed as Zen gazed down at his beauty. He counted himself a very, very lucky man. Soft dark brown curls were trapped between his arm and the back of her neck, but his hand still itched to run his fingers through them. And though her eyes were closed now, he remembered from earlier that she had the softest moss-green eyes he had ever seen. As he studied her sleeping face in detail, he wanted to place the tip of his tongue on the very edge of her slightly upturned button nose. And those lips. Her lips were made for kissing a man for hours, something both he and his dragon yearned for.

  Thankfully, the castle was quiet when he entered. He did not want to take a chance on running into King Thoran, afraid he might get a lecture on allowing his new Earthling mate to get drunk on her first night in a new land. Thankfully, there was a guest bedroom right across from his own, and he settled her in there, pulling back the bedcovers before removing her shoes and tucking her in gently. Q was trying to convince him she would be more comfortable without her clothing on, and she might well be, but he wanted her trust more than anything. Waking up in the morning to find out he had undressed her when she had been helpless did not seem like a very good way to start earning that trust.

  He forced his feet to walk back out the door, quietly but firmly shutting it behind him, and walked across the hall to his own bedroom.

  Chapter Seven

  King Thoran slipped silently into the room that held his two sons and their mate. He stood undetected by the door for a moment, listening in on his sons’ telepathic conversation.

  They were on either side of their mate, each holding one of her hands. 'I wonder how mad father is at us,' Adrian asked.

  'I don’t know, but what’s done is done, and I would do it all over again in a heartbeat to know I was saving our mate,' Aiden growled.

  'I agree, brother. I just hope father feels the same way. Maybe we shouldn’t have brought Angel. He is not going to be mad over us bringing Evangelina; he would have been irate if we had not brought her under these circumstances. It’s going to be Angel’s presence that will be the problem.'

  'Don’t worry about it, brother. When father comes in, I want you to stay silent. Someone needs to stay and care for our mate. I shall take whatever punishment he wants to dish out for bringing Angel. You just promise me to stay with Evangelina until I return.' The king could easily sense Aiden’s loyalty to the throne, his family, and to his mate in that statement. He cleared his throat.

  “That will not be necessary, Aiden.”

  Both sons jumped slightly in their seats as they realized their father was standing behind them and had probably heard every word they had communicated. Their father was a powerful mind-reader and as such, could pick up on his sons’ telepathic conversations from quite a good distance away. The fact he had probably been standing right behind them the entire time was not lost on them.

  They both sat quietly as the king gazed softly down at the young woman in the bed. She would one day b
e the queen of his country. “You two are off the hook for bringing Angel. It turns out she is Zen’s mate.”

  “Really?” Adrian asked in disbelief.

  “Yes, they are at dinner now. He knows she is human and will have to take it slow with her, but since she is his mate, she is now under my protection.” The king stopped and looked at both of his sons. “Why did you bring her? There was no way of knowing that she was someone’s mate, and you would have put me in a very difficult spot trying to figure out what to do with her once she had knowledge of us.”

  “Father, first of all, you must understand just how close these two women are. There was no way to disappear with Evangelina without Angel causing all sorts of problems. We decided it would be in our best interest for her to come along. Besides, I think her being here will help our mate when she comes around and we have to explain everything,” Aiden replied.

  The king nodded in understanding. “I must say, you boys took a huge risk, but it looks like everything is going to work out just fine.”

  Movement on the bed brought all of the men’s eyes down to Evangelina, who was thrashing her head from side to side and mumbling incoherently. While they were overjoyed her back and head injuries seemed already healed, they didn’t care for the fact she was so upset. King Thoran nudged Adrian out of the way and gently placed his hands on both sides of her head.

  “You are safe, little one. You have nothing to fear. You are in a safe place and no one is going to hurt you. Sleep, child. Go into a deep, healing sleep, and you will wake in the morning feeling refreshed.”

  The king kept his hands on the sides of her head as he willed his power into her. Within a minute all her thrashing movements stopped, her breathing evened out, and she fell into a deep, healing sleep. Moving his hands, the king murmured to his sons, “Try to get some rest, boys, because you are going to have your hands full explaining everything tomorrow morning when she wakes up.”

  Evangelina’s head felt groggy as she began to wake up. She tried to shift slightly, her body feeling as if she had been lying in the same position for far too long, but stilled when a bolt of soreness raced through her. She winced and lay still, trying to remember what might have happened to cause her to be so sore. What had happened to her? She remembered Angel waking her, saying that she needed to be off to work soon but that if she hurried she could drop Evangelina off at her car. Her car. That was the last thing she remembered. She had been walking across the street toward her car and clicked the remote start button, when all of the sudden she was thrown backwards as she watched her car explode before her eyes. She even remembered the searing pain of the hot flames scorching her skin just before blackness engulfed her.

  Oh…My…God… she thought, her breath starting to come hard and fast now at remembering everything that had happened. Angel! What about Angel? What happened to her? Is she okay? Where am I now? Am I even close by her? Oh God, what has Gerald done now? Does his selfish, delusional mind really know no bounds? She felt hot tears stinging her eyes as everything swept over her. She wanted to cry, and to be held and comforted. She wanted to rewind the clock back to the years before she met Gerald. Her mind went back to the night her apartment had been broken into and vandalized. How long had that been? It felt like years, even though she knew it couldn’t possibly be that long. She remembered breaking down and crying in Adrian’s arms. He had felt so good when his huge biceps had engulfed her and she cried on his chest, just letting out all the pent-up frustration and fear that had been building. Even though instinct told her Adrian had more of a gentle side than his twin, she had felt safe and cared for by both brothers, and right now she wanted both of them with her.

  She squeezed her eyes shut hard, trying to hold back the tears as long as she could, a light half-whine, half-groan of sadness escaping her.

  “Shh, sweet one, everything is all right,” a man’s voice said softly from somewhere near her right side, his hand gently cupping the side of her face as his thumb stroked lovingly across her cheek.

  Evangelina froze in place, recognizing the voice instantly as belonging to one of the twins. But why were they here with her? Surely they had better things to do like, maybe hunt down Gerald? Though it would be all right if just one of them was there, while the other was out working. Yes, she could accept that thought. And it would make sense for one of them to be there anyway, since they were now trying to keep an eye on her, because wacko Gerald was out running freely among society.

  Then she felt a pair of hands engulf her much smaller hand. Still too afraid to open her eyes, she still instinctively knew this other body was on her left side.

  “Hey, gorgeous, can you open those beautiful eyes for me?” The voice on the left spoke, and she was fairly certain it was Aiden.

  She had a deep fear as to what she was going to face when she opened her eyes, but with both men lovingly caressing her, she couldn’t ignore the request.

  Her eyelids felt heavy as she pried them open. The first thing she saw was the faces of both twins, but something didn’t feel right. Something was wrong, so very, very wrong, but her brain refused to work to figure it out.

  Both men smiled down at her. “Hey, beautiful, it’s good to see you back with us. You kind of scared us for a while,” Aiden spoke gently.

  “Where am I? What is going on? Why are both of you looking at me that way?” If slapping her hand hard up against her head would have rattled her brain into working order, she cheerfully would have done so. Her head felt fuzzy, and try as she might, she couldn’t assemble the pieces of the puzzle of her life.

  Aiden watched her intently for a long moment before answering, “Do you remember anything? Like your car exploding and you being thrown backwards from the impact?”

  She nodded her head and immediately regretted it. Nausea hit her hard as she turned to get out of the bed at the same time as she held her hand over her stomach, praying to whoever would listen that she did not throw up on these two hunks. Of course, turning on her side did nothing but make matters worse. She managed to squeak out the word “sick,” but knew she would never make it to a bathroom. Two strong arms brought her to a sitting position as a bowl was shoved under her chin. She retched and heaved what little was in her stomach, as embarrassment turned her face tomato red.

  A hand in front of her face took the bowl and traded it for a cool, wet cloth. She wiped down her face, enjoying the coolness, and then swiped the cloth over her mouth. When she looked up, she really wanted to just keel over and die. Not only were the twins staring at her, but two other extremely large, extremely good looking men were also in the room.

  The larger of the two strangers took a couple of steps closer, watching her sink back into the pillows behind her the closer he got. He stared at her intently, and then smiled. “Evangelina, I am not going to hurt you, sweetheart. I am King Thoran, and I also happen to be the boys’ father.”

  The other man had followed the first, and now he stepped forward to address her. “Hi, Evangelina, I am Dr. Quinn. I can give you something for the nausea if that would make you feel better.”

  If Evangelina’s head hadn’t been spinning prior to these newcomers introducing themselves, it certainly was now. Did the first guy actually introduce himself as a king? King of what? Didn’t the guy know the United States was governed by elected officials? And he also said he was the twins’ father. I wonder if the father’s delusional problems are hereditary. The twins had seemed fine when she had spoken with them briefly before, but Gerald was a prime example of how someone could hide mental problems until it was much too late.

  The king snorted and chuckled as Dr. Quinn added something in her IV line, snagging her attention. “This may make you sleepy again, but I suspect your body still needs plenty of rest anyway. I will be back to check on you later.”

  As soon as the doctor walked out of the room, she heard the king tell his sons, “She thinks I am delusional.”

  Evangelina came out of a deep sleep. She felt a bit disorient
ed, but she immediately recognized her body was in no pain. Keeping her eyes shut tight for a moment, not quite ready to deal with the real world, she thought back to the dream she had earlier.

  In this dream, she had been laying on a bed in a strange room, surrounded by four enormous men. Two of which she knew, the twins, Aiden and Adrian. Of the other two, one claimed to be a doctor and she remembered him putting medicine in her IV line. The other man, who was also the largest of them all, had introduced himself to her not only as the father of the twins, but also as King Thoran. Whatever type of medication they were giving her, she decided right then and there not to take any more. Her dreams were more like hallucinations as she watched in her mind’s eye Adrian gently stroke her cheek and Aiden holding her small hand within his much larger one, lightly running his thumb over her pulse.

  She mentally shook her head. She didn’t feel too drugged at the moment, so she thought she could try to take baby steps. First, sit up and take in her surroundings. Opening her eyes, she was surprised at her new environment. She was no longer in the room she remembered waking up in earlier. It must have been a hospital room of sorts, although it didn’t resemble any she had ever seen before. No, the bed had been much more comfortable than what she remembered standard hospital beds to be. And the bed she was in now felt like pure heaven. She quickly inventoried her surroundings. The room itself reminded her of what you would see in some kind of medieval style castle. The walls were of stone, with candles mounted on the walls and hanging from the ceiling. An overly large fireplace sat straight across from the bed with what looked to be a hand painted portrait hung above it. The picture captured her attention, and she swung her feet over the side of the bed, intending to get up and get a better look. She paused as she noticed her legs were bare. She was wearing a rather short gown she had never seen before, and had no idea how she ended up wearing it. She ran her hand down the extremely soft cloth of the gown. This was no standard hospital gown, and she was not in a hospital room. The gown had a line of closures going down the back, which allowed the garment to stay shut, but if it was for medical purposes, she supposed it would still allow access for medical treatment to be given. The print and color on it were absolutely gorgeous, a light rusted red color with golden native designs swirling about.