by Tina Johnson
Dragon’s Desire
Box set
Tina Johnson
Copyright © 2016 Tins Johnson
All rights reserved.
This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in book review.
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Tina Johnson
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Contents
Chapter-1
Chapter-2
Chapter-3
Chapter-4
Chapter-5
Dragon’s Desire
Part-2
Chapter 6
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 1
Chapter-1
Hunter was agitated. He was in dragon form, pacing back and forth in his cave with his gold. Gold he couldn't find the desire to play in. Normally he loved counting it, stacking it, and rolling in it. He had a human house above ground, but this is where he spent most of his time, down with his gold and treasure he'd accumulated over the last few hundred years. His tail swept side to side as he paced the room.
While dragons were often known for their love of treasure and gold and anything shiny, it had slowly been losing its appeal to him. Something was wrong with him. He had snapped twice lately at the cleaning company who'd come out to clean his house for being five minutes late because of bad weather. He knew he was grumpy but he normally didn't take it out on others. He'd almost called his sisters then changed his mind, he knew what they would say. That he was restless and needed a mate.
He was a large, black dragon with blue tipped scales, he was impressive by most dragon standards, and his human form wasn't half bad either, or so his sisters and mother reassured him. What would he know, his sisters hadn't married any other male dragons, instead their mates ended up being shifters of other species. They had no idea if his nieces and nephews would take after their mothers, or their shifter fathers. Their first change set their DNA in stone. It had been so long since his first change, he barely remembered it.
While he'd dug his caves below the ground big enough to fly enough to get exercise, he normally enjoyed flying at night in the privacy of his own land. He owned thousands of acres in the hills, and lived high up the mountains where trespassers wouldn't dare to find him, at least on purpose.
Over the years he'd invested in numerous businesses, these days he kept his money in stocks and had an accountant that communicated with him via the internet and phone to take care of his money and investments. At this point he really didn't need any more money, but it was the challenge of winning and seeing his bank account go up with monetary value that appealed to his dragon side.
The lack of finding treasure and gold though made this era the worst that he'd been in. He missed the old days, the fighting, the blood, when dragons were thought to be real, they've all gone into hiding these days. Now that they could communicate via email, cell phones and private forums they no longer had to try to meet up every few years to check on each other. Now they could email every few weeks. His youngest sister was having another baby with her husband. She fell in love with a shifter panther down in the Amazon jungle and had settled down a couple years ago. He'd gone to visit her for the wedding, but all the hugging and babies had scared him. He knew he was beyond the age that most males mated, but he hadn't found the right woman yet to make him claim her as his treasure. Dragons mated for life, and for a male dragon they had to find one that inspired the same urge that gold did to claim it, protect it, and keep it safe.
He was the baby in the family, and he'd seen his older siblings one by one fall into the marriage and love trap. He had a hard time picturing who the right woman would be. It would take a pretty special woman to handle him let alone accept that he was a dragon shape-shifter. He just wasn't interested in his own kind. He had enough territorial issues as it was without fighting another dragon over his gold, mate or not. He needed to find a mate who didn't care about money.
Maybe he needed to get out more. His sisters kept nagging at him to meet some of their friends or extended family by marriage in case he'd find his mate. He just hadn't felt the need. He was moody, territorial, and controlling, he didn't want to fight all the time like he'd done with his sisters. His sisters never wanted to let him have things his way either. His father had died in a battle shortly after he was born so he'd never seen how his mother and father interacted, unlike his older siblings. All he knew was living with female dragons had made him want to run away from home as soon as his wings had developed enough to carry his full weight. Even his mother badgered him about finding a mate lately. She'd been the only one who had told everyone else to give him time... but lately she'd been after him too.
Hunter swished his tail and knocked over a section of stacked gold bars and flung them across the cavern with a clatter. He was irritated. His gold normally comforted him and instead, he was obsessing about his family and being here alone.
This was not boding well for his sanity. ****
"How is this possible?" She blinked at him in confusion. She didn't understand. "Why didn't he change his will? It makes no sense, my father was always prepared for everything and he didn't get around to this?"
"I don't think he thought he was going to die this early, and he was a busy man, he probably assumed he had more time." The lawyer sighed and rubbed a hand over his bald head and then adjusted his glasses on his nose when he looked back down at the papers on his big oak desk.
"But she's his ex wife!!!" Misty replied back, in frustration. "I can't touch my inheritance until I graduate either, what am I going to do?"
"Get a job?" The lawyer suggested, shrugging.
"Even if I got a job, I'd have to work for over a year and not spend any money to pay for the school I go to." Misty was frustrated. Her dad had left her in a complete pickle by not updating his will. It wasn't even about the money, she had her own as soon as she graduated college with her veterinarian degree, but she couldn't finish her internship, work a full time job, pay all her bills with the fulltime job AND pay for her schooling. She'd had a plan and this completely screwed her up.
"The car and everything else is paid for and in your name. You'll be fine as long as you have your own income until you finish school, the house, the business, and everything that was your fathers that he didn't put in your name is his ex's, there's nothing I can do about it legally since he didn't change his will." The lawyer handed her a folder with documents in it. "You could contest the will if you could afford the legal retainer and lawyer fees, but I don't think you'd win, he's been divorced for three years and had plenty of time to change his will and didn't."
"I don't need all my dad's money, I just want enough to finish school." She pleaded with him, even though she knew it was hopeless.
"My suggestion? You go see your ex step-mom in person and see if she'll either lend you the money to finish school, and honor your father's w
ishes for you to graduate. You were on good terms with her when they divorced, maybe she still has feelings for you, you weren't the reason they broke up." He replied.
"No, but my dad certainly gave her a good reason to be hostile with all his cheating." Misty sighed and decided to give it a shot. "Thank you anyways."
Misty left, intending to go home and pack. She had to MapQuest directions and look up her previous stepmom's address. It was a few hour drive through the mountains to get from California to Oregon where her ex-stepmom had decided to relocate to after the divorce. Dorothy would have a much harder time saying no to her in person then over the phone, she hoped that Dorothy still had some fond memories or feelings for her, enough at least to help her.
Her school for veterinary medicine in California was very expensive, and while she had enough money in the bank to pay for her rent, gas, food and bills for the next month or so, she didn't have enough for an entire semester. Her dad had given her the money each semester when he'd paid for her college, and since she didn't spend it all, she had enough left over to tide her for a few weeks. If Dorothy said no, she didn't know what she would do. She was so close to being finished and starting her internship.
When she was driving home she pulled into her rental condo's driveway and parked, but didn't get out. She slammed her fist on the wheel of her car in frustration. First her dad had to go and get himself killed chasing after a girl who was closer to her age than his own. Her dad had always been a womanizer, but he'd been an okay father most of the time. He at least pretended to care about her interests. He had set up her trust fund for her as a reward for getting through school... even though she'd told him she didn't need anything other than help with the price of school and some living expenses so she could focus, she was going to graduate early because of it, until now.
Misty knew her father had loved her, despite his flaws and faults. She started to cry. She didn't know whether to be mad at him for trying to impress a girl while skiing and smashing into a tree causing an instant death, or for not fixing his will to make sure she was taken care of while she was in school like he'd promised her.
Misty let herself cry until she had no more tears left and then wiped her nose on her sleeve and went inside to pack a travel bag. While she was upset about the school thing, she was pretty sure she was also just mad at her father for getting himself killed. She wasn't ready to be completely alone in the world. She'd been so busy getting through school she hadn't had time to make friends or socialize, she'd only had her dad.
As she stuffed a couple of sun dresses, blouses and slacks into her bag, she considered renting out a room in her condo to another student, maybe that would help pay the rent enough that with a part time job she could scrape buy. She looked around her room. She'd never bothered to decorate it. It had stark white walls, and a pretty four poster bed with a floral print comforter on it that her dad had bought her to celebrate her going to college. She had a full length mirror next to her dresser that she rarely looked at herself in. Misty often fell asleep on the couch studying with a book on her chest, she rarely slept in her bed.
Misty picked up her bag and looked at herself in the mirror. She looked horrible. Her eyes were poufy and swollen from crying, her thick blond hair was frizzy and thrown into a sloppy pony tail, her white slacks had a coffee stain on them and her light blue blouse was missing a couple of buttons and also had an ink stain on it. She'd forgotten to throw on a bra and her big breasts weren't exactly discrete. She'd been woken up by the lawyer calling her to see why she was late. Her alarm hadn't gone off and she had not even bother to change.
She at least now understood why the lawyer had refused to look in her direction the entire time she'd been sitting there. Her shirt left nothing to the imagination without a bra on, especially with the top two buttons missing.
She pulled her dresser drawer open and pulled out a graphic t-shirt with a picture of Mickey Mouse on it and dug out a fresh sports bra to put on. She found a pair of clean jeans and put them on and found her sneakers.
Misty decided she needed to take more care with what she was wearing before she left the house. Dressing like a slutty ho with dirty clothes really wasn't her normal image. She'd worked hard to graduate from high school at sixteen and to get a bachelors in just two years and had taken an extra heavy course load to get through the four year program in three years. She was about to turn 23 and hadn't done anything exciting in her life. School had been her only goal. Her dad had made up for her serious side by doing all the fun and dangerous things she hadn't wanted to participate in. The reality of how short life can be made her wonder if she'd done herself any favors by pushing herself through school so fast without letting herself live a little first.
Misty decided that once she figured out a way to get through school she'd worry about the rest. She picked up her bag after brushing her hair and redoing her pony tail. Unless she wanted to put on a bunch of makeup, her face and eyes were just going to have to look like she'd been crying.
She used Google to find Dorothy's information and got a printed version of the directions out along with imputing the data into her hand-held GPS device. She almost made it to her front door before remembering she needed her tooth brush and went back and got it. She locked her condo up after retrieving the item and threw her bag on the front seat of her car.
It would take her about seven hours of driving, most of it through the mountains. She would enjoy the scenery. It would be a nice distraction from everything right now. She could use some beauty in her life, and thankfully, there was almost nothing more beautiful to her then lush green hills with flowers and sparkling blue water.
Misty loaded everything into her car, checked the condo again to make sure she locked it, set the alarm before getting into her car, stuck her cell phone on the charger in the car and then pulled out of her driveway.
****
Chapter-2
Misty had been driving a couple of hours and had just managed to get out of the city into more rural areas. She was loving the big green fields and the hint of mountains up ahead. She loved the trees and the open blue skies. She had her window down, the air smelled different out here. Clean. She took in a deep breath and slowly let her breath out. She let her mind wander while she drove, trying not to think of her dad.
This was the kind of area she wanted to set up her veterinary medicine practice when she was done with her internship. She was thinking of doing house calls along with having a part time office open during set hours. She knew a lot of people couldn't bring their animals in during business hours, so she was thinking of doing surgery during the afternoon and house calls and office hours during the early evening, making it more realistic for people to see a vet after work. If she lived in a rural, small town environment she was even thinking of testing her hand at allowing them to call her for emergencies. That would never work in a big city, she'd never get any sleep, but in a small enough town, it might work, and heaven knows traveling to a big city for a medical emergency hours away could mean the death of a beloved animal.
She curved around the road and started heading up the deep mountain path, rocky cliffs leading down to big drop offs, along with crystal blue water down below as far as the eye could see was a beautiful image. She imagined mermaids swimming in the water below and it made her smile. She'd loved the little mermaid growing up and she loved the idea of true love, she'd just never had time for boys while in school. They were a distraction and she wanted to just get through school first. Her dad had teased her for not having any romance genes. She had always told him she just preferred to wait for the right one, instead of having fun with all the Mr. Wrong's in the world.
She felt her eyes well up with tears at the idea of her dad and her talking and laughing, and didn't see the deer jump into the road. Between the blurry tears, she realized something solid was in front of her, and jerked her car hard trying to avoid hitting it, and went flying off the road, she luckily jerked to the right and smashed
her car into the rock, rather than sending it spiraling off a cliff to what most likely would have been her death.
The airbag popped in her face, making her neck and shoulders hurt. This injury wasn't life-threatening, but it definitely was going to make her sore for a few days.
Her car hissed, sputtered, and died. She tried to get it to turn back on, but with the steam rising from the engine, and the sputtering and screeching noises it made when she turned the key, she pretty much figured it was a goner.
"Damn, damn, damn, damn." Misty muttered to herself over and over again.
She got out of the car and grabbed her cell phone, the urge to kick the tire overwhelming. How could she have been so careless, stupid, she'd never be able to afford a new car on top of everything else. The screen on her cell phone was cracked from the force of the impact sending it into the dash board. So much for the iphone protectors. Apparently it didn't include car-crash protection.
She held it up towards the sky, trying to read the screen, at least it was still working, she was able to squint enough to see that she had no cell reception here, and her odds of getting through to emergency services was slim to none with no reception of any kind. She was apparently in a dead zone.
Misty walked a few feet in either direction before giving up on her phone. She waited for an hour or two before giving up that anyone was going to pass by and help her. No one came. She decided to hike up the road and see if she could get cell reception, if she couldn't find anything, she'd stay in her car for the night and try again in the morning. She had enough bottled water in the trunk and some protein bars to survive if she had too, but it wouldn't last long out here.
She opened her trunk and dumped out her school books from her backpack, and packed a couple changes of clothes, some water, her cell phone charger and her wallet and put it on her back. Without her clunky books, it felt a lot lighter than she was used too, but her neck and shoulders still hurt from the airbag and she winced from the strain.
