"I only want to go home," he said, as if reading her thoughts.
"But you killed Lisa to do it," she said, tears in her eyes. "And me almost."
He slid his arms around her waist and rested his cheek on her head. "Lisa is alive. Caleb saved her in time. I felt the change when they reentered this world not many hours ago."
Her throat ached. "So it's fine that you're a manipulative bastard, because no one actually got hurt?"
"No." He pressed a kiss to her hair. "That is why I want you to stay with me. You will heal and be whole if you stay here. I never want to see you unwhole again."
Saba turned around. He let her, loosening his hold and sliding his hands to rest lightly on her hips. The dragon tattoo on his arm was sharp and clean, black lines on brown skin.
"Are you apologizing to me?" she asked him in amazement.
"I think I might be."
"Terrific."
His closeness unnerved her, six and a half feet of naked man, the scent of male musk, the long black hair that slid over his shoulders to brush her fingers.
She swallowed. "I'm sorry I'm not strong enough to send you home myself. You keep saying I have so much magic, but I don't."
"You do." His hands moved along the curve of her waist, thumbs resting beneath her breasts. "You are a powerful witch, Saba, and you will become a force to be reckoned with. I see it in you."
She hadn't decided yet whether he told her these things to manipulate her, or if he was mistaking her for someone else. "I can't be a witch at all without my tools." A dismaying thought struck her. "You didn't leave my altar tools behind in that warehouse parking lot, did you? My best chalice, my nicest athame…" He gave her an uncomfortable look and she let herself blaze anger. "You did leave them, didn't you?"
"Grizelda will care for them," he answered.
She twisted loose with an exasperated groan. "Do you know how much trouble it will be to cleanse and reconsecrate everything? My crystals shattered during the ritual so I'll have to replace every one of them. Do you know how expensive crystals are?"
"I can see you feel better," Malcolm said, eyes sparkling.
"Dragons just don't understand witch magic."
"Dragon magic doesn't need the trappings of Earth."
"Dragon magic doesn't have the survival strength of Earth magic," she countered. "You have a big burst, yes, but not a long-term effect."
Malcolm smiled a little. "Earth magic is slow."
"Fire magic is showy."
"Witches are stubborn."
"Dragons are arrogant."
She waited, brows arched, for him to answer, but he merely broadened his smile. "You are a ferocious little witch. When I leave this place behind, I will miss you."
"Well, I won't miss you," Saba returned. She felt a tug in her heart as she said it, and she swallowed before going on. "You've made my life complete chaos, drained me of any energy and peace I had, not to mention leaving my best chalice in a parking lot. Besides that, I'm hungry."
He kissed her, cutting her thoughts off in midformation.
His kisses amazed her. That a man so strong could kiss so tenderly, brushing her lips with his gentled mouth, was astonishing. She slid her arms around his neck, furrowing his sleek hair, giving in.
He kissed the corner of her mouth, light as a feather's touch. "Then I will take you to breakfast."
"I thought it was safer if I stayed here." Her voice cracked.
"It is safer if you are with me at all times. Donna will be looking for you. She has filled herself with demon magic, and she will drag whatever knowledge she thinks I've given you out of you, probably not in a pleasant way."
"Do you still want the dragon orb?" Saba asked, a little worried. "The door didn't work, so it's still your best bet for getting home, isn't it?"
He looked down at her, eyes softening, and brushed a lock of hair from her forehead. "No, I don't want it. I'll not destroy the Earth with you in it."
"Well, how nice of you."
"I have always looked for other methods. The dragon orb was to be my last resort. I still believe you and Lisa can open the way for me."
Saba laid her hands on his strong shoulders. "I think you're optimistic about me. But buy me a bear claw, and you can say anything you want."
He nipped the side of her neck. "Do not leave yourself open like that, or I might tell you, over my latte, how much I love the taste of your quim."
She went hot. "Do you?"
His teeth scraped her neck, his tongue a streak of fire. "I think I've showed you that. If you don't believe me, I'll show you again. Right now."
Saba shivered, remembering his tongue laving her between her legs and how hot her juices flowed into his mouth. "I really am hungry. But…"
Without a word, Malcolm unzipped her jeans and tugged them down her hips. He pulled her underwear down as he sank to his knees and blew his warm breath over the curls of black hair between her thighs. Then he leaned forward and slid his tongue inside her.
Saba gasped and threaded her hands through his long hair. "Malcolm," she breathed. "I guess the bear claw can wait."
Caleb smiled, feeling the welcoming spread of Lisa beneath him on the carpet. He was breathing fast from the exertion of flying and chasing her, but his human body was hard with wanting and not in the least sated. He wouldn't be sated with her for a long, long time.
Caleb had no idea how to mate with a human woman, but his body seemed to understand what to do. As she lifted her hips to him he parted her thighs and pressed the tip of his huge, aching hardness to her opening.
Her eyes, brown swimming with silver flecks, widened. The revelation that she was a silver dragon stunned her as much as it stunned him, but his shock was dissolving in a wash of need.
"Please," she whispered.
Caleb slid inside her so wet and slick that he entered all the way with no resistance. He closed his eyes as her tightness squeezed him hard, unbelievably erotic. He wasn't certain what to do now, other than love this feeling of being in her, but she gripped his hips and moved him back and forth, forcing him to a rhythm that he quickly joined.
So this was human mating. He ground his hips harder, each stroke more wild and burning than the last, loving it, loving her. Sweet gods, this feeling surpassed anything he'd ever felt, even in fifteen hundred years of dragon life.
Her hands moved down his back, nails scratching, her feet wrapping around him to pull him even more firmly against her. The wet heat inside her scalded him, her opening so slick he slid in and out with little effort.
He felt her little pulses around him, her climax beginning. Her desire scented the air, adding to the incredible feeling of being in her. He kissed her hot mouth, and she fastened her lips around his tongue and suckled. Hard, harder, her mouth a counterpoint to her sex pulling him in and in and in.
Then beneath him she turned to lights again, her body dissolving into translucent colors, but he still felt her around him, squeezing his cock tight, so beautifully tight. He felt her dragoness and her humanness and her otherness all at the same time.
"Fuck," he cried.
She became Lisa again, entirely woman, beautiful and smelling of vanilla and spice. Dark excitement swept over him and he groaned. He'd wanted to stay inside her for hours, letting her squeeze him, but his human body had reached its limit.
With another groan, he came. She squirmed beneath him, her own climax taking her.
"Lisa," Caleb said, voice hoarse. He pumped into her, needing to stay in her until the very last minute. Lisa held him hard, her face damp with perspiration, tears in the corners of her eyes.
Everything stilled, the only sounds the faint stirring of the wind chimes and the noises of the waking city outside the window. Caleb lifted a shaking hand and raked her hair back from her forehead. "Lisa," he breathed. Mine.
Lisa lay against her grandmother's Oriental carpet, the nap tickling her back, and cradled Caleb's hard body on her. He lay quietly, still inside her, pressing laz
y, warm kisses to her neck. His skin was hot, damp with sweat, fingers heavy on her.
Her thoughts whirled one on top of the other, fear and wonder, lust and love, and fear again. She'd been shot, carried to Dragonspace, turned into a dragon and made love to by Caleb, once as a dragon and once as a human. Her heart beat hard, the feeling of the awakened being inside her both terrifying and comforting and familiar.
"Did you know?" she asked Caleb, brushing her hand through his tangled hair. "About the silver dragon?"
"No." He licked her skin, his tongue slow.
It was frighteningly easy to dissolve her body into a string of lights, flowing away from him and resolidifying on her feet. He rolled over to watch her, and she looked down at his bronzed form stretched out on the white and gold carpet, a living statue of male perfection.
Her dragon, her warrior, at her feet. He folded one arm behind his head and studied her, unmindful of her scrutiny. He lay his other hand on his taut belly and watched her with blue eyes heavy with lovemaking.
"Why am I a silver dragon?" she asked.
"I don't know." He sent her a lazy smile. "But you're a beautiful one. And my mate."
Not comforted, she touched his bare toes lightly with her own. "Grandma Li Na never told you?"
"Never." He moved his foot up her leg, drawing a sensual line. "Dumb-ass golden dragons don't need to know these things."
Her heart beat swiftly with unanswered questions. She knelt on the carpet and began to massage his legs, even in her agitation loving the hard muscles dusted with wiry golden hair. "Tell me about silver dragons."
He traced his toes over her folded thigh, dipping them to the crease where thigh met calf. "I only know the dragon legends."
"Tell me the legends, then." She needed to know, she had to know and understand. A blend of fear and exhilaration was making her nauseous. Only Caleb seemed real right now, a dragon-man stretched naked on her floor, letting her touch him.
"Silver dragons are the most magical beings in the universe."
"You said."
His golden lashes flickered as he moved his gaze. "Silver dragons can go anywhere, can slide through space to any world they wish. They can look like whatever they want—a dragon, a being of light, a human, a wild beast. I've heard they can even traverse through time, flying through centuries as easily as other dragons fly through the air."
"Time? Is that all true?"
He shrugged against the carpet. "I have no idea. I wonder if Malcolm and Donna know. They know you have great power, but do they know about the silver dragon?"
She stilled her massage. "I need to have a talk with Malcolm."
"I'm going to kill him."
He said it so matter-of-factly that Lisa believed him. "No, I mean really talk to him," she said. "Find out his place in all this and what he knows about silver dragons. If you're right about black dragons being ancient and incredibly smart, he might…" She absently caressed Caleb's skin. "I feel the silver dragon inside me and all this power. I need to know what it can do and if I can control it. What happens if I can't control it and it takes me over? I so need to call my mother."
Caleb watched her, his eyes still. "Why?"
"To find out if she's a silver dragon, too. Li Na was, I understand that now. Is every woman in my family a dragon, or does it skip generations?"
By the way he looked at her, Lisa knew Caleb had no answers for her. The silver dragon surpassed even his understanding.
"I want to know what Malcolm knows," she said. "I think I can help him, send him back to Dragonspace, break the spell that binds him here, whatever he wants." She held up her hand. "Don't ask me how I know I can do it, I just do. The silver dragon inside me is wiser than I am."
"She's beautiful, too." Caleb slanted her a smile, lighting all kinds of fires, but his watchful look remained.
"Are you afraid of me?" she asked.
His smile faded. He hooked his leg behind her hips and pulled her forward, his strength too great to resist. She landed full-length on top of him, feeling his muscular body against every inch of her own.
"Yes. But if you kill me by mating with me, then so be it."
"You think I'd kill you? After mating, like you said lady dragons did?"
He growled, the vibration in his chest humming through her body. "I'm willing to find out."
She smiled. Despite her agitation and the wild revelations of the day, Caleb could still make her laugh. "Can a girl resist such sweet-talking?"
"I'm willing to find out," he repeated.
Lisa lowered herself to kiss him, but he threaded hard fingers through her hair and held her back an inch from his face. "I want to do it slow. I have never mated as a human."
"We just did," she pointed out.
"That was the dragon in us, still in the frenzy of your mating call. I want to start from the beginning." He pressed warm fingers to the hollow of her spine.
"I still feel the frenzy."
"So do I. But I want to touch you. Dragons don't touch."
"I remember liking your wings wrapped around me."
His fingers in her hair loosened, becoming caressing and gentle. "When you opened the spare room door for the first time, you touched me. No one had ever touched me before. I sat still for a long time, amazed at how good it felt."
"Humans like to touch," Lisa said, tracing his cheekbone in demonstration.
"I like to touch you." His voice was low, breath warm on her lips. His blue gaze flicked over her face, intently studying her. When he pressed a soft kiss to her mouth, he tasted sweet, like he'd been eating honey. "You feel different now. Like your skin is alive with power."
"It's what I always feel from you." Lisa drew a hand down his well-muscled arm, fingers catching on the cool armband. "I did from the first night you walked into my living room, all naked and sexy."
"Sexy." His smile was warm and slow. "I like this word."
"I like it, too."
He kissed her again, and she splayed her hand on his biceps, feeling the incredible strength of him. His mouth was hot, his returned kisses raw, as though he couldn't get enough of her.
He moved his hands over her buttocks, cupping her hips, parting them a little. His sex fit between her, still hard and wanting, not sated.
Lisa eased her hand between them and grasped him, liking the feel of his cock against her palm. The tip was smooth and velvety warm, and he made a faint noise as she ran her thumb slowly across it.
"I like this touching," he said.
"Dragons don't do this?"
"They don't." His eyes half closed in pleasure. "Too dangerous."
He shifted his hips so she could rub her hand up and down him. She liked the feel of his shaft, hard and strong, longer than the stretch of her fingers. She dipped her hand to the firm tightness of his balls, coarse hair tickling her skin. Caleb gritted his teeth as she traced his tip, feeling the different textures of flange and column, lingering on the sensitive skin below the tip.
He'd been so powerful as a dragon, holding her fast and not letting go as they fell together through empty space. It had been exhilarating and terrifying, though she no longer felt the insane urge to fly as high as she could before he caught her. The silver dragon still fluttered inside her, but Lisa was in the forefront now. Only because the silver dragon wants it that way.
What would happen when the silver dragon wanted to take over again, she didn't know. It terrified her, and at the same time she felt the dragon's soothing music. It will be all right. Ming Ue will explain.
Ming Ue? She halted, startled.
"Don't stop," Caleb breathed. His fingers bit into her skin, eyes heavy, cheekbones flushed.
Ming Ue knew about the silver dragon? She might. She had been Li Na's best friend, despite their differences in class—Li Na had been born into a nineteenth-century noble family while Ming Ue's family had come over as railroad workers. But they'd been very close, and Lisa had played with Carol and Lumi when they'd all been tiny. It made sen
se that the two women, both of them magical, had been confidants.
"Lisa." Caleb rested strong fingers on her wrist. "Don't go away from me. I've just found you."
She looked down at him a moment. He returned the look, eyes dark, his chest rising and falling with his breath.
Abruptly she leaned down and kissed the tip of his cock, then swirled in lights to her feet. Caleb jumped up, growling. She closed her hand around his shaft and pulled him with her to the wall between the bathroom and her bedroom. He landed against her, hands on the wall, still growling, his dragon ire roused. "Stay with me."
She kissed him, then she swirled into lights again, surrounding him with herself. It seemed so easy and natural to become the string of lights—she could do it without thinking. She could still feel him, his warm skin, his solid muscles, the vibration of his frustration, his firm erection. She could feel all of him at once against every molecule of her, and it was heady and furiously exciting.
When she became Lisa again she'd positioned herself in his arms, her legs around his hips, his arousal already inside her.
Caleb's eyes widened. "Sweet gods."
He made love to her in frantic silence, pressing her hard against the wall, his body dripping sweat. She'd never felt anything like it, the hot friction that seared her inside and out and made her know she was Lisa the woman. The silver dragon receded to the background, watching in wonderment and fascination.
The crazed sensations of this lovemaking were caused by more than Caleb's exuberance and her need. He cared what she felt, and he wanted to pleasure her as much as to take pleasure in her. Her ex-husband had wanted sex—Caleb wanted to be a part of her.
Lisa cried out as climax hit her. Silently Caleb held her, biceps working, sweat beading on his forehead. "Lisa," he said, his voice breaking as he came.
He shot seed inside her, hot and thick, then he held her hard against his warm body. She lay against his shoulder, breathing heavily. "Thank you, Caleb," she whispered.
The silver dragon added a satisfied, musical noise, as though she were pleased with herself.
* * *
Chapter Fifteen
Dragon Heat Page 17
