by Sadie Sears
“Is it okay if I let Cam borrow a pair of Dad’s old jeans?” Sophie whispered to Shae upstairs. They were in the hallway while I waited at the top of the stairs, so I could hear them loud and clear. Dragon hearing was advanced; not to the point that I could hear through walls or anything, but pretty close sometimes. Sophie had asked me to stay close, so I wasn’t going anywhere. “He wouldn’t keep them, but I’m still freaked out and I’d prefer it if he drove us to his place.”
Shae sighed and stared at me from down the hall, like she was checking to make sure I hadn’t already snatched a pair. Her shoulders slumped. “I guess. But he has to give them right back. And he can wear one of those big t-shirts you sleep in, not one of Dad’s.”
“Deal.” Sophie grinned and mussed her blonde curls playfully.
I didn’t want to do anything to make Shae uncomfortable. This wasn’t going to be an easy thing, introducing her to the idea that Sophie and I were destined mates, if I even did it at all. I still wasn’t sure it was something Shae could handle. Maybe when she was grown, but that wouldn’t happen for a long time yet, and I wasn’t sure I had the patience to wait that long.
Footsteps told me that they were going to their rooms to pack their bags. The light in Shae’s room seemed to work fine, but Sophie’s apparently did not, judging by the sweeping beam of the flashlight. A few seconds later, Sophie tapped me on the shoulder and held out a bundle of clothes. “Here you go,” she said softly.
I repositioned the blanket around my waist as I stood so that nothing slipped out and took the pants and a soft gray tee. “Thanks. I’ll just…” I went ahead and put on the jeans—which fit surprisingly well, if a little short—sliding them on under the blanket before buttoning them.
Sophie stepped close, unknotting the blanket from my side slowly, her fingers brushing over the skin on my hip. My dick, which had tried to tuck itself up inside my body at the risk of being exposed to Shae, hardened as Sophie ran the plaid fleece between her fingers. She smiled softly, letting her gaze drift over my still bare chest, and I pulled the soft shirt on a little slower than I would have otherwise, flexing much more than necessary.
And God, the shirt smelled like her. It was a smoky lavender scent, likely from the incense she kept downstairs. My mind’s eye projected an image of Sophie in this very shirt, and nothing else. I had the sudden urge to take her right there on the stairs.
Clearing my throat, I moved down a couple of steps. “Er, uh, yeah, better pack your bag,” I prompted before moving down again. If I stayed that close to her, even dressed, I didn’t know if I could stop my dragon from taking over and… well, it wouldn’t be good.
Well. It would’ve been good. Damn good. But not here or now.
Shit, my mind was in overdrive and I couldn’t switch gears.
But luckily, Sophie walked away, and ten minutes later we were in her car, me driving barefoot, headed toward my house. As soon as we pulled through Sophie’s front gates and away from her house, her shoulders sagged in relief. Much of the stress and anxiety that had been buzzing around her and Shae both practically vanished the moment we lost sight of the house.
My dragon puffed in pride that we were able to get them both out of there and take them to safety. He loved knowing we helped make Sophie feel that relieved. And I loved knowing that she was going to be so close, hopefully for several days until this was all resolved. The thought that they might leave afterward depressed me, but I’d fight that battle when I got there.
Spruce, as small a town as it was, was still rather lively in the evening. Snowshoe Brew stayed open all night, being right across from the police station and so close to the hospital. Further down Main, Spruce Bar—colloquially known as Sprucie’s—was busy as usual, and even the small theater beside it looked packed. I felt a strange kind of anticipation radiating from Shae as we continued south on Main, and I glanced back to find her watching the houses pass with wide eyes.
As we slowed and pulled into the gates, Shae gasped so dramatically that Sophie jumped. I looked at the girl in the rearview, and her eyes were as big as saucers. “I can’t believe we’re at this house. There’s just something about this place that Zoe and I love. We have been calling it our dream house for years!” she said.
The excitement in her voice warmed my heart. She’d been something of a raging mess so far, understandably so after all she’d been through. But I wasn’t mad at her. My dragon was thrilled that she loved our house so much. She continued raving as I drove slowly up the driveway and around the house to park by the back door.
When I’d bought the old place, it hadn’t had an owner in years. The real estate agent told me that the previous owners had died a long time ago and the family couldn’t afford the upkeep on the place, and when no one else bought it, it fell into disrepair. There was something about it that caught my eye when we first arrived, though, and I’d almost had to fight Theo for it. Fortunately for me, Theo understood my need for space; he was a bit older and had better control over his abilities than I did.
It hadn’t been a total renovation, but I’d had a lot of work done to get the place ready. There were a lot of original features that I couldn’t bear to get rid of, like the real wood accents in the bedrooms and the stone fireplace. Some of the locals whispered odd things about the old mansion, but I hadn’t had a single issue since moving there.
Shae spoke almost too fast for me to understand, such was her excitement. “We wander down here on weekends sometimes just to look at it and play in the woods near it. We would pick out rooms and imagine what we’d put in each one. It always feels like it’s meant for us to be here. Ah, if my bedroom isn’t already taken, I’m totally taking it! Zoe is never going to believe this!”
Sophie gave Shae an alarmed look, interrupting her as she babbled on. “Excuse me? How safe is that? Shae, this place is all the way on the complete opposite side of town. Why haven’t I heard of this before?”
“Oh, no, it’s fine for them to be here. I don’t mind at all.” I shut off the car and turned in my seat just in time to catch a smile from Shae, before she quickly remembered she didn’t like me. Still, I smiled back and winked. “If you let me know ahead of time, I could make some lunch.”
Sophie shot me an irritated look. “She’s growing up, and this town has been so safe in the past. But now, here lately, it’s not so safe, and the thought of her playing in the woods near a house whose owner she didn’t even know makes my skin crawl.”
I patted her leg, immediately longing for more, which was a great big no, given the current audience. “We’ll get to the bottom of this. I promise I’ll make this place safe again for everyone.”
Shae sighed—one of those teenage-level irritated sounds. “Mom, it’s already safe because didn’t you just tell me that dragons protect humans? And there’s a dragon living right here.”
6
Sophie
Cam caught my eye, and I couldn’t stop the blush, like he’d caught me talking about him. He winked, so at least he wasn’t offended or anything. “Two dragons live here, actually.” I spotted Vince sitting at the table on the back porch. He stood and waved hello, a happy expression on his face.
“Is that your boyfriend?” Shae gave Cam and me0 the most innocent look, but I knew it was a total farce.
Turning in my seat, I glared at my daughter. “Stop asking personal questions.”
Cam didn’t seem to mind, though. In fact, he chuckled. “He’s my roommate.”
Shae seemed disappointed for a moment, but it didn’t last long. She scrambled out of the car and rushed up to the house. I chuckled to see her so excited to go in. She stopped at the front porch and looked straight up, then flashed me a look of awe. I hadn’t even unbuckled my seatbelt yet.
Cam called out the window, “Go ahead and go explore!”
She squealed and sprinted past Vince, who followed her in with a bewildered look on his face.
With Cam’s attention all on me, my breath caught in my throat. Our gazes met and my
body instantly reacted. He gave me a sly yet shy smile, and I knew he felt the same things I did. The increased heart rate. The intense desire.
And I was about to stay in his home.
I forced my breathing to say controlled. This was exciting and scary as hell, and I didn’t trust myself to act just yet.
“Come on,” he whispered. “I’ll show you around before it gets too dark.”
He walked me around the outside of the home first. The house was enormous, with new blue-gray siding and tall arched windows on the first two floors, smaller windows on the third. When we walked farther away from it, toward the edge of the property, I saw the top of some kind of tower in the center. This place was a regular modern-day castle, and though I’d never been here before, I felt drawn to the place in a similar way to how Shae had mentioned feeling.
Along the property line, I noticed wild roses growing. “Did you have these planted here?”
Cam studied the bushes, then looked at me curiously. “No, they were here when I bought the place. I liked them, so I had them trimmed up a bit, but they’re pretty much untouched. Why?”
“Wild roses tend to be used as protection,” I explained. “Planting them around someone’s grave, for instance, can ward off evil spirits. Having them around a house, like these, can provide protection similar to that. I was just curious to know if they’re natural or if they were planted intentionally. Who owned this house before you bought it?”
“I’m not sure; the realtor said it’s been on the market for a long time.” We kept walking, following the bushes around to the front. “This small of a town and even you don’t know whose house it was?”
I smirked. “Contrary to popular belief, we do not, in fact, know everybody’s name. I bought the house on the mountain to have my privacy, and when the tarot called to me before we opened the shop, the people came to me. I liked the space and being close to nature. I like people, don’t get me wrong, but their energies can sometimes be discordant and overwhelming.”
He nodded and grinned. “I know exactly what you mean.”
We retraced the path the car had taken, feeling like we’d walked forever, and Shae came bounding out the front door as Cam and I stepped onto the wide front porch. The house was unbelievably impressive, though I tried not to be too obvious about my admiration. No sense in giving Cam a big head about it or anything.
Vince’s laughter drew my attention. He said something to Shae that I missed, and her squeal and obviously happy mood settled my spirit. It was a tremendous improvement from where she was less than an hour ago.
“She likes you,” I said as Vince joined us.
“That’s because I’m not making moon-eyes at her mom.” He flashed me a smile full of pearly white teeth and widened his eyes as he fluttered his lashes. Cam punched him lightly in the arm.
“Come on, Vince,” Shae yelled. “You said you’d show me the game room!”
Vince shrugged and pretended to look put-upon. “I’ll take one for the team. You two go ahead inside.”
As happy as I was to see Shae in a better mood, I wished she got along with Cam the way she did Vince. She didn’t have a problem with dragons, after all. It was just Cam.
“Would you like a glass of wine?” Cam offered. He held the front door open for me and we stepped inside.
I wasn’t a big drinker, but a glass of wine was exactly what the doctor ordered after the evening we’d had. It would settle my nerves and maybe I could get some decent sleep. “That sounds lovely.”
“This is the biggest gathering area,” he said. “I think it’s called a great room. We’ve made it into our living room, and we spend a lot of time in here and in the kitchen.”
The room had built-in floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that weren’t even halfway filled in. “Oh, look at all the bookshelves,” I murmured. My feet gravitated in that direction before I had a chance to think about it. “I could build my to-be-read pile indefinitely with shelves like these.”
Cam didn’t respond, so I turned away from the shelves to find him staring at me with the oddest expression on his face. “Cam?” I asked.
He blinked rapidly and rushed toward a doorway on the opposite side of the room from the entryway. “One big glass of wine coming up. Red or white?”
“White, please,” I called as he disappeared.
I meandered around the room and looked at the knickknacks and bric-a-brac. Familiar authors lined the few shelves they had filled, from Shakespeare to Charles Dickens to Tennessee Williams. One shelf was full of newer paperbacks, and I had a difficult time deciding which of the two guys had been reading about Lestat. There was an interesting collection of coins on display in one corner, most of them I didn’t recognize. I knew from Lila that the dragons had been in the military together, so these were most likely souvenirs from someone’s time overseas.
In my admiration of the architecture, I was drawn to the wainscoting. More specifically, the half-pillars that broke up the decorative paneling around the room.
The wainscoting looked recently restored, likely an original part of the house, and the symbol that I noticed on the pillar was faded almost beyond recognition. I moved to the next pillar, which had the same thing, and the next one did as well. Something about it felt comforting as I traced my fingers over it, even though I couldn’t tell what it was exactly. My intuition was usually easy to interpret, but this time I had no idea what it was trying to tell me.
Cam moving around in the other room caught my eye, so I walked through the doorway. It opened into another very large room. “This place is lovely,” I called.
“Thanks. Whoever owned the house before opened this all up and I really like it, though I do really love that the living room and kitchen areas aren’t connected and open. Fully open floor plans are asking for zero privacy.” He flashed me a smile as he put the corkscrew in the top of the wine bottle. Two long-stemmed glasses sat on the table in front of him.
I nodded eagerly. “I agree! I’m not a fan of open floor plans, but I do really like the way this one is set up.”
This room was a big eating combo. Closest to me was a gigantic oak trestle table with… I counted the chairs quickly. Sixteen chairs. Behind that, to the left, was a kitchen that would make any chef proud to call it home. To the right was a smaller table, more like the size I had in my dining room. It sat in front of a very large window with a real window seat.
I loved window seats. If the light came in just right, it was the perfect place to settle in and start on that ever growing to-be-read list I’d mentioned. Oh, if only I’d thought to pack some books in the rush to get out of there. Maybe if we were here long enough, I’d grab one of theirs and take over the seat for a day.
Cam’s silvery blond hair fell into his eyes as he turned to put the wine bottle under the counter. I stepped forward until I could see that he was putting it in a small, glass-fronted wine refrigerator.
“So, you’ve seen the kitchen and living room now,” he said with a chuckle. “How about drinking this on the back porch with me?” He held out the glass, which he’d filled up.
I plucked the glass from his hand and smiled. “That sounds lovely. I’m still a bit uneasy from the events of the last few days. A glass of wine might do the trick.”
“Right this way.” He opened the back door and held it open with his foot.
“Thank you, sir.” I winked as I walked past him and looked around.
The back porch looked out across a landscaped, idyllic yard. The edges were defined by hedgerows, and ornate water fountains were peppered in the middle of groups of flowers. The moon was fully up now, illuminating the flowers that were on the decline thanks to our change in the weather.
“Please, sit and get comfortable. I’m going to go change clothes.”
He set the other glass on a nearby table and I waited for him to walk back inside before settling on a wicker porch swing. “Ahhh,” I sighed and pushed off, getting the swing moving while I sipped at the wine.
She shrugged and waved at me. “He said he’d see me later.” She bounded up onto the porch and sat beside me. “Vince let me pick my room and, Mom, guess what? It’s mine! Oh, it’s so perfect. It’s just like I always pictured.”
I put my arm around her. “Go enjoy it. Explore and take pictures, or call and see if Zoe has service so you can tell her about it.”
Her face lit up and she leapt out of the swing, shaking it. “Great idea, Mom!” She smacked a kiss on my cheek and took off inside.
Shaking my head, I looked around the property and watched the ducks eat bugs in a huge vegetable garden. At least, I thought it was a garden; it was getting a bit dark to tell for sure. Even in the dark, though, I could tell the landscaping was done beautifully. It was a place of peace.
Sitting on the porch, sipping my wine, I couldn’t help but be blown away by how amazing this place was, and the feeling of rightness that I was here. Garden lights flickered on as the ducks started to waddle into a coop I hadn’t noticed in the dark. Cam stepped outside. He must’ve flipped a switch.
“I love the ducks,” I whispered. I didn’t want to freak them out. “They’re so sweet.”
“I think they were Leath’s idea, but no one is owning up to it.” He stepped forward with his glass of wine and handed me one end of a blanket.
I stopped the swing long enough for him to settle beside me, and together we spread the blanket over our laps before I lifted my legs and the swing rushed forward.
He’d dressed in a luscious deep-green sweater over a crisp gray shirt that brought out the silver in his hair and the green specks in his eyes, especially by the glow of the moon and the faint backyard lights.
A few seconds later, fairy lights cut on, hung in the rafters of the porch. They didn’t really add much to the lighting, but they were beautiful. I glanced at the window behind us in time to see Vincent’s cheeky grin before he disappeared up the stairs at the back of the kitchen.
