Not His Dragon Read online

  In the end, all this meant was she got a free steak dinner. High fives all around. He sat across from her at the counter, since the kitchen lacked a table.

  He offered her a fork.

  She took the first bite, conscious that he watched her chewing. She must look a mess covered in scale chips and filing dust with his bloody shirt wrapped around her hand. The steak melted in her mouth. “Oh my God.” She took another bite.

  The smile on his face was pure pride.

  Seeing Angie eat the meal he had prepared filled Eoin with a strange sense of accomplishment. It was akin to his first successful solo hunt. Except instead of feeding himself, he provided for Angie.

  He leaned on his elbows and sipped from his wine glass. Angie’s presence tied him in knots and the alcohol helped loosen them. Feeding her in his kitchen sated an ancient primal urge. He took another sip so he wouldn’t roar in triumph and send her running again.

  “Aren’t you going to eat?” She pointed to his plate.

  “Yes.” He ate a piece of steak to ease her worries, but he enjoyed watching her too much to bother with his meal. “Did you grow up in New Port?”

  “Uh-huh, in the orphanage off Willobrough Lane.”

  “Oh.” He hadn’t even known the city had an orphanage. He’d have to speak with his accountant about donations.

  “You didn’t know the orphanage existed, did you?” Her tone sounded more amused than insulted.

  He shrugged. “I don’t involve myself with human things. They tend to scream a lot when I try.”

  She laughed and the sound eased the empty isolation within his castle. When had he last shared a meal with someone?

  “That can be all true, but I heard a certain rumor about a cow.”

  The more she relaxed and conversed, the more he didn’t want the night to end. “I deny those rumors. That was some other sappy dragon.” He filled her half-empty wineglass.

  “Hey, I’m starting to think you want me drunk.”

  “If that were the case I would have broken out my collection of whiskey.” He raised his eyebrow. “Want some? Not like you have to work tomorrow.”

  “How do you know I’m not open on weekends?”

  “I checked your website.”

  “So you can surf the web. I’m impressed. I heard the older races usually stagnate in decrepit old castles.”

  “Must be the same source that told you about the calf.”

  “A calf? That makes the story even sweeter.” Her plate was empty.

  He switched his full plate for her empty one. “Finish eating. I’ll tell you the story.”

  “But you haven’t eaten.”

  “Eating in my human form is for fun. I have to hunt in dragon form to be truly fed, which is where the story begins.” He stabbed a vegetable and held it to her mouth. “You know you want it.”

  She took the morsel, running her tongue over her lips. “So?”

  He gave her a slow blink.

  “The calf?”

  “I was flying over the mountains behind my castle, hunting for dinner, when I spotted a speck of black and white curled on a cliff. I hovered next to the area and the spot uncurled.” How had this story reached her ears? This happened way before Angie had been born. “The calf had fallen off the cliff and landed on the ledge. A late spring snowstorm had hit the night before so the farmer couldn’t search for the babe.” The little creature hadn’t feared him. It was too young to recognize a dragon. The calf had cried out to him for help in the universal language of animals. “I carried it back home to the farmer, who did a lot of that screaming I mentioned, before realizing I was there to return his calf, not eat his family.”

  She went quiet in the way that pushed on his skin. She had a few more bites. “Why did you save it?”

  He shrugged. “It wouldn’t have been a mouthful.” Babies were taboo to eat. Not everyone thought like dragons. Even humans, with all their morals, ate them.

  Setting her fork on the second empty plate, she leaned back and patted her stomach. “That was a really good meal. Thank you, Eoin.”

  He sat taller on his stool. He would’ve thumped his chest in triumph if he thought she’d understand. The urge to ask her to spend the night almost loosened his tongue before he locked it down. He’d made a promise. No seduction. For tonight. “Ready to go home?” Before he did things he’d regret.

  Her smile fell. “Sure.”

  The drive back to her apartment was filled with quiet promises as she leaned against his back, her breasts pressed on either side of his spine, and her thighs squeezing his hips almost daring him to change his mind.

  He took the scenic route, prolonging the ride as long as he could. The night couldn’t last forever, though, and he parked in front of her building, then walked her to the door.

  She faced him, eyelids heavy. “Thank you for dinner.” She leaned against the entrance.

  He followed, caging her head between his arms. “You’re welcome.” A kiss wouldn’t break his word, right? It would seal his interest in her and make his intentions utterly clear. Angie was tall enough to kiss without cramping his lower back. He normally liked females with long hair but her pixie cut allowed him to admire her fine bone structure.

  She unwrapped his shirt from her hand and offered it to him then held up her palm. “See? Almost healed.”

  He stared at the starting-to-scar wound. “Impossible, even for a half-breed.” He grabbed her wrist and poked at the injury. He’d seen it with his own eyes. The cut had been deep.

  “Hey.” She yanked her hand away. “Watch who you’re poking.”

  Enough was enough. He’d believed her story of shifter ancestry until now. Healing that quickly was impossible for someone with mostly human genes. He’d have to look at Angie with a spell to truly see what she was made of. Cringing, he shifted his eyes from human to dragon. Magical vision allowed him see magic such auras around life forms and spells. In a city the size of New Port the light from so much living energy was blinding. Not to mention the headache he’d suffer. He spoke the spell to open his magical vision. He blinked and almost shouted “A-ha.” While pointing at Angie.

  Definitely dragon. How could she not know, and why couldn’t he sense her magic? He should have done this the day they met, but it always left his head pounding for days. He looked closer. What was that? Something surrounded her body like a thin film of oil. This time he did gasp. He’d never seen anything more evil or devastating.

  The light from her aura reached out to the natural magic of the world but they didn’t connect. This shield prevented Angie from touching magic. No wonder she thought she was human.

  He clasped her hand and shook it as she leaned up for a kiss.

  She jerked away. “Oh.” She stared at their clasped hands and shook back as he bent to return her kiss too late.

  He kissed her forehead instead. “Well shit, this is awkward.”

  She giggled. “I’ll take a rain check. We’ll try again tomorrow.” She opened the door to her building and turned to enter.

  He followed on her heels and slapped her ass before the door closed. She gave a surprised yell from the other side.

  “Night, toots,” he called through the door. Grinning, he returned to his bike. So she already planned to see him tomorrow.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Dragons didn't require sleep as mortals did. Eoin could go days without, but like most of his kind, he enjoyed a good nap. Dreams could be as good as memories. The older a dragon grew, the more he retreated from reality. That’s why most of his people lived away from human civilization. Too much change too fast.

  Eoin found human culture fascinating, though. One moment they were wearing white wigs and the next they were painting flowers on their cheeks, having sex in the fields. Time worked different for them somehow. He envied them. For the last half century, he’d felt stuck in place. How did Angie cope as a dragon who thought she was human? Did time move the same for her? She obviously was young but she always
seemed to be in a hurry. Very undragon-like behavior.

  He squashed his cigarette under his boot and watched the junkyard dog rush out of his shelter. A fence protected the animal from him. This would be a good time for him to stop obsessing over Angie. She’d already given him a migraine with her aura. He had to put her out of his mind and concentrate on obtaining the material he needed for his sculptures if he was ever going to give this a full-hearted try.

  The only thing that had given him solace over the last century was art. He could understand the evolution of an artist’s skill. The statue Lorenzo and Roger had fawned over was a new direction in his work. This step could change everything.

  Nausea rolled his stomach. This could be the start of new and exciting things, a fresh branch sprouting along the path of his long life. Like most green stems it was fragile and could snap at the wrong move. The urge to vomit struck him hard. Thank goodness, he’d given Angie his dinner and his stomach was empty.

  There wasn’t anyone around to witness him puking except the dog. It barked at him through the chain link fence, saliva foaming at its mouth. Eoin gave him a small smile and tossed a huge, thick steak over the top. He waited until the animal started gnawing before scaling the barrier and landing next to the creature.

  The dog gave him a wary glance and whined. Animals always could sense who was the bigger predator even masked by a human-looking body.

  Fog had rolled in, clinging to the ground between the piles of scrap metal. It leant the junkyard a mystical feeling, as if Eoin was embarking on a soul-searching quest for treasure, instead of breaking and entering to steal garbage. He chuckled and meandered through the aisles hoping something would give him inspiration. Something he could mold into a reflection of his soul and stir viewer’s emotions, like how Angie’s aura had moved him. He wasn’t asking for a vision of the Holy Mother in a warped bumper. Just something…

  Anything.

  Shoving his hands deep in his pockets, he surveyed the stacks of abandoned vehicles. His view of the world was more two-dimensional, paint and canvas. How did one purposefully create a statue? He’d made the last one using garbage, so it only made sense to create similar objects with the same material.

  With the full moon above in the clear night sky, he didn’t need a flashlight to see his surroundings. This part of the yard consisted mostly of things either from vehicles or household appliances. Metal things. Things he could melt with his flame.

  Now, fire he could understand.

  On a whim, he gathered any part that caught his eye—a car door, rusted fenders, a child’s bike, an old soda dispenser. He dragged them one by one to the front gate, tossing each piece over the fence. He took one more cursory search of the area and spotted the front end of a motorcycle. ‘A death trap,’ Angie had called it. Inspiration struck. He pulled it from the pile and added it to his other things.

  The dog finished his meal and came towards him wagging his tail. Kneeling, Eoin gave the pooch a scratch behind its ragged ear before vaulting over the fence and stacking the pile of junk in the back of his pickup truck. He pulled out his cell phone from his back pocket and called Roger.

  “Eoin?” His agent sounded as if he’d woken from a dead sleep.

  “Hey, I’m at the junk yard.”

  “Good for you. Have you any idea what time it is?” Roger yawned.

  “Not really.” He’d left Angie on the roof around ten p.m. Eoin glanced at his phone. It was well past midnight. “I’ve taken some materials to work with.”

  “I didn’t know they were open so late.” Roger’s voice dripped with sarcasm.

  “You know they’re not, but I couldn’t wait until morning.”

  “Like the rest of us mere mortals.”

  Eoin laughed. “You’re cranky when you wake up.”

  “Yes, especially when I was having a good sleep. What do you want?”

  “Swing by the junk yard and offer the owner payment in the morning.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’ll take care of it.” Roger was silent on the other end of the line for a moment. “You think you’ll have those pieces finished in time?”

  Eoin scratched his head. “I’ll try my best. You placed me in quite a position.”

  “Wait a minute. Are you only starting on them now?”

  “I had things to do earlier today.” Things that mattered to him.

  “More important than your career?” Roger sounded much more alert.

  “My life doesn’t revolve around my art.”

  “Since when?”

  “I had some…health issues to take care of.” Eoin didn’t like the timetable his agent and dealer had given him. Dragons did not work this way. A day was nothing to him so they should be more than happy if he accomplished anything on deadline.

  “I didn’t know dragons could get sick. Are you all right?” Roger grew quiet.

  “We don’t get sick. We do need to do some maintenance and I have been neglecting myself these last few years.” He rubbed the back of his neck. The last thing he needed was Roger to start mother-hen-ing him. “Just take care of the junkyard owner, okay?”

  “You can count on me. G’night.”

  Eoin hung up and stuck his phone back in his pocket. Jumping into his truck, he headed home. He’d already set up a space in his castle on the first floor where he could blow his fire without burning down the roof and not have to carry this load of junk to the top of his tower. His stomach grew sourer as he drew closer to home. He hadn’t a fucking clue what to do with all this crap in his truck bed. How was he supposed to concentrate on creating something from scrap when he couldn’t stop seeing Angie’s aura in his mind’s eye? What was stopping her from shifting? How could she not know that she was pure dragon? How did human parents get hold of a dragon baby? Angie was such a puzzle.

  Eoin shook her clear of his mind. He had so much to do and so little time to do it. Undressing, he tossed his clothes to the far corner, not wanting to scorch them with his flame. He dragged pieces of metal scrap together, separating them in piles, and shifted to dragon form. With a deep breath, he let loose his fire and watched as the middle group changed from dull gray to glowing red.

  The statue that Lorenzo was fond of had been created by just the heat in the room, not direct flame. It was too late for him to change his approach and he watched the metal melt into a gooey mass. With his tail, he beat the shapeless blob, trying to mold it as if it were clay.

  God only knew how long he worked in this manner.

  Fire. More smashing. More flame. Until at last, he stood before a crazy lump of Megatron shit. The piece should be titled “Desperation”.

  His chest ached with each dry breath. He hadn’t blown this much flame in ages. Not since his last battle. There’d been so much destruction, he’d almost wept. Dragons, as a whole, sometimes forgot their overall goal during a campaign until things went south. That fight had gone straight to hell.

  With legs wide apart, he took another deep breath and blew. Smoke emerged from his throat and nothing else. He coughed and coughed again, choking on his own exhaust. That was disconcerting. He cleared his throat and made another attempt to set his work on fire.

  Nothing, not even a spark. Eoin leaned the side of his face against the sizzling hot stone floor and caught his breath. His chest grew heavier and his lungs felt full of sand. Had he lost his flame? He shifted to human form. What would he do now? Maybe he’d over-taxed his system.

  He stalked toward the hot watery metal, swung back his right arm, and punched it. The intense heat sizzled against his flesh and he savored the sensation. He was fireproof, so he struck again and again. The molten metal couldn’t hurt his flesh even though it stung.

  Falling to his knees, Eoin ran his sore hands over the stubble on his head and stared at what he’d done. He’d made his first sculpture out of rage so it only made sense he made the others in the same manner.

  Torn and raw inside, he shifted back to dragon and bit the first lump using his teeth until only
sharp angry bites remained in the metal. He used tail and claw. Standing, he hit the metal until they had cooled enough to resist molding.

  Eoin shifted to human and sat hard on the floor. He didn’t know how long he stared at his vicious sculptures. This wasn’t what he wanted to share with the world. Anger? Violence? How predictably dragon of him.

  Inching his way, he rose to his feet and abandoned the room. Turning his back on what was supposed to be his new medium, he escaped to the top of his tower and his easel. He rested his hands on the cross member under a new canvas and closed his eyes. If Lorenzo and Roger were trying to drive him insane then they’d done it.

  Outside the window, the morning sun crested the horizon. Shades of pink bled to dark blue as the light chased away the night. The variance of colors reminded Eoin of Angie’s aura. Grabbing his palette, he equipped it with the paint colors he would need and began stroking canvas with loving caresses of his brush. Out of the corner of his eye, he continued to watch the sunrise.

  Angie was the new sun in his life. She brought light to his darkness. He continued to paint from memory, but capturing that moment when he’d first glimpsed her aura was harder than he’d thought. He needed another look because it was very difficult to see the details of magic in the city. Whatever kept Angie from shifting, they would destroy it together, even if she didn’t harbor the same burning need to be with him. His gaze wandered back to the painting. Now this was beauty. What he’d made downstairs was pure, unadulterated, raw emotion. He obviously couldn’t understand what people wanted. Maybe he should just cancel the show and give up on art.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The morning sun shone bright and the air still held last night’s crispness. Eoin stared out the window, wiping the paint from his hands. He’d worked all night yet felt like he hadn’t accomplished much—neither sleep, nor inspired masterpiece—but had managed to destroy his ability to blow flame. Only time would tell if it would return on its own. He would wait a very long time before crawling back to his clan seeking assistance. He could almost hear his brothers’ laughter already.