by Bobbie Rayne
16
Eeli
“Bo, you can’t go into the bathroom with him,” I said with a groan.
The little purple dragon tilted her head at me. Why?
Because he needs some privacy. You can stay with him when he’s done.
Humans are odd. She was annoyed, but she finally hopped from Christian’s shoulder to mine.
He stared at me with wide eyes, so I shrugged and said, “I told you she wanted all your attention.”
“Yeah, but…”
I nodded. “I know. Um… I’m going to grab the hammock and take it over by the garden since there’re trees there and Kite doesn’t usually go over there, so I can stay hidden.”
He lifted a brow. “Is it his hammock or something?”
I grinned. “Yep.”
Christian shook his head with a smile. “Okay, want me to meet you down there when I’m done?”
“You know the way? I can send Bo back if you want her to fly you down.”
His eyes widened. “Fly on her without you?”
“For like two seconds.”
“Uh… I’d rather walk.”
Bo leaned over and nudged him. I would never let him fall.
I know, Bo.
Tell him. He’s mine, too.
“Bo wants me to tell you that she would never let you fall, and uh, she keeps calling you hers.”
He grinned a little and stepped closer to me, but instead of kissing me or hugging me or anything, he leaned in toward Bo and kissed the top of her head as he pet her and whispered, “I know, Bo. I don’t doubt it, but I’m not ready to fly without Eeli yet. I need more practice.”
Then I’ll take you flying.
“She wants to take you flying.”
He kissed her head again, then stood up with a smile. “Maybe later. You have to train today, right?”
“I train every day, so yeah.”
“Do you think… could you teach me some things, maybe?”
My smile widened. “I would love to!” Training and fighting were a huge part of my life and something I enjoyed doing, so having him want to be involved was awesome. Plus… I’d get to put my hands on him all I wanted without anyone being jerks about it. I could probably even convince him to take off his shirt.
“Eeli?”
I snapped my attention to him.
“Where’d you go?”
Picturing you shirtless. “Um, sorry, daydreaming. What did you say?”
He laughed a little. “Never mind. I’ll meet you by the garden after I’m done.”
“Okay, awesome.”
He searched my face for a moment, then leaned in and kissed me slowly, letting his tongue brush against mine, and we both ignored the dragon rubbing her cheek all over his head. He laughed against my mouth a little, then pecked my lips and pulled away before giving Bo a scratch and kissing her snout.
When he walked into the bathroom, I scratched Bo’s neck as she balanced around my neck on my shoulders. “You’re such a Christian-hog.”
You hogged him for days.
He’s my mate.
He’s my other ma’cordhe.
She called him her special endearment she used for me—her little heart—and I couldn’t be happier about it. She loved him so much, and if I was honest with myself, I was starting to fall, too. Pulling her face close to kiss her snout, I said, “I’m glad you like him, Bo.”
He’s ours.
I know he is.
I kissed her again as I walked outside to where Malachite kept his hammock, then I unhooked it from his favorite spot and took off running so he didn’t catch me stealing it. Bo was amused with me as she clung to my shoulder.
After hooking it up in the trees near the garden but back behind a few so I couldn’t be easily spotted from anywhere in the yard, I laid back with Bo on my stomach and chest, both of us resting while we waited for Christian. My eyes were closed when I heard footsteps. Figuring it was Kite coming to look for his hammock, I held as still as possible.
Kyla’s voice reached my ears. “—you think the others would mind?”
“Of course not. We want you to feel at home here,” Malachite answered to whatever Kyla was asking.
I peeked my eyes open and saw the two of them walking into the garden. It was kind of funny that little, tiny Kyla had chosen the biggest of my brothers to latch onto, although I understood why she did. Malachite looked intimidating to most people because of his size, but he was probably the nicest and most chill out of the four of us. He could easily kick anyone’s ass, but he would much rather give you a hug.
“I brought you some gloves and shovels and things,” Kite said, passing Kyla a bag.
She squealed a little as she took it from him. “Thank you! I’m so excited to plant the seeds I found by the water yesterday.”
“You know what they are?”
“Psh. Of course. My parents owned a flower shop and we grew a lot of the plants ourselves.” She opened the bag and examined the things Kite brought her. I felt like I was spying, but I also didn’t want to interrupt.
“I didn’t know that.”
“Oh, I thought I told you. Yeah, my mom had a major green thumb and always said that I had one, too. I love plants.”
“What was the shop called?”
“The Tilted Tulip.”
He chuckled. “I like that.”
She sighed. “I miss that place. We lived above it, but the whole place, and especially the huge gardens behind it were home. Our shop looked like a cozy house from the front, almost the same as the houses beside it, but everything behind the houses was filled with growing flowers. It was really pretty.”
Malachite looked around at our kind of sad-looking garden as he leaned against the fence. “Well, we can always expand the garden for you. I put the fences up to try to protect the plants from animals, but I can easily build more fences so you have more space to grow whatever you want.”
Kyla stopped what she was doing and looked up at him, whispering, “You would really do that for me?”
“Of course, Super K. I told you I want you to feel at home here, so—” he was cut off when Kyla threw her arms around his waist in a big hug. My brother hugged her back and whispered something I couldn’t hear, and after a minute, she released him and wiped her eyes. “You doing okay, Ky?”
My heart was in my throat as I watched them, and I felt terrible for intruding on such a private moment, but now that I’d been there for a few minutes, I didn’t want them to know I was here and think I was spying on them.
She nodded. “Yeah, I just haven’t been able to garden, and, um… it’s nice having someone besides Christian care.”
“We all care about you.”
“I know.” She sent him a watery grin, then dug back into her bag. “Can I teach you a few tricks?”
“Sure. But I’m not very good with plants no matter how hard I try.”
“I’ll teach you.”
She handed Kite a couple of things and led them to the far end of the garden. Since their backs were to me, I looked up into the tree branches above me and pet Bo, who’d fallen asleep on me.
After a few minutes, I heard my brother ask, “You doing okay with everything?”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s been a lot of change happening, and I know it’s been you and your brother for a while now, so… I’m worried that you might be upset or something, you know, since Eeli and Slash are…?” I snapped my gaze over to them at the sound of my name.
She knocked Kite with her elbow. “Don’t be silly. I love Eeli, and I love that Christian found somebody. He’s been lonely since we moved here.”
That made me sad that I hadn’t at least befriended him in the past three years. I’d been such a jerk, judging him by his appearance. I didn’t even deserve such an amazing person as my mate.
“Whatcha doing?”
Christian’s voice made me jump, and Bo flapped around since I’d scared her. “Jesus, where did y
ou come from?”
He chuckled and started climbing into the hammock. “You were so focused on spying on my sister and your brother that you didn’t hear me coming.”
“I wasn’t spying.”
He fell into me with an “oomph” and the three of us rearranged ourselves so I had my head on his shoulder and Bo was lying on his chest with her snout under my chin. “So listening to their conversation without them knowing you’re here isn’t spying, huh? What do you call it?”
“Eavesdropping.”
He chuckled. “That’s the same thing.”
“They were talking about us.”
“So? I’m just glad my sister’s talking to someone else. She seems to have made a friend in your gigantic brother.”
I snorted.
“Are you going to spy on us all day, or were you planning on coming out, pipsqueak?” Malachite called out.
“Shit,” I muttered.
“Told you it was spying.”
I nudged Christian with my hip, then said to Kite, “We’re fine in here.”
“Christian? Are you back there, too?” Kyla asked.
“Yeah, I’m here. What’s up?”
“Come here. I want to show you something.”
He looked at me and lifted a shoulder, then kissed my forehead, plopped Bo on my head, and scrambled out of the hammock. It swung so much that Bo and I started to fall, so I grabbed her and hopped out after him and followed my mate out of the trees.
As soon as Malachite saw me, he frowned. “Just get your own hammock.”
I grinned at him. “But I like stealing yours.”
He tried to ruffle my hair, but I dodged him with a laugh and walked over to where Kyla and Christian were standing, staring at our calma plant. When Kite walked over, Kyla looked at him and said, “You know it’d grow better if you moved it away from the shade of the trees so it gets more sun every day. And if you plant red daylilies around it to attract hummingbirds, that’ll help, too. She’s looking pretty sad. You guys have been overharvesting her.”
Malachite and I shared a glance of surprise, and he said, “I think you might think that’s a different plant, Super K.”
Her brow furrowed. “Why? It’s a dragonfly flower.”
“Uh… I don’t know what a dragonfly flower is, but that’s a calma plant. It’s where we get the oil for our dragons’ skin.” Malachite lightly touched one of its dark green leaves.
“I’ve never heard it called that. Mom always said it was a dragonfly flower, but I’m sure that’s what it is. Christian and I used to help put its oil in jars, and Dad would give it away for people to cook with or something. Right, Christian?”
My mate leaned down and inspected the plant, then shrugged at Kite. “She’s right. Our parents grew these and gave away the oil. Or maybe they sold it? I’m not sure, but they didn’t sell its flowers in the shop like the other plants and flowers. They told us it brought good luck, so they kept it for our family.” He shrugged. “That’s definitely the same plant.”
Kite looked at me again, and I asked, “Do you know where your parents got it?”
Christian and Kyla shook their heads and he said, “We grew up in that shop, and it was there for as long as I remember.”
“Mom told me once that our dragonfly flower patch started with one flower a long time ago, but that our patch was passed down from her mother, and from her mother’s mother and long before that. And she said that our family had been harvesting the oil from the plants for centuries.”
“She did?” Christian frowned at her.
Kyla nodded. “She told me she would pass it on to me when the time was right.”
“Oh.” Christian frowned, so I stepped closer to him and put my hand on his back while Bo climbed onto his shoulders and wrapped around his neck.
Kyla looked at her brother. “Mom said all the women in our family have had green thumbs and it was tradition to pass the flowers down to the next woman in line.”
Malachite glanced at my mate, then pulled Kyla’s attention back to him by asking, “Are you sure it was this same plant?”
“One hundred percent.” She nodded. “If you let me move it over into the sun more and plant the hummingbird plants near it, it’ll be healthier and will seed so we can make more plants. That way you’ll have more oil for the dragons.”
“She’s right,” Christian said. “At least about the planting thing and having more oil. I didn’t know it was used for dragons before, obviously.”
Malachite and Kyla kept talking, so I leaned into my mate and whispered, “Are you okay?”
He nodded. “It’s just hard to talk about them sometimes.”
I pulled him into a hug and kissed his cheek. “I know it is… let me know what I can do to help.”
He hugged me back, then asked, “Can we lay in the hammock again?”
“Of course.” I looked at Kite and Kyla. “We’re taking the hammock closer to the water if you need us. We’ll be in later.”
“Get your own hammock!”
I chuckled at my brother since I knew he wasn’t being serious. “Yours is better.”
Malachite waved us off and continued talking to Kyla about the calma plant. How in the world had Christian’s parents ended up with one? And from the sound of it, they knew how to secrete the oil and jar it up.
Once we were set up in some other trees away from everyone else, I pulled Christian’s head onto my chest, and he wrapped his arms around me as Bo curled up around our heads. I kissed his forehead and breathed him in.
“You’re comfortable, Eye.”
I glanced down at the top of his head. “Did you just call me ‘Eye’?”
He tilted his head up to look at me. “Yep.”
“As in eyeball?”
“Yep.”
I chuckled. “Why would you call me that?”
He stared at me and pulled his eyelid down. “Because I got my eye on you.”
I laughed and pushed him, making the hammock rock. “Oh my god, you’re a huge dork.”
He grinned at me. “You just now figuring that out?”
Pushing him again, we laughed as the hammock rocked harder and Bo flapped her wings in annoyance at being woken from her nap.
Once we were no longer worried we’d tip over, Christian said, “Or we could go with Aye—A-Y-E.”
“Great. Now I’m a pirate.”
“They say ‘arrrgggghhh’ not ‘aye.’” He was grinning widely and trying not to laugh.
“Oh.” I shook my head at him. “Wait, I think they say both.”
“Hmm… maybe…”
“Know any pirates you can ask?”
He snorted. “No, I’m fresh outta pirates.”
“Obviously my name is just way too long to say the entire thing.”
“Obviously. That whole two syllables is too much for me. Who uses two syllables, anyway?”
“Everyone. Absolutely everyone.” I nudged him again.
He laughed, and I loved the sound. Before I’d gotten to know him, I hadn’t thought he was capable of making such a joyful sound; his laugh was contagious. With both of us cracking up, the hammock was swinging wildly, and Bo got so aggravated, she jumped on my head and flapped her wings in both our faces, which only made us laugh more.
Bo hopped off the hammock with an annoyed chirp, and I looked at Christian. We found ourselves in each other’s arms, and I just had to kiss him. Before I knew it, hands were wandering as we made out.
When we finally pulled apart, he stared at me with those hazel eyes and a soft smile as he placed soft kisses on my lips every few seconds. With every moment that passed, I was falling more and more for him.
He whispered, “Wanna go teach me some moves, Aye?”
I laughed. “Are you really going with that?”
“Yep, like a pirate, Aye.”
Chuckling, I shook my head and said, “Okay, fine. I’ll teach you some grappling first and maybe how to throw a proper punch. We can start later toda
y if you want.”
“Awesome. Soon I’ll be able to spar with you.”
I snorted. “I’ll take it easy on you.”
He laughed. Kissing my neck, he ran his fingers along the collar of my shirt, lightly caressing my skin.
I whispered, “Will you sing for me?”
“You want me to sing?”
“I’ve always loved your voice. I was happy you ended up in my chorus class this year so I could hear you.” It was a little embarrassing, but I told him, “Every time there was a concert, I sought you out because I always loved hearing you sing. Especially since you had solos a lot.”
“Really?”
“I was a little jealous of how good your voice is.”
He rubbed my jaw with his thumb.
“Please sing for me?”
He hesitated for a second, then opened his mouth and began singing a song I didn’t know but sounded a little familiar. I closed my eyes and let his voice wash over me. With him up against me, I could feel the rumble of his baritone in his chest. The melody along with the emotion he put into the words made my heart swell more and more with every word.
When he finished the last note of the song, I whispered, “That was beautiful. Sing another,” and he didn’t even hesitate this time. His voice put me in a daze I never wanted to come out of.
After several songs, we managed to climb out of the hammock. Bo immediately flew over and landed on his shoulder. Christian gave her a good scratch as we headed back toward the training arena.
17
Christian
“Come on, guys. It’s going to get cold,” Davis yelled as we hurried up the stairs for dinner.
Groaning, I adjusted myself as Eeli scooted down the hall in front of me, ass swaying in front of me like a homing beacon. He stopped and turned around. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” A smile split his face as he glanced down at the obvious bulge in my pants. “Don’t look at it,” I hissed as it jumped in my pants under his knowing eyes.
“You—”