Married to the Dragon

by Selina Coffey

  “Remember that girl you used as a driver that time?” Rog asked.

  Axel nodded.

  “She was standing on the sidewalk across the street from the lobby earlier today. I was going to ask what she wanted but she disappeared.”

  Axel thought Rog had probably taken so long to work up the energy to walk across the street that Julia just got tired of waiting and went away.

  “Don’t bother with her,” he said. “She’s not worth your time.”

  Rog saluted again and Axel went up for one last sweep through his apartment. He left the most of his belongings behind, if it could be replaced it was worth it for him to look like he was still living there.

  He drove to his Van Markle apartment and unloaded the car. It was important for it to look like he dropped his “trash,” while he was here. He showered and changed, thinking it would be nice to have furniture, so he paid the apartment manager to let delivery men in. Then he drove into town and stopped at a family-run store he shopped at before. He made their sales quota for the month paying for furniture as well as delivery and set up. The next time he walked into his apartment it should look like home, right down to the plates on the table.

  That done, he slid back into his car, cranked the air conditioner and drove back to his hometown. He went straight to the Police Department, walked to the reception window and gave his name. Then he asked to see the chief.

  Axel got a lot of satisfaction out of how quickly everyone started moving when he said his name. He was big stuff and he was about to give them even bigger stuff.

  It was a near thing. Axel could tell the chief was itching to get to him, but Axel waylaid him with the offer of a bigger fish. In fact, the biggest fish in this Podunk town.

  “You’ve got to let me go in first and bring Eduardo down. If I don’t assert my dominance, those ass holes will be dogging me for the rest of my life. That’s a deal breaker.”

  In the end the chief agreed. They set a date a few days away to give all the parties involved time to get ready.

  Next, Axel went to see a man he had been avoiding for a very long time, asked for forgiveness and got his job back. It helped when you had family on the board of trustees.

  The worst of it over, he went back to the new apartment – still no furniture, not that he was surprised – and changed back into his gang clothes. Then he drove back to the old apartment and walked in like he owned the place, his senses on high alert in case there was a snitch in the police.

  He laid low for several days, until the time came for action. On the day he was calling “Operation Free Axel,” he took the elevator to the top floor. As he stepped into the vestibule, he incapacitated the two guards by snapping the fingers on their trigger hands and knocking them unconscious.

  He opened the door to Eduardo’s apartment and took a minute to assess the situation. There was a goon out on the roof, his back to the glass doors and Eduardo was on the couch with a different blonde than last time. Axel wondered what Eduardo’s wife thought about the revolving blondes. Axel stepped into the living room.

  “Better send her to the back,” Axel said indicating the blonde, “I’ve got news.”

  Eduardo jerked his head in surprised and sent the girl away.

  “What’s up?” He asked.

  Axel stepped forward and grabbed Eduardo’s dominant hand, breaking his fingers. Then he twisted that arm up behind Eduardo’s back and held there with the lightest of pressures on the broken digits.

  “Push the panic button,” Axel said.

  “Are you crazy, the boys will kill you.” Eduardo’s voice was two registers higher than normal.

  “Only if they kill you first. Push the button.” Axel applied the tiniest pressure to Eduardo’s broken fingers and Eduardo quickly reached under the table and pushed the button.

  The building erupted in the noise of men in heavy boots running up the stairs. As the first man burst into the room, he stopped frozen at the sight of Axel with a gun to Eduardo’s head. As more and more men arrived they pushed into the room; the front line of men being pushed closer and closer. It would’ve been humorous if Axel hadn’t known that this was freedom or death. If he got it wrong, he wouldn’t live to walk out of this room.

  When the noise in the stairwells stopped, Axel performed a mental count and calculated that everyone was here. He spoke.

  “Does everyone see this?” He asked in a voice so low they had to strain to hear him. Axel indicated the gun that he held to their bosses head.

  The men nodded.

  “Does anyone dispute that I’m now the Lord of this house?” Again his voice was low.

  There was a mass headshaking this time.

  “Good. I want you to know that as is my right, I am disbanding this community. Should I see any of your faces ever again, I will shoot you on sight and without question.”

  Again they nodded. At that moment, the entire Police Department plus at least two more from the surrounding areas, burst in through the stairwells, the roof, the windows and even the elevator shaft.

  It was fall before Axel went looking for Julie, even though he knew she was nearby. He had completed his transformation, including having the worst of his tattoos removed. But not all of them, a man had to have some autonomy. He spotted Julie walking from class, freshman seminar he guessed and fell into step beside her.

  Julie looked at him and smiled her polite smile, the one she reserved for strangers. He had to choke back laughter when she did a double take and stood stock still on the path.

  “Axel?” She looked both pleased and frightened.

  “Professor Kehoe to you.” He said sternly.

  “What? Professor?” She looked around and sat on a nearby bench. “Are you really professor here?” She asked.

  “Adjunct professor of criminal studies, law enforcement and prison culture,” he said. “For a start.”

  “I didn’t know you were qualified,” she said, still somewhat dazed.

  “Back before I fell in with the wrong crowd,” Axel said. “I’m not as uncultured as you might think.”

  “I never thought you were uncultured,” she said. “You are a very cultured criminal.”

  “Cultured ex- criminal,” he said pointedly.

  “Really? Ex- criminal?”

  “Yes.” And he held out his hand to her. “Why don’t you come back to my place and I’ll show you just how reformed I am.”

  He pulled her to her feet and she threw her arms around him. When they broke apart, he walked her the three blocks to his apartment. There was so much heat between them, they could barely get through the door. He pushed her up against the wall and kissed her with all the gentleness of a werewolf at the full moon. She pushed him away.

  “I tried to find you,” she said. “I wanted to tell you that I loved you, but I couldn’t live a life of crime.” She sounded sad and Axel couldn’t bear it.

  “There will be none of that,” he said. He pulled her through the living room and into his bedroom, which was dominated by a king-sized bed. She got the better of him, twirled him around and pushed him backwards onto the bed, climbing on top of him. She sat on his stomach grinning down at him.

  “None of what?” She asked.

  “None of any of it,” he said. “No crime, no sadness, no lowlifes, no prison.”

  “Good,” she said. “I won’t tolerate any of that. In fact, I think I must punish you for the crimes of the past.” She bent down and kissed him full on the lips.

  Axel reached up to pull her flat against him, but she batted his hands way.

  “You are forgetting this is your punishment,” she said. “Lay still.”

  She unbuttoned his shirt, pushing it aside to run her fingertips over the hair on his chest. She felt him harden against her ass and liked the feeling of power over him. She licked his nipples until he writhed and bucked against her, his breath ragged.

  “Stay,” she said, standing above him to shimmy out of her silk panties. He groaned as she dan
ced overtop him until she took pity and leaned down to slide down his zipper. The movement brought her vagina inches from his face and she gasped as he slid his tongue between her labia. He sucked her clit and it was her turn to moan and writhe. The she slid his erection into her mouth and the tables were turned yet again.

  She left off torturing him to sit up and say, “Enough of this,” and she turned and lowered the warmth of her vagina over his penis. She rocked her pelvis over him, moaning and gasping until he could take it no longer and bucked into her until they came together.

  Julie slid down next to Axel; resting her head on his chest and he pulled her close.

  “Why did you decide to give up your life of crime?” she asked. “It had to be more lucrative than teaching community college students.”

  “I had my reasons,” he said softly.

  She smacked him on the shoulder.

  “Yes, and I’m asking what they are,” she said.

  “Babe,” he said. “It was because I knew you wouldn’t have me unless I went straight. So I had to.”

  “Too right,” she said crossly, smacking him sharply on the chest. “Don’t you forget it.”

  But Axel could see her face in the reflection of the dresser mirror. Julie was smiling, she was his forever.

  THE END

  Billionaire Romance

  Part I

  Billionaire - The Truth

  Romantic Suspense

  About the Book

  Sweet, young Jenn is a creature of habit, her life dictated to her by an autoimmune disease. Receiving dialysis three times a week, Jenn spends many hours daydreaming in hospital, living vicariously through her wild and beloved sister, Kenzie. It is at her regular appointment, in her regular room where Jenn encounters the handsome Dr. Blake.

  But Jenn is soon to discover her medical appointments are anything but regular. Aided by Steve, a gorgeous and friendly male nurse, Jenn must make some earth-shattering discoveries about herself that she simply cannot face alone. In this thrilling story, Jenn struggles to balance falling in love and uncovering the horrifying truth. As the tension escalates, the drama unfolds. Jenn’s vivid dreams, both gripping and terrifying seem to be nothing like her reality. On the other hand, are her dreams closer to her life than she ever dreamed possible?

  Part I

  Chapter One

  Another day, another drip.

  It was Friday, the third day this week that Jenn Walsh visited St. Benedict Regional Medical Centre for her regular dialysis treatments. By now, her fourth year of being in hemodialysis treatment for kidney failure, she knew the routine by heart: the IV treatments, the blood filtration and the constant buzzing and whirring of hospital machines. She lay back, closing her eyes as she listened to the faint hums, steady beeps and regular clicks of everything in her room. For Jenn, who had lupus, today was par for the course in her medical journey.

  Before she began today’s treatment, she lay down in the bed and waited for her doctor to show up. Like clockwork, suddenly there was a knock on the door and a tall man wearing a lab coat carrying a clipboard poked his head through the doorway.

  "Afternoon, Jenn!” Dr. Samuel Blake, M.D., flashing Jenn a sparkly smile from the doorway, was one of the best nephrologists in the area. He had Jenn’s routine down pat.

  Jenn was 21 years old the first time she collapsed, she was singing during her church choir’s rehearsal. After running a series of immediate tests, it was determined, she had lupus, an autoimmune disease that inhibits the body’s ability to fight off bacteria, viruses and germs. Given the frequent and severe complications of her diagnosis — kidney failure, blurry vision, respiratory inflammation — the doctors at her hometown hospital recommended she begin treatments with Dr. Blake; she'd been seeing him ever since.

  Today, Dr. Blake hooked up Jenn's IV and measured her blood pressure. Then, examining her chart, he frowned. "It looks like the last time you were here you had some blood in your urine, which could mean internal bleeding," he explained. "Just for good measure, I'm going to take a peek around," Dr. Blake muttered, switching her IV out for propofol that would numb her abdomen and lower body. "You should start to feel this in a couple minutes. While we wait, why don't you tell me a little about how you've been? We don’t get much time to just chat."

  "Okay," Jenn said. "Work is going okay. I've been having trouble reading lately, so I got new reading glasses. It's just the blurriness again —"

  "That should go away in time; it comes and goes. Are you still doing that bank work?”

  "No, I’m a receptionist for local lupus awareness nonprofit now. It's not glamorous, but I really like it. I didn’t tell you that before? I’ve been there for almost a month now, and I finally feel like I'm making a difference." Jenn beamed. Her journey with lupus had been a long one, and she wanted to make sure other people knew what lupus was and how to treat it. "Um, what else? Oh, my sister is coming into town next week. I'm excited to see her."

  "Where's she from?"

  "Los Angeles. She’s kind of—" Jenn looked away, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. "Well, we’re pretty different. You might see if you meet her. But anyway," she rushed on, "she might stop by if she gets a chance.” Jenn yawned; the anesthetic was beginning to set in. She poked herself in the stomach and experienced half the tactile awareness as usual. "I think its working."

  "Good. I'm going to touch certain areas and ask you if you can feel it. Just keep talking. How old is your sister?"

  "She's 28.” Jenn's speech was beginning to slow. Although the anesthesia numbed only her lower half, she felt the calming effects of the propofol coursing warmly through her blood until she was fully relaxed.

  "Jenn? What can you feel now?"

  "I feel ... sleepy."

  Pinching the skin on Jenn's stomach lightly, Dr. Blake smiled, and creases formed up his face and met his slick, black hair. "Good. Just lie back and close your eyes."

  Obeying the doctor's instructions, Jenn shifted her body in the hospital bed; her eyelids grew heavy. As she watched Dr. Blake busy himself with equipment below her waist, her eyes began to shut involuntarily.

  As she drifted off, Jenn could see flashes of light through her eyelids and the thoughts in her mind morphed into images in a dream.

  She is running through the jungle, jumping over fallen trees and treading narrow paths. When she looks back, she can see the sharp green eyes of dozens of giant anacondas chasing her, closing in, leaping onto her. She shrieks and tries to run away, but they corner her in a cave and start biting her, striking her, penetrating her skin with their sharp fangs until her legs, groin, and stomach were in pieces. She falls to the ground in pain, whimpering, and her world fades to black.

  Then, the lights flashed on again and Jenn's eyes opened slowly. Standing over her was Dr. Blake, clipboard in hand, his face somehow rosier than before, and his hand resting on Jenn's hospital bed. The curtains to the hallway outside had been firmly closed while Jenn slept, and half of the lights had been turned out — at least, so Jenn thought, since her whole head felt fuzzy now.

  "All done!" Dr. Blake coughed once and exhaled heavily. "How do you feel now?”

  Jenn shook her head sleepily. "My legs ... feel funny."

  Dr. Blake shot her a look. "Funny how?"

  "It's like.... They're still tingly, but my thighs are a little ... sore. They just feel weird." Jenn still felt half-in and half-out of consciousness, and she furrowed her brow trying to think of what to say.

  Dr. Blake cleared his throat and straightened his posture. "Well, the numbness will probably take about thirty minutes to go away. You'll be able to walk soon and head on home. I've got to run now, but have a nice afternoon and I'll see you back here next week." With a nod toward Jenn, Dr. Blake brushed the wrinkles out of his coat and started toward the door.

  "Wait," Jenn leaned forward in the bed. "Was there blood?"

  "Huh?" Dr. Blake's brows furrowed.

  "You said there ... might be blood. Was there?"


  "Oh, the blood in the urine. Right. No, your organs seem fine to me. Okay, see you next week!" With no other words, Dr. Blake strode quickly out the door, letting in a sliver of light into the darkened room where Jenn now sat, alone.

  Looking around at all the machines, Jenn yawned, rubbing her eyes. The tingly feeling below her navel slowly started to let up. She felt a sudden throbbing of pain as consciousness rushed back through her bloodstream; warmth flooded into her chest, her stomach, down past her hips and into her thighs. When she swung her legs over the side of the hospital bed, she felt all the blood come back to her and she gingerly put weight on both feet again to walk to the bathroom. While washing her hands at the sink, she noticed a huge pile of rags and tissues stuck at the bottom of the trashcan. “Hmm”, she thought. “They must not have cleaned very well here today. I'll have to mention that to the staff on my way out.”

  It was just before rush hour when Jenn finally left the hospital parking lot, cruising down the freeway home. Jenn lived with her parents in a suburb of the city, where they could care for her in her illness in relative peace and take her to the hospital for medical emergencies. Her parents lived in the same house for all of Jenn’s life; it had worn the test of time and two kids. They lived a sheltered life before, but with Jenn’s health on the line now, her parents tried extra hard to keep her close to them. Even though they smothered her sometimes, she still adored them — and she adored her sister even more.

  When Kenzie arrived on the tarmac a few days later, the sisters met with a heartfelt hug; they were happy to be reunited. The first few days packed with family dinners and tourist outings, but Kenzie decided to accompany Jenn to the hospital that week.

  “How do you get used to this?” Kenzie said, peering up at the enormous hospital in front of them as they walked through the front doors.

  Jenn shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s not that bad now. Actually, sometimes it’s nice to have some time away to myself.”