Amethyst Dragon (Awakened Dragons Book 5)

by Terry Bolryder

  Citrine and Topaz had many questions about the human world and their purpose there and what was expected. And funnier questions like what microwaves were and how toast was made without fire.

  Dom was thoroughly enjoying himself, basking in the warm glow of knowing Lana was, at least mostly, his. She was sitting on a cushion in front of him, leaning on his knee, though he’d tried to insist she take the chair.

  The conversation was winding down, and it was growing late, and as the others stood and started talking about a nightcap, Dom found himself growing bone tired, ready for bed.

  The only thing was he didn’t know if Lana was planning on sleeping in his bed or wanted him in hers or just wanted them separate.

  He liked the idea of keeping her with him but knew she probably needed her sleep.

  He walked with her arm-in-arm up the stairs and stopped at her door. She looked up at him for a kiss, and he gave her one, loving the heat that ran through him every time they shared themselves with one another.

  When he pulled back, letting her roll back on her feet, she gave a low whistle. “Holy heck, you can kiss.”

  He smiled. “That’s a good thing, right?”

  She nodded, running a hand over his chest, making his whole body tighten.

  He caught her hand in his. “You know you’re always welcome in my room, right? Or welcome to come get me. But I’m not going to push it. I just want what you want, and if that’s space tonight…”

  She shook her head emphatically, making her dark curls bounce. “You’re staying with me. Are you kidding? Benefits of being a boyfriend.”

  He let out a sigh of relief. “I’ll go get the kittens.”

  “Yes,” she said. “I need to see them anyway.”

  He nodded and went to get them. When he had their box and all their things, he headed back to her door and knocked. She had already changed into purple silk pajamas with a pink robe. Her curls spilled over her forehead, and she gave him a playful grin.

  “You gonna spend the whole night with the cats instead of me?”

  “No,” he said. “But they need to be fed.”

  “I’m just teasing,” she said, taking the box from him and setting it on the floor by the chair he liked to use. “I’ll help feed them, and you can rest more.”

  He grinned, feeling relief. “I appreciate the help.”

  “All right,” she said. “I’ll give them their cuddles while you go get ready for bed, big guy. Those aren’t your pajamas, right?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t really have pajamas. I just sleep in soft pants.”

  “Those are pajamas,” she said with a giggle. “Though, I wouldn’t mind if you slept naked.”

  He shook his head. “What would I do if I needed to protect you in the night? Fighting naked would be most undignified.”

  “But so very attractive,” she teased, pushing him toward the door. “Now go get changed.”

  He did, and when he was back, wearing his softest tee shirt and pants and wondering what it would be like to hold his sexy mate all night, he saw she’d changed out of her robe and pajamas and into a short, silky nightgown that grazed her gorgeous, thick thighs.

  “I like it,” he said, throat dry and aching.

  She smiled, sashaying her hips as she led the way to the bed. “I can’t do more with you yet, still sore, but I wanted to give you something pretty to look at.”

  “You’re always something pretty to look at,” he said. “But if these are pajamas, then I’m seeing the benefits. Perhaps you could even sleep naked, since you wouldn’t be the one fighting if something happened.”

  “But then wouldn’t someone see me if they broke in?” she asked, pouting.

  “No, they’d be dead. And I’d make sure the sheets were on you.”

  She laughed. “Well, I’m not sleeping naked. That’s weird.” She burrowed into the sheets and pulled his arms around her.

  He slowly relaxed against her. It was weird sleeping in another person’s bed.

  It felt weirdly wonderful to know she trusted him like that and he could let down his guard with her.

  “It’s so hot when you’re protective,” she muttered, holding on to his arms.

  “I’m glad, because I can’t help it,” he said. “I thought you hated it.”

  “I guess I’m coming around,” she said on a yawn. “You’re winning me over.”

  “Sleep well, sweetheart,” he murmured, placing a kiss on her forehead and then settling in again behind her. He loved the way his body cradled hers. The way all of her full, rounded softness fit in against him, letting him protect it. The way she fit into his huge arms like he could keep his whole world safe.

  Everything was just right for the first time in his life.

  And then, just as he drifted off, the nightmares started.

  Chapter 16

  It was dark all around him in his dream, almost as if he were lost out in space, nothing grounding him, and as bitter wind whipped around him, Dom fought to make sense of the dream threatening to take him down.

  He fell to his knees, images swirling around him in a kind of tornado. He reached out with one hand. He didn’t often have dreams like this. They were more like visions he couldn’t escape because his body was unconscious.

  But his mind was trapped. Fear shuddered through him as the images blurred too fast for him to make out.

  Then his heart jumped as he saw Lana. Her face twisted in anger, in sorrow.

  “No!” he said hoarsely, reaching forward.

  Other faces swirled, laughing.

  His mate was threatened, and he didn’t have any idea what to do.

  The last time he’d had a dream this awful, his whole world had fallen apart.

  And it hadn’t been that great a world anyway, so now that he did have a great life, it would be that much more devastating if he lost it.

  He groped blindly, trying to make things make sense. Think, Dom. Make sense of this. Figure out what you have to do. The answer is here somewhere.

  Lana was fighting something unseen. Yelling. Something about it being too late. Being mated. But it wasn’t to him; he could feel it with a mounting sense of dread.

  He could feel himself in the dream, knowing she wasn’t his. His feeling of despair and helplessness.

  She was crying to him for help, and there was nothing he could do.

  She was in danger, and she was going farther away from him. She shouted, her voice echoing in a nightmarish way. “Don’t let them take me away again!”

  She was reaching for him, fighting, but disappeared into the swirl of darkness, out of his reach.

  It felt like the ground was falling out from beneath him. He looked down but saw only darkness, looked up and saw only night. And around him, images like fleeting wind, threatening to make him throw up from the confusion. Blurs of faces too fast to make out. Panic making his blood rise to boiling point.

  And then, as it had in the Thurston dream, an answer came to him.

  A tiny bit of calm that was an eye in this terrible storm. Someone putting an umbrella over him for just a second.

  A vision of himself slipping his ring on Lana’s finger. Immediately. Claiming her.

  His heart pounded, affirming it even as he growled his protest. He didn’t want it to be the only option. He’d only won her by being careful, being patient. What would he do now? If he pushed her, he could lose her. If he didn’t push her, he couldn’t save her.

  Once again, he was in a lose-lose situation, and it brought back memories he fought to keep buried every day.

  Memories of how things had gone with Thurston. He’d gone to Thurston’s house, as he’d been told in the dream. He’d argued with Thurston’s parents that they needed to gather a group to go find him. That they needed to figure out where he was. He was in trouble.

  But his parents had been irritated, scared of what Dom was, and taken that time to tell him they didn’t want him around Thurston. And that Thurston was safe with his un
cle.

  But Dom knew better. The terrifying images in his dreams had been so real.

  So Dom had taken off on his own, into the forest where he’d seen Thurston in his dream, running as hard as he could. But he needed a search party. He needed others with him. In his dream, he’d seen he needed to get everyone to join him.

  But as a kid no one liked, no one listened to, it wasn’t possible.

  He’d charged through the woods, looking everywhere, even as the darkness was making it impossible, and then he’d fallen to the ground, gasping.

  Hours later, he was still wandering alone, calling weakly, and something bumped his foot.

  Thurston. His blond hair was plain even in the dark, even with mud all over it. He’d been dumped here.

  Dom held his friend in his lap and cried. He hadn’t had long to know Thurston. It had only been last week that he had come over to him when the other kids were bullying him and told them to back off.

  And for once, Dom hadn’t felt so alone.

  So when he’d had that dream, saw Thurston running through the woods, trying to escape his uncle, Dom had wanted more than anything to stop it.

  But now it was too late. And all because no one had listened to him.

  Dom had torn at his hair, wailing at the sky, waiting for someone, anyone to find him.

  And the next day, they had. And the next day, they’d wanted to kill him.

  Thurston’s uncle hadn’t admitted anything, and Dom had been found with the body. And since other kids had disappeared in the past year, everyone wanted someone to blame.

  And the little freak holding Thurston’s dead body seemed the perfect person to point fingers at.

  Dom shuddered, reliving the memory as he often did in dreams, but this time, there was more to it.

  This time, he could see Thurston in the distance, watching. He didn’t have the evil gleam in his eye as he did when he appeared in person, when Dom was awake. Instead, he seemed troubled, like he wanted to come closer but something was holding him back.

  Dom called out to him, but no answer, and Thurston disappeared. The images kept swirling.

  Damn these powers. And damn his inability to understand them, even after all these years.

  He saw Lana again, this time in danger. She was screaming, fighting, and someone was holding her.

  Was it whoever had mated her?

  Shit. Shit, shit, shit. His head burned unbearably. Everything was wrong.

  Once again, the answer was there, shining in his mind.

  Put your ring on her. You have to put it on tomorrow. You have to fight to put it on. Everything depends on it.

  As he closed his eyes, trying to make sense of it, trying to resolve himself to it, he woke.

  The dream released him, and he sat forward like a slingshot, breathing heavily like he’d never be able to get enough air.

  Lana was lying beside him, peaceful in sleep, her little hand tucked under her head, her lips parted softly.

  He wanted to reach out and touch her but was almost afraid to. What would she say when he tried to tell her about the dream? What would she do?

  Would she look at him like the townspeople? Like Thurston’s parents? Would he once again fail to convince someone and end up losing them?

  He lay back down on the bed, looking at her back in the semi-darkness. He just wanted to stay right by her side. Just wanted things to be simple in his life for once.

  Just wanted not to get hurt for being who he was.

  But he didn’t want Lana to get hurt either. Not for the first time, he wished he had someone to tell him what was right.

  But all he knew was in the morning, he and Lana would have to have a difficult conversation. One that might lose him everything he’d gained. And all because of the thoughtless actions of a horny wolf.

  Regardless of what happened, Dom was going to make sure that dude was beheaded.

  But that didn’t mean it would make things right with Lana.

  He heard a mew in the darkness and got up to feed the kittens. There was no way he was going back to sleep tonight.

  Lana was amused at the familiar sight of Dom feeding the kittens when she awoke the next day. However, this time, instead of being asleep, he was wide awake, with bloodshot eyes that were staring at her in a way that made shivers course through her.

  She pulled the covers tighter against her. “Is something wrong?”

  “We have to talk,” he said, setting the kitten aside and sitting forward with a sigh, running both hands through his hair.

  She got out of bed and walked around to sit on the edge where she could be close to him. She reached out for his face, but he raised it, looking up at her sharply.

  She flinched. “Dom, what’s wrong?”

  He looked like he hadn’t slept at all.

  “I don’t… I don’t know how to say this,” he said. “I just…”

  She sat back on the bed. “Did you have nightmares?” she asked. He nodded, and pity waved through her. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  He shook his head and then nodded. “I guess we have to. I don’t want to, though.”

  “I think you should know you can tell me anything right now,” she said. “Nothing is going to shock me at this point, I think.”

  “I just… I…”

  She stared at him, growing more nervous by the second. Why was he being this awkward about it? Why couldn’t he come out and say it? She’d been accepting of everything so far.

  “I need you to mate me,” he said hoarsely. “Today.”

  She stared at him, gaping openly. Sitting there in the chair, even in his hunched, vulnerable position, he was unbearably handsome. So tall, his shoulders so broad, his face so striking, his hair so touchable.

  But none of that mattered compared to the words that had just left his mouth.

  “I what?”

  “You need to mate me,” he said. “It’s not an option anymore.” His voice sounded scratchy, painful. “I know it’s the last thing you want to hear.”

  Walls went up inside her, defenses she hadn’t thought she would have to put up against him. “How can it not be an option?” she asked. “I get to choose.” Her hands tightened into fists.

  “Is it so bad?” he asked. “You care for me. I’ve seen it. And I care for you.”

  “It’s my choice,” she said. “Anything is bad when it’s not your choice.” She swallowed, which was nearly impossible since it felt like something was choking her. “Take it back. Say it’s an option. Say we don’t have to right now.” She felt her voice crack. “I was coming to love you.”

  That broke him, and his face fell. He clasped his hands over his knees. “I know. I know, and I didn’t want it to be like this either, but… I had a vision.”

  Coldness swept through her. “Oh, did you?” She hated this cynical part of her, but it was the part that had kept her alive when Galen kept assaulting her, telling her she had no choice, telling her he knew better than she did.

  She could feel his hands now, creeping over her, and there was only one way to make them go away. She stood, covering her ears.

  “It is always my choice! No one can force me. Not ever again!” She grabbed her robe, throwing it on and running for the door, not knowing where she would go, but needing to be away from him.

  She’d gone to sleep next to the man who was now her best friend and woken up next to a nightmare. He was proving to be a shifter like Galen after all.

  He stepped in front of her, blocking her exit, his whole body tense with remorse. “Lana, I can’t let you go. We need to talk.”

  “There’s nothing to talk about,” she said, shoving him, wishing she could shove at the panic inside her the way she could his chest.

  No, both were pointless. She couldn’t move him, and she couldn’t get away from Galen.

  “Get out of my way!” she shouted, trying to leave. “Get out of my way now. You said you wouldn’t force me. You said you wouldn’t talk like this. You’r
e being just like Galen!”

  “I’m nothing like that rapist!” he roared.

  She stared up at him in shock, heart pounding so hard it was painful.

  He took deep breaths, still blocking her way. “I thought you, of all people, would believe me.”

  “I don’t believe anyone who wants to take my choice away,” she said. “I’ll never believe anyone who tells me something I don’t hear in my heart. Not ever again.”

  He caught her gently by the arms, trying to make her look up at him. He was so gentle she wanted to cry, but it didn’t matter if it was going to come down to the same things it had with Galen. With any shifter. They could pretend to be nice, to be kind, but eventually they had to get their way.

  “Let me go,” she said. “Or I’ll hate you forever. I swear to you, Dom, if you don’t let me go now, I’m never going to look at you again!” She shook her head, feeling tears whip to the ground from the corners of her tightly shut eyes. “You’ve brought back everything I’m running from, and now you need to let me go and recover. Away from you.”

  He finally released her shoulders, looking more lost than she’d ever seen him.

  Maybe it wasn’t his fault, but maybe it was. Maybe it was her fault for thinking he’d truly understood her. Had he just been pretending he could wait, that he could let her make her choice, when all along, he’d been planning to spring this on her?

  She didn’t know. Hearing Dom, the man she trusted, tell her she had no choice, seeing him stand in her way was some kind of living nightmare.

  “I thought you’d believe me. I thought you’d give me a chance.”

  “Dom, your vision doesn’t give you a right to me any more than Galen’s signs from the moon gave him a right.”

  “This is different,” Dom said. “I’m a freak. I know that. But I’ve seen the future, and—”

  A chill went through her, but she shook her head. “There should be no future where I don’t get to make a choice. Even if you’ve seen something, there has to be another way. I can’t do this. And after everything, after I let you inside me, you should have known this.”

  He slowly stepped to the side as she shoved at him, and she ran from the room, holding back sobs.