And then they disappeared.
She could only think the worse. They fell into some crevice she could not see and Quinn was too hurt or worse to climb up from it. Her only thought was finding him, but as the morning sun rose and illuminated more of the rock she found there was no crevice.
They were simply gone.
She didn’t know what that meant or if Quinn was alive or dead.
No, she told herself, if he were dead, you would know it.
But despair wrapped around her. Dana’s life had taken one crazy turn after another and turned her life upside down. Reality had taken some very strange turns and even her analytic mind had difficult figuring what she should do next.
Then she decided it didn’t make any difference. Quinn was gone and her life filled with color since his arrival turned to flat shades of gray.
A shadow fell on her and she shivered thinking it clouds covering the sun. But a loud flap of wings brought her head up. It couldn’t be.
“Quinn!” she cried.
He shifted and she threw herself into his arms. The heat of his skin against her body filled her heart with sunshine.
“What happened?” she said breathlessly. “I thought, oh my god, Quinn. I thought you died.”
“I beat him so I took him home.”
“You what?”
“His wing got torn up. Abalon couldn’t fly on his own.”
“And he didn’t hurt you?”
“I beat him up too good. He said I got lucky and promised me a solid thrashing should we ever run into each other again.”
“That’s gratitude.
Quinn shrugged. “Brotherly love.”
“So, what now?”
“Clothes,” said Quinn wryly glancing down to his naked body “My backpack should still be here.”
“Aw,” she said playfully. “Clothes? Really?”
“We need to decide what we are going to do now. Abalon isn’t a problem for the time being, and I haven’t heard anything from the dragons at Dragon home, but your boss seemed pretty intent on us.”
Quinn moved toward the back of the cave as he spoke and picked up his backpack. But the sound of flapping wings drew their attention to the front of the cave.
“Did someone mention me?” said a deep voice from the entrance of it.
“What are you doing here, Kaur?” growled Quinn as he hastily hopped into his fatigue pants.
“Checking up on my employee. I trust she is well.”
“How did you find us?”
“You don’t make it easy. But we can track Abalon quite well. When he should up here, and then back at his mansion, I figured there had to be a reason.”
“And you came yourself?”
“I don’t have dragons on staff. Sometimes you just have to do the work.”
Dana moved toward entrance of the cave.
“I don’t work for you anymore, Mr. Kaur.”
He shook his head ruefully. “The thing is not having dragons on staff is a hassle. I need you two. I wouldn’t have gone through all the trouble I did to bring you too together if I didn’t.”
Dana’s eyes narrowed as she stared at her erstwhile employer.
“What do you mean?”
“It wasn’t easy to do you know. Quinn, we found through the newspaper accounts though we worried when we discovered he went into the Marines. And you, well, we have a certain number of lines from Ireland a genealogist traced. When I found you, well, I set up the study with the government. I’m sorry this seems all cloak and dagger, but with Rhea’s agents all over the place, and Abalon’s wide sphere of influence, I had to do all this as surreptitiously as possible.”
“Why,” said Dana. “Are you doing all this?”
“A storm is coming,” said Kaur, “and people are going to panic if they only know what people like Rhea and Abalon tell them. I need dragon/seneschal teams to work for me if I’m going to head off the war those two want.”
Quinn stood with his arms crossed as he studied Ryan.
“And what would you want us to do.”
“Find dragons and seneschals. Help me pair them. That’s the start. You, Dana will do this under cover of conducting studies on dragon DNA in the population.”
“And what would I do?” said Quinn.
“Protect her for one thing and help her identify dragons. Give them guidance as they learn their dragon powers.”
“But I have my service contract to work out.”
“You let me, or rather my wife, the lawyer, take care of that. We have friends in high places that will get you an honorable discharge.”
“I don’t know,” said Dana. “You haven’t been honest with me so far. What’s assurances do we have that you are telling the truth now?”
Kaur held out his hands. “You don’t. But let’s put it this way. I’m giving you and Quinn access to the Kaur Industry resources, an open checkbook, and freedom to do what you want, as long as you get the results I’m looking for. I don’t want to know what you are doing exactly. From time to time I have to stare congressmen and senators in the face and answer their questions and I can’t lie. But it is imperative that we stop this brewing war.”
“Under cover of DNA testing.”
“That’s right.”
“And the study on PTSD?” said Dana.
“If you want to do that, you can too. Like I said. I don’t care how you do it.”
Dana glanced at Quinn who stared at Kaur with his arms crossed against his chest. She nodded and his jaw set.
“Okay, Mr. Kaur,” said Quinn. “Under one condition.”
“What is that?” said Kaur.
“That we have time for our honeymoon first.”
“Honeymoon!” snapped Dana. “Don’t you think you better ask me to marry you first?”
“I, I just thought—”
“This is my cue to exit,” said Kaur. “I know enough not to involved in marital spats” He winked at them. “Have fun making up, you two.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Epilogue
Quinn walked along the beach holding the two drinks he purchased from the hotel bar, dodging children running and teenagers batting volleyballs between them. Squinting, he spotted Dana lying on a beach lounger. Her stray hat flapped in the breeze along with the towels thrown over her legs and shoulders. When Quinn chose this location for their honeymoon he didn’t think about what the sun would do to Dana’s very white skin.
On the other hand, her delicate flesh provided a wealth of excuses to message sun block into it.
“Hello, Mrs. Morgan,” he said cheerily as he waited to hand her the drink. She closed the folder in her lap and put it in her beach bag.”
“So. How’s the employment contracts look?”
“Very good. We get to choose our home base and the salaries are very good. Of course, Mr. Kaur is eager for us to start.”
“And you sure you want to do this?”
“I can’t think of a better thing to do than help dragons and seneschals and keep Rhea and Abalon from drafting them to their causes.” She took the drink Quinn offered and sniffed at it.
“There’s alcohol in it. Are you trying to get me drunk?”
Quinn lowered a backpack from his back where he stuffed cold bottles of water for hydration.
“And why,” he said as he sat in the lounger, “would I need to get your drunk? You’re willing enough.”
“Willing?” she said lifting her eyebrows. She stared at him over the rim of her drink.
“Oh, more than.”
She wrinkled her nose, which gained a few freckles on this foray into the sun.
Quinn smiled at his beautiful wife. He never thought in a million years he’d be married, let alone to such a smart, accomplished and beautiful woman as Dana.
He looked at her left hand and frowned.
“You did it again,” he said picking up her right hand. He slipped the Claddagh ring she insisted on using for her wedding ring and transferred it to he
r left hand with the crown pointing up indicating she was married.
“I swear,” he said. “It seems like you don’t want anyone to know you’re married.”
“And I swear that possessive streak you have?”
“Yes,” said Quinn.
“It’s a touch enchanting. I think you are using dragon magic on me.”
“Oh, it’s magic, baby, that’s for sure. But I’m not so sure it’s my magic. You’ve cast your spell on me.”
“Humph. Maybe. Or we might have caught each other into our magical nets and now we are hopelessly entangled.”
“I’m sure of it, Mrs. Morgan. I certainly am.”
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Dragons of Paragon
A Dragon’s heart
Book 1
Jan Dockter
© 2017
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter One
Aldain Kincaid sat on the couch sulking. He would never admit that is what he was doing, but that is exactly what someone would call it. His friends Cade and Becca were basking in their love for each other, while he was alone, with no one to call his own. He would never admit he was jealous of their relationship but he craved that kind of relationship for himself.
There were many dragon shifters that never found their soul mate. They either married someone other than their soul mate or chose to remain alone the rest of their very very long lives. He fell into the latter category, he wanted all or nothing. His friends noticed that he wasn’t really acting like himself. By having them watch him every day for the last several months they have been living with him was obviously affecting him. He was glad to have them there. His castle was more than big enough to accommodate them and give everyone their privacy. The only places shared were the Den where the books were kept and the room that housed the satellite television.
Aldain thought of asking them if they wanted their own private den closer to where their bedroom was but he doesn’t want them to think that they are not welcomed in his home and that their company is not enjoyable. He really does enjoy having them there; it was the days like today he was having a pity party for himself wishing that they would snuggle up somewhere else. He knew that today wasn’t a good day for him because his face seemed to be in a perpetual scowl. Becca looked questioningly at him but said nothing. She respected his privacy enough to think if he wanted her to know what was bothering him, he would tell her. He knew it would never dawn on her that he was anything but happy for them. He loved Becca and both she and Cade knew this, but they also knew he could never love her as he would a soul mate and his love for her was more like a family member. There was a time he was willing to try and make a different kind of relationship with Becca work, but that was when Cade was treating her so badly she would cry herself to sleep every night.
Thank God, those days were behind everyone and everything worked out for them. He just wanted what they had and it wasn’t until he was around them long enough that he realized he really was lonely.
He knew he had to get out; he was getting so miserable that he couldn’t even stand himself. He looked over at the couple across from him, snuggled up to each other watching some kind of re-run on television. He quickly stood up from the chair he was in, and while heading for the door yelled, “I am going out for a while. I may be late so don’t hold dinner for me; I will eat while I am gone.” Without waiting for a reply, he shifted into his dragon form and flew away.
Aldain flew for what seemed like hours, then his stomach started to grumble. He seemed to have lost track of time. He was surprised to find that he was starving, he was so deep in thought wondering if he would ever find his soul mate. He flew to an island he saw and decided to see if he could find anything on it dinner worthy. He didn’t see any people on it but he did see wild goats. His mouth watered as he dove down towards them. The goats saw him coming and took off running in all directions, bleating warnings to each other, but a dragon was much faster than a goat. Aldain caught his dinner in his mouth, full of foot long teeth, and landed on the beach as he ate the goat whole.
When a dragon shifter gets extremely hungry, his dragon takes over to the point he is more dragon than human and the only thing on his mind is filling his stomach. If there was a human who knew about dragon shifters and saw anything like that, it would scare them so badly that they wouldn’t care about the human half. They would probably never want to have anything to do with another dragon shifter as long as they lived.
Aldain felt full and his dragon got sleepy so he stayed on the beach basking in the sun and again was thinking of his lack of a soul mate. He fell asleep.
The sounds of bleating woke him up. The sky was dark and the goats, while still a distance from him, were closer to him than was probably wise for them. Then he saw the long lush grass that his very large body was close to and understood why they were taking their chances. He shook his head to help himself wake up for the long flight back home. When he started moving the goats again started to run in all directions bleating, but Aldain knew he could eat when he got home and wanted to get there before the sun came up. He didn’t want to worry his friends and he wanted to sleep in his own bed.
He spread his wings, ran along the beach and took flight. It was a beautiful thing to see, a dragon in flight; Aldain was beautiful in his dragon form. His red scales were shimmering in any kind of light. His eyes were emerald green in human form, but in dragon form his pupils slit sideways like a cat and turned yellow. He has a set of black, wickedly sharp looking horns bending back from his head going almost halfway down his back. He has a mo
uth full of foot long teeth. His tail even has three spikes on the end. You could tell just from looking at him that his body was made to be the perfect fighting machine. His human form was just as imposing as his dragon form. He has shoulder length black hair and bright green eyes. He stands six foot four inches tall, and has wide shoulders and muscular arms. His waist tapers down to reveal a six-pack stomach and long, muscular legs. With every movement, you saw the perfect muscles formations. His physical body also looks like the perfect fighting machine. In either form, he was beautiful to the point of perfection.
He finally made it home in the wee hours of the morning. Everything was quiet; he quietly snuck into the kitchen to raid the refrigerator. He heard a sound behind him that startled him. He quickly turned to find Becca behind him.
Chapter Two
Wearing a robe and slippers, as it was getting colder out at nights, she padded over to him and hugged him. Aldain hugged her back then put her away from him and said, “Well thank you, but what was that for?”
Becca looked up at him with worry in her eyes. “I know something is going on with you. I figured maybe you could use someone to talk to, my shoulder is all yours.”
Adored by The Dragon: (The Dragon Lord - Book 3) (The Dragon Lords) Page 11