by Donna Grant
Few could understand that better than Con. The King of Dragon Kings might even have it worse than she did.
While she remained a part from others, he was surrounded by other Dragon Kings, never allowing himself to get too close to any of his brethren. It was the bane of a leader. In order to make the right decisions, many times, personal feelings had to be taken out of the equation.
No one did that better than Constantine.
His focus had always been on the dragons and saving them, even when he was fighting for his life with Ulrik – his best friend.
It nearly killed Erith not to get involved between the two of them, but she had kept her distance. In the end, it was Con’s love for his friend that prevented him from ending Ulrik’s life.
Some could argue that it was Con’s greatest mistake. In her eyes, it proved how great a leader he was. Despite the threat that Ulrik could one day come for him, Con did what was in his heart.
Talking to the King of Kings, getting to know him had been a real treat. She hated lying to him and giving him a false name, but she wasn’t ready for any of the Dragon Kings to know of her existence. The Fae were her focus.
At least she had bestowed a gift upon Con. Gold from the deepest mountains. Dragons she personally carved. And a sincere wish that they would bring him some sort of peace in the tumultuous years to come.
For an untold number of eons, she hadn’t just been judge and jury to the Fae – both Dark and Light – she had been their executioner as well. It was while watching one of the many battles between the Fae that she came across a warrior who captured her attention.
He fought as if he were waging war on his own. His skills were incredible, his blade lethal. He was one that others looked up to and followed. And then he was betrayed by those closest to him and killed.
When the last breath left his body, she went to him and gave him an offer. If he carried out her punishments without question, she would return his life. In service to her as a Reaper, he would be given more power than before. He had accepted.
The creation of her Reapers was the missing part of her journey. Erith couldn’t believe she had gone so long without them. They were an extension of her. Now, she was the judge and jury, but the Reapers were the executioners.
And it hadn’t taken long for them to become feared. More so, because part of their promise was that no Fae could ever know their identities.
She teleported into a rainstorm on a tiny isle in the middle of the loch and found the Fae doorway. Once through it, she smiled as the sunlight beat down on her. The songs of birds filled the air along with the heady smell of the various flowers.
Erith stopped next to a group of wild heather that was a symbol of Scotland. And since the Dragon Kings made Scotland there home, the choice in her alias had been easy. She studied the hearty, fast growing plant with its purple blooms. The flower had many uses in the Scottish culture, and not surprisingly, even the Druids considered it a sacred plant.
She gave one last look to the heather before moving to the various roses to inhale their heady fragrance. Daisies were another particular favorite of hers, as were dahlias. And acacia, violets, irises, and jasmine.
Then again, there wasn’t a flower she didn’t love. They were all stunning in their unique way. The blossoms brought beauty and simplicity into her realm.
The plain clothes she wore to meet Con disappeared, replaced with a long black gown. The full skirt brushed against the plants as she walked down the path. She released her hair from the braid and let it fall loose to her hips while butterflies danced around her and dragonflies zoomed ahead of her in a wild, beautiful dance to welcome her back.
The white tower that was her home gleamed in the sunlight like a beacon. She made her way toward it. Meeting Con had set things in motion, things that she now couldn’t undo. She hoped she’d made the right decision.
For herself, for the Reapers – and the Dragon Kings.
And for what was to come.
Thank you so much for reading Constantine: A History. With so many of you begging to know more about Con and his history, I thought this would be a neat way to bring it to you as well as connecting the lines between series that hasn’t yet been addressed in the books (it will be!).
Please read on for an excerpt from DARK ALPHA’S CLAIM, the first Reaper book. You will find buy links to the entire Dark World at the end.
If you’ve not checked out my new www.MotherOfDragonsBooks.com website, please do. It’s all things dragons and the Dark World. You can find the reading order, characters listed by Dragon Kings, Reapers, Fae, Humans, and Druid, places, and things found in each of the series.
Dark Alpha’s Claim
Reaper Book 1
Jordyn Patterson stepped to the side to dodge a man hurrying down the narrow aisle with a cup of coffee. She rolled her eyes and made her way to her desk.
She’d barely sat down and rolled her chair into place when her boss, Detective Inspector Dougal MacDonald walked from his office to stand by her desk.
“It’s been a few days since the American, Lexi Crawford, has been in. Did she make her way home?” he asked.
Jordyn gave a nod. “I made sure I’d get notified by the airline when she checked in. She’s back in South Carolina now, sir.”
“Good. Good,” he said again with a nod. “Too much craziness has been going on in this town. At least the killings have stopped. That’s a relief.”
Jordyn merely smiled as he walked away. She never told MacDonald her thoughts, because they went against everything he was. From the first time Lexi Crawford came into the station and repeated her story to MacDonald in her southern accent, Jordyn had been enthralled.
Red eyes! She hadn’t believed Lexi either at first. MacDonald dismissed Lexi’s story as nonsense, but Jordyn felt the need to look deeper into the case. Especially when more and more people were being killed every night.
There had been a day—only a few hours really—when everyone whispered about red eyes.
Jordyn went home and frantically searched through the mountain of books she accumulated on the Fae. She read in one that some of the Fae had red eyes.
She stayed up all night looking for that passage. An hour before dawn, she finally found it. Jordyn had sat on the floor with the open book in hand and stared numbly.
For as long as she could remember, the Fae were talked about in her family. Sometimes when someone did something unique and amazing, her family would say it was because of the Fae within them.
Other times when someone did something horrible, the Fae were mentioned with words laced in fear.
Jordyn’s curiosity about the Fae grew as she did, until it consumed her. She began researching them when she was thirteen. Now, twenty years later, she was still gathering information about them, only she was doing it in Edinburgh hours away from her family. There was really only so much a person could do in a small village. Jordyn had needed a city.
She knew the Fae were real. There couldn’t be that many stories—folktales or otherwise—without the beings being real. However, she had yet to meet one.
Over the last five years, she’d begun to try and discover how to find the Fae. She thought she would have to do all sorts of tricks to see one, but it seemed that all she had to do was go out on the streets of Edinburgh.
The very next day she had, and she’d been shaken to her very core. Every book she read described the Fae differently, from tiny winged creatures to giants. She didn’t know what to expect, but the sheer number of Fae walking around with red eyes gave her pause.
Then she saw them killing. And it wasn’t with a knife or gun. They killed with sex.
Jordyn shuddered in her chair. She’d been hunting the Fae for most of her life. What she found made her wish she didn’t know of them.
But they were the dark side of the Fae. Dark Fae to be exact. Their use of glamour aside, they had red eyes and their black hair had silver in it.
Some of the Dark had more silver
than others, and that gave her pause. She wanted to think it meant they were older, but she suspected it meant something else entirely.
Their laughter as they killed human after human made her ill. She ran away that night and ducked behind an alley to empty her stomach.
After that, she desperately wanted Lexi to come into the station again and tell MacDonald more of what she had seen, but Lexi didn’t return.
For a while, Jordyn began to suspect that Lexi was dead with dozens of other humans. Then the notice from the airline came, and Jordyn breathed a sigh of relief.
Halloween was the worst. Even now, a few days later, it still appeared as if the Fae had a hold on the city. Most of them were gone, but she could tell where a Dark was just by where the men and women gathered, fawning over them as they tried to get close.
Jordyn didn’t know why she wasn’t drawn to the Dark like everyone else, but she was glad she wasn’t. Perhaps it was all she’d read about the Fae. Despite not knowing what was true and what was fiction, she did know they were real.
A glance at the clock confirmed she had a few hours before she could take her lunch. Jordyn came across mention of a book that might shed more light on the Fae.
She tried to purchase it, but no one had it. It was fortunate that she called the library and they actually had a copy.
The new librarian, however, was a bit of a prude and refused to hold the book for her until after work. If Jordyn wanted it, she was going to have to race over there during her lunch.
She kept busy until noon, then Jordyn grabbed her purse and hurried from the office. She flagged a taxi and gave the address. There wasn’t much time to get to the library and return to work before lunch ended.
Normally she would walk, but it was too far away. She’d never make it back in time. Jordyn drummed her fingers on the door of the taxi as it drew to a halt at a stoplight. Every second spent sitting still was a second wasted.
Her stomach rumbled in hunger. If she were lucky, she would be able to grab some chips and stuff a few in her mouth before she was back at her desk.
By the time the taxi pulled up to the library, Jordyn was anxious to get out. She threw a few bills at the driver as she opened the door and said, “Keep the rest.”
She ran up the steps as a gust of wind barreled down the street. Jordyn pulled her arms tight against her, wishing she hadn’t forgotten her coat.
The man exiting the library saw her but didn’t hold the door open. She shook her head. Where were the men who held doors and were still gentlemen? Apparently, they went the way of the dodo bird.
“Jerk,” she mumbled beneath her breath as she entered the library.
As soon as she stepped inside, Jordyn smiled. There was a special smell to a library. It was leather, wood, and the pages of books.
She’d always had a love of books. The feel of the weight of it in her hand, the smell of the pages, the words written that could give her facts or take her off on a visual story.
Now wasn’t the time to wander the aisles though. Jordyn walked up to the counter. “Excuse me. I have a book being held.”
“Your name?” the woman asked without turning around.
Jordyn frowned at the back of her. It was like the woman studied what a librarian should be and copied it from the tight bun, the glasses, and the frumpy, plain clothes. “Jordyn Patterson.”
The woman looked at her watch. “With just a few minutes to spare.” She bent and pulled out the book from the beneath the counter and turned, setting it down beside her.
Jordyn was taken aback at the woman. She was pretty with her dark hair and pale blue eyes. Not at all what she expected with such a bitchy voice from the phone, or the image she got from the back of her in her prim button-down, cardigan, and long, plaid skirt.
“Here,” she said, handing the card over to Jordyn to sign out the book.
Once she filled it out, Jordyn pulled the book into her arms. “Thanks for holding it.”
“You have two weeks. The book will need to be returned then,” the librarian said as she met Jorydn’s gaze.
“Yep.” Jordyn turned her back on the woman and rolled her eyes.
Had she been able to find the book online, she wouldn’t have had to deal with the librarian from Hell. If the book held as much information as Jordyn hoped it did, she was going to have to widen her search for it, because a book like it belonged in her own library, not the city’s, where no one would check it out.
Jordyn fought the urge to open the book as she walked down the steps of the building. By the time she reached the bottom, her will crumpled. She had it open and was flipping through pages in a heartbeat.
Her eyes scanned page after page as her brain soaked up everything. Jordyn couldn’t wait to get home and begin making notes.
With her stomach rumbling again, Jordyn turned to find some food when she ran into someone. Her shoulder was jarred so that she nearly lost her hold on the book. “Sorry,” she said and looked up into the most amazing silver eyes.
“Must be an interesting book,” he said.
She nodded, unable to find words for a moment. The man was the most gorgeous person she’d ever seen. Her reaction to him was instantaneous, earth-shattering.
He was mouth-wateringly gorgeous, heart-stoppingly magnificent. His short coal black hair was wavy and full. Her fingers itched to run through the locks and see if they felt as shiny as they looked.
His beautiful face was lean and hard, with his chiseled jaw and chin. Not to mention his wide, thin lips. His gaze was direct, intense. Relentless.
While he sized her up, she let her gaze fall to his chest. An olive green long-sleeved tee showed off broad shoulders and arms that rippled with muscles. She imagined when he took off that shirt that he would be toned and supple, with just the right amount of hard sinew. Black jeans were slung low on his narrow hips with black boots completing his look.
“It is,” she finally answered when she looked back up into his face.
“Fae, huh?” He glanced down at the page before his silver eyes returned to hers.
His gaze was molten, holding her still and making her blood heat. The desire, the yearning to have his lips on hers made her heart skip a beat and her stomach flutter.
Jordyn had never felt such attraction before. Another gust of wind hit her, but she didn’t feel the chill. Her body was too heated.
That’s when she registered the Irish accent. “Research.”
“Good luck with your research,” he said and bowed his head.
Jordyn had the urge to stay and talk to him, but her stomach growled, reminding her she had little time to get food and make it back to the office. She reluctantly walked away from the handsome Irishman to the pub down the street.
It was the first time in a long time that she actually wanted to interact with a man, because the Irishman knocked her off her feet with just a few words and an intense look from his silver eyes.
In no time, she had an order of chips to go. With food in hand, she hailed another taxi and gobbled the grease-soaked potatoes and flipped through the book. Though she found herself looking out her window for another glimpse of the Irishman.
It was the worst sort of punishment to have to put the book away and get back to work. The day crawled as she constantly looked at the clock, waiting for her workday to end so she could get to her research.
~ ~ ~
Baylon was sitting on the steps outside the library watching the mortals when he saw her. She stood out amongst the humans like a star in the midnight sky.
Her beauty was undeniable, catching the attention of everyone around her - though she didn’t seem to notice. He liked the way her dark blond hair was cut short and trendy with it swept to the side in the front. A pixie cut, he thought he heard a human call it.
The mortal was tall and thin, with every curve just the right size. Her turquoise eyes were large, and there was a hint of innocence about them that drew him again and again.
She wore large
earrings that brought more attention to her beautiful oval face. Her brows were thin and arched delicately over her eyes. When she smiled, she dazzled. Her lips were just wide and full enough to be alluring.
He’d laughed when he heard her mumble “jerk” to the man who hadn’t held the door for her.
He knew immediately that she had Fae blood. It wasn’t just her beauty. There was an air about her that was as distinctive as a beacon. And he was happy he found her before the others.
Baylon waited outside the library for another glimpse of her. She walked out a short time later carrying a large book. She was entranced by it. Several people had to walk around her because she wasn’t looking where she was going— she was too intent on reading.
He wanted to see what kind of book was so interesting. When he put himself in her path, he never expected to look down at a tome all about the Fae.
His shock was quickly replaced with a blinding and penetrating desire when they bumped into each other. Then she looked up at him.
He was completely taken by her, tumbling into incredible turquoise eyes.
If he didn’t speak, he was liable to do something stupid—like kiss her. His gaze lowered to her lips, an ache gripping him, begging him to take her. To taste her.
“Sorry,” she said.
Her Scots accent was soft and lilting. Beautiful, just as she was. What was it about this half-Fae that held him enthralled so? “Must be an interesting book.”
Her gaze slowly raked over him, heating his blood to such a degree that he fisted his hands to keep from touching her. Didn’t she realize she was playing with fire?
If her gaze wasn’t so guileless, Baylon would have suspected she was proficient in teasing a man to such a degree. But it was the need in her own eyes that made his cock instantly hard.
“It is.”
He glanced down at the page she was reading. “Fae, huh?”
“Research,” she said breathlessly.
Warning bells went off in Baylon’s head. Research? Did she know she had Fae blood? It was time he found out more about her. Besides, he was going to make sure none of the other Reapers found her.