He was sorry he’d added that last tidbit of information since it instantly reminded him and the others of the very thing he was trying to avoid, particularly since Marlee seemed to take it as a personal affront and a direct, derogatory reference to the fact that she was human.
She sent him a look that was part hurt and part anger and finally smiled tightly. “I keep forgetting.” She got up. “I think I’ll just go with you. I need to stretch my legs.”
Dismay flickered through Eli. “Stretch them here,” he growled. It wasn’t the least bit tactful and he knew it, but he wasn’t in the mood to be fucking diplomatic!
Shrugging his shoulders at the laser glare he knew she’d focused on the middle of his back, he led the way. He began to relax when they’d passed the areas he was familiar with.
Despite his remarks to Marlee, it was dark enough fairly quickly to make it a strain even for him to see well. He wasn’t worried about finding his way out. He was confident that wouldn’t be a problem. He was a little uneasy about discovering a shaft leading down by stepping into it, however. The shadows were deep enough that it was difficult for him to tell until he was right up on them whether it was a deeper shadow or a hole.
The narrow passage he’d taken from the fountain seemed to go on forever without showing any signs of opening up to a larger cavern and he’d just decided that the ruse had been a waste of time after all when he found what he’d been looking for—a larger cavern.
Actually, he found a lot more than he’d been looking for or expected. He found their mother’s treasure room.
———
“He’s certainly a bear when he’d hungry!” Marlee muttered when Eli and the others left.
“He’s a beast when he’s horny,” Gabriel said dryly. Getting to his feet and stretching, he closed his eyes and transformed himself to human form.
Pleased to see he’d healed enough to shift forms, Marlee smiled at him, but she was still upset about Eli’s crankiness. It didn’t seem to her that it been long enough since they’d last had sex to account for that level of horniness!
“It’s your arousal he’s responding to,” John said coolly, nudging her away so that he, too, could get up, stretch and change forms.
Marlee felt her face redden with a mixture of indignation and embarrassment. “I’m not aroused!”
John and Gabriel exchanged a speaking glance. “I think I’ll make use of the pool,” John said after examining himself.
“I’ll join you,” Gabriel agreed. “I’m sticky.”
“I think I’ll go, too,” Marlee said, getting up.
“Stay here!” both of them growled at her in unison.
Marlee gaped at them in dismay for several moments before the shock wore off that they’d growled at her. She glared at their backs as they strode toward the back of the cave, but she couldn’t help but notice they had really nice backs—nice butts, too.
Nice everything actually.
“That’s exactly why you need to stay put,” Gabriel growled, throwing her a look over his shoulder. “Try to keep in mind that there are six horny dragons penned up with you.”
That comment was disconcerting enough to set her back for several moments, but she discovered when she’d thought it over that she wasn’t nearly as unnerved as she thought she ought to be. She didn’t know if that was because she trusted them or if it was because the idea of having all of them was actually a little titillating.
Alright, more than a little!
Maybe he was right and she was a little horny? She hadn’t thought so, but maybe it was residual survival syndrome—the need to reaffirm life after a near death experience, the search for comfort and reassurance?
She’d thought she’d done that when she’d hugged them all so tightly. She’d needed that.
None of them, including her, had been in any shape to even consider more, but she’d needed to hold on for all she was worth. If there hadn’t been so many to worry about, she thought she wouldn’t have been satisfied with just a hug. She would’ve wanted to cling until the shakes went away.
It didn’t necessarily have to be for that reason, though, she thought a little irritably. They didn’t have clothes to put on. That was probably enough by itself to keep fucking on their minds. It certainly was for her! No red-blooded female, she was sure, could spend the day confined in a small area with six naked hunks and not entertain fantasies.
She was still mulling that over when the objects of her thoughts returned and she discovered that the explorers had found something to distract all of them. Marlee surged to her feet and went to meet them as soon she saw what Eli was carrying. “You found that in the cave? What is it?”
Eli grinned at her a little shakily like someone who’d just won a million dollars. “Mother left it for us. In ancient times they called them a philosopher’s stone.”
Marlee frowned. It actually looked more like a bowling ball except it didn’t have finger holes. It was about the size of one anyway. It looked like it was made of glass, though. “I’ve never heard of one. What is it?”
Eli knelt and carefully set down on the stone floor. He flicked a look at her curious face and grinned again. “It’s like an ancient computer. It contains data.”
Marlee stared at him blankly for several moments and then stared at the ball again.
“You’re joking, right? It’s just glass. How could you tell it was ancient?”
“Actually it’s crystal and I know what it is because it spoke to me.”
Marlee gaped at him that time and then looked around at the faces of the others, more convinced than before that they’d hatched some kind of practical joke. Not that she’d ever noticed they had the tendency to do such a thing, but there was always a first time for everything.
She couldn’t see anything to indicate that she was right, though. They all looked excited, tense with expectation, but she didn’t get the sense that it had anything to do with her at all. “It spoke to you?”
He lifted a hand to her. Still convinced he had some sort of trick in mind, she took his hand. He tugged on her arm until she sat beside him. “Place your hands on it like this,” he said, showing her.
Frowning, she did what he said, waiting for the punch line.
“Do you hear it?”
“I don’t hear anything.”
Instead of laughing as she expected, he looked disconcerted. “Nothing?”
As unpleasant a thought as it was, it occurred to Marlee that maybe he actually could hear something and she couldn’t because she was human. “Maybe only dragons can hear it? You said your mother left it.”
He blinked at her and glanced around at his brothers.
“I have an idea,” Gabriel said abruptly, lifting his hand to her.
Reluctantly, she got up and moved to him. That time, though, Gabriel directed her to sit in his lap. Her suspicions immediately rose again, but she wasn’t against a game of whatever they had in mind. It might be fun!
He surprised her by settling his palm over her belly and placing one hand on the ball.
“Now you put your hand on the other side and just hold it there.”
Still wary, Marlee did as he instructed. Almost immediately, she felt an odd … almost like a prickling in her head. She thought at first that it was her scalp, but then she heard a voice in her head. She jerked her hand from the ball and it stopped.
She met Gabriel’s gaze. “What was that?”
“The language of dragons—my mother’s voice.”
She realized abruptly why they were all so excited—or thought she did. They hadn’t heard their mother’s voice since they’d been nothing but babies. She swallowed against the tightness of emotion that closed her throat with empathy for them. “Do you understand it?”
“A dragon never forgets anything,” Eli said, reminding her of what he’d said before.
“I heard it because of the baby,” Marlee said abruptly as that realization sank in.
Gabriel flicked a lo
ok at Eli and then John and shook his head ever so slightly. She wasn’t certain what that communication was all about but before she could ask, he placed her hand on the ball again. “Listen and you’ll understand it, too.”
She wasn’t convinced, but after a few moments, she discovered he was right. The words resolved into speech she could understand and the voice was definitely feminine. It made her feel strange to hear the woman’s voice explaining the history of dragons and their abilities.
It occurred to her forcefully after only a little while that the messages weren’t merely a general history at all. All of it had been for the sons she’d left behind. She was on the point of releasing her hold on the philosopher’s stone when the voice began to explain her trials in searching for a mate. She hesitated, but she’d been fascinated by the tale when she’d read it. The opportunity to hear it told from the viewpoint of the golden dragon herself was irresistible.
She explained how she’d taken the seed of man and made it her own so that she could produce her sons.
And then she explained that her sons would have to find mates among human women as she’d found her mates. They would first have to blood bond with her by sharing blood of dragon with the human female. That would make her womb receptive to their seed, would bring her into her fruitfulness for them, and produce the eggs they needed for their seed. Only then could they have off-spring of their own. She cautioned them, though, that they should seed the female and move on else they would become bound to her through the seed they’d sown.
Marlee jerked her hand from the crystal and surged to her feet. She discovered she couldn’t think of a thing to say once she had, however. After staring at John and Eli for several moments, she finally left the men to listen to their mother. The temptation to leave the cave for a breath of fresh air was strong, but she wasn’t so lost to her emotions to forget the danger of doing so. Instead, she left the main cavern and headed back to the hot pool.
They’d accidentally bred her and they’d accidentally bonded with her.
She discovered she couldn’t escape that fact even after she’d stripped and swum the pool enough laps to exhaust herself. Now she understood why they hadn’t tried to find her afterward!
She supposed it had to have been instinct, though. As much as she would’ve liked to blame them for something so that she could just be angry instead of so hurt she felt like dying, she was as convinced as she could be that they hadn’t known.
They’d blood bonded with her when they’d decided to save her life. She knew that had to be it and that meant that they’d fought the bear to save her and been wounded themselves.
She couldn’t think of any other way it had happened.
Eli had told her they didn’t understand themselves what had happened, that they hadn’t been in control any more than she had been.
She wanted to cry. She didn’t even understand why she felt like crying, but the urge was so strong that it was only the fact that she knew they’d hear her that kept her from yielding to it.
They hadn’t wanted her any of the time, she realized after a while. That was what made her want to cry. They’d just felt sorry for her because she was dying and tried to help. That was all it had ever been!
Except that she’d come back, looking for them, and they’d been snagged in the net they’d woven without even realizing they were.
She’d been snagged, too. She’d fallen in love with them—because the poor idiots didn’t have a clue that they’d gotten tangled in the pheromones—or whatever—that they’d inadvertently given her when they’d shared blood transfer.
That was what the tests had found! She was abruptly certain of it because she knew it was still there. That was why they found her damned irresistible! That was why every time she became aroused it drove them up the wall!
“Marlee?”
Marlee jerked all over at the sudden intrusion, whipping her head to look at Gabriel.
“It’s dusk. I think it’s safe for us to head home.”
Marlee swallowed with an effort against the fist sized lump in her throat and finally nodded. Getting up, she put the clothes on that she’d discarded to swim and followed Gabriel back to the main cavern. The others, she discovered, had already assumed their dragon forms.
Eli had the crystal tucked carefully in his arms and was standing at the cave entrance, surveying the landscape below.
Gabriel shifted and reached for her. “I’ll carry you.”
Marlee resisted. She didn’t want to get that close at the moment, even if he was in dragon form. He misunderstood. “I won’t drop you, baby. You’ll be safe.”
She thought for a moment that she was going to lose her hard won control and burst into tears. She swallowed convulsively several times and finally managed to tamp the urge.
The drop from the cave effectively diverted her mind. It felt like her belly floated up and wedged itself in her throat. By the time Gabriel caught the air currents with his wings and lifted the two of them higher, she was so tense she felt like a piece of petrified wood—except she was also shaking so badly her teeth began to rattle together.
It didn’t help that it was dark. There was enough light in the night sky to illuminate the terrain far below her and strike terror into her heart. She’d never been more glad of anything in her life than she was when Gabriel began to descend and she saw the cabin she’d come to think of as home.
Because it was where they lived.
As soon as Gabriel settled and released her, and she managed to get her legs to function, Marlee marched into the house and straight up to the room where she’d been staying, slamming the door behind her and locking it. Her clothes were filthy even if she wasn’t, but she didn’t care. She sprawled on the bed, burrowed her face into a pillow, and wept until she was exhausted enough to pass out.
The rattling of the door knob woke her. She lifted her head from the pillow groggily as it was followed by a knock. “What?”
“We fixed dinner. Come on down and eat.”
Marlee considered Gabriel’s invitation and decided her hunger had passed and she could make them think she was suffering without actually having to. “I’m not hungry.”
He didn’t say anything for moments, but he didn’t leave. “You should be. You haven’t had anything since yesterday.”
“Well, I’m not!”
“Open the door.”
“Why?”
“Marlee!” he growled. “Open the fucking door! I just got the damned thing fixed. I don’t feel like fixing it again!”
She glared at the panel. “Go away. I told you I wasn’t hungry! I’m tired.”
“Don’t be childish, Marlee! You need to eat for the babies’ sake even if you won’t do it for yourself!”
Her temper rose. “It isn’t going to hurt me or the baby to do without a meal!” Marlee snapped. “I’m not being childish, damn it!”
“What’s going on?” Eli asked Gabriel from the other side of the door.
“She won’t come out.”
“Quit sulking and come eat,” Eli growled.
“Asshole! I’m not sulking!”
“The food is getting cold,” John said irritably, joining Eli and Gabriel at the door.
“What’s going on?”
“Marlee locked the door and won’t come out.”
“Marlee?” John said gently.
“What?”
“Get your ass out here or I’m coming in!”
“For crying out loud!” Marlee said through gritted teeth. “I’m tired, damn it!”
“You’re tired because you haven’t eaten anything in a solid day and you lost a lot of blood, Marlee. What is going on with you?”
If he hadn’t decided on that approach she would’ve told him to go to hell. It occurred to her rather forcefully, though, that there wasn’t much point in hiding in the room if she made it clear she was hiding because she was so miserable. “Fine! I’ll change and be down in a few minutes.”
“If
I have come back to get you I’m going to break the fucking door down!” Eli threatened.
“Scaring her isn’t going to get her to come out,” Gabriel said tightly.
“I’m not scared!” Marlee snapped, rolling off the bed and stomping toward the dresser to find a clean change of clothes.
Apparently the opening and closing of the drawer satisfied them. She heard them turn and head back down the stairs again. She was tempted to push it and see if Eli really would break the door down, but she decided that actually might be a little bit scary besides making a mess and making it hard to shut the door. As Gabriel had pointed out, they’d just gotten it fixed from the first time. In any case, she was empty even if she didn’t especially feel hungry and he was right about the blood loss. Her hair had still been matted to her head with dried blood when she’d woken up.
Then, too, she didn’t know what she was going to do now that she knew the whole truth.
It didn’t change the fact that she was pregnant and one of them was the father. It didn’t change a whole lot of anything, in fact, except that she was miserable now when she’d happy before.
When she’d changed, she went downstairs and took the seat reserved for her. The food had cooled while she’d screwed around arguing and then dressing, but it was still wonderful!
She had to say one thing for them, they all knew how to cook!
Actually, they were so good at everything she thought she would probably have a hard time thinking of something they weren’t good at.
Which stood to reason considering they were probably two or three hundred years old, at least, even if they still looked like they were her age.
They aged well, too.
It flickered through her mind to wonder if they were still going to look the same way when she was so old she looked like a prune.
Probably, she thought glumly. It was small wonder they were so unhappy about being blood bound to her! If she hadn’t been a complete idiot it would’ve occurred to her before that they couldn’t possibly want to be tied to her. “This is good. Thank you whoever cooked,” she said when it finally dawned on her that she’d forgotten her manners.
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