by Celeste Raye
Max had come for Heather after all; maybe Blake would show up and ask her to go in that roundabout way that Max had asked Heather to decamp to that world.
Or not.
Blake was horrifically stubborn, and she had been pretty clear that she hadn’t wanted him. Regret threatened to topple her right onto the dirty floor. Why, oh why had she been so cruel?
Because I was scared.
That was the real answer. She had been scared of love and of loving him. She knew what he wanted, what he needed, and she was afraid of being a mother to any creature, even a human one. She was really scared to be a mother to a weredragon.
But motherhood, in general, terrified her.
Her own childhood had been so bleak and strained, and she had never really known any stability at all. She was afraid she would mess up whatever child she had, and with good reason. She had never had any really good examples of what a parent did or did not do, and all she had ever known was the crushing harshness of a mother who had never gotten over her husband leaving her with two kids she did not really want to raise.
Christy’s shoulders slumped. It was a lot to admit to herself. Even if she could find a way back to him, she might not be right for him. He had to have kids. His line was nearly extinct, and he was so set on keeping it alive. What happened if she could not bring herself to have kids?
She would find herself back in her own world, because how could she stay knowing she could not have him, or she would have to stay there watching him love someone else, someone who would have those children he wanted so desperately.
There was another option. She might have a child or two, prove to be as lousy a mom as her mom was and ruin everyone’s lives.
Yeah. That was the option that had made her run and be so mean when he had told her she could stay if she wanted to. She had known even then that he was offering her a chance at a life with him, she just had not known why.
There was still that one very large question hanging over her mind. Did Blake want her or did he just want her because she could bear children? Did he love her, or just love that he could finally have the children that would carry on his line with her?
Her phone battery icon came on, warning her that she was about to lose her flashlight. Well, that figured, and she had already lost her nerve so she turned away and headed back toward the front door.
She managed to get the warped and heavy thing open a crack. She peered outside and then, seeing nobody very near, she quickly stepped out into the sunshine and fresh air, taking a big deep gulp of it to clear her lungs.
Her head did not clear though. Her every emotion felt magnified and so did her tension. She wanted to go back to him. Now that she had actually walked through that door, she could not deny that anymore, and she knew that everything she had held at bay, the fact that she loved him, that she wanted him, that she needed him, was all going to cause hurt, and it would all be hers.
Because there was no way that she was willing to wreck a child’s life. She would. She would be a lousy parent, and she would mess everything up. She would mess up Blake, their kid or kids, and she would even mess up her own heart.
Better to just forget that she had ever gone to that house at all, that it even existed.
Way better.
The worst part of it all was that the one person she knew she could talk to about all of that was Heather, and Heather was over there, living her…she stopped walking. “Oh for goodness sake.” She reversed her footsteps. “This is stupid as hell. I should not do this. I’m probably going to die. But she’s my bestie, and if I go to see her, I’m not going to see him, right? But maybe that is what I need. To see him without him thinking I am there to see him. Like hey, I’m just here to see my bestie, never mind me.”
She stopped. Indecision kept halting her and then sending her forward. She groaned and ran her hands down the sides of her face. Was she really doing this? Was she really going to go there and…and what? Scope out whether or not he still wanted her and if she wanted him?
It looked like it. It was dumb, yes, but it was far better than her earlier plan, which was basically just go, throw herself at him, and hope for the best.
The house looked even worse. She eyed it carefully. Had she done something by going in it the first time? Like weakened it or something? Or was it just that she knew that she would have to go back in there again knowing just how bad and very dangerous it was?
She took a long look up and down the street and then she went forward. She didn’t have much power on her phone, and so her flashlight was weak, and the light didn’t illuminate much beyond her feet and the area right area right around them.
She scuttled forward a few feet and then she stopped There was nothing there! Just an empty wall! She turned around and went into the next room. Every room just led her to blank walls and no way past them.
She was on the verge of giving up, about to just try to find her way back out, but she spotted a small door, set right under a staircase, that she had not seen before. She opened it to see a narrow hallway. She paused. Was this yet another dead end? It might be, but she had to at least try it. Then she could go home and say she had tried, anyway. She stepped down that hall, her phone growing dimmer with each second. She looked back over her shoulder, but the darkness was growing. She couldn’t see much. She did, as she held the phone up in an attempt to see in front of her, finally spot a second door.
She reached for that knob. It gave a rusty scream and then it opened just as the light on her phone went totally out. She didn’t need the phone; there was glowing but faint light emanating from the wall opposite the door she had stepped through.
Her heart beating triple time now, she went forward and rested her hands against that wall. She whispered, “Come on. My bestie is over there, and the love of my life might be over there. How about I catch a single break?”
She stood there, her heart beating hard. She half-expected a door to suddenly come into focus, to throw itself open and allow her to exit from her world into that one she was trying to get to, but nothing happened. She tapped at the wall, but all she got for her efforts was a face full of plaster dust and what was likely a spider.
It was the last that made a little shriek come flying up from her throat. She shuddered all over and then tapped her fingers against the walls again. Nothing. Just the unmoving wall and her, standing there like a big idiot.
“Ugh!” She reached out, hand flapping as she tried to find a way to turn around, to go back. Whatever that light was, it didn’t seem to be leading her anywhere. It was probably some freak refraction of light leaking in from a broken exterior wall, she decided. That what she was doing was futile was clear. She stepped away from the wall, disappointment crashing through her. Tears came to her eyes. She really did miss Heather, but more than that, she truly wanted to see Blake again.
“I’m a fool. He’s so wrong for me. My whole life’s here, and I want that life but…but how will I know we won’t work if I don’t even try? How can I try if I can’t get there? Did I ruin it by coming back? Am I locked out forever?”
There was a low groaning sound from somewhere. Her skin prickled and the hair stood up on her arms and at the back of her neck. Uneasiness hit. Was she about to get killed in some sort of implosion?
She took a hasty step back. The floor felt weak and soggy, like her shoes were about to go through it at any second. “Shit!”
She poised to run but before she could, the wall before her crumbled away. Christy stood there, staring at the sight of a long and empty field. Her breath jerked in and out of her mouth. Her legs trembled. Her body shook so hard she was afraid she was about to just fall right on her face. Instead, she started walking forward and back into Blake’s world.
Chapter Thirteen
Blake stood on the grass, his eyes turned upward to the blue skies. The war with the Orcs was going to happen. He knew it. Part of him looked forward to it. He was spoiling for a fight, and he knew that the reasons were ro
oted in his being unhappy about Christy’s refusal to stay. That hurt had only worsened when Max had returned, all smiles and triumph, with Heather.
Blake kicked a loose rock, his mind going back to Christy. She was so damn beautiful, and stubborn. He knew going after her would just end with him returning alone. The last thing he wanted to do was have to sink back into his world in ignominious defeat, so he had not tried that route.
His shoulders tensed as he studied the pattern of the clouds running above him. The Orcs were vast in numbers, and it seemed that their numbers grew all the time, unlike the number of dragons and humans.
Evil. It just got bigger and darker, all the time.
His sigh was part irritation, part weariness. The fight would probably kill him, but so what? He was the last of a line that would be extinct soon anyway. He’d tried to get a human mate and look where that had gotten him. Max had a mate, and all he had was the memory of a woman he didn’t just want to mate with, but to love and live with.
A stubborn, impossible, crazy woman who wanted absolutely nothing to do with him. It would be hard to have a romance with her since she hated him and since she had left him to go back to the world she was from and wanted to be a part of.
His heart hurt. He lifted a hand to his chest and took it away, looking down at his fingers. He truly expected to see blood, but there was none. He turned away, meaning to go back to the castle, but he stopped. Had he just heard…? He listened, but there was no other sound. Must have been the wind. Just as he started forward, a faint but desperate scream came from below the face of the tall cliffs that the castle sat upon.
His wings sprouted from his back as the change took him. Whatever was happening down there, he had to help. That was a human screaming, and he could tell it was a female. He soared higher and then dove downward.
She was up against the rocks and throwing them too. The rocks pelted the approaching Orcs but weren’t slowing them down one bit. His heart nearly burst from his chest when he saw a familiar head of bright hair.
Christy? Here? And holding off Orcs with rocks?
Goddammit!
He swept down, wings beating and fire shooting from his nose and mouth. One hapless Orc caught the brunt of that fire and went down, dead before it had a chance to scream. Christy pried another large rock loose from the pile and hurled it at an Orc who had gotten a little too close. The scent of blood filled the air, and the Orc staggered backward, one hand to its bleeding forehead. The others, less bold now that there was a dragon in their midst, fell back but didn’t retreat fully.
The battle was on, and now it was even more important. That was Christy he was trying to save and he would either die with her or help her escape. Period. He swung into the fray, claws gleaming and teeth snapping at limbs. Christy kicked an Orc in his crotch and then beat at its head with the bloody rock she held. Time stood still. He couldn’t get past the Orcs to get to her, and she could not get to him either. They had to battle their way through it; there was no other way. He blew fire again, singing the Orcs closest to him and sending a few more running for cover.
Christy was screaming, but now there was rage and an instinct for survival echoing in that scream. He grabbed an Orc and tossed it over his shoulder. It hit the edge of the cliff and tumbled away down it. Christy saw a chance and ducked past a grinning creature and raced toward him. Blake, seeing her coming, lifted a wing. Christy had two more rocks, one in each hand, and she threw them just as she reached his side. He grabbed her in his mouth and took flight, only going a short distance, just far enough to set down for a moment. He said, “Get on my back.”
She did, and fast. They took off again just as the Orcs, clearly pissed off now, charged back toward them. He got higher in the sky, letting his massive wings take them away from the Orcs.
He had so many questions, but they would have to wait. He settled down again just below and beside the castle. He changed and asked, “You missed me?”
Christy yanked her hair off her face. Her eyes blazed. She shot out, “Don’t flatter yourself. I missed Heather. I decided to visit my bestie.”
Ouch. He lifted an eyebrow and managed to say, “Oh. Well, you should have been more careful.”
Christy glowered at him. Goddammit, how did she manage to look so beautiful when she was angry? He had to hold his body rigid to keep himself from going to her and planting a kiss right on her full and ripe lips. He went stiff just then, and he turned away, hoping she would not see the erection tenting out of his trousers. “You could at least say thank you.”
She fell in step beside him. She said, “I had it under control.”
“You were fighting off a dozen Orcs with a handful of rocks.” That floored him. She had been fighting off that many Orcs with nothing but rocks. That she had done so was a huge testament to just how brave she was. He peeked over at her face. “And you’re welcome.”
She looked at him and then her shoulders slumped. “Okay, you are right. They were going to kill me. I get it. It was stupid. How was I supposed to know I would come through there and right into a bunch of Orcs? And thank you. Happy now?”
No, he was not happy. He wanted her more than ever. Her sudden arrival back into his life had proven two things. She was just as perfect for him as he had thought she was, and she still wanted absolutely nothing to do with him.
She stopped walking. Her hand caught his arm and flames of a whole different type went running through him. She asked, “How much time’s gone by here since I left?”
He said, “Two weeks. In your world, I guess that’s different.”
It was. For all he knew, in her world she’d lived years since the last time he’d seen her. Had she met someone, fallen in love, gotten married maybe? Had children?
Her fingers were bare, and she didn’t look like her body had changed but that was not a certainty. He asked, “So…so you came back to see Heather, huh?”
“Yup.” She started walking again. His desire only grew when he watched her go. The sight of her ass in those tight jeans was something he could have looked at all day long. Then he remembered the Orcs, and where he had found her. They were definitely in dragon territory. He had to talk to Max, and very soon.
They entered the castle. Heather sat at a table and Christy ran to her. He watched their happy reunion with a heavy heart. Why weren’t the arms she wanted to fling herself into?
He signaled Max, and the two of them stepped into the hallway. Blake quickly filled him in on how he had found Christy and as he did, Max’s brow clouded over. “Orcs were so close?”
“Yeah.” He sagged against the wall. “If I hadn’t heard her…” The words trailed off. He could not even form them. The sheer weight of it all, that she might have died out there and he never would have known it, that he might have gotten there too late to help her…all those things made his blood run cold. He tried to shunt that aside; that the Orcs had been there at all was clearly a bigger concern, but all he could see in his mind’s eye was her being killed by them, and his blood ran frost cold and then it began to boil.
Max asked, “She held them off with rocks?”
“Yeah.” The word was barely above a whisper. “What if…what if…”
Max’s hand caught his shoulder, squeezed down hard. “It didn’t happen. She is alive and here and safe. Thanks to you.”
Blake found he could smile. “To hear her tell it, I was hardly any help at all.”
Max snickered. “I bet that’s just what she said. That woman’s crazy.”
“In the best way. Now if only she were crazy about me.” Blake peeked into the hall to see Heather talking animatedly and Christy laughing. His heart gave off another powerful thump. “But that’s never going to happen. She might not outright hate me, but she sure doesn’t want anything to do with me.”
Well, she had that one night, but she had said it was NSA, something he still had not puzzled out in his head. He just knew it meant she wanted to sleep with him, that once anyway, but after th
at, she was pretty much done. He asked, “You want to get the others into the council room?”
Max nodded. “Yes, we should. You know, maybe if you weren’t so busy romancing her womb, she might see you for you.”
Blake grimaced. “You said that before.”
Max rolled his eyes. “You did not take my advice either. Women love to be cherished, to be…look, even she-dragons want to be loved for who they are. You went after her like she was just a baby-making machine for you. Maybe if you tried to show her that you care about her, and just her, she might change her mind about not wanting you. I mean, she does not really even know you either.”
He was right. Blake did not want to admit it, but Max was right. He had chased her because she was the woman who might be able to bear his children. Had he taken the time to get to know her and let her get to know him?
Nope.
Not at all.
He scratched a finger along his chin as he thought about that. He did care for her, and not just because he desperately needed children. Christy was everything a mate should be. But he had never told her that. He had also been so busy trying to impress her into bearing his kids that he had not let the mask he wore so often slip off, had not tried to reveal who he was behind the mask he wore so much of the time.
He let himself admit, right then and to himself, that he was in love with her. He didn’t just want her, he loved her. He took a deep breath. There was a lot to handle right now: the Orcs, and the humans who needed protection from them to name but two.
But he also had to formulate a plan. Not just one that would charm one certain stubborn human out of her pants either. One that would show her he was in love with her.
It was time for romance, dragon style.
Chapter Fourteen
Heather said, “I can’t believe you came! Oh, thank God Blake was there to …”
Christy wagged a finger in her face. “Don’t you dare say Mr. Lend-Me-Your-uterus saved my life.”