by Anya Nowlan
***
“You’ve got to relax,” Apollo said sullenly, sinking into one of the big leather chairs that waited for them in their green room.
The younger Goldplains dragon reached for a beer in one of the several ice buckets set at strategic intervals in the room, uncapping it and taking a long swig. Alexander was half-surprised Apollo didn’t already have some crazed fangirl all over him. He must have been having a slow day.
“That’s not good for your vocal chords,” Alexander added mirthlessly, getting a singeing look from Apollo as he toweled off his messy wheaten hair.
His black wifebeater clung to his sweaty, muscled body like a second skin, outlining every hard ridge and dip. Thin gold chains hung around his neck and double gold cuffs were locked around his wrists – just a tiny offering of the Goldplains hoard, but enough to make him feel close to it.
Apollo propped his combat-booted feet up on a small table, leaning back on the couch and taking a long, luxuriating sip of the ice-cold drink – doubtlessly to piss Alexander off. He only smirked. Apollo was always the rebellious one. Though that was a lot to say about a duo of brothers making their vast fortune as some of the most beloved rock stars in the world.
“I’m sure that’s our biggest problem,” Apollo murmured in reply as the green room door opened with a bang, making way for a disheveled and annoyed Michelle, her red hair as a crown of thorns around her head.
The forty-something manager and also the only person on their crew, who knew the brothers’ secret, hesitated for a moment at the door, her gaze locked on Apollo. Alexander glanced in the direction she was staring, and he and his brother shared a private smirk. Yes, a shirtless, sweaty, gold-covered Apollo was enough to make any woman stumble, even one as used to their random bouts of nakedness as Michelle was.
“You two have some nerve,” Michelle started finally, regaining her iron composure and slamming the door behind her. “Where do you two get off on leaving almost a hundred thousand people screaming for an encore and then not giving it to them? What the fuck?”
Alexander picked up a beer from a nearby bucket and slung it to her, Michelle catching and uncapping it in one smooth move. She had the striking, unnerved gray eyes of a hawk hunting for its prey, never missing a single thing, and her demeanor was almost always that of extreme efficiency. Alexander liked her, even if she was a bit overbearing at times. Dragons above, he and Apollo both knew they needed a bit of reining in and herding around at times. And, being the heir of a fairly impressive record label, Imprint Records, there was literally nothing Apollo and Alexander could do that would shock her – even if they were dragons.
“That’s what I was saying,” Apollo grumbled darkly, bottoming out his beer and reaching for another.
Clad in his ripped jeans and larger, thicker gold chains and countless strings of gleaming gold bracelets, the younger Goldplains twin looked exactly the part of a Class A rock god.
His longish blonde hair fell in tangles on his neck and reached his shoulders, some strands sticking to his face and curling around the gold studs he wore in his ears. Next to the more subdued Alexander, Apollo looked and acted the part of lead vocalist with unerring confidence. It was no skin off of Alexander’s back – he preferred to remain slightly in the background, directing things while his brother got to play the big rock genius.
“I wasn’t feeling it anymore,” Alexander said noncommittally, unscrewing the cap off of a water bottle and taking a long sip.
He wasn’t fooling Michelle, though, that much he could see from the way she arched her brow and pursed her lips.
“So it had nothing to do with the light not reaching the entire crowd?” she asked, her voice softer than the words she was delivering.
Alexander didn’t say anything.
“Well, it is one of the biggest arenas we’ve ever played,” Apollo said.
That was true enough. But Alexander knew it couldn’t just be that. For the longest time, he’d expected it to start happening as they grew older, but a piece of him had hoped it wouldn’t. There were far too many reasons to count as to why he had hoped that, but the fact was that they were losing their powers, and it was getting faster and more noticeable by the day.
The Goldplains were an old dragon family and the fourth remaining kin in Treasure Lane. Historically, the firstborn sons of the Alpha mother were always twins and always healing dragons, as were Alexander and Apollo. Their ability was to soothe and fix, to right a wrong, both physical and mental.
Dragons had rarely lent their help to humans in the old days, but the 21st century came with its own demands. To keep the family fortune from dwindling, Alexander and Apollo had started a band when they were just teenagers, and it had exploded into a global phenomenon, commanding billions in revenue and keeping the Goldplains’ coffers happy and healthy.
It wasn’t just the music they played that got them the attention and adoration of their fans. While both Alexander and Apollo were brilliantly musical and could play countless instruments, it was a healthy dose of their dragon magic that really pushed them into stardom. Their presence alone was healing, but when they played, the whole crowd felt it. It was the tiniest sliver of their power spread out over everyone in the crowd, elating them, bringing them higher than anything else they could have experienced.
Like a hit of pure acid, the Gold Dragons’ music changed what the listener could take from the experience, warping their entire worldview for the duration of that one concert. A slice of heaven, as one reviewer had called it. But lately, not all was good in heaven.
“It’s not just that, and you know it,” Alexander grumbled, falling into a chair near Apollo’s.
Sharing a look with his brother, Alexander was struck again by how similar and how very different they were at the same time. Near identical gold dragon twins, they were far stronger together than they were apart, but something had never quite clicked right between them.
Though they worked as an unfaltering team, Alexander had always felt a slight disconnect with his boisterous, wild brother. Where Alexander wanted to plot and plan, Apollo wanted to dive in headfirst. Where Alexander wanted to hang back and let things unfold at their own pace, Apollo wanted to grab the situation by the reins and direct it himself.
“I was wondering if you two were having problems,” Michelle said with a sigh, sitting on the armrest of Alexander’s couch. “I saw that the wave didn’t go to the end. I didn’t know if I should say something about it,” she said with a tight, worried smile.
Alexander nodded. He knew what it was, and so did Apollo, but neither of them had wanted to face it.
“Same thing happened in Chicago. And New York. Every big arena we play, it becomes more obvious. We’re losing it,” Alexander said gloomily.
His dragon stirred within him but didn’t fight his assessment. How could he, the evidence was plain to see. While they were still plenty powerful, judging by the way they had recently patched up both Devon Bluewing and Cillian Greenmeadow, things were taking a sharp turn for the worse.
“And why is that?” Michelle queried. A silence fell between the brothers, Apollo and Alexander eyeing each other quietly.
Say it, Alexander urged Apollo wordlessly. Their dragons could communicate well enough, but it wasn’t quite as easy as humans. In fact, they didn’t strictly even want to – one thing both of them agreed on was that their minds should remain their own.
“It’s because we’re getting old,” Apollo said with a smirk, and Alexander chuckled. Sure, that was one way of looking at it.
“He’s not completely wrong.”
Michelle quirked a brow again, obviously not satisfied with the explanation. With a sigh, Apollo resigned himself to elaborating on the matter.
“Alpha twins aren’t whole before they find their third.”
“A third?” Michelle queried.
Both of the Goldplains nodded, and in a fit of uncharacteristic sullenness, Alexander plucked a beer out of the ice bucket and crac
ked it open. Dragons above, just listening to what he knew to be the truth made him want to drink.
“Yes, a third. We have what is called an Alpha triad. Essentially, we need to find a mate to complete us, to help our powers reach their full potential. Otherwise, if we do not marry, if we do not find a mate, our powers will slowly grow weaker and weaker until there’s nothing left.”
“So all we need to do is get you two laid?” Michelle scoffed, looking incredulous.
In her tight dark blue jeans and Gold Dragons tee, she looked like the fairy godmother of rock, ready to solve their every problem.
Not so easy, Alexander thought to himself, shaking his head.
“Not just laid,” Apollo said with a grin. “Get laid by a woman we both want equally and could share for the rest of our lives.”
Michelle fell quiet again, her mouth slightly agape. When she finally closed it, she let out a long, drawn-out sigh that perfectly mimicked Alexander’s feelings on the whole thing.
“Well, that’s pretty much impossible, then,” she said.
Alexander was almost certain that their manager was right on the money. What kind of a magical creature of a woman would be perfect for both him and Apollo?
CHAPTER THREE
Jade
What are you so damn nervous about? You’re just going to go to two dragons, who happen to be the biggest rock stars on the planet, and tell them you know exactly what they are. It’s not like they’re going to breathe fire on you and make you disappear.
Jade gulped.
She was hanging on to the strap of her bass guitar’s case, letting her hands nervously wrung its fine stitches. Casting a look around herself, she quickly determined that she was one of maybe two women in the veritable sea of men, all toying with their literal and figurative instruments and waiting to be called in for their audition. This was the biggest thing that had happened to the Texas rock scene in… well, maybe forever, and anyone capable of stringing a bass had gathered for their chance at becoming a member of the Gold Dragons.
The news of the open audition had come somewhat abruptly after a killer concert held in San Antonio just the night before. Jade had also been at the show, and the only thing that had dampened her enjoyment, other than the fact that she was in the process of running away from some very powerful people, was the occasional beat missed by the band’s bassist. In retrospect, she had to be thankful for it.
She’d just needed to see them one more time before she dared approach the enigmatic Goldplains twins with her somewhat whacky tale and confronting them on being ancient shifters with magical powers.
The more she thought about it, the more ridiculous it sounded, but she knew in her heart that she was on to something. She’d seen their golden wave the night before, and it wasn’t the first time she’d seen magic like that. In fact, that was the whole reason she was there – knowing a tiny bit too much.
A thin line of sweat trickled down her neck and made the hairs on her back stand up. There was another killer heat wave going through Texas, and it was no joke trying to sit around for hours on end in a cramped, musty waiting room with a hundred rockers, who smelled like various stages of not giving a fuck. She wasn’t even that bothered by the smell or the closeness of the bodies, having had to sit through plenty of auditions in her day, but this one was going to be different. She was sure this one would either make or break her.
Jasmine van der Kamp – better known as Jade in a small circle of mostly progressive rock artists, who bothered to know a few more people than just the singers and guitarists – was in deep shit. There was no better way of putting it. She had to physically restrain herself from glancing over her shoulder every few seconds, as if the big bad wolves that were after her would just suddenly show up in a packed audition hall and drag her off.
Dragons, she corrected herself darkly, reaching into a side pocket on her guitar case and taking out a pick.
She flicked it between her fingers, the matte black pick looping gracefully over her pale skin. Her jet black hair was pulled back into a loose pony tail, and she wore whitewashed blue jeans, Converse sneakers and a ragged AC/DC tee that had served as her lucky shirt through most of her auditions. Of course, that didn’t mean that she got past the first round most of the time, but she was willing to take all the help she could get – even if that meant trying to leech some magic from Brian Johnson.
She watched idly as another tall and gangly bassist stalked out of the room the Gold Dragons were holding the auditions in, raucous laughter that she could recognize as Apollo’s following him all the way until the door slammed shut behind him. He didn’t seem half as amused as Apollo. Jade cringed a bit in commiseration. He wasn’t the first one to leave in a hurry, ridiculed by the loud and almost always difficult Apollo Goldplains.
She knew that the Goldplains had always been very picky with choosing their band mates, resulting in more than one heated and very public fallout. Jade wasn’t entirely certain that some of them hadn’t been more for show than anything else. After all, everybody loved some good dramatics every now and then, right?
“Jade van der Kamp,” a familiar, small but strict looking woman called, teetering at the doorway.
Jade recognized her instantly as Michelle Ferren, the architect behind the success of not only the Gold Dragons, but a plethora of other bands all too awesome to name. She hesitated for a moment, fumbling the guitar pick and having to dive on the floor to find it.
“Jade?” Michelle called again, an obvious hint of annoyance in her voice.
“Coming, coming!” Jade yelped, scrambling up on her feet and grabbing her bass, almost knocking a fellow rocker over in the process.
No time to waste! She had an ass to make of herself, and the looks she was getting from the rest of the grizzled crowd told her that they were expecting her to do just that.
“About time,” Michelle murmured as Jade pushed past her, feeling awkwardly commonplace next to the casual but completely in control Michelle.
Jade stepped into the big audition room, leather couches lined up in front of a small raised stage, sporting a mess of gear that must have been piled there from the previous night’s concert. There was also one separate speaker and volume controls she could plug her bass into. But that wasn’t what stopped her dead in her tracks.
Fuck, she thought, feeling like a deer caught in the headlights. I knew they were hot, but did they have to be so hot!?
Her gaze travelled from one Grecian God of a man to the other, the Goldplains brothers sprawled out on the couches and looking somewhat worn by the whole process.
Alexander, the older of the two and the lead guitarist of the band, was dressed in a white button-up and light-colored slacks, giving him an almost effortless look that still accentuated his wide shoulders and chiseled body. Apollo, the lead singer and the wilder of the two, looked like he had just stepped off the stage a second ago, his lion’s mane of hair falling to his shoulders and his blue eyes considering her with primal interest.
Jade felt rooted in place, like the ground had opened up and latched down around her legs, making her unable to move. It wasn’t easy facing rock royalty, especially when she knew that they were hiding a secret no one would expect, and they were her only ticket to safety.
Well, the fact that they were both really, really fucking hot didn’t help any bit either.
“Come on, girl, show us what you’ve got. We don’t have all day,” Michelle said, nudging her towards the stage.
Just then, Alexander looked up, and Jade’s eyes met with his, her cool greens and his warm blues locking for a second that seemed to go on forever. Something stirred inside of her, making her knees weak and her breath catch in her throat. When her eyes drifted to Apollo, she thought she’d just collapse to the floor and ask them both to take her right there and then.
Apollo’s gaze burned through her, making her wet and wanting within a fraction of a second. Suddenly, she understood all of those fan girls who were willing to
go through fire and ice just to be at one of the Gold Dragons’ shows. How couldn’t she? They’d only have to ask and she might just throw herself at them.
Snap out of it. Play it cool, dammit! Or at least play something!
Jade averted her eyes and took a few determined steps towards the raised platform. She had been planning on having some witty banter with the brothers, exchanging jokes and maybe complimenting them on their show last night, but she couldn’t do it. The words just wouldn’t come. She’d watched them all night, but somewhere far from the center of the crowd, undulating back and forth with the adoring masses and feeling every bit as taken by their powerful sound as the people around her.
But she’d been too far to make out their faces or see the miniscule details of their body language – the way Alexander’s chin squared as he leant back in the seat or how Apollo’s eyes twinkled with mischief as he exchanged a look with his brother before his attention centered on her again.
It was like being caught between twin beams, both pulling her with equal force, and she wasn’t entirely sure she could withstand the pressure.
“Quiet one, isn’t she,” Michelle commented.
Jade loosely noted that the older woman sat down on the armrest of one of the couches, flipping through the sheets of paper in her arms.
“I like them a bit quiet,” Apollo noted with laughter in his voice.
Jade couldn’t help but grin a little at that. He wasn’t making fun of her, and she appreciated the banter. She fished her heavy bass out of the case and set it aside. Plugging it in, she made a few experimental plucks and fiddled with the levels until she had them where she wanted them.
“What are you going to play for us?” Michelle asked, sounding a bit impatient.
Jade looked up at her and smiled, feeling like she had stepped into a force field now that the bass was around her neck and her hands safely on the strings. Whatever happened, she could deal with it now.