Tempting the Dryad
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Tempting the Dryad
A FADA NOVEL BOOK 3
REBECCA RIVARD
Wild Hearts Press
Table of Contents
THE FADA SHAPESHIFTER SERIES
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 SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
EPILOGUE
Copyright
THE FADA SHAPESHIFTER SERIES
Prepare to be ensnared…
The fada.
Shapeshifters created during Dionysus’s infamous bacchanals from a mix of fae, human and animal genes.
They’re ruthless, untamed—
and irresistible to the one person fated to be their mate.
Welcome to the world of the Fada Shapeshifters. Tempting the Dryad is Book 3 in a series of sexy fantasy/paranormal romances set in my fada/fae world.
The series so far:
The Rock Run River Fada (a clan of river-based shifters)
Seducing the Sun Fae: A Fada Novel, Book 1 (Dion and Cleia’s story)
Claiming Valeria: A Fada Novel, Book 2 (Rui and Valeria’s story)
Tempting the Dryad: A Fada Novel, Book 3 (Tiago and Alesia’s story)
The Baltimore Earth Fada (a clan of earth-based shifters)
Books 4–6
Coming soon—Jace, Marjani and Adric’s stories!
And look for “Lir’s Lady,” a sexy novelette featuring an Irish sun fae and her shapeshifter lover.
To stay informed and be eligible for special giveaways, ARCs and sneak peeks of upcoming novels, sign up for my newsletter: http://eepurl.com/8hWFH
CHAPTER ONE
The argument erupted out of nowhere.
One moment the Rock Run clan was eating breakfast, their conversation a low murmur in the spacious cavern that served as their dining hall, and the next moment Cleia was on her feet and slapping her hands on the plank oak table.
“I will not,” she told her mate, her lovely face set.
Dion, lord and alpha of the clan, rose as well, facing her across the table. He placed his own hands on the surface and leaned closer. “Excuse me?” he asked in a soft voice that sent a tremor up the spine of everyone nearby.
Everyone but Cleia, that is. A queen in her own right—of the neighboring sun fae, and indeed, of all seven sun fae clans—she allowed Dion to push only so far and then she shoved right back.
“I said,” she repeated, “that I will not sit at home sewing baby clothes or whatever you think a pregnant woman should be doing. I’m going and that’s final. Artan and Grady”—her longtime bodyguards—“can come if it makes you happy. Although they are not going to be in the negotiation room.”
Dion speared his fingers through his shoulder-length black hair. “It will not make me happy,” he gritted. “Those Baltimore earth shifters are sneaky filhos da puta. I don’t trust them worth a damn.”
“Look, I know you’ve had trouble with them in the past.”
That’s an understatement, Tiago thought from his seat at the next table. The Baltimore shifters wanted Rock Run and had done everything short of all-out war to get it.
“But there’s no harm in listening to what they have to say,” Cleia continued. “If they try anything funny, I can always ’port myself out of there.”
His brother snorted. “You can’t teleport instantly. And in the few seconds it takes, they could have a knife in your heart.”
“But why would the earth shifters want to hurt me? We sun fae aren’t their competition—you are. We have something Lord Adric wants and we’re more than happy to take his money. We’re not using that quartz for anything.”
“Damn it, Cleia, you know what the man is like. He doesn’t negotiate, he takes. He’ll sweet talk you into letting his men on your lands and then steal the damn quartz right from under your nose.”
“Then I’ll ask for a large payment up front.”
“And if he’s using it as a cover to infiltrate and then attack you? You’re going to have to let your wards down to allow them to enter.”
“I’ll hire your men as guards. Everyone knows they’re the best there is.”
“Claro.” He flicked his fingers in a dismissive gesture. “Mas—”
Dion had slipped into Portuguese, never a good sign. Rosana, Tiago and Dion’s younger sister, grimaced from where she sat across from Tiago.
He looked at Cleia, wondering that she didn’t sense her danger, but she spoke over top of her mate. “It’s a win-win situation. Rock Run will get a hefty fee for protecting us and my clan will—” Her words ended in a small shriek as Dion rounded the table in two big steps and scooped her up in his arms.
“Basta. No more arguments.” He strode toward an exit.
“Put. Me. Down.” Cleia slammed an elbow into his chest.
Tiago winced. That had to hurt.
Across the table, Rosana pressed her lips together, trying not to laugh.
“Acalme-te.” Dion brought a big hand up and smacked his mate’s round bottom.
Uh-oh. The entire room held its collective breath.
Cleia’s breath hissed out. Her exotic amber eyes narrowed. “You like water so much. Why don’t you go jump in a pond—as a slimy green frog?”
Her lips moved. Magic shimmered in the air.
“Like hell,” growled Dion. His mouth descended on hers in a hard kiss, preventing her from completing the spell.
The men hooted, while the women yelled encouragement to Cleia. “Keep fighting, my lady. Don’t let him win.”
But the two had disappeared in the direction of their quarters.
The adult members of the clan exchanged knowing smiles. Dion and the sun fae queen had a fiery mating, but they were crazy in love. Everyone knew how this latest fight would end.
Only Tiago felt no mirth. His face blank, he slapped butter on the delicious and entirely blameless roll on his plate. It had been nearly five years since his oldest brother had mated with Cleia. The pair had at last conceived a much-wanted child, news that had been received with great joy and much celebrating by both clans.
Cleia was elated and his badass brother couldn’t stop smiling.
And Tiago was eaten up by jealousy.
Because he’d had her first. She’d lured Tiago with a glamour, keeping him for one wild, never-to-be-forgotten week, then tossing him back like a too-small fish when she learned he was barely twenty-one, a child to a fae of Cleia’s two hundred-plus years.
But he hadn’t been a child even then, and he certainly wasn’t one now, five years later. He was a full-grown fada male, and he had all the needs that ran in the hot, part-animal blood of his kind.
From the bench beside him, his otter friend Fausto tilted his silky brown head and regarded Tiago, his small mouth pursed with concern. Lifting onto his hind legs, the otter snatched a walnut from a bowl on the table, cracked it between strong jaws and offered Tiago the meat.
Tiago gravely accepted the offering.
“Muito obrigado, meu amigo.” Although he and his friends spoke English among themselves, his Gift for communicating with animals worked best when he spoke in Portuguese, the clan’s native tongue and the language the older people still preferred.
Fausto chittered cheerfully in reply. As far as he was concerned, food was the cure for just about anything.
Rosana leaned across the table. “Be happy for them,” she murmured. “Dion was alone for a long time before he met her.”
His jaw clenched. “I know.”
His eldest brother had changed since he’d mated with Cleia. He smiled more easily, had learned to delegate authority so he could spend more time with his family. Tiago had been too young to realize it, but Dion had been lonely. A family wasn’t enough—a man needed a woman.
And damn if he needed his younger sister to point it out to him.
Tiago came abruptly to his feet. He had to get out of there. Once it had been enough simply to be around Cleia. To talk with her, laugh with her, gaze on her long golden body.
But now, he wanted more, his beast a restless pressure beneath his skin. At night he burned for her, tossing on the mattress as he spun dark fantasies in which he stole her from his brother. Fantasies that by day caused his gut to twist with shame.
The mate bond was for life. Only death could sever it.
It was time for Tiago to leave—permanently—before he committed an act so vile, he avoided naming it even in his mind.
He jerked his head at Fausto. “Let’s go.”
* * *
The Rock Run base had been carved from a system of underground caverns bordered on the north by Rock Run Creek and to the east by the Susquehanna River, a large, powerful river that drained into the Chesapeake Bay. The base’s main exit was six fathoms beneath the surface at the confluence of Rock Run Creek and the Susquehanna.
To leave the base, you had to pass through a hidden grotto accessible only by a narrow underwater tunnel. Tiago went first, swimming through the tunnel and then up through the icy creek to surface in the Susquehanna. It was early April and a light rain was falling. The river was only shade above freezing, a temperature that would’ve been dangerous for a human. But to a river fada, it was invigorating.
Tiago lifted his face to the rain and paused to wait for Fausto. Ordinarily Tiago would’ve been either on sentry duty or training with the other warriors, but he’d just returned from an overseas mission and had several days leave coming to him. Maybe he should just get the hell out of here.
Fausto popped to the surface nearby, blinking his round black eyes against the raindrops.
“Onde agora?” Tiago asked. “Where to now?”
The otter shrugged and treaded water nearby. It was clear he didn’t care; he was just along for the swim.
“Okay, then.”
Tiago glanced around. To the north was Rock Run territory, with most of the land for the first few miles on either side of the Susquehanna owned by the clan. To the southeast was the Chesapeake Bay and the human town of Grace Harbor. The river in that direction was controlled by humans.
The last thing Tiago needed right now was to run into a human boater. In his current mood, if the man pissed him off, he just might snap his neck, setting fada-human relations back several decades.
“Vamos.” He jerked his chin at Fausto and struck out upriver, deliberately staying as a man. Best to work his muscles until they screamed…anything to calm the beast.
Fausto kept up for the first quarter mile or so, gamely propelling himself forward with his webbed paws and tail. When he grew tired, Tiago had him climb on his back and continued north.
It was another mile before they came upon a trio of small, densely wooded islands. The Susquehanna River had a number of unnamed islands like these. The humans had for the most part left them alone, finding it unprofitable to harvest the relatively minor stands of trees, and eventually the islands on this stretch of the river had passed into Rock Run’s hands. Both Dion and their father before him had left the islands alone, a touch of wilderness for their animals to play in. Their only permanent residents were three dryads, sisters who’d agreed to tend the forest and its animals in return for free run of the islands and Rock Run’s protection.
Tiago paused to take a breath, treading water as he looked at the center island, the one occupied by the middle sister, Alesia.
Alesia.
Deus, he needed to see her. He supposed this was where he’d been heading all along.
Fausto had already slipped off his back and was swimming toward the island. The otter loved visiting the dryad.
Tiago followed suit. As he stepped onto the narrow beach, he shook himself off and headed for the tree where he kept some spare clothes in an oilskin bag. He donned a pair of shorts and strode into the woods, Fausto loping eagerly alongside.
The island was covered by an old growth forest of oak, hickory, walnut, beech and maple. As they followed the familiar path to the center, the rain increased. Tiago raised his face to the chill drops. Water was his element, necessary to him in the most basic, primal way. The easiest way to harm a water fada was to keep him from his river or lake or sea.
He and Fausto entered a clearing presided over by a large pin oak surrounded by daffodils in full bloom. Several years ago, he’d given Alesia a large bag of bulbs and helped her plant them. With her Gift for making things grow, they’d multiplied rapidly and now this part of the forest was carpeted with sunny drifts of yellow and orange and white.
He wasn’t a flower kind of guy, but he liked seeing them here. They seemed—right. His shoulders eased and for the first time since returning to Rock Run last night, he felt like he was home.
He glanced toward the oak’s crown. “Alesia? You home?”
No response. But he felt her in the tree, watching him. He narrowed his eyes at the uppermost branches. From above came a giggle, cut short.
His lips peeled back in a feral grin. Backing up, he took a running jump and caught the first branch, and from there continued up at a rapid pace. Fausto chittered a greeting to Alesia but remained on the ground, having an otter’s dislike of climbing trees.
Dryads were born at the same time as their host trees. As Alesia and her oak had grown, the tree had shaped itself into a cozy abode with quirky furniture formed from its branches and trunk, and clever nooks for storage. Alesia had added cushions woven from grass, and at the oak’s sturdiest point, she’d strung a wide, comfortable hammock between two branches.
Tiago had never seen a home that so perfectly matched its inhabitant’s personality. There were times he envied Alesia the connection she had with her tree.
Near the crown, he halted and sniffed. As a dryad, Alesia had the ability to blend into the bark, making her almost impossible to detect with the naked eye. But her scent filled the air, wild and green like her tree, with a tantalizing overlay of woman. To his animal-enhanced sense of smell, it was as if she’d waved a bright flag.
He followed his nose until he located her on a seat formed from a branch, her back against the trunk. She’d become one with the oak—literally—her skin and hair and clothing hardening to a gray, bark-like substance.
He scaled the last branch to crouch before her. “Change.”
The air shimmered. Gradually her skin softened and her color returned to its usual smooth, rich ivory. She had a heart-shaped face with exotically tilted eyes and a pointed chin. Her hair was next. He watched, fascinated, as it changed from bark gray to a sun-streaked brown that tumbled over her shoulders. A single pointed ear poked out of the curls, the mark of a pureblood fae.
The last to change was her dress. She must have been caught in the rain, because the green cotton was spattered with rain drops. His gaze caught on where the damp material clung to her breasts, hardening the nipples into inviting points. Her chest began to rise and fall and her lips parted.
He drew in a slow breath and reminded himself that Alesia was a friend, not a lover. Still he couldn’t help brushing a
thumb across those rosy lips as he waited for her to finish.
By the time her eyes opened, she was smiling. “Hello, Tiago.” She pressed a quick, bashful kiss to his cheek and her wild forest scent washed over him.
He clenched his fists and wished for—hell, something he couldn’t put words to. That things were different. That he was different.
“It’s good to see you,” she said. “It’s been too long.”
“I’ve been busy.” It wasn’t a lie—he’d been away on a job with his squad. But he’d also been avoiding her.
She flinched and he swore under his breath.
The gods knew he wanted Alesia. They’d met five summers ago when a den of half-feral fada had taken a cavern beneath her oak as their lair. The den’s leader, an old Greek sea fada, had kidnapped and drugged a Rock Run woman named Valeria and forced her to take part in a dark, forbidden bacchanal. Worse, they’d sold Valeria’s adopted daughter to the Baltimore earth shifters.
It was only by chance that Tiago had witnessed the abduction. When he’d realized what was happening, he’d gone back for Rui do Mar, Dion’s second-in-command and Valeria’s mate.
During the rescue, something had sparked between Tiago and Alesia. He’d returned a few days later, thinking to drown his craving for Cleia in the dryad’s firm little body.
But it hadn’t been that easy. Like most fae, Alesia had been raised to think of the fada as little better than animals. Men who’d as soon as slit your throat as talk to you. Men who lured women to take part in their dark rituals as the Greek sea fada had done to Valeria.
It had taken weeks to coax Alesia into trusting him. By then Tiago liked her—too much for the no-strings fuck he’d sought. It seemed wrong to take her as a substitute for the woman he really wanted.
But he couldn’t keep away. She was unlike any female he knew. She made things grow. She made him laugh. Even the beast calmed in her presence.
Sometimes he believed she was the only thing keeping him sane. He’d cut off his own arm before he hurt her.
So he kept visiting—and somehow, they’d become friends, he and this shy, half-wild dryad who trusted almost no one.