by Eden Robins
“Yeah, well, Christian definitely has the calm, cool and collected thing going on. But I talked to him about Magnus and he said he’d keep an eye out,” Eric explained. “I also saw Maria at the club.”
Malcolm’s eyes lit up with pleasure and a wolfish grin broke across his face. “You lucky dog. You got to see Maria? That is one fine woman. I wouldn’t mind crashing on a rocky coast for a chance to snuggle up to her.”
“I hear you on that,” Eric said, nodding his head.
“So do you need me to hang around longer?” Malcolm asked.
“No. Thanks again. I appreciate your help.”
“Any time, man,” Malcolm said, heading toward the door. “I think I’ll pass on the goodbyes with Sabrina’s parents. I have a feeling they’ll be more than happy that I’m leaving. Besides, I’m in a hurry. If I get over to Twice Charmed right away, I might get a chance to see the beautiful Maria.”
Malcolm waggled his eyebrows up and down.
Eric laughed. “Good luck.”
Malcolm waved a hand over his shoulder and left without another word.
Eric’s humor faded as he thought of the challenge that now lay ahead of him. Taking a deep breath, he headed into the other room. He had a job to do. And the first thing on his list was to check on Sabrina.
Eric ascended the stairs but only made it halfway up. Manuel blocked his way. “Where do you think you’re going?”
Eric met the man’s stare. “To check on Sabrina.”
“No, you’re not. You walked out of here, remember? You lost the right to see her once you did that.”
“Says who?”
Manuel’s eyes narrowed. “Says me.”
“I think you need to check with your boss on that one.”
“My boss?” Manuel asked in confusion.
Eric let his gaze wander up the stairs to where Helaina now stood looking down at them. “What’s going on, Manuel?”
Sabrina’s father turned toward his wife.
“Nothing, mi amor,” Manuel said pleasantly, but the minute he turned back toward Eric his smile became little more than a baring of teeth. “Eric and I are just having a friendly discussion.”
“Would you please come up here a moment, querido? I need you to help me with something. Eric, if you would stay there for the time being, I’d appreciate it.”
Eric met Sabrina’s mother’s gaze. He saw the pleading look in her eyes and nodded his head in agreement. She was telling him to be patient for the moment. He could do that, for now.
“No problem.”
Manuel shot Eric one last warning look before his gaze turned pleasant once more as he turned toward his wife. “Of course, Helaina.”
A few minutes later, Manuel returned. His face looked stormy as he headed down the stairs. Eric could only guess what Sabrina’s parents had discussed. The older man’s expression could mean only one thing. Eric tried to hide his triumph.
“For reasons beyond me, my wife has agreed to see you and will allow you to see my daughter,” Manuel said between gritted teeth.
Eric started up the stairs, but just as he was about to pass Sabrina’s father the man grasped his arm.
“You’re lucky, boy. If it were up to me I’d take my daughter home with us right now and you’d never see her again.”
“Well then, I guess it’s a good thing it’s not up to you,” Eric replied, barely holding his anger in check. He could understand Manuel’s protectiveness but he would not let the guy push him around. He slowly lowered his gaze to where Sabrina’s father held his arm, then looked up and met the older man’s eyes with his own unwavering stare. Manuel released his hold on Eric and led him upstairs.
Eric strode to Sabrina’s bedside the minute he entered the room, ignoring both Helaina and Sabrina’s doctor. Looking down at her, he barely kept his anger in check. Her loose hair fanned out over the pillow, framing her face in a midnight cloud. Her face looked pale and fatigue filled her eyes. Whatever had been done to her had been unpleasant and trying. She had fought a battle with something, and barely won by the look of it.
Eric tried to fight his feelings for her. He tried to remember the fact that she was the enemy. It was difficult. Despite the fact that she was a dragon, something about her tugged at his emotions and called to the man he was. The urge to gather her close, make her his and protect her was unbelievably strong.
He clenched his fists tightly to his sides to stop himself from reaching out to her.
She is a dragon…she is a dragon…she is a dragon.
The mantra played strongly in his head. He repeated it over and over until a semblance of composure filled him. Then he became the dragon slayer once again.
Sabrina opened her eyes slowly then squeezed them shut again as a rush of pain speared through her skull.
“How are you, darling?”
She winced.
Her mother’s words, though spoken softly, played like a cacophony through her head. They ricocheted around her mind, echoing over and over. She covered her ears in a useless attempt to stop it. It was too much. The comforting darkness called to her and she followed, falling into its soft, welcoming nothingness.
The next time she woke it was to the sound of Eric’s voice. He and her mother were talking.
“Sabrina has been through quite a struggle, Eric. I’ll try to explain the best that I can. Although you now know she’s a dragon, the intricacies of that existence are not easily understood.”
Eric was tempted to tell Sabrina’s mother just how much he knew about dragons, but knew that now would not be the best time to share that information with the woman. She had enough to worry about without the added knowledge that he was a master slayer of their kind.
“I’ll try my best to understand, Helaina,” he said respectively. He liked the older woman and would offer her as much respect as she deserved, despite the obvious differences he had with her kind.
“Sabrina was not only physically attacked and drugged, she was also bombarded with some sort of mental control, a psychic attack. Dragons are particularly vulnerable to this kind of assault. We are creatures of nature, but our mental abilities are a large part of us, much more so than with humans. They are used more extensively and routinely than humans use theirs. Humans use only a small percentage of their brain. Dragons tend to use almost eighty percent of their brain capacity. That greater aptitude is a benefit, but it also makes them more affected by any kind of brain-altering drugs or psychic invasion.”
Eric frowned. He thought about what Maria had told him about Magnus. And he remembered the way Sabrina had kept fading in and out at the park. Dragon to human, back to dragon, then to human, as if she hadn’t been able to keep any form permanently. He knew dragons used their mental abilities in a way humans hadn’t learned yet, but the thought that they could be so affected by psychic control still surprised him.
“What kind of mental control?” he asked.
He needed to know how Magnus was trying to control her.
“Her attacker was able to rein in her powers, at least temporarily,” Helaina explained. “Sabrina lost her dragon abilities, specifically her power to transform.”
He nodded his head. “I saw the way she kept changing her form back and forth. Was that due to Magnus’ mental control over you?”
This time it was Sabrina who answered him. Her voice was weak and quiet. At the sound of it Eric leaned closer to the bed so that he could hear her more clearly.
“No. That wasn’t psychic,” she said. “My attacker injected me with some sort of compound. The doctor took a blood sample and said he’s going to analyze what’s in it. Once he shot me up with that stuff I lost the ability to focus on anything. I couldn’t move, let alone control my transformation. But the only thing that kept running through my mind was the thought that I needed to change back into human form so that my attacker would realize I was human and let me go. I know that wasn’t the best logic, given the situation, but I just couldn’t seem to think straight
. Whatever he gave me scattered my brain completely.”
Her doctor approached the bed. “I’ve never seen this kind of reaction before,” he explained to Eric. “The fact that Sabrina could not contain or control either form is a frightening thought. It was almost as if whatever she was given was able to obliterate her brain synapses having to do with not only shape shifting but also the ability to focus on both physical and mental tasks. In other words, the chemicals she was given paralyzed her ability to make up her mind. Quite a devastating reaction for a dragon to encounter.”
Eric nodded his head. “So how did you rid her body of it?”
The doctor shook his head. “I didn’t. We had to wait it out. The only thing I could do was mind join with her to help her process and stabilize until the injection wore off. Luckily, whoever gave her this substance didn’t want her in this state very long and only injected a small dose. Otherwise we could have been sitting this out through the night, and frankly, I don’t know if any of us could have made it that long, or if Sabrina would have been able to maintain her sanity in such a state.”
Eric glanced back down at Sabrina.
She was staring up at him with sad, tired eyes. She looked like a kitten that had been dunked in the water and fought her way out. Eric thought she had never looked more beautiful.
“Thank you for saving me.”
Her voice sounded weaker than before, and he noticed her eyes starting to close.
“You’re welcome, gatita.”
She and Eric stared at each other, silently communicating something they both knew at a basic, primal level, but neither of them was willing to admit to.
Helaina cleared her throat. “I think Sabrina needs to sleep now, Eric. She’s been through so much. Why don’t we discuss this more in the morning?”
Eric agreed. Sabrina needed to rest. She was exhausted from her fight. But when morning came, they would talk. There was much he needed to say, and a lot she needed to explain.
“Okay. I’ll leave her to sleep. But please let me know when she wakes up in the morning. She and I need to talk about a few things,” he said before walking out of her room.
Manuel was waiting, angry and impatient, outside in the hallway. “Let’s go downstairs. You and I have to clear the air about a few things.”
“I agree,” Eric said, following the older man downstairs.
The minute they hit the ground floor, Manuel started in. “What do you want with my daughter, Eric?”
Eric felt his irritation rise but tried to hold onto his patience. “I’m not sure how to answer that.”
“What are your intentions where she’s concerned? Are you planning on hurting her again? Because if you are I’m not going to allow it, do you understand me? You tore out her heart out when the two of you broke up. I will not let her go through that again. Are we clear?”
Manuel moved closer and met Eric’s gaze head-on.
Eric didn’t back down. He met the other man’s stare with his own angry one.
“Your daughter is of an age where she can decide for herself who she wants to be with, Manuel,” Eric said between clenched teeth. “I respect her enough to know that. We are not having a relationship at the moment, but if we do decide to see each other in that way, whether you agree to it or not, it will happen.”
Manuel’s face darkened with anger. His breathing became more labored. Suddenly, Eric remembered Sabrina mentioning that her father had some heart issues and was on medication because of it. He wasn’t about to let the older man push him around but at the same time, he didn’t want Sabrina’s father to have a heart attack.
“I will promise you, however, that I’ll respect your daughter’s wishes. If Sabrina decides because of what happened tonight that she doesn’t want to see me again once this case is over, I won’t see her again.”
His answer seemed to satisfy the older man. He backed away somewhat and nodded his head. “Agreed. It will be my daughter’s choice whether you see her again, and you will respect that.”
The satisfaction on Manuel’s face made Eric suddenly curious and wary about what they had just agreed to.
“What?”
“We need to talk about the other little issue.”
Eric was confused. “What other little issue?”
“My daughter being a dragon, of course.”
“Of course. That little issue,” Eric said, not bothering to hide the sarcasm in his voice. “Which part of it did you want to discuss?”
“What do you plan on doing about it?” Manuel asked. “Who do you plan on sharing this information with, or have you done so already, during your absence? If not, how can I persuade you not to say a word?”
The older man looked belligerent, ready to do whatever necessary to contain the information.
“I’ve told only a few working with me at Sundown who need to know, but I can promise you, they will not share that information with anyone. As far as I’m concerned, I plan on telling no one else about this,” Eric assured him. “The fewer people who know about the existence of dragons, the better.”
Manuel raised one eyebrow in surprise. “Why aren’t you surprised about this?” he asked.
“I was surprised about Sabrina being a dragon. Despite our past relationship, I had no idea. But I already knew about the existence of dragons, if that’s what you mean.”
“That’s exactly what I mean. How did you know about our existence?” Sabrina’s father narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
“Let’s just say that the agency I work for encounters many different kinds of people.”
“I see,” Manuel said, studying Eric more intently. “Then I can trust you not to say anything to anyone about my daughter?”
“Of course.”
Sabrina’s father nodded his head. “Good. Then we have nothing else to discuss. I need to check on my daughter.”
Eric watched the older man walk back upstairs. He really did admire his protective instincts when it came to his daughter. But he meant what he’d said to Manuel. If he and Sabrina ever did become involved again, it would be their choice, no one else’s.
Sabrina was dreaming about flying.
She was soaring through the night sky, the stars overhead and the lights of human dwellings below. The wind gently caressed her skin, bringing her peace and tranquility. The quiet evening calmed her and she savored the moment.
“You do know that you’re going to die, don’t you?”
The voice she heard was unfamiliar and male. And it came from right beside her.
Turning toward the sound, she came face-to-face with her stalker. He flew right beside her. Her heart sped up and she suddenly couldn’t seem to catch her breath.
His knowing gaze glowed with an insane light and he leered at her with a smug grin.
“Who are you?” she asked, not sure why she didn’t just fly away from him. She wanted to but couldn’t seem to make her body respond.
“I’m St. Magnus the dragon slayer. And I’m here to kill you, dragon,” he said in a low voice filled with hate. And as Sabrina looked into his crazed eyes, she saw no remorse for his words, no indecision about that which he spoke. “Once you’re dead, you will be unable to fulfill your destiny to help your people. Without you, my mission to rid the world of your disgusting kind will become that much easier.” Sabrina had heard of St. Magnus, just as all dragons had. Dragon parents told their children about dragon slayers from the time they were quite young. Although things had changed over the centuries, and the dragon community existed in relative secrecy, slayers still existed, and it was a dragon parent’s obligation to warn their offspring about them. And the most well-known, the most feared of all dragon slayers, was St. Magnus. Known because he had lived so long and savagely tortured and killed so many of her kind, he was often the subject of the scary stories dragon children told to each other late at night.
She didn’t see the large knife until too late. As he spewed his evil words, he pulled out the weapon. Before she could
react he brought the knife sideways and plunged it into her heart.
The pain shot through her and she gasped. Then he laughed loudly and twisted the knife slightly right before pulling it out. The pain was unbearable.
He continued to laugh. It was the most evil sound she had ever heard. And as she fell through the sky, plummeting to her death, the sound of it echoed over and over again. It filled her, leaving her cold and lifeless. It was over. She was dead. Just as Sabrina was about to hit the ground, she was wrenched from her dream. Jerked up in her bed by a pair of strong arms, her eyes flew open. She couldn’t see much because her room was dimly lit. She gathered her powers around her and opened herself to feeling just who or what was in her room with her. To her relief, it wasn’t her stalker who held her. It was Eric. And as he moved closer she could tell by the worried look on his face something had happened to concern him.
She got her breathing back under control and the pain in her chest slowly eased.
“It was only a dream, gatita. Only a dream. You’re safe.”
Eric pulled her against his chest and she gave in to the urge to lay her cheek against it. Her heart slowed to its normal pace as he gently rubbed her back. It was a comforting touch only, nothing more, and it helped her relax.
At least that’s how it started. But the feel of his strong arms around her, the press of his solid chest against her cheek and the warmth of his hand as it glided over her back was too much. Her heart sped up again, she couldn’t help it. Even though she was nowhere back to normal, her body didn’t care.
She wanted Eric.
She wanted him then and there, without preamble, without conversations, without explanation. Desire spiked through her and she couldn’t stop her hands from wandering to his chest. Running her fingers along his hard planes and angles, she heard him draw in a sharp breath. His arms tightened around her for a moment then relaxed, giving her more space.
She pulled back slightly and looked up into his face. Eric stared down at her with hunger darkening his gaze, but didn’t move or say another word. He was waiting for her to make the decision. Desire shot through her, ending in a pulsating ache at the core of her.