Lincoln_The Manning Dragons

by Kathi S. Barton

  Chapter 4

  Grace couldn’t have been more in love with the house than if he’d read her mind and created what she’d always dreamed of in one. The big balcony off the master bedroom where she was had her wanting to bring her bed out there and sleep. Then there were the large his and hers closets that just screamed for her to fill them. She wouldn’t, of course, but it was nice to have all the room.

  “I’ve not done much in here but put in a bed.” She turned and looked at him. “Do what you want in here, I don’t care. So long as I can sleep with you, it could be bright pink for all I care. I’d prefer earth tones, but I can live with whatever you want.”

  “It won’t be pink. I can’t handle that color, much less a bedroom. I love the earth tones as well, like the ones in the living room. I’d like to stick with that.” He nodded and handed her a thick envelope. “What’s this?”

  “The deed to the house. It’s been put in your name. And before you say anything, we needed to do that because we don’t die. The next time we need to resume our lives, it’ll be in my name and so on until we adopt children. Then they’ll take a turn at it.” She asked why he’d say that to her, talking about dying so soon after meeting. “I’m sorry, but you won’t die either, love. The moment we touched, you became what I am. As your sister is as well. I believe she touched the wings of a faerie, and that was her gift for not harming them.”

  “I’m an immortal? As in, I’m not going to die?” He nodded. But before she could ask what exactly that meant, he moved to the bathroom that was as big as her living room at her old house. “What does that mean? There’s something wrong with that statement. How will I ever die?”

  “You can from being beheaded. But if anyone gets that close to you, they’ll be burnt toast. And then there is blood poisoning. Though now that I think on it, I’m not sure iron would harm you. But then there is the shot to the heart. That one will be harder to do since I’m never leaving your side when we’re out.” He stretched, and she wanted him right then. But she had to focus on what he was saying. “Also, you’ll have to have a faerie. All dragons do—we’re very closely bonded together. Mine is Drizzle. I’m not sure why he likes to be called that, but that’s what he told me. He’s usually off running things for me when I’m home. Otherwise he’s right there with me. Same as you— I’m overwhelming you, aren’t I?”

  “Yes, and not a little bit either. Why do I need a faerie? I’m assuming it’s because of safety concerns. I’m not really keen on having someone with me all the time.” While she was talking, he moved for her to see the railing, and there stood about half a dozen of the cutest little people she’d ever seen. Walking toward them, she asked if these were all hers, but spoke to them before she got an answer. “I love that you came here to see me even if you’re not going to be with me. My goodness, you’re wonderfully shiny too.”

  She wondered if she had insulted them when their wings fluttered quickly. But when they bowed, she curtsied for them. It was a thing that just popped into her head. Something that she’d not done as a child, yet it seemed appropriate. They smiled at her and she returned it.

  “Mistress? Lady Manning, my name is Rose. I am the faerie for the king.” Grace had forgotten Cooper was the king of dragons. “This is, in order of where they are, Piney, Jackson, Benson, and Tulip. They have come to see which of them would serve you.”

  “I guess I’m just too new at this; serve me how?” They explained what would go on and how they were to help her. “That sounds so wonderful. To have someone do small things for me would be nice, I think. I’m not so sure how much I could use someone all the time. I’m used to doing things for myself. But if I must have a faerie, how do I pick one of you, and what happens to the others?”

  “They will go back to the flower fields. It is their job, you see.” She did, but didn’t want to pick only one. She really did want all four to be with her, just to keep them out of the fields. That sounded like a hard job, and if she could, she wanted to save them from that. “If you wish, my lady, they can all work with you. But it will be most difficult on you and them if they don’t have enough to do. Boredom is bad for a faerie.”

  “We get into trouble a great deal when we’re not working.” Jackson smiled, then blushed when he spoke. She could see that. Their wings were moving miles a second, and she would bet it was nervous energy. “Piney and I, we’re from the same picking. Benson is the oldest, and Tulip the youngest. You can take any of us, mistress, and it’ll be all right. There are more brides coming, and perhaps they’ll pick one of the others.” A decision came to her while they were standing there. But she asked what they meant by a picking.

  “The queen of all faeries comes to the flowers where we are born and picks us up to make our wings work.” Tulip smiled at her as she continued. “Sometimes, when we’re not picked up, we can become big, like a human, and help them in ways they do not know. I have a sister that works in the human world, and she loves it. She likes people.”

  With her decision made, she looked at Rose, then Lincoln. She had a feeling that he knew what she was going to do but said nothing to him. He had a big enough head as it was. So, she turned her attention to Rose.

  “I want all four. I could use two with me during the times I’m not painting, and the other two for when I’m working. They can trade off if they wish. But the ones in the work area, they’ll have to learn to clean brushes for me, pick up lids when I drop them. Things like that. Okay?” She was getting the best of the best, she thought when they all nodded. “I’m a very messy painter too. But I love it quiet when I’m working. Not even any music. You’ll have to remember that, please?”

  “Then you should take Benson with you there. He is very quiet and he’s a hard worker. He can’t sing either.” The man bowed before her, and she looked at Lincoln when he laughed. “Sir?”

  “You are going to love having them around all the time. And I’m betting it won’t matter how much you keep them busy, you’ll be getting them into trouble too.” She smacked him again. “All right, I’ll tell you how to care for them because they would never presume to ask for anything they need. It can be annoying when you forget something, but we’ll work together on that. They need to have fresh flowers when we can get them, and water. I usually leave some on each of the floors for Drizzle.”

  “I’m going to write this down.” Benson followed her into the bathroom where she had put her notebook about things that she thought the house could use and what she wanted to bring here from her storage unit. But before she left the room, she saw the older faerie had followed her. “Hello, Benson. Are you ready to work for me?”

  “Yes, mistress, it’ll be my honor. I just need to ask are you famous? I’ve had a dream to work for someone famous.” She said that she wasn’t, and the look of disappointment on his face was priceless. “I might be someday. I sold all my work at the gallery last night.”

  He perked up and asked where she was going to be working. Actually, she’d not thought of that and told him so. She’d have to ask Lincoln about the big barn, or perhaps the basement. She’d be thrilled to death either way. The house and the people in it were wonderful.

  Grace even began to feel better. She didn’t feel so angry all the time since coming here. Of course, she was getting laid on a regular basis—at least twice a day, so perhaps more than regularly, but she was most assuredly more relaxed.

  She and Lincoln walked out to the two places he said she could have as a studio with all the faeries. Benson sat on her shoulder and told her things she wouldn’t have otherwise noticed. The tree faeries were working on the leaves, he said, getting them ready for fall. There were also brownies about. They were the workhorses, he told her, always making it so the big limbs fell from the trees so as not to harm anything below them. He said that they would fly to the earth to warn others to move when it was about to go. Or sometimes, and this was less dangerous, they’d push the wood from the trees ahead of where they might be working. It was how the other
creatures of the earth found homes for themselves, as well as food.

  The metal barn was huge, and she figured Lincoln would want to do something with it instead of her taking up the room. But he assured her that he had no use for the place and would be honored if she took it. Honored? Well, she would take him up on the deal. To have so much space without anyone bothering her would be just what she needed. Especially since talking to Garrett and him already asking for more work.

  “What do you do? I mean, other than be very rich?” Lincoln laughed and told her that he saw to businesses. “I have no idea what that means. Do you just buy them then break them apart? Do you put old ladies and children out to the street? Or are you the type of rich person that donates tons of money to half assed causes that don’t need it, because the CEO makes more than most people?” She looked at him.

  “I can’t tell if you’re pissed or not. But you keep bringing up my being rich. You are too. I don’t know if I’ve told you or not, but as of the moment you moved in with me, you were my other half. As in, everything, and I do mean everything, I have is now yours. Not half, not a part, but whatever is mine is now yours as well.” She asked why he’d do that. “Because I never want you to have to worry about a thing again. Not money, nor whether you can afford anything. If you want to donate all our funds to something, there will always be more. I’m good at making money. Then there is the fact that you’re going to be selling enough that I’d never have to work again.”

  “You mean if I were to go to the bank and tell them to give all the money in the account to the person behind me, you’d say that was all right.” He nodded. “No one is that generous.”

  “Your temper is showing again.” Grace tried to bring herself back to her good mood, but she was upset that he’d say something like that and not mean it. “We have more than you could spend in several lifetimes, love. The money in the bank here is only a drop of what we have. I have a castle that has been renovated and brought up to date that we can visit any time you wish. And you’ll be happy to know that it, too, is in your name. Being around as long as we have, we were able to amass fortune after fortune and not have to spend a great deal of it. We saved everything we could for a rainy day.”

  “You’re serious.” He nodded at her. “How could you be so free with your money? And to put my name, a lowly human, on all your things. I mean, is it true about dragons? Can you really make diamonds from tears?”

  She didn’t have any idea why she was so angry, but he seemed to not care. Once they were near the building, he sent the faeries inside and stood there looking at her. When she turned away, embarrassed at how she had spoken to him, he brought her face back around and kissed her on the mouth quickly before speaking.

  “Lowly human? I would never think of you as lowly anything. You are the bright shining star in my life. The person that makes me a stronger and better dragon. I couldn’t care less if you were a wolf, or cat. You are the person that is for me, and I am thrilled beyond words to get to be a part of your life.” She wasn’t sure what to do with such words. And she knew this time they were sincere. As she lay her head on his shoulder, he continued. “When we were born, we were dragons. Not shifters, but real dragons. My father noticed, unlike a lot of them then, that our population was being murdered. Our bodies were cut up and sold off. And what they couldn’t sell, they left to rot in the sun. My own mother had been killed and stripped of everything for greed. So, my father had gone to a great witch and asked for a spell to give us, his six sons, a chance to survive. It was that night, my uncle, Dad’s brother, said that he could no longer be in this world. His own family, his children and mate, had been killed not a month before, butchered like they were nothing more than cattle grazing in the fields. His youngest was younger than me at the time. He left us all his gems—his worth, we call it.”

  “He killed himself?” Lincoln told her that being without his other half, he didn’t want to live. And without his children, he felt he had no need of life. “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine the grief that he must have felt. Or the love your father did.”

  “He did love us. And in doing so, he too died to give us the ability to shift into humans. To walk among them like them so that they’d never know we were what they sought. It was the only way to save us, and it worked. We’re the only ones of our kind. Dragons that can shift into humans, rather than the other way. But because of this, we cannot change our mates into what we are. Nor can you have our children, because you cannot bear an egg, which is how we are made. Your body isn’t equipped for such a thing. We are also sought after. There are people that would come and take what we have because of a book we own.”

  “Your life sounds much harder than I thought it would be.” Grace looked around, seeing things that she never had before. The faeries of the forest, the other creatures that were there working as if they did this all the time. And she supposed that they did. Without humans knowing it. “I’m sometimes a terrible person. I was just thinking that I was in a better mood all the time, profoundly more relaxed, but then you talk about money and I go off again. Why do I do that?”

  “Perhaps you cannot imagine a time when you would no longer worry about things such as money, or where your next meal might be coming from. Or that you have always worried about them and can’t fathom not doing so now. I don’t know. But I love you, Grace.” She looked at him. “I do. I have since the moment you touched me. The second that I figured out that you were for me and me for you. I need to be honest, I never thought that I could be this happy with a mate, but I love you. More than I thought possible. And I wanted you to know that.”

  “I don’t know what I feel about you. You make me feel wonderful. I feel like I can take on the world with you here. I even feel good about myself, which isn’t always the case.” He said that he could understand that. “Do you? I don’t understand how you can be so nice to me when I’ve mostly been a bitch.”

  He laughed and took her into the barn. As soon as she entered, Grace wanted to cry. It was no longer just a barn, but her studio. He’d brought all her stuff here and had them set up. There were also items she’d only dreamed of. Things that as a struggling artist, or even just at life, she’d never thought of having.

  “This is too much.” He said never. The canvas stretcher was begging to be touched, it seemed, and she ran her fingers over the canvas on the roll. “I’ve always wanted this. I’ve had to wait until these sorts of supplies went on sale before I could buy them. But never did I dream of having something so nice as this. You’ve made it so I don’t have to worry about that, haven’t you?”

  “I told you. You’re my other half, and I want you to be as happy as I am. Even if you do show me you still have a temper once in a while.” She laughed with him but was embarrassed. He had taken the time to get these things for her, and she’d been a mean bitch again. “What are you thinking?”

  “How am I ever going to get used to you being nice? I’ve been nothing but hot and cold since I met you. How the hell are you able to be so nice to me when I’m rarely nice to you?” He kissed her then, and she looked up at him. “You keep this up, Lincoln, and you just might make me fall in love with you despite the type of person I am.”

  “That’s the plan, my love. That’s all it has ever been. Not to buy your love, but to make you see that I care enough about you to be your whipping post if you need me. Or your sexual slave if that’s what you want.”

  She was still laughing as they moved around the room. This was going to be her biggest leap into becoming a real artist, she thought. No more excuses that she couldn’t afford something. And Garrett was going to be very happy too. Her muse was already ready to get to work on something new. And Grace was glad to be needed.

  ~~~

  Walton watched his father talk to the police from his hiding place in the kitchen. They’d been by twice now to see if he’d heard from him. Walton thought they were doing a half assed sort of job in locating him, but he didn’t care. So long as they
left him alone and didn’t try to arrest him again. But now that he was out, he was going to take care of his wife and that daughter of hers, and make sure his father never touched his little boy.

  He had a son that he was going to raise to be just like him. Well, perhaps not just like him. Walton was going to make sure that his son didn’t fear him as he did his own father. Not that he really feared him, but he didn’t like him all that much. Mostly it was because he lorded things over him all the time.

  Like how he had a record. So, what? Most of the people in this stupid world did and got along fine. Or how he’d never finished college so he didn’t have a degree in anything but partying. Again, so what? He could read and write and get by when he needed to. When there was something put before him, he could make out what it was about without having to resort to someone explaining it to him word for word. That was another thing his father did. Over explain things. Like he was some big dummy who wasn’t smart enough to get out of the rain. Walton was far from that.

  When the police left he went to talk to his father. The fact that he’d lied for him twice now was a good sign. And if he could, he was going to milk that. Now if he could get him to search for his wife, and then give him money, things would start to look up. Walton had plans, and his father, he knew, was going to be standing in the way.

  “You didn’t tell me that you weren’t married to the twat. Why the hell are you even bothering with her if you don’t even know for sure if that boy is your son?” He said that he was. “How do you know? You have some sort of crystal ball that tells you these things? Who do you think had sex with her when you weren’t home?”

  “Because I tied her to the bed when I wasn’t fucking her, or to the kitchen table when she was supposed to be working. I had plans, Father. I also had a dragon that was going to make me richer than you are. Because, as you’re so fond of telling me, it’s not my money but yours, and you’re taking it with you.” He said that he was. “Well, how do you expect me to make it in this world the way I want with no one to carry on my name? How many times have you said that over the years? And told me that was the only reason you had me.”