by Julia Mills
HER
DRAGON
TO SLAY
Dragon Guard Series Book 1
By
Julia Mills
Copyright © 2013 Julia Mills
All rights reserved.
DISCLAIMER
The characters, locations, and events portrayed in this book are a work of fiction or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
NOTICE
This is an adult erotic paranormal romance book with love scenes and mature situations. It is only intended for adult readers over the age of 18.
DEDICATION
Although my name is on the outside, it is your names that are on the inside where the heart and soul beat and thrive.
Thank you, God.
To the two most important people in my world, you are beautiful, intelligent young women that have been the greatest blessings in my life. Thanks for never ever thinking your mom has lost her mind. Always follow your dreams! I believe in you!
Liz and Em, MOM LOVES YOU!!!
To my dad, you left us too early but taught me what a real hero is.
To my mom, I sure hope they have the best books and even better coffee in heaven, thank you for always expecting the best.
To my Gramma Mary, Gramma Martha, Aunt Kristie and Aunt Karita who always made sure I knew someone believed in me.
To Emma Edwards, my beautifully brilliant friend and writing partner, without you there would be no book. YOU ROCK!
To JD Nelson, who could have imagined this would be born from six words and three sentences?
To Dorinda Reyes, thank you for putting my first paranormal romance in my hands and being my friend no matter what.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am very thankful to everyone that helped me created this book:
~Susana McGarvie, my editor, who spent hours reading and proofreading Her Dragon to Slay. I could never have done it without you.
~Linda Boulanger of Tell-Tale Book Covers for bringing Rayne and Kyndel to life. You are amazing!
~Emma Edwards, Dorinda Reyes, Faith Bates, and Kelli Smith who volunteered to read this novel in the very early days and over and over again. You helped me make it what you see today.
~Thank you to my Facebook family, there are so many and you know who you are. You are always there, no matter day or night, to make me smile and give me the encouragement I need to keep tapping the keys. YOU ROCK!
~To every one of you that turns or scrolls the page, THANK YOU for making my dreams come true.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
EPILOGUE
HER DRAGON TO SLAY
Index of the Words of Love of Original
the Dragon Kin
Drakes
Male Dragons
Vibrias
Female Dragons
Dragonettes
Young Dragons,
either male or female
Mo chroi
My Heart
Mo ghra’
My Love
Evgren
Sunshine
Ta’mo chroi
istigh ionat
My Heart Is
Within You
A Thaisce
My Treasure
M’Anamchara
Soul Mate
A Chumann
Sweetheart
M’Fhioghara’
Mate
Fi’orghra’
True Love
CHAPTER ONE
Why did she loan her car to Grace? She knew better, she really did, Grace never did what she said she would but Kyndel had such a hard time saying no to her best friend. Now she was the one that had to walk all the way home, past the park, in the dark! She hated the dark! Had hated it ever since she was a little girl and her babysitters had thought it would be funny to make her watch “The Brain Eaters”. The 1958 Sci-fi horror movie where alien parasites landed on earth, sucked the brains from all the unsuspecting humans and then left them as mindless zombies. She remembered sleeping with the lights on, a hat pulled all the way down over her ears and the covers completely covering her neck for at least six months.
Now even at twenty-six she still hated sleeping without a nightlight. No matter how many times she checked before turning out the lights, it still felt like there were eyes staring at her. And then there were the shadows. They made things look longer and fuzzier, just plain scarier. Normal every day things always looked so different when there was no light. Anyone or anything could be hiding anywhere and there was no way to know they were there, no way to see what was coming. The longer she thought about it, the more scared she got until she realized she was making it worse. She was literally scaring herself. The mantra she always used when she was faced with these situations started going around and around in her head. “I can do this! I can do this!” Only a little over four blocks and she would be home. She could do it. God knew she felt like she had walking down to an art form. She had been walking on that damn treadmill at the gym every day for over a year now. It didn’t matter that she still had all her curves and weighed exactly the same as she had when she had started; she was now one hell of a walker.
Thud! She jumped and then stood completely still. “What was that?” she thought to herself. The longer she listened the more she wondered if she had really heard anything or if her imagination was running away with her. She waited a few more seconds, felt really silly for her overactive imagination and then chalked it up to the wind or a stray cat chasing a mouse. Hell, it might have even been a teenage couple sneaking away for some alone time. She snickered as she realized she could seriously use some alone time. It had been a long time since she'd been with a guy in any way, alone or not.
Come to think of it, the last guy she had dated had been a total jerk. Of course, she should have known better than to go out with one of the muscle heads from her gym. All she could think of was that her common sense had taken a back seat to her hormones because, well, he had a body to die for. It was just a shame that a brain was optional equipment on his model and he had not paid for the upgrade. She made it through three dates with the idiot. Three long dates that included him telling her about a majority of his body parts (not any of the good ones) but now that she thought about it that was probably shriveled from his use of enhancements anyway. Then there was the fact that when he did finally stop talking about himself, he was checking out every other woman in the place.
Kyndel was certain she would never be Miss America. Hell, she had never even entertained entering a beauty contest in her life. She had a few extra pounds and her curves were curvier than all the girls she saw in magazine ads but she knew she had a beautiful peaches and cream complexion with a spattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks and a God given chest no plastic surgeon could duplicate. She also knew how to accentuate the positive and camouflage the not so positive. She was smart and could take care of herself, if need be. She had worked hard to convince herself that she was a catch and she was just not going to settle, no matter how good looking the idiot sitting across the table from her was.
She thought about how far she had come from her days in junior high when she was the chubby girl with pigtails and freckles. She had hated her freckles almost every day of her youth. Then just like that, she had an epiphany. It
was just a regular old day. She was looking in the mirror getting ready for another day in high school; dreading putting on makeup just to go out in the hot sun and sweat it all off. That was when it hit her. Those little brown spots were part of who she was. They were just one of the many great things her parents had given her. Both her mom and dad had had freckles. She had thought they were perfect on their beautiful faces and realized they were just as pretty on hers. From that day forward she stopped hiding them and embraced her freckled self in all her glory.
Just a couple of days later, she was looking through a box of old pictures and came across a picture of her mom from when she was in high school. Carolyn Miller, later to be known as Carolyn Masterson, was an amazingly beautiful curvy woman even as a teenager. As Kyndel looked at the picture it occurred to her that she looked more like her mom than she had ever realized. It was in that moment that Kyndel vowed to accept her body just as it was, with all its curves and voluptuousness. She also decided that if a man could not or would not accept her for who she was, he could go screw himself. Along with all her other prayers, she added one asking for a man as awesome as her daddy and a relationship as special as the one her parents had shared. The moments or sometimes longer periods of self doubt still reared their ugly heads but little by little she got closer to being completely comfortable in her own skin all the time. Last year, she even started working out more regularly and eating right, for the most part. Her one big cheat had been and always would be Ben and Jerry’s Cherry Garcia; she simply could not see a world without it!
She had been so lost in her thoughts of the past that she had almost forgotten she was walking home after sunset. A ‘thump in the night’ caused her to jump and brought reality crashing down around her. She was certain she had heard something that time. It sounded like someone being thrown against a wall or a tree, something soft hitting something very hard and unforgiving. No matter how hard she tried to convince herself that it was just her overactive imagination, made worse by her fear of the dark, she could not shake the belief that she really had heard something. She shook her head and thought, “Get your head out of your ass, Girlie! You will not stand here and freak out over something you don’t even know is real.”
She took two more steps and stopped so quickly she almost fell flat on her face as yet another noise came from the black abyss of the park. This time there was no denying that someone had yelled for help. She turned her head, narrowed her eyes and tried to see through the inky blackness. All she saw was more darkness, made even creepier by the overlapping shadows of all the trees and foliage that looked like long tall figures or skeletal fingers reaching for something unseen. As if that was not enough to make her think she was losing her mind, now it was completely silent except for the sound of leaves as they were blown across the sidewalk by the breeze. Standing in the same spot for what seemed like an eternity and hearing nothing else, she knew she really needed to get the hell out of there. It was just too creepy.
She mentally slapped her forehead, hoping to restore her sanity and her backbone. After all, she was standing beside a public park in the middle of town where anyone could walk or drive by at anytime. Surely, no one would be stupid enough to do anything nefarious with the police station just a few blocks up the street. She straightened her back, squared her shoulders and reminded herself that she was strong and independent and more than capable of taking care of handling whatever might be out there. “Enough of this scaredy cat shit,” she scolded herself. Done jumping at shadows and freaking out over sounds that just were not there, she started in the direction of her apartment again. The click of her heels on the sidewalk reverberated off the brick wall of the library as she hurried past and in their own way reassured her that she was not crazy, just a little rattled.
She was feeling much more confident and had made it all of ten steps when she heard a groan. There was no mistaking that sound, someone was groaning in pain. They were very close to where her feet seemed to have glued themselves to the sidewalk and they seemed to be in a lot of pain. Her instincts screamed that she needed to help the person that sounded so miserable but her common sense screamed that it might be some kind of trap. True to form, her mind picked the most inopportune time to remember the story Sally, the office busybody, had heard on the evening news. She shared with everyone that would listen about a gang of thugs that kidnapped unsuspecting women by luring them somewhere private with the guise of needing help. After the scumbags had the poor women alone, they proceeded to rob, beat and in some cases, rape them. A chill ran down her spine and the little hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. That was so not what Kyndel had planned for this evening or any evening. “Nope, no way, not happening!” She thought to herself.
The only way she could keep her conscience from condemning her for not helping someone in need and her common sense from kicking her in the ass for putting herself in danger, was to get home as soon as possible and call the police to help whoever was hurt. Once again she made a mental note to never be without her cell phone and never ever let Grace borrow her car again. She straightened her shoulders, took a deep breath and started to move forward when another moan came floating out of the deserted park. If it was one of those guys that had been hurting the women from the news, he was a damn good actor. Kyndel could hear the pain and feel at least some of the agony the person that continued to moan was feeling. It was so real. It made her heart hurt and the hair on her arms join the ones on her neck by standing on end. She found it really hard to justify leaving a man in need even though she knew she was going to get him someone more qualified to help him. Standing there, listening to an unknown man moaning in the dark damn sure was not helping him and with the way her luck was going God only knew what would happen next.
Decision made. The best thing for both of them was for her to get home as quickly as possible and call the police. They could take care of the injured man and she could have a much needed glass of wine while plotting how to torture Grace for putting her in this situation in the first place. Hell, she could even stop at the police station. It was on her way home. She started moving again, clutching her satchel to her side, head up and eyes forward, moving as quickly as possible. She kept thinking about the delicious glass of wine waiting for her in her safe, well-lit apartment.
Kyndel thought again about Grace and wondered what the hell had happened that she had forgotten to pick her up. She had tried calling her best friend’s cell and then her office when she realized Grace was not outside waiting for her. Both lines were answered by voicemail. She tried Grace’s home, even though she knew she would not be there. Her last resort had been to call her own apartment. Grace had a key, so she might have gone there thinking Kyndel had gotten a ride with someone else when she was late arriving but the damn machine picked up.
She started to get pissed all over again when she figured her friend had probably gone out for a drink with some good looking lawyer and just lost track of time. Such was the life of one of the most sought after first year lawyers in the state. It also did not hurt that Grace was 5’9” with ebony hair, sky blue eyes and a curvy body that made men drool. She hoped her friend was ok but if there wasn’t at least a bump or a bruise involved Kyndel thought she might just snatch her bestie bald. She loved Grace like a sister but her absent-minded BS was really getting old and it was time for a change.
Thinking about how many times Grace’s forgetfulness had put her in crazy situations coupled with her fear of the dark made Kyndel pick up her pace until she was almost jogging despite her heels. She looked right and then left, hoping to see someone she at least recognized. Before she could take her next breath, she found herself falling forward, arms swinging, mouth stretched wide in a silent scream, with the sidewalk racing towards her face. Her only prayer was that she would not break her nose when she made contact with the concrete. She really didn’t want to explain a broken nose, along with the two black eyes she was sure she would have, to the idiots at her office. Time st
ood still as she braced for an impact that never came. Instead, she found herself hanging above the sidewalk, staring at a pair of obviously male feet. Huge, incredibly sexy male feet. She closed her eyes and opened them again. Nope, she wasn’t hallucinating but her sanity was most definitely coming into question. She held back an entirely inappropriate giggle as she realized this was the first time ever in her life that she had found feet sexy. She mentally placed another check in the ‘Kyndel has lost her marbles’ column.
She realized hanging around, literally and looking at some strange man’s feet was not getting her any closer to her home. In an effort to figure out exactly what the hell was going on, she lifted her head and the completely unexpected side effect of her butt rubbing against a set of incredibly hard abs took her by surprise. It was in no way unpleasant and set her lower extremities to tingling. She could feel the perfect definition of the mystery man’s six pack through her clothing. It was then that she realized she was being held around the waist by a huge muscled arm and the hand attached to that arm was resting comfortably on the side of her breast. The heat from her rescuer’s body warmed her inside and out. Her thoughts were cut short as the sidewalk was once again coming towards her face, even more quickly than before. Her world spun and she ended up sitting on top of the abs she had been inadvertently admiring with her bum just a moment before instead of hitting the sidewalk. The arm that had kept her suspended above the sidewalk was lying across her lap.
A giggle slipped out as she wondered if the rest of her rescuer matched the parts she had already examined. The hand that been warming the side of her breast just seconds before, slid up and down her thigh, seemingly of its own volition, causing goose bumps to rise on her legs and thoughts that she absolutely should not be thinking about a total stranger pop into her very addled brain. She twisted from the waist up, keeping her legs draped over his thighs with her knees barely touching the sidewalk, trying to get a look at her mystery man. What she saw made her gasp. The man lying beneath her had the most beautifully masculine face she had ever seen. Even with his eyes closed, he had an air of authority and command that coupled with his sheer size, made her feel small and feminine, something she had never experienced before. The shadows played perfectly across his high cheek bones, aristocratic nose and pouty lips. The thought of touching her lips to his immediately flooded her mind accompanied by a vision that she was sure was burned into her memory for all time. She knew she was gawking but there was no stopping it, her mouth was only one of her body parts aching to touch this exquisitely handsome man.