by Becca Van
“Everything will be okay, Belinda,” Ed said before he kissed her on the cheek and closed her door before walking around to the driver’s side and got in.
She bit back a giggle when he pushed the seat all the way back to accommodate his big body, but it still looked like his knees were up around his ears. He must have seen the humor in her eyes when he looked at her, then smiled and winked before starting her car.
“Tell me where you live, honey.”
Belinda told him and he pulled out of the lot. As he drove onto the road a big black truck eased out of a parking space and moved up behind her small car. When she glanced in her side mirror, she saw that Eli and Erwin were in that truck. She noticed the rental sticker on the front windshield and wondered why they had hired a rental car since they said they only lived three hours away, but was too sore to think any more of it.
It took less than ten minutes before Ed stopped in her driveway and he hadn’t once asked her for directions, so she assumed he and his friends had visited town more than a few times, since they could find their way around.
Her thoughts drifted to the small kitten she'd let out of the house that morning, and sadness assailed her, because she had a feeling she would never see that little feline female again. Bid somehow knew that the kitten wasn't a stray but had somehow managed to escape from her owner's home and wonder throughout the night. She was just glad that the little kitten had landed on her back doorstep because the thought of her being hit by a car was horrifying. When she picked up the little one after she'd finished her bowl of milk, she'd realized she wasn't as skinny as she'd first thought, and when she stroked the side of her kitten she'd noticed her bulging belly and knew that the cat had had too much to eat.
Bid pushed her thoughts aside as she placed her hand on the door handle and opened her door as she unclipped her seatbelt, but before she could pull herself up to her feet, Eli was there. He reached in and scooped her up out of her seat and carried her to her front door. He smelled so nice, like a mix of lemon and lime, and she couldn’t stop breathing him in. In fact, all of them smelled good and Bid knew she was in deeper than she thought, but had no idea what to do about it.
* * * *
It felt amazing to have Belinda back in his arms, and when he carried her through to her living room he didn’t want to put her down, but he did so, albeit reluctantly. Ed and Erwin came in behind him and shut the door.
“Do you have any pain meds?” Eli asked as he walked closer and squatted down next to where Belinda was sitting on the sofa with her foot up.
“Yes.” She pointed to the purse she’d dropped on the floor just inside her front door. “The doctor gave me some samples.”
Erwin lifted her purse from the floor and brought it over to her before he turned and headed to her kitchen. He came back moments later with a glass of water and an unopened bag of peas.
He handed the water to Bid and then wrapped the peas in the clean towel he had under his arm before carefully adjusting her foot on the cushion and gently placing the bag on her swollen bruised toe.
“Thank you,” Belinda said and handed Eli the now-empty glass.
“Don’t thank us, sweetheart, we’d do anything to make your life a little easier.”
All of a sudden her face paled and then grew pink. She gasped and her mouth gaped open for a moment before snapping closed. “Oh. My. God. It’s you.”
“What?” Ed asked as he sat on the edge of the sofa and took one of her hands in his.
“You’re the men from my dreams,” she whispered and then shook her head. “No. That can’t be. That wasn’t real.”
“I assure you it was very real, sweetheart.”
“What?” she asked as she looked from Ed to Erwin, and Eli before locking gazes with Ed again.
“We shared those dreams, too. They were very real,” Ed explained.
“How is that possible? Wait! What? How did you even hear me?” She pushed up until she was sitting more upright and tugged her hand from his.
Ed knew that it was time to come clean with her and hoped like hell she didn’t laugh in their faces, think they were crazy, or scream blue bloody murder.
Chapter Five
Bid couldn’t believe she hadn’t recognized the three men at lunchtime, but since she hadn’t really seen their faces in her dreams, it wasn’t really a shock. But when the light streaming through her living room window had hit the glass, all Eli’s form had been illuminated from behind. It made shadows, and that’s when she figured out she’d seen them before, and where.
What shocked her was that they had all heard her whispered comments and she was even more flabbergasted when Ed said they’d shared her erotic dreams with her.
What the hell is going on? How is any of this even possible?
“What the fuck?” Bid managed to form the words rolling around in her mind.
“Belinda, we’ll explain everything, and I know it’s going to be really hard for you to believe us, but will you please try and listen with an open mind?”
Bid shifted on the sofa and propped her sore foot up on the coffee table. When Ed sat closer to her, she wished she’d stayed where she was. Erwin pushed up from his knees and sat on her other side and Eli perched his ass on her coffee table, right in front of her, his hip touching her leg. She was hemmed in, but not in a bad way. In fact their individual scents were wreaking havoc on her olfactory senses and she was getting more turned on.
And although she should be scared over her reaction to these three strange men, she wasn’t. She felt like she’d known them for years. It was as if she’d known them in a previous life and her body and mind recognized them on an unconscious level.
“Okay.” She finally remembered to answer.
“We aren’t quite human, sweetheart,” Eli said with a serious expression and then reached out to place his hand on her knee.
“What?” She frowned not sure if he was pulling her leg or if he was being earnest.
How could anyone be not quite human? They look human to me. Did he think he was an alien or something? And if that was the case, were they fucking crazy?
“Sweetheart, we are shifters.” Ed took her hand back into hers and her insides fluttered when he caressed his thumb over the inside of her wrist.
“Shifters? What sort of shifters?” She knew she was supposed to remain quiet until they’d explained everything to her, but she just couldn’t keep her mouth shut. When she was nervous, she tended to babble and repeat things like she was a damn parrot.
“Dragon shifters.”
Now she knew they were yanking her chain. She couldn’t help it. She tipped her head back and laughed. She laughed so hard her stomach began to hurt and tears leaked from her eyes. But when she realized she was the only one laughing she quickly sobered up. She looked at Erwin and saw him scowling at her. Eli was trying to frown, but the corners of his mouth were tipped up as if he were trying not to laugh. And when she glanced at Ed, his expression was completely stoic.
“That’s a good one, guys, but you’re the ones in my house. You can walk out the door at any time you want to.”
“What the hell do you mean by that?” Eli snapped.
“Just what I said. If you don’t want to spend time with me, you don’t need to make any excuses. The door’s right there.” Belinda pointed.
“We aren’t going anywhere,” Ed stated emphatically.
“We aren’t lying,” Erwin said.
“Yeah right. Did you know that pigs can fly backward?”
“Can you just stay quiet and listen?” Eli asked.
“Okay.” She sighed and leaned her head back on the back of the sofa. The pain meds were starting to kick in and she was getting drowsy. “Well, go on then.”
“We were born as dragon shifters nearly three hundred years ago. We are from the bloodline of Arthur Pendragon and Guinevere. Arthur was changed by Merlin to protect humanity as were the Knights of the Round Table.” Erwin shifted in his seat.
; “Protect them from what?” Bid asked.
“Hunters. Those bastards wanted to take down our kind, but they wanted to rule over humans more. They are evil greedy and power-hungry assholes. Evil was prevalent as was magic and the only way to protect humanity was to create dragon shifters,” Ed explained. “Merlin was like a brother to King Arthur and since Arthur and his knights were fair and just, the wizard decided the only way to keep everyone safe was to make him, his friends, and knights into dragon shifters.”
“We don’t usually interact much with humans anymore. In fact we stay away as much as we can. The larger the population grew the more danger there was to us,” Erwin stated. “We’ve lived in our large lair beneath the Wind River Mountains all of our lives and even though our home is really an underground cavern system, we have every luxury you could ever want.”
“We have all the latest technology and each flight pod has its own apartment of rooms. We have central heating and all the mod cons we need,” Eli said.
“What’s a flight pod?” she asked and wondered why it was so difficult to form the words.
Oh yeah, the pain meds. Even over-the-counter painkillers made her drowsy. The doctor had given her some really strong shit.
“A flight pod is usually a trio of dragon shifters who are as close as blood brothers would be,” Ed explained. “We have a strong emotional connection and don’t like being away from each other.”
“So what? You’re gay?” Her heart lurched as she awaited her answer. If they were gay, what the hell were they doing here with her?
“Fuck no!” Eli snarled. “We are just really close friends who like to do everything together. We aren’t sexually attracted to each other, or any man for that matter. We are as straight as a line.”
“There’s nothing wrong with being gay,” Bid said as she opened her eyes to look at Eli.
“I never said there was.” He sighed and ran his hand over his face as if frustrated.
“Can we get back on track?” Erwin asked.
“The dreams we shared—” Ed paused and drew in a deep breath. “There was a reason for it. You are our fated mate, Belinda. Our dragons could feel you even though we’d never even met.”
“Mate? What do you mean mate?” She swallowed audibly and tried to keep her heavy eyelids from closing. The painkillers were really starting to take hold and even though her heart was racing in her chest, she was almost falling asleep.
“You are ours, Bid. Ours to love and protect,” Eli said with so much sincerity she was having a hard time refuting his claim.
“B–But you don’t even know me,” she slurred as her eyelids finally won the battle and closed.
She tried to open them when she heard something slam into the side of her house, but they wouldn’t co-operate.
“What the fuck was that?” Erwin asked.
“Let me go and look,” Eli said, and she felt him move away from her.
“Shit! We need to leave. There’s a man out there and he looks like he’s in a rage. I think he’s a hunter.”
“Damn it! How the hell did they find us?”
Bid wanted to ask what they were talking about, but her tongue was so thick she knew she wouldn’t be able to form any words.
“Go pack our mate some clothes. We have to go back to the lair. That is the only place she will be safe.”
Pack? Lair? Safe? What the fuck?
She didn’t want to go anywhere until she had more answers, but she wasn’t in any condition to get the information she wanted from them. She heard footsteps heading away from her and knew one of them was going to her bedroom. She wanted to protest but she was too drowsy. Her body felt so heavy and yet she felt like she was floating. Bid had never been so frustrated in her life and wished she hadn’t taken the pain medicine. Maybe if she had just put up with the pain she would have the answers she wanted.
“How the hell are we going to get her out of here without her being hurt?” Eli asked.
“I’ll go out the back, change, and lead the asshole away,” Ed said. “You two are to get our mate to the lair as fast as possible, but make sure you stay alert for other hunters. This guy could be a distraction or bait to a trap.
“I’ll let you know when I’m out front. Eli, make sure you wrap your front legs around her to hide her body. I don’t want this bastard seeing any part of our woman. Erwin, make sure the bag is hidden.”
Bid heard Ed moving toward her back door, but as she listened for the sound of the door opening and closing, she didn’t hear a thing. How can he be so quiet? Why am I not freaking out right now? Why do I want to be with them?
All the questions kept tumbling around in her mind, making her even more tired. When she was scooped up into strong muscular arms and held tightly yet gently against a warm chest, she sighed with contentment and finally let the meds pull her into sleep.
* * * *
Eli and Erwin exited Bid’s back door, and after making sure it was locked up, Eli handed their sleeping mate to Erwin. After glancing about and making sure there was no one around and his body was hidden by the dense copse of trees near the rear of Belinda’s yard, he called his dragon forth.
For the first time in his long life, he was glad that he and his dragon brothers weren’t the size of the mythological beasts in the fairy tales. Yes he was much larger in this form, but nowhere near as big as the largest dinosaur that used to roam the Earth so long ago.
After his transformation was complete, he took Bid into his large front legs and pulled her tightly against his chest, but made sure not to use any real strength since he didn’t want to hurt their mate. He met Erwin’s gaze and waited for him to speak.
“She is covered all over. It is a good thing our mate is so tiny and you will be able to hide her even better once you call on the reflection skill.”
Eli nodded and then waited for his flight brother to change. Then he juggled the small bag they’d packed with their mate’s clothes as Erwin shoved it under his right leg in the crevice which would normally be an armpit. When Erwin nodded to him, they both called on their reflection ability and took to the sky.
When he searched for Ed, he could just make out a shimmer toward the front of the house but about fifty feet above. There was a large blond man on the front porch of Belinda’s house, and from the red in his face, he was angry as hell. Eli didn’t know if he was a hunter because he had no weapons, but when the guy spun around and tilted his head to look up as if he felt their presence, he guessed he was wrong. Somehow his eyes seemed to be looking right where Ed was hovering in the sky and then he pulled a cell from his belt and dialed.
* * * *
Wallace left City Hall and sped toward Belinda’s home. The rage roiling inside of him felt like a living entity and although his anger was nearly all-consuming, he needed to be near her. He regretted firing her because she had walked away without a backward glance, but he was about to rectify that. He needed her by his side.
He parked his car outside of the fence surrounding her land and got out. When he breathed in deeply trying to calm his tumultuous emotions, he nearly growled as he smelled a foreign scent. Taking another deep breath, the rage inside built to an uncontrollable level, hazing his eyes with a red tint. He could smell three males and their scent was mixed with hers.
Not caring about being surreptitious, he ran toward her front porch and stormed up the steps. When the aroma of the males became stronger, his rage couldn’t be held back. He slammed his fists against the front door one after the other.
He felt the hair on his nape stand on end and his inner radar had him moving off the porch and looking up. There was a shimmer in the sky and he knew in that moment he was looking at a camouflaged dragon. Why his anger dissipated enough for his brain to kick into gear, he didn’t know, and right now didn’t really care. As he stared at the shimmering space in the sky, his sonar locked onto the heat signature and he knew he’d be able to find the shifter without any trouble.
Great gusts of wind
washed over him as he retrieved his cell phone and called in for backup. After this he would be Jerome’s right-hand man, but first he needed another hunter so that they could track the fuckers.
Minutes later, Reginald was standing beside him and that was the moment Wally knew other hunters had been watching him. The anger began to surge again, but he swallowed it down. None of their kind trusted each other. Their aim was to climb the ranks as quickly as possible, not caring who they had to stab in the back, kill, or maim to achieve recognition.
Reg was one step above him, one step closer to Jerome’s side, but right now all that mattered was finding the shifters’ lair. Once he accomplished that, he would be above them all. Jerome liked to play them off against each other, but when Wally had met him at the meetings he could see that their leader was weak. He didn’t know the first thing about ruling. All he cared about was keeping himself entertained with the infighting.
Maybe being Jerome’s second was too small a goal. What he should be aiming for was leader over all the hunters. If he could rule, he would be the richest and most powerful man on Earth. Yes, that would be his aim from now on. He would find the lair and then he would take out the dragon bastards.
Another gust of air came from behind. When he turned to look, he saw that two other dragons in reflection mode were moving through the sky away from the house. He caught a glimpse of a small foot and roared with fury. Those fuckers had his woman. She was his and they were going to die for ever touching her.
The wind became stronger and he had to close his eyes, cursing when dust brought tears to them. The dragons were leaving and taking Belinda with them. She would pay for that, as would those bastard shifters.
He would need to bide his time. First he and Reg would need to reconnoiter to find the lair and see how many dragons they would be up against. They would need to call in more hunters. He would also need his specialized weapons. Only obsidian glass was strong enough to pierce the metal-like armor of a dragon shifter. A wound from the glass wouldn’t kill a dragon, but it would be slower to heal. The only way a hunter could kill a dragon was to pierce the heart with the obsidian and for that to happen, he would need to be very close to the beast.