Believing Binda (4 page)

A lump formed in
her throat at his declaration. He couldn't mean it. No man would ever really
mean what they said when they were trying to trap her. She'd been stupid
earlier. Giving into some bizarre alien connection she felt to them and her
daft childhood dreams of finding a happily ever after with love and kindness
from a lover.
Or two.

She trembled as
she raced down the hall until she found what had to be the master bedroom. The
first door she opened within the room revealed a huge bathroom complete with a
massive hot tub. Maybe a hot shower would help her calm down. But she needed a
change of clothes first. The next door she tried exposed a small room filled
with dresses.
All blue and green.
To match their dragons.
She
couldn't bring herself to wear anything they'd bought for her. She'd had men in
the past do that, buy her nice new clothes—that she had to wear when and where
they told her to. She'd had enough of men controlling her.

After leaving
Dean, she'd finally confided in her mother
all that
she'd been through with past boyfriends. Binda had previously kept it all to
herself. No one knew how her arm really got broken. She'd told everyone she'd
been having a go at roller-blading down at the park and had fallen. Once she'd
purged it all to her Mum, she'd spent so much time with Binda, explaining how
it should be between a man and woman. When her father had found out, he'd told
her that any man worthy of her time and heart, would be one who was willing to
take his time in wooing her and would make her feel cherished always.

On a back shelf
she saw her hiking bag. Digging around she found a pair of jeans, a singlet top
and a baggy jumper. And clean knickers and bra. Arms full, she headed from the
closet. A little of her tension eased when she saw the bedroom was still empty.
With a small sigh of relief, she entered the huge fancy bathroom. She couldn't
deal with Zane again until she’d reinforced her mental armor. She closed the
door and huffed in frustration when she couldn't find a lock. She looked around
the room but couldn't see anything she could use. She sat all her clothes on
the bench and opened the drawers until she found a toothbrush with a tapered
handle. She smiled a little as she went back to the door and proceeded to jam
the plastic underneath. Hopefully that would keep the door closed if anyone
tried to open it.

She then made
her way to the huge stall and flicked on the tap. She breathed deep as the air
around her filled with steam. The moment she stepped beneath the spray she felt
the remaining tension ease from her muscles. As she washed the men's scents
from her skin she started thinking of the future. With no way obvious way to
return to Earth, what could she do that would distract her from these two men?
No way would she easily fall into bed with them. If they wanted her, they were
going to have to work for it and prove to her they meant what they said.

****

Zane paced the hallway of their chambers. What the hell had happened?
Their little Desired had gone from soft and willing to cold and distant in the
blink of an eye. Baxter had looked a little fierce before he left, but Zane
suspected Binda's reaction was to something more than simply reacting to that.

How is Binda?

I have no idea, brother. She's in the shower at the
moment.

Are you with her?

No. She's jammed the door so it won't easily open. I
don't want to barge in and frighten her so I'm pacing the damn hallway.

Bloody hell.
Bring her to the library
after she's finished. I'll try to get some time in there with her. Carina has
now woken up, and Becky's injuries are simple flesh wounds. We should both be
able to spend the night with her tonight.

The crack of the
bathroom door opening had him returning up the hallway to the bedroom doorway.
He gripped the doorframe to stop himself from going to her. She looked so damn
fragile with her wet hair and bare feet. She wore a tight sleeveless shirt and
long pants while she held another item of clothing in her hands. A stab of pain
shot through his heart.

She's refused to wear our colors, Baxter.

Shit. We will fix this, brother. We will show her
we're worthy of her.

Zane loved his
older brother, but he wasn't sure how the hell they could fix this. Especially
while neither of them knew what
this
was.
He'd thought they were fortunate to have one of the five females as their
Desired, but if she refused them, they were condemned to a life of insanity or
worse.

"Are you
feeling better, Binda?"

"I'm fine,
Zane. I was actually thinking I’d like to have a better look around the library.
Would you please take me there?"

Zane sighed as
her truth band glowed red. She was not fine, and she was lying to him. He and
Baxter needed to work out what they hell they were going to do.

"Sure,
beautiful. I'll help you find the way before I go check in with Baxter."

He walked beside
her as they made their way through the castle. He watched her from the corner
of his eye. She twisted and tormented the material she held in her hands. She
kept her gaze fixed straight ahead. The hard line of her jaw made her look cold
and closed off. Yet, she'd been so soft and sensual earlier. This female had
him so confused! Didn't she feel the connection between them? Or was it the
fact they were healers, and would need to leave her often to attend to others
in the clan that needed medical help, that had her being so standoffish?
Although the way her fingers never stopped moving gave him hope. That was a
sign of
her own
confused thoughts. Maybe she only
needed a little time to process everything that had taken place. So much had
happened to her and her friends since the Great Wind brought them through the
portal.

Feeling a little
calmer he opened the door to the library and stepped in behind her. He gently
gripped her arm before she could move away from him. He leaned in to kiss her
forehead.

"Binda,
talk to me. What's wrong? Did you not like any of the dresses?"

She closed her
eyes as she shuddered in his grip.

"The
dresses are beautiful, Zane. I just needed to wear my own clothes right
now."

Her truth band
glowed green, so Zane racked his brain for what might be the issue.

"I know
Baxter frightened you when he stormed out earlier, but you know Baxter wasn't
angry at you? He was cross that he had to leave."

He felt her
stiffen and saw the fire in her stare.

"I was not
frightened. I am not some … some silly young woman who needs a man to prove she
has value. Who falls apart at the thought of angering
him.
That is not me. Not anymore."

Her last words
were whispered, but Zane heard them and they made his heart ache. His precious
Desired had been hurt in the past. She was putting up mental walls against him.
He rubbed his thumb over her truth band, which was now glowing red, and
wondered if she knew she was lying.

"Please
don't lie to me, Binda. Baxter and I would never hurt you, nor would your
relationship with us define who you are. How about we find you a role to
fulfill in the Clan? You mentioned earlier you were a librarian. How would you
like to look after our library, catalog everything? No one really has any idea
what's in here." He paused as he allowed her to glance around the room.
"I'll leave you be for the moment, Binda. But Baxter and I won't give up
on you.
Ever."

Before she could
respond he retreated from the room. He leaned against the stone wall next to
the door for a minute with his eyes closed. He allowed the coolness of the rock
to seep into his body and focused on it to calm his nerves. His Desired had
deep issues about her self-worth. She'd been hurt and hadn't healed yet.

The clinic door
opened to reveal a miserable looking Drake, and Zane slipped into the lab where
he assumed Baxter would be.

"Brother,
what's going on? Drake looked wretched."

Baxter flicked
the switch turning off the speaker that let them hear what was going on in the
clinic before he spoke.

"It’s
Carina. She's been hurt in the past by men. Becky made all the men promise they
wouldn’t harm Carina or any of the females before she asked them all to leave
the room."

"She's not
the only one. Binda's said a couple of things that make me think she's been
hurt, too."

Baxter sighed as
he rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"Where is
she now?"

"In the library.
She asked to go
there after she showered."

"That's
good. Honestly, I'm too damn tired to focus enough to work out what to do for
our precious Desired right now."

****

Binda stood frozen to the spot after Zane left her. She stared down at
her stupid truth band, its red glow fading away. How had she lied? She thought
back over what she said but couldn't pinpoint anything that should have made
this stupid thing glow red.

"
Gah
, who cares anyway?"

She stomped away
from the door, walking through the rows of shelves. She ran her fingertips over
all the leather bindings as she moved. The smell of paper and leather filled
the air, and she took deep breaths allowing the scent to calm her. Very few
people understood her love of books. How she could spend all day, every day in
a library. A jolt up her arm had her pausing. She gripped the book that had
jolted her and pulled it free from the shelf. The spine held a single word that
made no sense to her while the cover was free of markings. The leather was old
and well worn, so at one time this had been a well loved, often read book.

She made her way
to the plush arm chairs that rested in the center of the room. Tucking her feet
up under her as she sat down, Binda opened the thick tome on her lap. She said
a little prayer of thanks that despite the spine appearing to be written in
another language, the contents were written in old English. The same strange
word was repeated on the first page.

"Dubhghlas.
What on earth does that
even mean?"

With her
curiosity taking over, she forgot about all the other dramas going on and
focused on the pages before her. By the end of the first page she was gob-smacked.
Before Earth's creation, humans, dragon shifters and liaths had all lived
together on Dubhghlas.

Zane had told
her there was no fiction in this room. So this must be a telling of their
history, which apparently included humans. She returned to reading, turning
page after page as she learned about this beautiful place that sounded much
like the Garden of Eden from the Bible. There was enough of everything for all
to thrive. Each race had its strengths and complemented the other species. All
three were clearly designed to function alongside each other. But the liaths grew
full of self-importance. They spent their time focused on learning magic, and
with each new skill they learned, their egos grew along with their power.

"Yeah, this
garden might not have had a snake, but they still had evil."

She winced as
the story continued to detail the liaths trying to kill off all the humans and
dragons. They focused on the humans first, and as not many had any skill with
magic and limited defenses to fire they were quickly all but eradicated. The
dragons were not so easy to take out. They'd come to help defend the humans. In
their dragon forms they had all the fire they needed.

In the end, the
land was nothing but a burned out shell of its former glory. With nothing left
to fight over, the liaths and dragons were caught in a standoff, the two humans
left stood terrified behind the dragons. That was when the Goddess used her
Great Wind for the first time.

The humans were
taken first in the cyclone wind tunnel before it returned for the dragons. The
dragon warriors woke to find themselves on a new plane.
Lush,
green, and full of potential.
The Goddess appeared before them and told
them they were now in The Land of Feury where they would be the only higher
beings and they needed to care for the land and the animals here in order for
their species to thrive. She explained that she had taken the humans, a male
and female, and had given them to her brother to care for. He'd created a world
called Earth for them to inhabit.

"Guess that
explains why the Garden of Eden sounds like Dubhghlas."

The Goddess also
informed them that the liaths had been left on Dubhghlas. She’d hoped they
would learn their lesson of not letting ego and greed dictate their actions as
they rebuilt what was left after the war.

Binda closed the
book when she finished and simply sat as she tried to process the story. So the
Goddess's brother was the God that created Earth, according to the Christians.
It didn't line up with her knowledge of Dreamtime legends of creation. But she
guessed all these legends were old and open to interpretation, and the truth
was probably somewhere in the middle of it all. Who's to say the Dreamtime
story of celestial beings rising from the barren ground to create life before
returning to leave humans to roam with the animals wasn't how Earth was created?
It was perfectly plausible.
Especially since the Great Wind
had proven it still existed.