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Authors: Mackenzie Lucas

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BOOK: To Have & to Hold
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There was only one way to take care of scum like Michael James.

Only one language he

d understand.

And no one
in the room
spoke dragon better than her husband.

 

 

Chapter Eight

 

“Grayson.
This isn

t what it looks like,” Michael
said
.

He now stood at the foot of the bed and yanked his trousers from around his ankles and fastened them at his waist. His hands shook. He glanced behind him on the floor, no doubt looking for the gun
Cate
had knocked off the table. She spied it peeking out from the bed skirt, three feet from her.
Over six feet away from Michael.


Cate

s
been coming on to me for years now. I

m a weak man. I caved. She

s a beautiful woman. You

ve been separated for months
. No hard feelings, right?”

Cate
snorted from her position against the wall. “Good luck with that.”

Michael
stopped wheedling and
sent her an If-You-Know-What

s-Good-For-
You-
You
’ll
-
Shut-
Up-Bitch look. How he thought he

d get out of this situation, she had no idea. He had no clue what he faced in Grayson Cooper.
He’d find out.
One more second.
Two.
When Michael turned back to confront Grayson, he screamed.
A high-pitched, girly scream.

Cate
wished she could feel pity for Michael. Really, she did. Only she couldn

t find an ounce of it anywhere. Not after everything she

d learned about Michael James. Within her quiet, peaceful
haven,
stood a monster. A monster in the form of a human man faced off with a dragon.
Her dragon.
Pride welled inside her at the sight of the beautiful raw power of Coop as dragon mage, his iridescent scales glowed richly against the gray-cast backdrop of the room--gold on his belly, purple on the underside of his wings, green and blue mixed over the rest of his body in intricate patterns laced with red. Folded wings opened at half span, to impress his sheer size upon his prey, but not enough to damage her bedroom. Smoke rings puffed from his nostrils. Grayson took one step forward on huge clawed feet. Sharp teeth
bared
.

“What the fuck?” Michael backed up, fell onto the bed and scuttled backward, crab style.
He whimpered.

Cate
?
What is this?” Sweat dripped down his face.

“Remember that mangy shag rug you loved so much? Yowling the rafters down in Cornwall? The one you promised to dispose of for me? Michael
,
meet Coop, the beast in the attic--Grayson Cooper. Coop
,
meet the bastard Michael James, no friend of ours.”

Grayson blew a tongue of fire that crackled across the six feet of air between him and Michael.

A wet spot bloomed
and grew
on the front of Michael

s dress pants. “Don

t let him eat me, please
. I beg you. I never meant to hurt you.”

“Y
ou are pathetic
and such a liar
. You
were going to drug me and rape me for years on end
. Who knows how many other innocent people you

ve harmed along the way?”

Grayson moved a step closer. His heavy jaws snapped together, a strand of drool dripped from the right side of his mouth. Then, he opened wide to let free a bellow that shook the lamps and rattled the bookshelves and pictures on the wall.

And no matter how scary he looked, she loved Grayson.
Body and soul.
Dragon or man.
The tattoo on her neck warmed. She caressed it. The dragon looked at her, cocked its head. He closed his eyes. A purr sounded from deep in the beast

s chest.

Cate
pushed away from the wall. She walked up to the dragon and stood less than a foot away from him. He lowered his head, blinking his eyes slowly.
One green eye and one tawny eye.
He mesmerized her. She stroked his nose. The hard blue-green scales, cold to her touch, felt like glass. He leaned in to her touch and closed his eyes.

Cate
, I love you.

He turned his big clawed hand to run his knuckle down her cheek. A tear slipped free. Joy pulsed through her.

It is finished.

She sighed and pressed her mouth to the same knuckle he

d used to caress her.

“My, isn

t that a touching scene?
Beauty and the Beast.”
Michael sneered directly behind
Cate
now.

She whirled around to see him holding the Luger, pointed directly at Grayson

s heart.

Fear exploded in her chest.

Michael pulled the trigger.

Fire flashed a few inches in front of the barrel. The bullet hit Grayson
’s scaly armor
and ricocheted into the wall behind
Cate
. Grayson nudged
Cate
to the ground and spread his wings to protect her. She covered her head with her arms and curled in a fetal position to prot
ect the life growing inside her
.

A rapid-fire volley of bullets sprayed throughout the room, bouncing off of Grayson and hitting the walls, the pictures, the lamp and light fixture. Glass shards fell around her. Fiery heat ripped through
Cate

s
shoulder. Damn.
Collateral damage.
Pain seared through her. She gasped,
then
panted. She looked down to see blood wetting her blouse. She pressed hard on the wound to staunch the blood flow. Her vision blurred.

The dragon bellowed. A scorch of fire erupted in the room, the smell of brimstone heavy. This time,
the action
would be no fear tactic. This was self-defense.
Pure and simple.
To the death.
Protecting h
im and
his own
.

The gun
j
ammed
. Michael screamed
and threw it at Grayson in frustration
.

Cate
peeked from under Grayson

s wing just in time to see a fiery inferno blaze for a minute, then two. The fireball collapsed. Smoke cleared. A colorful stone pinged as it bounced against the hardwood floor and rolled to a stop at Grayson

s feet. Then, a fine fall of ash
floated
to the ground, a gentle dance of carbon all that was left of the monster Michael James.

“Grayson?”
She looked up at him. Pain wound through her in tight, fiery spirals from the gunshot wound.
“Help.”
She panted, fighting against the darkness that threatened to overwhelm her.

The dragon folded his wings and lowered his head. His nose quivered. He nuzzled first her stomach, his warm, rough tongue swiping the bare skin of her midriff. The baby in her womb moved at his father

s greeting. A tear plopped onto
Cate

s
shoulder from the dragon

s amber eye. Then he lapped the wound with his tongue.

An ancient language she didn

t understand buzzed in her head. Then the words righted themselves,
To
have and to hold from thi
s day forward until death do us part
.

A quiet peace filled
Cate
. A gentle hymn she

d always known.
A sacred place long forgotten, but unearthed by the healing tears and the restorative kiss of a dragon mage.
She didn’t know if it’d be enough.
Cate
had found her hoard. And she

d never let it go.
Ever.
Even if she never held her baby in her arms or kissed her husband again
.
Sh
e just hoped it wasn’t too late and that Michael hadn’t stolen that from her, too.

#

 

Grayson Cooper had never been
so
scared in his life as when he

d seen
Cate

s
lifeblood soaking her clothes and smearing her body. He splayed his hand over her tummy and caressed the growing child she nurtured in her body. The baby rolled, as if he enjoyed the touch. Grayson chuckled, but sobered at the closed eyes of his wife, the pale countenance. It had been
two
day
s
now since she

d passed out after the confrontation with the scumbag Michael James.

Hattie had bandaged
Cate

s
shoulder and had given her something to ease the pain. She

d said
Cate
might
wake when the wound knitted, when she no longer needed all her strength to fight infection and fever.
The word that stuck in his throat was
might
. P
regnancy hormones could wreck havoc on the strongest female dragon mages and while
Cate
was strong, she wasn’t a dragon. Grayson didn’t even want to think what dragon hormones might do
to
his wife or the baby in this situation.
Hattie thought she might not ever wake.

Cate
would
come back to him. She had to. He loved her, needed her to become the man he wanted to be, the dragon mage he wanted to be. He wouldn

t survive without valiant
Cate
by his side. He didn

t even want to try. And he

d be damned if he

d ever leave her or the baby unprotected again. No matter what the Dragon Consortium dictated.

A knock sounded at the sliding glass door leading to the porch. Grayson opened the door to find David waiting for him. He

d pushed his friend off yesterday, after
Cate
had been s
hot. David had given him space, but now he was back and more determined than ever.

Grayson stepped onto the porch, forcing David back a step or two. He wouldn

t allow another dragon male anywhere in close proximity to
Cate
or his baby. For some reason, the instinct David said would cause him to attack the baby had not materialized in him yet. But he

d always been a late bloomer. He wouldn

t take any chances with their lives around other mages and he

d need to be quick to recognize his own urge to harm them. This had been
all his
fault. Never again would he endanger his wife. He

d give her up before he allowed that to happen
again
.

“What can I do for you, David?” He sat in one of the high-backed green rocking chairs and propped his bare feet on the deck railing.

“Damn it, man. I told you
you
can

t stay with her.” David sat in the rocking chair beside him, but leaned forward, elbows propped on his thighs, hands
steepled
.

“I

m not leaving.”

“Grayson, it

s not safe.”

“I have no idea what you

re talking about. I was with
Cate
all day yesterday and today. Nothing happened. I felt the baby moving inside her. I will not hurt
them
.”

“Other dragon mages have failed.”

“I

m not other mages.”

David studied him. “No. You

re not.” He sighed. “I

m not sure what it is that makes you special. You didn

t turn until thirty-eight. Every other dragon in recent history has changed by the age of five or they never change at all. Thousands of years ago, there were a few reported cases of late changes--but they

re so rare we don

t know much about them. I

ll have to see what I can find in our archives.”

BOOK: To Have & to Hold
3.88Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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