Royal Blood Page 2

  He didn’t move a muscle as she lifted a hand, moving slowly, but curiously, toward his face. Gently, as she thought she would startle him otherwise, she traced a finger over the scales on his snout. Donovan would have thought that he wouldn’t be able to feel a touch through the thick armor of his scales, but the heat of her finger seared him.

  Apparently it did her too because she instantly whipped her hand back, holding her finger. “Ouch. Sharp.”

  She looked down at her hand and Donovan followed her gaze. She was bleeding. From touching him.

  Donovan had always been a particularly fierce dragon. He’d had vicious encounters with dragons who’d infringed on the Prodigo family territory. But at the sight of her blood, something new rose up in Donovan. A feeling so intense, so fierce, so protective, that Donovan could barely identify it. All his dragon heart knew was that his true mate was injured. In a field. Completely vulnerable and exposed.

  “No,” Donovan growled. No to the whole situation.

  “What?” she looked up from her wound.

  “No,” he said again. “You. Home.”

  “How?” she asked incredulously peering back up at the sky where she’d fallen from.

  “NO,” Donovan growled even louder, furious that the idea of returning to her realm had even crossed her mind. “MY home.”

  “Oh. Uh. OK.” She shrugged, and Donovan didn’t understand the bemused look on her face, but he didn’t care. She was coming back to his home now.

  She stood and looked around, like she expected his home to be somewhere that she could walk to. Donovan stood, stretched and flexed his wings, making sure everything was in working order. He shook his mighty body, flinging dirt off of him in a great cloud.

  He reached out for her with one claw and was surprised when she batted him away with her good hand.

  “No way!” she said, something strong passing across her face.

  He tried again with the claw. And again she slapped it away.

  “Stop that!” she yelped.

  “You stop,” he growled.

  “No.” She stamped her foot on the ground. “You’re too sharp! Even the tiny little cute scales on your face cut me up.” She held her bleeding finger up and Donovan felt an agitation like he’d never known build in his chest.

  He couldn’t touch his mate without hurting her. For the first time in his life, Donovan wanted to shift into his human form. But not out here, in the field. Not where they were still vulnerable. He needed to be able to protect her from anything.

  Considering, Donovan walked over to one of the trees that lined the field, each of his tremendous steps making the ground shake. He yanked the tree up by the root. He couldn’t interpret the woman’s gasp that he heard come from behind him, but he hoped it wasn’t fear.

  He brought the tree back over to her, laying it down flat on the ground. “Get on.”

  Again, she shrugged her shoulders and crawled onto the tree. She hugged it around the middle with her arms and legs laced in with the branches. Reasonably sure that she was safe, Donovan gripped the tree on either side of her body with his claws. And with a great, heaving beat of his wings, he lifted her from the ground, flying her home.

  CHAPTER THREE

  So, this was happening. If Felice had to wager a guess, bulleting through the sky just moments after she'd nearly tumbled to her death would not have been welcome. But, like everything had been in this strange place, it was. Welcoming. Familiar. Exhilarating.

  Felice gripped the branches of the tree the dragon carried her forward on. She watched as the prairie landscape below them gave way to forest and then the forest rose up into a mountain.

  So apparently the talking dragon lived on a mountain. That didn't completely surprise her. How was she supposed to know where a dragon lived?

  But she was pleasantly surprised when the dragon circled, lowered and gently touched down outside of a small cabin. A nice little cabin set back into the mountain with ivy creeping over top and a smattering of little yellow flowers planted out front.

  “You planted flowers?” Felice asked as she stood up off the tree and dusted her hands off. How the hell would a dragon plant that neat little bed of sunny flower?

  The dragon chuffed out a breath of air and didn't answer. He just dragged the tree out from the clearing and set it back into the woods.

  Felice shrugged and tentatively took a step toward the cabin, unsure of whether or not she should go in. She froze mid step as something occurred to her.

  “Wait, how the hell do you fit in this tiny ca-” she cut off with a strangled scream as a completely naked man sauntered past her, the dragon nowhere to be seen.

  Holy hell. Her brain totally shorted out. Up until now, she thought she'd done a pretty good job of rolling with the punches, but this was suddenly too much.

  The man turned to her, totally unabashed, and raised his arms up like, what? He gestured for her to follow him and walked to the cabin, holding the door open for her.

  “Did you- Were you- Where did-” Felice threw her arms up in the air and gave up. She had no idea where to even start asking the seven million questions she had to ask.

  The man did the same thing, threw his arms up in the air. He strode back over to her and Felice had a difficult time keeping her eyes on his face. He had been extremely impressive as a dragon, ranging from emerald to sea green depending on where the light caught him. She guessed he was 40 feet long from snout to tail. And his head was the size of a smart car.

  But somehow he was even more impressive as a man. He was easily over 6’4”. His broad shoulders arrowed down to a slim waist. Her eyes skittered over his man parts. She really wanted to stop and stare but she was too jumpy, too overwhelmed to completely take in his… humanity. Muscles roped over his entire body and gave the impression that they were caging in a beast. Like something fierce was threatening to explode out of him.

  Which kind of made sense, Felice considered, if he was somehow also a dragon.

  He had shaggy blonde hair, which seemed kind of funny to her. It gentled his rough appearance.

  Felice braced herself as he strode up to her, remembering the way he'd grabbed at her with his claw earlier. But she found herself smiling down at the hand he extended. He was asking her to come with him. Not grabbing her like before.

  Her life experience had her hesitating. She was an intelligent woman. Some of those smarts had been extremely hard won. Was she really about to follow a naked man into a cabin in the middle of the woods?

  “Come home, True,” he said to her, speaking as a man for the first time.

  Felice’s hand snapped back and gripped at her throat, weirdly searching for the jewel she'd dreamed about. Something inside her spun off its axis at his words, at his baritone voice.

  “What did you call me?” she asked, her voice hoarse.

  “Your name.”

  “My name is Felice,” she asserted.

  He shrugged, like semantics. Gesturing out with his hand again, Felice could see his patience wearing thin. It was now or never.

  The woman inside of Felice gawked at the man’s hand held out in front of her. The lonely foster kid inside of her reached out and took the hand he offered without a blink.

  She barely had time to think about how warm his hand was, how rough, before he was tugging her into the cabin and slamming the door closed behind them. He hurried her across the small cabin toward a sitting area in the corner.

  Felice glanced around and saw a small stove and sink in the corner, a fireplace and a rumpled bed. She turned back when she felt something tugging at her front.

  The man was frowning at her coat and trying to pull apart the zipper from either side. Felice tried to bat his hands away but he ignored her. Letting out a frustrated growl, he bunched the fabric on either side of the zipper in his fists and ripped the coat apart.

  “Hey!” Felice cried. “That was a good coat!”

  The man grunted and pushed it off her shoulders. Felice automat
ically crossed her arms over her chest as her coat fell to the floor. She was still in her pajamas after all. Just a thin camisole and some leggings. Neither of which did anything to hide or contain her extremely curvy body.

  A low growl reverberated out from the man’s throat and Felice froze in place. He surveyed her like a predator observing prey. Felice forgot her own unsureness when her eyes traveled down the man’s body. Her brain basically stopped working as she observed his very physical reaction to seeing her in her skimpy attire. Jesus. He was huge. And hard. She gulped.

  Felice had never seen a naked man in person before, but she was pretty sure she was seeing something extraordinary right now. The afternoon light slanted in from the side, shadowing his dips and valleys in the extreme. His barrel chest rose and fell and his hands flexed at his sides. His face was a study in focus, in intensity, and she was his subject. Every muscle in her belly tightened and Felice found herself pressing her thighs together. Maybe she should be freaked out by this stark naked stranger’s reaction to her, but something in Felice was calm. She was drawn to him.

  Her eyes dragged back up his body to his face. They locked gazes and his remained fierce, desirous, protective for only a moment before something gentle came across his expression.

  “True,” he said again and he moved toward her, gently pushing her down in the chair. He knelt next to her and brushed her hair back across her shoulder.

  “Um. Could you maybe put some pants on?” Felice asked nervously. Why she was nervous she had no idea. He was the one who was butt naked.

  Confusion clouded his eyes as he looked down over his naked form. Frowning, he stood and walked over to a small chest at the foot of the bed. He dug through it for a moment and came up with a pair of canvas pants that he pulled on. Stalking back over, he pulled a small box off of a shelf behind her and knelt next to her. He pulled her injured hand toward him.

  He quickly bandaged up her finger and sat back on his heels, surveying her. Felice’s heartbeat quickened under his discerning stare.

  “True.”

  What was that? Why did he keep calling her that? Beginning to get a little annoyed, Felice tossed her hair back. “No, my name is Felice.”

  The man swatted that information away with a wave of his hand. He pointed at himself. “Donovan,” he said.

  Something skittered around in her gut. The name suited him. But he wasn’t done making whatever point he was trying to make. “True.” He pointed at her. And then he laid his hand over his heart. “True.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  This was why Donovan hated human form. How much clearer could he possibly be with the woman? They were each other’s true mate and the sooner she accepted that the better.

  But here she was, leaning away from him on the chair like he was a crazy man. Making him put pants on. He hadn’t liked that at all. She was his true mate. She was supposed to want to see him naked. She was supposed to want to mate with him for fuck sakes. But she wasn’t showing any signs of that either. She was actually looking at him like she wanted to be very, very far away from him.

  Little did she know that they were never going to be far away from one another again. Not if he could help it. He’d found her and he couldn’t un-find her. That was that.

  Donovan stood and paced a quick circle around his small cabin. He was torn in two pieces right then. He wanted to go back to his dragon form. Everything was simpler in dragon form. He was dominant and in control and never confused. But for the first time in his living memory he also didn’t want to shift into his dragon form.

  His dragon form was dangerous to his true mate. To Felice. If he wanted to be close to her, to touch her, he needed to stay in his human form. And he wanted those things. Badly.

  “Um.” Her small voice had Donovan whirling back around to face her. Her golden skin glowed in the waning light of the afternoon. Her eyes tracked him across the room, like two kisses of nighttime planted in a face made of sunshine. And her lips. Good lord her lips. Her breasts pressed insistently against her thin clothing, round and falling away into her little waist. Only to flair back out at her hips. She was as still as a statue. Watching him like she had no idea what was going to happen next. Which, he had to admit, she didn’t. She was so lovely perched on the chair. Something in his chest tightened.

  “Do you speak English?” her voice small but sure.

  Donovan’s mouth dropped open. He was really failing at this communication thing if she wasn’t even sure they spoke the same language. “Yes, I fucking speak English.”

  “Ok.” She put her hands up in the air, seemingly to soothe him. “Just trying to get the ball rolling. You said your name is Donovan?”

  A little growl tore out of him at the sound of his name on her tongue. He nodded.

  “And you’re part dragon?”

  “A dragon shifter.”

  Her eyes grew wide. “So you can shift back and forth whenever you want?”

  He nodded again.

  “Ok, so we’re in, like, Dragonland?”

  “The Dragon Realm. It’s like earth, but populated with dragon shifters instead of humans.”

  “Ok,” she said again, pinching the bridge of her nose like she had a headache. “Do you have any idea how I got here?”

  “Through the portal,” he said, shrugging like it was obvious.

  “Portal,” she repeated dully. “In the sky. Yeah.” She dropped her head to her palm. “Sure. Why not.”

  She was tired. She must need sleep. From the legends he’d heard, humans were very fragile compared to dragon shifters. Now that they were true mates, it was his job to take very careful care of her. He crossed the room in two giant steps and scooped her off the chair.

  “Hey!” she yelped and went stiff as a board, but Donovan was immensely pleased when she didn’t fight him. He strode over to his bed and set her gently into it. Her eyes grew large when he yanked off one of her boots and then the other, tossing them back over his shoulder. He could feel the tension start to radiate out from her. She thought he was going to touch her. And she didn’t want that.

  “I won’t mate you until you’re ready,” he told her and her mouth fell open. He reached down and yanked the covers clear up to her chin. “Sleep. You’re tired. When you wake up I will feed you.”

  She didn’t look tired as her wide eyes tracked his movement back across the cabin, but her fatigue was so potent he could almost sense it in the air. He yanked the pants off and threw them on the floor of the cabin. He heard her small gasp behind him and found he rather liked his true mate looking at him while he was naked.

  Once he was outside he shifted into his dragon instantly. He didn’t want to be away from her any longer than necessary. It made him uneasy to lift off into the air away from the cabin and away from her fragile little self. But he needed food for her, and he would have to fly across the mountain to get some from his aunt.

  He touched down in their front yard where his aunt was hanging laundry on a line. “Donovan!” she exclaimed, thrilled as always for a visit from her nephew.

  “Aunt Roma,” he said, not bothering to shift into his human form. She was used to talking to his dragon.

  “Well, honey. What brings you over here in the middle of the day?” She was much more used to him showing around dinner time.

  “I have a human at my house and I need food for her.”

  He never was one to beat around the bush.

  The skirt she was hanging got tangled up in a passing breeze and blew right out of her limp hands. Donovan easily caught it in one claw and handed it back to her. Roma cleared her throat and shook her head, taking back the skirt and clipping it onto the line.

  “I assume you’re serious?”

  “Of course.”

  “Alright, well. I guess I’ll get some food together for you. And for her.”

  Donovan waited outside in his dragon form as Roma bustled around inside her home. His Uncle Stillwell was presumably out in the woods somewhere, trapping
and gathering food for them.

  There were dragon cities of course, where the populations were much more modern. Telephones, electric stoves, grocery stores, the works. But since Donovan and the rest of the Prodigos were driven out by the king, they’d had to live much more rustically. Which was ok with Donovan, but he sometimes wondered if life was a little harder on his Aunt and Uncle than it was on him.

  Aunt Roma came outside with a satchel of food and supplies for them. “Honey,” she started.

  But Donovan cut her off. “Aunt Roma, I promise I will explain everything to you very soon. But right now, she’s alone and unguarded in my house and I have to get back to her. Protect her.”

  Roma’s eyebrows shot upwards. “And you’re the one who protects her?”

  “Of course. Dragons are born to protect their true mates. You know that.”

  Roma’s eyebrows disappeared into her hair line. “Donovan, you couldn’t possibly-“.

  But he didn’t wait to hear what she had to say. He lifted off from the ground, the satchel of food gripped in one claw. He knew it was rude, but he couldn’t stay and hash this out with her for another second. He was crawling out of his skin being away from Felice.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Felice stretched and brushed the hair out of her eyes. That had been a really lovely nap. She felt rested and warm and-

  She sat up straight, one hand flinging to her neck. Well, she was still in the dragon’s bed. That was for sure. Her heart raced as the events of the day came back to her. What could she really do besides accept it? Either she was dreaming, and she should make the best of it. Or she really had fallen through a portal into the dragon world and she should still just make the best of it.