Thea Harrison - Dragon Bound

Graydon stood not three feet from them, arms crossed, watching her with an anxious expression. Okay, so that was maybe a little too close when she was busy getting lost in Dragos’s kiss. She shooed him with her fingers.

He shook his head. Then he mouthed, “What the fuck?”

She rounded her eyes, mouthing back, “I dunno.” She shooed him again.

The gryphon was stubborn as a mule. He cleared his throat and said aloud, “Boss, you gotta know we would never hurt her. We were just going through some self-defense maneuvers. She turned out to be so damn good we started to have some fun, that’s all.”

Dragos lifted his head. He cupped the back of her head and pulled her closer as he turned away from the gryphons, putting his body between her and them.

Realization dawned. He wasn’t being protective. He had almost killed his First because he was jealous.

She planted her hands on his chest and shoved. He let his hold loosen. She glared up at him, but when she saw the strain on his dark face her quick flare of anger died. Maybe she didn’t understand what was going on. Maybe she would never understand.

She drooped. “Is there anything more I can do?”

“I need to talk to my men,” he said.

She bent her head and nodded. She looked around the empty gym. “Okay. I’d like to take a shower.”

He let her go. “We’ll all go upstairs.”

As he spoke to his men, she turned toward the doors.

A tall powerful woman stood in the hall, looking in on them. Armed and dressed in leather, she had a strange beauty, with lean muscles, tangled black hair and stormy gray eyes. It took Pia a moment to recognize her. She was one of the sentinels from the Tower rooftop. Aryal, the harpy.

The woman turned away as she watched, but not before Pia looked upon the merciless gaze and cold white face of judgment.

Pia, Dragos and the four gryphons went up to the penthouse. Pia took the Saks box from the bed and disappeared into the bathroom without a word. A few moments later the shower started.

The gryphons raided the wet bar for bottles of Heineken. Dragos opened up the French doors. He stood in the doorway as a sharp breeze gusted in. The fresh air was brisk and calming.

Rune joined him and stood casual and relaxed, hands on his hips as he too looked out over the city.

He said to his First in a quiet voice, “I owe you an apology.”

The gryphon searched his face. “It’s all right, my lord. I can imagine how things must have looked. You’d already warned us to take care with her.”

“No,” he said. “It is not all right. It’s clear I am not in control. I am well aware that I am not acting or thinking normally or even rationally.”

Rune’s gaze was keen, perhaps more keen than he was comfortable with. “Dragos,” he said, “we’ve all seen Wyr acting this way before, you know. We’ve just never seen you acting this way.”

He tilted his head. “What do you mean?”

“Come on, think about it,” said the gryphon, a smile creasing his tanned face. “When have you seen Wyr acting too jealous, possessive and obsessed? When have their tempers become too volatile? Too irrational?”

His mouth twisted. “I’ve always been bad-tempered.”

“Well, yeah, you can be one crabby son of a bitch, especially when things don’t go your way. But you know, when you lose your temper you have a reason. There is a reason for all this too.”

His thoughts twisted and turned. He considered the drama that played out when Wyr passions ran hot. “You think I’m mating.”

His First shrugged. “The possibility occurred to me. There’s also a lot going on right now. You’ve been under considerable strain. It’s rare when you’ve been in real danger of being killed.”

He took a deep breath and nodded.

Mating. Hmm.

He was a solitary creature by nature. He might interact with others, but inside he had always been alone. He counteracted the stresses of constant socialization in modern life by escaping for regular long flights where he could lose himself in wind and sunlight.

That was the juxtaposition that perplexed him. Instead of feeling relief at escaping Pia’s presence earlier today when he had left her sleeping in his bed, he had felt her absence as a loss.

He had . . . missed her.

“I guess I’ve got a lot to think about,” he said. The irony of that statement occurred to him, coming so soon as it did after his annoyance at it being Pia’s favorite refrain. He rubbed his chin and started to pace around the large room. “Just—don’t any of you touch her right now. Not until I figure this out.”

Rune strolled to join the others on the couches around the fireplace and accepted the bottle of lager that Bayne offered. He said, “Understood. Unless, of course, her life depends on it.”

He explored the strange landscape inside himself for a moment and nodded in agreement. He changed the subject. “Still no lock on Urien’s location,” he told them. “Whatever Goblins that might have survived have scattered. The mayor’s whining, the governor of Illinois is trying to tunnel up my ass, the Elves are being manipulative, and . . .” He stopped and shook his head. “She didn’t say she’s feeding the state, did she?”

Graydon rubbed his face, covered his mouth with a hand and said, muffled, “Ayup.”

Rune and the others weren’t so circumspect. They shouted in laughter at his expression. Rune explained, “She asked the shopper to stock up all the food banks in the state. To be honest, I think the credit card freaked her out a bit. Maybe she’s more of a flowers-and-candy kind of female.”

As he scowled, Graydon added, “She liked the robe, though. Said it was real nice.”

“Whatever,” he said, dismissing the subject with a wave of his hand. “I think it’s pretty clear to everyone I can’t be around too many people right now or I really might tear somebody’s throat out.”

Bayne grunted. “It is pretty tough to apologize after the conversation degenerates to that point.”

He gave them a grim smile. He finished one circuit of the room and started another. “Another day like today isn’t going to happen. We’re going to start selling off some of the businesses and get life more simplified.”

“Maybe it would be a good idea to go upstate to Carthage for a few weeks instead,” said Constantine in a cautious voice. He referred to Dragos’s 250-acre country estate in northern New York. “You know, take some afternoons and fly out over the Adirondacks, figure out what you really want to do, let stuff settle in your head?”

“Going upstate for a while isn’t a bad idea, he said. “But I’m settled on a few things right now. Aside from the fact that Urien’s got to die, I want to downsize my life and get rid of some of the white noise. And while we’re at it, I want you guys to help me figure out what to do with all the crap I’ve got crammed underneath the subway.”

Under the cover of the shower, Pia sat on the bench with her head in her hands. A backlash from fear and adrenaline hit, and she cried until her throat hurt and her nose was clogged and she couldn’t cry anymore.

The last couple of days had been so full of extremes, she felt like she was suffering from some kind of psychic whiplash. Everything was strange, full of hidden currents and nuances, with bouts of intense joy and sudden sharp spikes in anxiety and isolation. Reality had become a kaleidoscope that kept breaking up and re-forming.

For a while when the shit had hit the fan, Dragos had been her center, her one stable point. Odd, but she had been okay with all the danger and uncertainty that surrounded them. Here Dragos was part of everything else—unpredictable and unknown.