Demand of the Dragon Read online

  Caleb nodded as the door slammed shut, echoing through the chamber as hard and loud as his drumming heart. An awkward, gaping silence filled the space between them.

  As Lucy watched Queen Elixa leave, Caleb realized she hadn’t looked at him. Not really. Her attention had focused on Queen Elixa, the four-post bed in the corner, the mahogany dresser on the far wall, the flickering candles in the wall sconces, and even the sleeve of her gown. It was as if she’d mapped every detail of the room, leaving him completely out of it.

  “Where is he?” she asked.

  “I don’t know.” Guilt tore into Caleb’s side, splintering hot shards of pain into his stomach. “I lost track of him when he went through a portal.”

  Portals on Feralon were nothing extraordinary—each of the three territories on the isle had a few. Some portals led to San Francisco, back to the mainland and human civilization. Other portals led to adjacent territories on the isle. Caleb knew one that led from dragon territory to werewolf lands, and another that led from there to mermaid territory. But there was one portal in particular that no one had ever traveled...at least not until he and Tristan went through it.

  “So the situation’s not any different than it’s been for the last three years.” Lucy tunneled her fingers through her golden tresses and gazed far off. “Tristan’s gone.”

  “At least now you know he’s not dead. He’s simply missing.”

  “I never thought he was dead to begin with. Everyone may have given up believing that he was out there somewhere, but I never have.” Lucy leveled him with a heated stare. “Where have you been?”

  Her eyes sparkled like sapphires, the most precious gems he’d ever laid eyes upon. Her gaze stirred something in his chest, the way it used to when they were close. When he’d swallowed his feelings for her brother’s sake, so things wouldn’t be awkward, so he wouldn’t have to explain to Tristan why he’d rather spend time with Lucy than with his friend.

  Fear of the unknown had always played a part in Caleb’s decision making. What if he got Lucy in bed only to realize they weren’t compatible that way? He would’ve had to break her heart, and if Caleb did that, Tristan would’ve wanted to break his face.

  Rightly so.

  Swallowing down his desire, Caleb clenched his jaw and folded his hands in front of him. He couldn’t reach out for her if his fingers were linked...

  “You’re not the only one who has held onto the belief that Tristan is still alive.” He wanted to say so much more.

  “You’re right,” she said, “But I’m the only one who’s been here waiting for him to come back. You shouldn’t have taken off the way you did. Or at the very least, you could’ve said goodbye.”

  Something flashed across Lucy’s expression. Something dark and shadowed. Why did he sense anger flaring within her? This was far from the homecoming he’d anticipated.

  Unable to stop himself, Caleb reached out for the bump on Lucy’s head. “Does it hurt?”

  Lucy flinched, eyeing him with distaste. “At first it hurt like hell, but after a while the pain got easier to bear.”

  Caleb leaned back, and sat on his haunches. “Did you really expect me to be there to catch you every moment of every day for the rest of your life?”

  “I certainly didn’t expect you to drop me.” Lucy glared. “I thought you were dead, Caleb. I thought you were both gone. If you’ve been alive all this time, where the hell have you been? Why didn’t you come back or send word that you were all right?”

  Caleb leaned forward and clasped his hand over hers. Sparks of electricity sizzled through Caleb’s fingers and up his arm. “Luce, I had to go. After Tristan disappeared, I did what I had to do and—”

  “Don’t tell me about what you had to do,” she finished, sliding her hand from beneath his. “I had to stay here and wonder what happened to my brother and my best friend. I had to try and accept the fact that you were never coming home. I had to listen to Queen Elixa when she said you were both dead. That the time had come to move on. I’d finally accepted my new fate...until you come waltzing back into my life acting like nothing has changed.”

  “It’s more complicated than that.” He’d held everything inside for so long. Too long. He ached to tell Lucy everything. “I’ve worked for Isle Security, securing the portals on Feralon for the last eight years.”

  “Come on.” She shot to her feet. “You think I can’t do math? That means you worked there five years before Tristan disappeared, when we were still friends.”

  She slowly paced around the room wringing her hands in front of her. As if the tight circles around the bearskin rug helped her separate truth from lies.

  “There were things you didn’t know,” he said, standing, folding his arms over his chest. “Things you couldn’t know for your own safety.”

  “I’m a big girl, Caleb, I think I can handle whatever you’ve got to say.”

  Caleb’s heart slammed against his rib cage. The pain of that night clawed its way back into his mind, gritty and raw, scraping against his insides like talons in tender flesh.

  “Tell me,” she said.

  The room grew hot. Stifling. Caleb bristled under her penetrating gaze.

  “I have to know everything.” She closed the distance between them, looking calmer than she had mere moments before. “You can’t hold anything back from me now.”

  Lucy hadn’t only grown up in the three years he’d been gone. She’d grown stronger, too.

  “Tristan and I were working together, guarding the portal beneath Thorne Castle. On the night he disappeared, I wasn’t there. I was near the Sindracos’s village when I heard his screams. They were so loud, they echoed up from the ground.” Caleb paused as Tristan’s shrieks blasted through his ears once more. The memories were as sharp as they’d ever been. “I flew back to the castle and saw Tristan fighting some sort of beast. It wasn’t like any creature I’d ever seen on Feralon. I figured it came from the portal, from some other realm. When it retreated into the portal, Tristan followed, diving after it. I didn’t have a choice. I did what I had to do.”

  “Don’t say it,” Lucy said, covering her mouth with her hand. “You didn’t...”

  “I went into the portal after him.”

  Lucy froze, but Caleb hadn’t told her the worst of it.

  “I searched the wastelands on the other side of the portal for what felt like forever. Time doesn’t stand still on the other side, Lucy. It simply doesn’t exist. There are things that no one should ever have to see. Pain that no one should have to bear.” Caleb paused, remembering the deranged creatures, black, scorched plains that stretched on for miles, and the throat-clogging stench of sulfur. “When I finally found Tristan, he was being attacked by the same kind of beast I saw the night we went into the portal. There was another portal nearby, but neither of us had a clue where it led. He was injured, but managed to escape through it. He dropped this on his way out.”

  He fished Tristan’s medallion out of his pocket. It looked more like a silver pocket watch than a medal, with deep grooves on the back that twisted into an S shape.

  Lucy took the medallion and turned it over in her hand, examining every smooth curve. “Tristan never took it off. I don’t think I ever saw him without it.”

  “I escaped through the same portal,” Tristan said, his voice hoarse, “but I emerged beneath Thorne Castle. Yesterday evening. Tristan wasn’t there when I came ‘round. He must have exited through another portal.”

  Lucy’s expression shone with hope. “If you made it out of the wastelands alive, then maybe Tristan did, too. He could be on the isle somewhere!”

  “That’s precisely why I interrupted the ceremony to tell you. If we can find him, you won’t have to be mated to Geezer. I’m just glad the timing was right.”

  Throwing her arms around his neck, Lucy squeezed Caleb tightly, squealing into his ear.

  “Everything’s going to be fine,” she said. “Everything’s really going to be all right.”
/>   “I don’t know where to start the search,” Caleb said, breathing in the sweet scent of Lucy’s hair, “and the portal could’ve taken him anywhere, but I won’t rest until I find him.”

  Pulling back, Caleb brushed his hands over Lucy’s shoulders. She was so tiny in his hands. Delicate and fragile like a rare flower blooming in Feralon’s wasteland.

  Lucy blinked quickly, tenderness glistening behind her deep blue eyes. She was quiet for a few beats before asking, “When do we leave?”

  Even after all the time that’d passed, Lucy still amazed him. She’d go willingly, fly into the heart of their enchanted isle to find her brother, even if Caleb didn’t know where the hell to start. After everything that had happened—Tristan disappearing because Caleb wasn’t at his post and leaving Lucy behind for three years—she still trusted him. Wholeheartedly.

  It was a trust he didn’t deserve.

  “How is it possible that three years have gone by, and you’re still the same Lucy you were before I left?” Caleb fought the urge to brush the back of his hand down her rose-tinted cheeks. It seemed as though no time had passed. The urge to touch her cheek, kiss her lips and hold her hand was just as strong as before. He lowered his voice to a tender whisper. “Queen Elixa told me about the demand in Tristan’s will. You know you wouldn’t have to marry Geezer if you’d had another prospect. Why haven’t you been claimed, yet?”

  “Maybe I’ve become a spoiled brat and no one wants me.” She paused, hands on her hips, the light from the bathroom illuminating the edges of her hair in a halo of gold. “Or maybe I haven’t found a Draco on the isle who is good enough for me.”

  She was right on that count. No one would ever be good enough for Lucy. Not even him, and he knew she was special from the first moment he laid eyes on her. She’d been clumsily descending the Drakein Cliffs on her sixteenth birthday, searching for an entrance to a legendary series of lava tubes. She’d tripped. Tumbled headfirst into the sea. And when the waves rose, crashing over her, Caleb had thought she was a goner. He’d dived in. Just as Lucy emerged from the water, smiling deviously, and splashed him in the face.

  “You look more beautiful than the day I left,” Caleb said, unable to bite back the words. “I didn’t think that’d be possible.”

  “You can’t charm me, Caleb.” Her lips twisted, making Caleb’s mouth water. “I’ll help find Tristan, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to step in line behind the other Sindraco women who are falling at your feet.”

  Sure, there’d been others. But didn’t Lucy know that they were stand-ins who filled a void? A void that lingered, aching until he was numb, because he couldn’t have her? Didn’t Lucy know she was the only one he’d ever wanted? The stakes were simply too high where she was concerned. The loss would be too great if they didn’t work out.

  “You have to know...” His feet moved toward her of their own accord. “I may’ve been gone for three years, but I thought about you all the time.”

  Caleb stood before Lucy, inches apart, closer than he thought he’d ever be, yet there was still so much between them. Finding Tristan. Revealing what really pulled him away from his post the night Tristan disappeared. Not to mention the fact that the claiming ceremony would still take place if they couldn’t bring Tristan back.

  He’d be damned to stand idly by and watch Lucy marry Geezer.

  “You always did know just what to say to make a woman melt,” Lucy whispered, her velvety-soft voice drawing him in. “I was a girl when you left, Caleb. A girl who didn’t know how to tell a man what she wanted. But things have changed. I’ve changed.”

  Oh God.

  She set Tristan’s medallion on the armoire and stood up on tiptoe to meet Caleb eye to eye. “I dreamed of the day you’d return. I dreamed that you’d come back, sweep me into your arms and make me forget about all the lost moments we’ve had. I dreamed you’d say things to me that you used to say to your other girlfriends, the ones that you took to bed after talking and laughing with me.”

  “Lucy...” Caleb didn’t know what to say. This was Lucy. His friend. If they took their relationship to the next level, would they regret it later? Getting physical always changed things. Always. Expectations grew heavy and stifling. Emotions ran high, oftentimes deeper on the part of one person and not the other. Shit, could he go there with Lucy? He didn’t know. How could he take the chance? “You’re not like my other girlfriends. You never were.”

  “I know that,” she said, softly rubbing the tip of her nose against his. “But couldn’t you just pretend that I am? Just for tonight?”

  Jesus. “Lucy, I don’t want to pretend that you’re anything but what you are.”

  “Damn, you’re good.” Her breath coated his face in a sweet, sugary rush. “Kiss me.”

  Stomach clenching, cock swelling, Caleb’s primal instincts kicked into overdrive as Lucy closed her eyes and waited for his lips to cover hers. Unsure as hell what would come from this moment, Caleb did the unthinkable. He took a leap and reached out, grazing his thumb across her lower lip. Consequences be damned, Caleb’s control evaporated with a single, quivering touch.

  He caught Lucy around the waist and dragged his lips against hers.

  Chapter Three

  Lucy felt as if her insides exploded at the contact. Her entire world lit up firecracker bright, starbursting into blinding brilliance the instant Caleb’s lips touched hers.

  Nothing existed before this moment.

  Heat flushed through her body. Caleb’s fingers tunneled through her hair, grasping at the back of her neck with increasing urgency. She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t suck in a solid breath. Not when his mouth was possessing hers and his tongue was exploring her cheek and—

  It was all too much.

  Maybe she’d been rash.

  Lucy pulled back.

  “No,” Caleb growled and pressed her against him once more, claiming her lips, her tongue. They were hip to hip, chest to chest, the heat between them fierce and tangible, sparking over her skin like rods of lightning.

  How many times had she dreamed he’d kiss her this way? Not like a friend, but a woman. A woman with need and desire pulsing through her veins. She couldn’t believe it was happening. All the anger she’d felt earlier...none of it mattered. Not now. Not when his arms roped possessively around her waist, gripping tighter still. The skill of his mouth overpowered her. Drugged her.

  Caleb made her feel as if there’d never been another he held so closely. Like he didn’t ever want to let her go.

  Having been surrounded by loss and doubt for so long, his embrace was all Lucy needed.

  She threw her arms around his shoulders, giving herself over to him, to his all-consuming kiss.

  Caleb groaned in approval, splaying his palms over her back, bending her into him. His mouth claimed hers, engulfing her in blazing white heat that melted the skin over her bones. His hands skated up her back, then down to her backside. And when her hips writhed against his—tiny movements she couldn’t control—his hands kneaded the flesh of her rear, digging in.

  By the time Caleb finally dragged his mouth away from hers, Lucy was light-headed and gasping for air. Only he didn’t stop his assault. His mouth smudged a fevered line of kisses down her neck, dipping into the severe V of her gown.

  Lucy had never seen Caleb like this before. Although she’d dreamed of his hands caressing her body, she didn’t realize they’d be so rough and commanding. His hands covered her body with primal intensity, blowing away her greatest expectations. Lucy had imagined how skilled Caleb would be at kissing—he’d had more girlfriends through the years than she could count—but Lucy never expected him to be this good. His kiss buzzed down to her toes, tingling every nerve on the way down her body.

  When the hard shaft of Caleb’s arousal pressed against Lucy’s stomach, she bit back a gasp. He wanted her. And from the long, hard feel of him, he wanted her a whole lot. More than she could possibly take in. Warmth pooled between Lucy’s legs, saturating
her in desire, filling her with raging need.

  As Lucy opened her mouth wider, panting for air, Caleb came up to meet her and plunged his tongue deep inside. Lucy couldn’t control the whimpering sounds escaping her now. With each swirl of his tongue, she lost herself a little more. Held captive, unable to move from the spell Caleb had over her body, Lucy was sure she’d stand here on quivering legs forever if he wanted her to.

  “I can’t believe we’re doing this,” she sighed.

  As if he sensed her surrender, Caleb slid his hands beneath Lucy’s rear and lifted her onto his hips. “Want to stop?”

  She wrapped her thighs around his middle and squeezed tightly. His erection pushed at Lucy’s center, creating a wave of anxious pressure that built and compressed until she was soaked in molten heat.

  “Don’t you dare,” she said.”

  Caleb growled once more, though this time the possessive sound came with a surge of movement.

  Before Lucy knew what happened, Caleb had crossed the room and tossed her onto the bed. She landed at the edge with her legs hanging over the side. Caleb knelt on the ground, poised between her legs, his mouth inches away from her center.

  She shuddered, raking her hands through his dark hair. “What are you—”

  “Shh,” he said, and in one forceful move, jerked Lucy’s dress over her stomach. With another jolt, Caleb yanked her underwear aside, tearing it to shreds.

  Lucy’s head snapped back onto the fur blanket covering the bed. Cold chills of anticipation coated her body. Her knees shook.

  This was really happening.

  “I’ve waited so long to taste you.” Caleb spoke against her sensitive flesh, his breath hot and moist, driving Lucy to the brink of madness. She wanted pressure. She wanted his mouth covering her to take her over the edge.

  Breath hitching, Lucy looked down her body, catching Caleb’s gaze. It was greedy. Hot and a bit frightening. No one had ever looked at her that way before. As if she was something to be ravished. It thrilled her like no adrenaline rush could.