Dragon's Claim

Chapter 8-2

THE URGE TO FEED HER must have been some kind of primal instinct. He couldn’t help it. After the night before, when her day had been so busy with the needs of others and she had forgone feeding herself, he wanted to make sure she ate regularly.

He only wished she would allow him to satisfy her in other ways.

Time, he reminded himself. He might have lived a long life, but she was still young. She had yet to live, had yet to learn from the trials in her life. He would give her that time. He just hoped that he could withstand it.

They ate on the way to the site the GOE agents had picked out. Watching her eat out of his hand had been an oddly arousing situation. Drake had enjoyed watching her lips part at his request and seeing the flush that filled her cheeks while he watched her. He secretly hoped they could try that again in the secret of his home.

After that intimate experience, Layla refused to face him. That was fine. Every step, no matter how slow, was progress. So, he turned back to enjoying his own sandwich. Strips of bacon audibly crunched when he bit into his sandwich and Layla jabbed him with her elbow every time. He only crunched louder for her.

“What did you get?” Drake asked, eyeing the wrapped meal in her hands and the thick layers of meat and cheese.

“Muffuletta, I think it was called.”

Drake reached out without invitation, grabbed her wrist, and pulled the sandwich to his mouth. He forgot how quick she could be. He got a small bite of her sandwich, but she brought her foot down on his instep before dancing away.

He hissed in pain, a sound that turned into soft laughter. His eyes rose to find hers gleaming with the expected challenge. Instead, of trying for another bite, he stood and finished the one he’d taken.

Play smarter, not harder, he thought.

“That’s not bad,” he said.

Layla let her guard down, thinking he was finished, and returned to walk beside him. Once she was comfortable, he snaked one arm around her waist, capturing her free arm in his embrace, and plucked the sandwich from her grip.

“Maybe I’ll take it back,” he said, teasingly.

Her eyes narrowed up at him. Her skin grew uncomfortably warm beneath his touch. Damned red dragons, his beast hissed while Drake stubbornly held on. She was beautiful, even as she burned in his grip. The high arch of her cheekbones begged for the brush of his thumb. Her lower lip was ripe for his taking, even though he it wasn’t time yet.

But, he forgot to account for the empty hand now that he held her sandwich. With a deceptive smile, she brought her fist into his stomach. The punch knocked the air out of his chest for a moment and made the food in his stomach do a queasy flip.

He handed over her sandwich, feeling that she had rightfully won. His mate was a force to be reckoned with, even over matters as small as a sandwich. He was glad to see, when she turned away from him, that some of the guarded tension had left her limbs. She walked away with a smooth gait and a confident swing to her hips that he paused to appreciate.

Ahead of them, a giant building rose over the small town. The domed roof that rose over the town was the faded green of copper exposed to the elements for decades. Gray-green columns rose on either side of the entrance, sturdy and imperial. The building had been a law library for a few decades until the librarians decided they no longer thought it would be useful to stay in a town that did not grow.

He knew why the town stopped growing. It happened all around his Territory, people leaving in fear of his dragons or being run out by the raiding dragons that circled him like scavengers. He had hopes that the Embassy would allow some of them to meet with him, to attempt to lay down a true home on his land.

Beside him, Layla’s jaw dropped. She took in the beauty of the building, a kind of elegant creature beside the brick facades of factories long out of use. She cast a sidelong glance at him, as if to ask if they were at the right location.

Ahead of them, a man broke from his post at the information plaque posted outside the building and approached them. Drake had worked with this GOE agent a few times before, building not trust, but a comfortable partnership from afar. The Agent looked like he should have a kid or two in college and had tried to endure one of those follicle treatments in which they replace the hair the scalp had lost.

“Agent Forrest.” Drake greeted the man with an extended hand. “Meet the Welsh dragon ambassador here to help us, Layla Taniff.”

“Good to see you again, Mr. King,” the agent clearly lied, his voice dead flat. The agent turned his gaze to Layla, trying to suppress his distaste and failing. “Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Taniff.”

Layla caught the man’s hatred of their kind, and to Drake’s pleasure, she stood taller and let the creature inside of her swim closer to the surface. Drake watched shadows pass over her eyes. It reminded him of the shadows a bird or a dragon might cast on the ground as it flew overhead. A smile broke her lips, not the sweet one he was able to coax out of her or the motherly one that Miri had found in her, but the predatorial one he’d first seen.

Agent Forrest did his best not to step back as his eyes widened a fraction. It was almost imperceptible, but Drake caught it. Layla did too, from the low laughter he caught after the Agent spun on his heel and beckoned them to follow.

She leaned in to him and whispered in his ear. “Are GOE agents d***s everywhere?”

He could barely suppress the shudder that raced down his spine when her breath brushed over his ear. Now was not the time, he told his beast and his c**k. He nodded, unable to respond for fear of what he might do. He wanted to claim her mouth then and there, touch places inside her no one else had ever done.

But, they had a job to do.

The GOE agent led them through the vacant building. A feeling followed them in the empty rooms, a ghost’s whisper of what the build had been in times past. Drake liked that. He liked history, especially when it was not his own.

The building was nigh perfect. It was only going to be pricey to install the security upgrades and new technology. He would have to ask the Egyptian Princess if she could get him a discount with Secur IT. It blew his mind that there was a chance the Egyptian Princess might be his sister-in-law someday.

While they were walking through the building, Drake reached out and grasped Layla’s hand. She let him hold it, probably to keep from making a show in front of the GOE agent. It eased the beast inside of him that roared to claim her before anyone else could. The agent would glance back at them from time to time, his eyes roving over Layla’s body.

It wasn’t even like she’d dressed provocatively. She wore a pair of slim, black jeans and a sheer, violet shirt over a camisole. It was nigh conservative for American standards. Yet, the agent couldn’t stop sizing her up. The agent’s eyes lingered on the curve of her hips when he turned to speak to them. His eyes stayed too long on her rise of her breasts when he looked over his shoulders.

When Layla slipped her hand from his, he felt the world grow smaller and the beast rose with a growl. He would tear the agent’s throat out if he moved toward her. But, his mate cast him a look of mischief and his heart seized. What was she going to do?

The room they stood in was a simple office. Someone had left a plain, metal desk and a few knickknacks on a floating shelf. A window looked out over the small town and the falls in the distance. Drake felt the pressure in the room begin to grow. He fought to keep himself from looking at his mate to see what she was trying to do.

Her beast’s presence surged from her body, not physical or corporeal, but a magical aura that echoed the beast that lived inside of her. The room around them trembled, knickknacks falling off shelves to crash on the floor. Pieces of pottery scattered in every direction.

The agent staggered on his feet. He grabbed at the desk to keep himself upright as he looked around for the source of the quake. The only indication that it was Layla was the lip she sucked into her mouth as she smiled.

“Perhaps this place is haunted?” she offered, nonplussed by the events.

Drake fought to keep from laughing at the agent’s expense. He deserved it after all his leering. But, he had to wrap this up quickly to keep her from getting herself into any more trouble. The agent could easily file against her for using her abilities on a human and have her sent home, or worse.

Drake informed the man that this location was perfect, and that he had a connection with Secur IT that he would like to contact before any renovations went into effect. They signed some papers on the old, metal desk before retreating into the open world again.

Layla let out a sigh as though she let go of the persona she’d been wrapping herself in. Her hands rose in the air, a long stretch that exposed a slice of her stomach to Drake and Drake alone. He wanted to reach out and run a finger along that thin slice of skin.

“I love the building, but working with him is going to be like working with a thorn my paw.”

“You are not wrong,” Drake agreed. “But, you have officially spent too much time with Luc and his antics. No more pulling stunts like that on humans here. The States have some very strict laws regarding dragons that do not work in our favor. Had Agent Forrest known that was you, he could have contacted his office and had you deported.”

Layla froze, eyes widening for a second. “s**t,” she breathed.

Drake’s lips pressed together. He didn’t tell her what else he’d seen done to dragons that had been caught. He didn’t even want to imagine it happening to her.

“I’m sorry. I got so damned sick of his attitude...” she struggled for the right words.

He reached out and pulled her close, trying to smooth away the concerns that had risen in her. He wouldn’t let the agent take her away. He would fight for her, and that terrified him. It put his people in a risky position. She needed to know.

There were a few dragons in his family that had been incarcerated by the American GOE agents. Perhaps he would introduce her later. It was a scare tactic, but his ever brave and rash Layla might need it.

Another voice whispered to him. The voice wondered if that was what happened to Miri’s parents. It wasn’t too far-fetched. He knew her parents, knew the kind of life they lived and the things they’d done. If Forrest was in town, his crew might have done a sweep of the area to put a damper on any raiding.

But to leave a child behind like that... it was cruel. He thought Forrest and his crew were better men than that. They would have contacted Drake about the runaway child, had him retrieve her or, at the very most, left her in his care. He shared his thoughts with Layla as they walked back to the convertible.

By the time she slid into her seat, she was fuming. Her face became a blank mask, but her eyes betrayed her. They were dark with the thing inside her. It shifted, anxious to draw the blood of those that had betrayed the small child that had clung so fiercely to her the day before.

Drake was starting to wonder if the thing inside her was a beast, or if it was something more. He’d been there.

And, he’d barely come back, but he’d come back stronger than before.

*