I Like Big Dragons and I Cannot Lie (The I Like Big Dragons Series) Read online

  I’d nearly reached my door when a large man came barreling out of the apartment next to mine. Macy’s apartment.

  He was a huge man.

  Big, with beautiful brown hair, a strong jaw and gorgeous eyes. Whiskey-colored eyes that actually leaned more towards gold rather than brown.

  Those eyes flicked up to me and away just as fast, focusing instead on the man he was dragging out of the apartment with him, kicking and screaming.

  A kicking and screaming nearly naked man.

  I flattened myself against the wall, but the shoulders of the large man in his impeccable business suit still brushed my collarbone in the narrow hallway.

  His bare hand brushed along the exposed skin of my thigh where the damn booty shorts my boss at the diner insisted we wear, ended. I mean really, it’s a diner for Christ’s sake, not Hooters.

  An electric jolt surged through me, causing my spine to straighten and my eyes to find his as he passed. This shouldn’t be so natural – even if my body did somehow yearn for the stranger.

  His eyes were just as wide, and he was looking at me like I’d just grabbed his testicles in a one-handed grip… which I most certainly did not.

  Not that it wasn’t tempting, but I didn’t think I could work up the energy to have sex with the handsome man, even if my body did yearn for his.

  I started walking away on wobbly legs just as he passed me, ignoring the man he was dragging completely.

  I’d seen nearly naked guy before, of course.

  The apartment they came out of was Macy’s. The man being dragged was Farrow, her boyfriend. He’d probably been the reason that Macy hadn’t come into work today, the big bastard.

  The other man likely was Farrow’s brother—a man that Macy continuously spoke nastily about due to the fact that he made Farrow be responsible. How dare he?

  Although, now that I knew that the mere graze of his fingers along my leg could set my vagina on fire, I needed to avoid him at all costs.

  Something I could easily do since it was more than obvious he’d never stoop down to my level. Slumming didn’t even look like it was a word in that man’s vocabulary.

  As I got my door open, though, I looked over my shoulder to see the handsome, suit-wearing man’s eyes on mine.

  He was staring at me intently.

  I didn’t grab your balls, why are you staring at me like I did something inappropriate? I wondered.

  His smile widened, almost as if he’d heard my thoughts.

  My eyes narrowed on him, and he began to laugh as he started to pull his brother down the flight of stairs by his hair.

  Farrow got to his feet. He stopped fighting the man and went willingly. Walking, because it appeared that he didn’t want to be dragged down the stairs. He likely didn’t want to scrape any tender parts, though I noticed that his nakedness didn’t appear to affect him.

  The suit-wearing man didn’t look like the type of guy who would take no for an answer, anyway.

  Closing and locking the door behind me, I headed right to the kitchen and grabbed a cold can from the fridge

  Dr. Pepper in hand, I headed to my room, ignoring the large pile of clothes on the floor at the entrance to the hallway that I’d yet to pick up from where they’d fallen that morning.

  I hated doing laundry. And it wouldn’t matter if I did. My cat, Teller, a.k.a. Slimeball, would knock them down regardless of whether or not I’d taken the time to fold them.

  My shoes were kicked off in the hallway, and my shorts soon followed, discarded at the entrance to my room.

  My shirt was the last thing to go as I made it into my bedroom.

  I stood by the open window, taking my jewelry off and placing it on the nightstand when I looked up and screamed.

  A~ because there was a dragon sitting outside my window, and B~ because it was looking at me. A huge motherfucking dragon. Right there, outside my goddamned window.

  His head was level with my open window, and his large face was turned and looking in on me curiously.

  He was a beautiful gray beast. Not much larger than a cement truck, but he definitely created a presence with his size. He had large red horns glistening in the sunlight extending from the top of his head. His eyes gleamed golden picking up flecks of the ruby of his horns. Following the scales of his concrete colored skin, his back was covered by the beautiful shades of red on his folded wings. They ranged from a red so deep it resembled blood to a purple on the tips, which were so bright they glowed with an inner fire.

  His red tail flicked like a cat’s, thick and strong. The end barbed with what resembled one of those medieval metal balls with spikes attached to a chain on a stick.

  I reached out in awe, my hands only inches away from the dragon’s nose.

  Then I thought better of it and yanked my hand back.

  I covered myself by pulling on a T-shirt off of the floor, even though he was only a dragon, and I was happy I’d done it a moment later when the suit-wearing man dragged his brother out the backdoor and straight up to the large dragon.

  His eyes flicked up at me, and his lips curved into a sexy grin as he threw his brother at the dragon.

  The dragon caught Farrow with a giant clawed hand, and then extended his tail to the other man.

  The man climbed up onto the dragon’s back.

  His strong powerful thighs hugged the dragon’s sides expertly as he reached for his sunglasses that were in his front suit pocket.

  He slipped them on over his eyes, winked at me, and disappeared.

  I gasped in disbelief.

  I hadn’t realized that they could do that.

  My gaze darted to the sky, looking for the dragon and its rider. I scanned the area for them for long moments, but they were gone.

  “Holy shit,” I breathed.

  I’d seen dragons, of course. Everyone had.

  They were beautiful creatures, centuries old, and very popular around our area. It wasn’t uncommon to look up and see one flying high above the city of Dallas. I didn’t know of a time in my life where they weren’t around. Unlike migrant animals, the dragons stayed year-round, filling our sky with their beauty.

  My soul always found this soothing even though they had no interaction with people. Not normal people anyway.

  Seeing one outside your window, well, that was highly unusual. They liked to settle in open areas. The tight alleyways and bustling of the city wasn’t anything that appealed to the winged beasts, according to the many articles I had read over the years. They were simply too large, and the cramped city too small.

  Woodenly, I turned and surveyed my room, feeling strangely as if my life had just somehow been changed.

  Why, I couldn’t say. I just knew I felt different.

  With nothing else to do, I went to bed, my thoughts consumed with the suit-wearing man and his dragon.

  Mostly, though, I was thinking about the way that single brush of his fingers against my bare legs felt. How hot his touch was, and how the feeling had gone straight to my core.

  A feeling that was still wracking my body.

  I’d give just about anything to have his hands where I really wanted…

  I squelched the thoughts in their tracks. I was not going there with that man. No ifs, ands or buts about it. He was bad news with a capital NO WAY!

  He’d eat me up and spit me out.

  Though, just because I couldn’t have him didn’t mean I couldn’t think about him.

  In my dreams we were made for each other. Reality could eat shit and die.

  ***

  I woke up to my lower half on fire.

  At first, I thought it was just an aftereffect of my dreams, but when I finally peeled my eyes open, I could smell smoke.

  When I opened my lids and looked down, it was to literally find my panties on fire.

  I screamed and rolled; rolling so far in the bed that I hit the floor and kept going.

  By the time the
fire was finally out, my panties were burned to ash. However, my skin was perfectly fine. In fact, the hairs that I’d planned on having waxed later in the week were gone.

  It’d given me a fire waxing…minus the wax.

  “What the fuck?” I yelled, staring down at my now hair-free mound.

  Blasphemy.

  My eyes widened and I looked around. Was someone in the room with me?

  I started reaching for the lamp but couldn’t find it. There was a pile of things beside the bed that I’d knocked over in my haste to get up. I could only assume that the lamp was one of those things.

  “Light, light, light,” I chanted, shifting through the things on the floor.

  My candles that I had interspersed around the room all lit at once, and I screamed.

  “What the hell is going on?” I shrieked.

  Macy started hammering on the wall, or her boyfriend. Whatever. Fuck her.

  I narrowed my eyes at the wall.

  That stupid heifer! I’m allowed to scream if I want to. She fucks day and night, and she’s going to bang on my wall to get me to quiet down?

  Master Farrow has always had excellent stamina with the ladies.

  I froze, turning around and scanning the room.

  “Who’s there?” I asked nervously.

  A deep, rumbly laugh filled my head and my eyes widened.

  “Holy mother of God, get out of my head!” I yelled.

  The voice in my head continued to chuckle. Oh, this is almost as good as when Prince Keifer came into his powers. He didn’t shriek like you do, though.

  I couldn’t explain it, but I knew whatever was in my head wasn’t human. He didn’t sound human.

  Or if you could say ‘sound’ at all. Was hearing something in your head ‘hearing’?

  My panic started to make my heart beat faster, and the worse the panic got, the more afraid I became.

  Then things started…floating.

  My brush on the dresser was the first thing that started to lift off the wooden surface. Then my jewelry. Then…everything.

  “Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God!” I whispered.

  Calm down and it’ll stop. You freaking out about it isn’t helping. Go take a shower. Cool your tits, the voice said.

  Cool my tits? For real?

  “What are you?” I whispered, taking his advice and walking into the bathroom.

  Jesus, I was taking the voice in my head’s advice.

  I was going crazy. There was no other alternative.

  I am a dragon. What else would I be?

  What else would he be? Right, a dragon.

  “Umm,” I flipped on the hot water. “How is this possible? I thought I read that women couldn’t communicate with dragons…Couldn’t command them.”

  Women can’t, he agreed instantly.

  “I’m a woman…just sayin’,” I informed the voice in my head.

  Pulling the tie out of my hair and ripping the shirt off my shoulders, I jumped into the shower, squealing when the ice cold water hit my skin.

  Macy must’ve used all of the hot water again. Fucking perfect.

  I closed my eyes and thought about warm things, letting the water roll over my shoulders and head.

  For once, the meditation worked, and the water actually felt warm and luxurious.

  I opened my eyes as I reached out for the shampoo when I saw the steam rising from the shower floor, coating the glass shower doors and covering the mirror over the sink.

  The steam was everywhere, including wafting through the air and curling up over the top of the glass shower door.

  It’d never been that hot before.

  “Oh, my God. I’m in heaven,” I whispered.

  Chapter 3

  All I want for Christmas is your soul.

  -Text from Blythe to Brooklyn

  Keifer

  My eyes opened, and I knew instantly something was different.

  The lights.

  The lights in the room weren’t on.

  Why were the lights not on?

  I sent out a small pulse of energy, willing the lights to come on, but they stayed dark.

  A sense of foreboding went through me.

  Were we under attack? Why else wouldn’t the lights turn on? Something had to be stopping me from turning them on.

  I sat up, throwing my comforter off my body, and shivered when my feet hit the cold floor.

  Declan, what’s the status of the estate? I asked.

  Unremarkable, Declan answered.

  Would it kill the dragon to say ‘nothing’s happening?’ Or possibly, ‘all’s clear?’

  He answered, yes, but he didn’t sound right. Almost as if he was answering me from a long way away.

  Where are you? I asked.

  Watching a woman, he answered quickly.

  What woman?

  The pretty brunette that we met this afternoon. The one with the big tits.

  I winced. You’re not supposed to say things like that to women. And again…why are you there?

  She’s amusing, he drawled.

  I sighed. Something’s wrong with my powers. I can’t do a goddamned thing. Not even light a candle.

  I walked to the doors of my room that led outside and did something I hadn’t had to do in over twenty years.

  Twist the knob.

  The feel of the knob on my hand felt foreign, and I couldn’t believe that something as simple as turning a handle was so complex when I could move things with my mind.

  The moment my feet met the cool wood of the deck that wrapped around the house, Declan touched down.

  His large, muscled dragon body quivered as he shook slightly, trying to rid himself of the wetness he’d collected in the clouds.

  “Do you know what’s going on?” I asked.

  Yes, yes I do, he confirmed, surprising me.

  I blinked. “You do? Is it everybody or just me?”

  Young master, I think you need to go speak with your Mamen. Once you’ve done that, then I’ll take you where you need to go, he rumbled.

  Annoyed with the cryptic words, as was Declan’s usual, I turned around and walked back through my room.

  Then I promptly face-planted into the door since it didn’t open when I sent the gentle request for it to do so.

  Wincing, I rubbed my head as I opened the door to my room, heading straight for my mother’s wing of the estate.

  Declan’s devilish laughter followed in my wake.

  Bastard.

  Oh, Master. You never cease to amuse me, he teased before cutting off from me, releasing me to my own thoughts.

  The estate we lived on was in the heart of Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas. Right on the outskirts of the actual city of Dallas where the energies of the Meridian ran underneath the city.

  The heart was also known as The Meridian and was what gave dragons their life force. Gave them their nearly immortal abilities.

  As long as they stayed within two hundred square miles of one of the six hearts of the Meridian, they’d continue to thrive. But if they moved too far away for too long of a period, then they’d slowly lose their immortality and age just like any other living being.

  There were five more ‘hearts’ scattered across the United States, all in small towns, making it easy to conceal their presence.

  Humans didn’t know about the Meridian, and if I had anything to say about it, it’d stay that way.

  By the time I made it to my mother’s rooms, the sun was just starting to light the halls of Darcy Manor.

  I’d lived in Darcy Manor my entire life and really had no plans of ever leaving.

  Darcy Manor belonged to me now and always would. At least until I died, then it’d pass on to my first-born son, and if I didn’t have a son, then to Nikolai.

  Knocking softly on my mother’s door, I waited long moments for her to answer it.

  I must’ve woken her, because her hair was askew, and
her eyes puffy with sleep.

  She raised her eyes at me in question.

  “I have a problem,” I murmured, pushing into her room.

  She moved to the side to allow me in, and I was struck, just like I always was, with the way her room seemed to be stuck in time.

  It looked exactly like it always had.

  My father’s things were still exactly where they’d been the day he’d died. His glasses on the table beside the bed. His clothes still hung in the closet, and his belongings still spread throughout the room.

  It was as if he’d just left twenty minutes ago rather than fourteen years.

  “Mom,” I cleared my throat, shaking off the pang in my heart that followed me remembering how my father had died. “I don’t have my powers. They’re all gone.”

  Her eyes widened as she stared at me.

  With a decisive determination I’d never seen from her before, she ran to the closet in the back corner of her bedroom, and yanked the door open before disappearing inside.

  I waited several minutes while she rifled through it moments before she returned with a leather bound book with gold lettering etched into the front.

  “What’s that?” I asked, nodding towards the book, temporarily sidelining my freak out while I tried to figure out why she was handing me a book at a time like this.

  Instead of signing like she usually did when she wanted to relay something to one of her children, she held out the book.

  “Read it,” she mouthed.

  I blinked.

  “Mom, I don’t have time to read anything. What if there’s something seriously wrong here? Who will protect the manor if something were to happen?” I growled in frustration.

  I didn’t have time to read a godsdamned book.

  She crossed her arms and started to tap her foot.

  “Read it,” she mouthed again.

  Growling in annoyance, I pulled the book open to the first page and began to read.

  MATING.

  That was what the first page said. One word. Mating.

  “Mating?” I blinked. “What’s any of this got to do with mating?”