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15 July 2004
I met a Guardian yesterday. She is an interesting contradiction of perceptive and ignorant, or at least that’s the impression I gained. I believe I will—
“Drake, the Venediger has asked to see you. I told him you were busy, but he insists.” István stood next to where Drake sat in his favorite booth tucked away in the back of G&T, attempting once again to make some notes in his rediscovered journal.
He looked up, his brows pulled together. “I’ve already explained to him that I did not find the aquamanile at the mortal’s house. There is nothing more to discuss.”
István gave a one-shoulder shrug. “I’m passing along the request.” The emphasis on the last word was impossible to ignore.
Drake thought of doing just that, but after a moment’s consideration of how difficult the Venediger could make his time in Paris, he tucked away the journal and rose, moving to the bar where Albert stood in his usual spot at the end.
“There is a rumor,” Albert said before he could even offer a greeting, “put about by the police that a mortal has lodged a charge stating you have stolen a valuable artifact while she was at Madame Deauxville’s house.”
Drake arranged his expression to display surprise. “How curious. What is the artifact I am supposed to have stolen?”
Albert’s eyes were steady on his, and Drake was aware that although he had no great affection for the Venediger, he had to respect the amount of power the latter all but exuded. “I hoped you would tell me.”
“I have nothing,” Drake said, lifting his hands in a gesture of innocence. “Ah, I see. You believe I took the aquamanile that you hired me to locate. I would like to point out that I am not known for cheating others. In addition, I can’t help but wonder why you’d believe that a mortal would have possession of such an incredibly valuable object. It’s not as if it’s something that has changed hands often, as I well know. It’s one of the few things I was able to trace during my all-too-brief time with Interpol.”
“Yes, yes, you told me that you’d traced it to the last world war, where it disappeared into Italy, and that it was only six months ago that it came to auction and was sold to an American collector. That does not explain the fact that some mortal is claiming you stole something valuable from her.”
Drake pretended to think about the matter. “I did see a mortal woman at the house where I believe the aquamanile was being held, but she objected to me kissing her. No doubt she seeks some type of revenge by attempting to send the police after me. It does not concern me. If every woman I kissed tried to have me arrested, I’d never set foot out of jail.”
“No, I see that,” Albert said slowly. Disappointment flashed in his eyes for a few seconds before his face donned his usual placid expression. “Your reputation being what it is when it comes to mortal women ... yes. Very well, I will dismiss my concern about the mortal, and instead repeat my request that you double your efforts to find the Anima.”
Drake bowed his head in acknowledgment and murmured, “I will do everything within my power to locate the two remaining Tools of Bael.”
Before Albert could answer, he was summoned to take a call in one of the back offices, and Drake was left at the bar counter, Pal and István next to him.
“I believe we will have no further problems about the American woman,” Drake told his men in a volume limited to their ears. “Albert is—”
“Well, if it isn’t Puff the Magic Dragon.”
Drake stiffened at the voice, then immediately felt his fire surge to life, demanding he give in to his dragon nature and claim the woman who had haunted his dreams the night before.
He turned around to find Aisling Grey, Guardian, stomping forward toward him, her antagonistic expression both amusing him and warning that she had more of a temper than he’d originally thought.
“You have something of mine, Drake. I want it back. Now.”
Behind him, Pal gave a little gasp. Drake knew just how his guard felt—he, himself, was more than a little astounded by the audacity of the Guardian.
“I had not expected to see you here,” he managed to say, clamping down on the fire inside him that warned he needed an outlet to indulge in all the fantasies that had plagued his sleep the night before.
“I’m sure you didn’t. I want my aquamanile back,” she answered, and before he could do more than narrow his eyes on her, she poked him in the chest.
Poked him! In the chest! He was a wyvern! No one who wanted to see the sun rise the following morning poked a wyvern in the chest, and yet here was this woman, this mortal, who dared do just that. Not to mention the fact that she continued to berate him about taking the Anima. He dismissed the ridiculous notion that he’d return something he claimed, and instead told her he had almost fallen for her innocent act.
“It wasn’t an act,” she answered, lifting her chin, an action that both annoyed and delighted him. The fact that she had no idea who he was, or what respect was due him, was evident.
He would have to see to her education.
“Are you by any chance threatening me?” he asked when she continued to chastise him.
István and Pal kept sliding odd glances his way, but at a signal from Drake, they relaxed back into leaning on the bar and watching Aisling as she continued to argue.
“Only if you intend on making things hard,” she answered, her chin lifting again.
Drake, on the whole, was a circumspect man, despite Kostya’s propensity to walk in on him at awkward moments. He didn’t believe in public displays of affection, he seldom raised his voice outside his own home, and he preferred to keep his temper under control (no doubt due to having two highly volatile parents).
Despite that, he couldn’t resist the temptation Aisling posed. It was her chin, he told himself later. Her little round, stubborn chin drove his control past all bearing. “Things are already hard, sweetheart,” he told her, then gave in to the demands of his body and pulled her to his chest, her body soft and warm and fitting perfectly against him.
As he kissed her, his fire whipped through him with a roar of something akin to hunger, and for a second, his control slipped and it twisted from him to Aisling. Immediately, he started to pull the fire back, not wanting to harm her, but to his immense stupefaction, just as he felt her body heat past the point of bearing, she flipped it back onto him, the shared fire driving his desire to the stratosphere.
He jerked back, but managed to keep his mouth on hers, relishing the sensation of the shared fire, of her body, of the taste of her that filled his mind and pushed his sudden erection to a level of hardness that he couldn’t remember experiencing before.
“Maybe you’ll think twice about messing with me again,” Aisling told him as soon as he managed to pull his mouth from hers.
Christos, the woman tasted like heat and desire and honey. He wanted to kiss her again, and then possess her wholly and completely. Next to him, Pal and István moved a short distance away.
It took Drake a few seconds to focus his mind on things other than his erection, and the need to take Aisling against the nearest private wall. When he had wrestled his libido to a dull roar, he turned to acknowledge the Venediger’s arrival.
“Drake, you will do me the honor of introducing me to your companion,” Albert said.
He made the introduction, and that was the moment he realized what truly had happened—she’d taken his fire.
No mortal could do so unless she was a mate. But he was a wyvern, and that meant she ... he gave a mental headshake. It wasn’t right. She couldn’t be his mate. She was human.
Every dragon knew that wyverns could not have human mates.
“This is the Guardian you saw earlier?” Pal asked softly in their native Magyar while Aisling continued to argue.
He gave a brief nod, his attention focused on the woman before him.
“She took his fire,” István said to Pal.
“She did,” Pal agreed. “I don’t understand how it is, but she did.”
Drake ignored the question of just how Aisling could take his fire when she was mortal, and itched to be rid of the Venediger.
Fortunately, Albert did not dally after meeting Aisling, allowing Drake to give in to his body’s demand to be near her. He drew her to his favorite booth, watched as she drank a glass of dragon’s blood, and found himself highly amused when she accused him of trying to poison her with it.
It was clear that she was, in fact, exactly what she said—a woman who had just found out she was a Guardian.
What he couldn’t wrap his mind around was the inexplicable need that seemed to grow inside his belly, a warmth that went beyond dragon fire. It was as if she had a bond to him that she refused to see, and which he, himself, didn’t understand.
Wyverns did not bond themselves to mortals, he reminded himself.
When she left after he refused her awkward attempt to seduce him in order to regain the Anima, Pal and István slid into the booth. Drake watched her return to a table occupied by a Wiccan and her doppelganger, his mind filled with speculation.
“She’s mortal,” István said in his usual manner of getting straight to the point. “She can’t be a wyvern’s mate and be mortal.”
“I am aware of this fact,” Drake said, his eyes still on Aisling. Why did he like that defiant toss of her head when she saw he was watching? Why did he want to march over to her table and demand to know of what she was speaking? What outrageous thoughts did she have that she wasn’t sharing with him?
And dammit, why did he care so much? She was just a woman, a single, solitary woman who evidently did not have a very good grasp on her own life, and yet there she was, storming into his, dragging chaos after her.
“I won’t have it,” he said aloud, narrowing his eyes when he caught one of the mages lounging across the bar ogling Aisling. “She is just a woman, nothing more. I’ve had hundreds of women over the course of my life. Thousands of them. This one is no different.”
István nodded. “Mortals these days are sorely lacking as sexual partners. They’re so skittish, and their heads are filled with ideas shoved at them by films and books. It’s ridiculous the things they believe about us. Fortunately, I have Suzanne, but I can’t imagine how frustrating it is for you to be so spoken to, Drake. That Guardian is out of line in her manner, and will bring you nothing but trouble.”
Pal gave Drake a long look that was impossible to interpret. The small smile that accompanied it, however, was all too obviously full of sympathy.
