For the Memory of Dragons (6 page)

A slight smile curved up the corner of his
mouth. “I’ll be fine. Go.”

Terra considered him for a moment longer
before getting out. It was amazing how fast he had gone from joking
to depressed. If he were going to take her teasing so seriously,
she would have to watch what she said around him. She was, after
all, just getting to know him.

***

Alex watched Terra as she disappeared into
the building. What the hell was wrong with him? He had just gone
from laughing and joking to dark and depressed in a matter of
seconds. The mood swing had hit him so fast it left his head
spinning. If he didn’t know any better, he would have said he was
pregnant, or brooding.

That thought made him stop.
Brooding.
He knew that word but couldn’t remember what it meant. A flash of
scales provided him with the answer his human mind couldn’t come up
with. It was a time in a male dragon’s life where his hormones got
out of whack, usually caused by a growth spurt, a female dragon
during her fertile period, or when faced with a potential mate.

Alex was sure he was finished growing, so a
growth spurt was out of the question. He would’ve had to have spent
a fair amount of time in the presence of a fertile female for that
to bring on a brooding, and he didn’t think that was the case. So,
that left a potential mate. The ads in the window of the shop hid
most of the lobby, but Alex could just see Terra waiting in the
short line. A feeling of contentment rolled through him.

He closed his eyes and focused on his dragon
bit. “She’s human,” he protested.

His dragon laughed at him. That was a weak
argument, and both of his halves knew it.

Taking a human as a mate could be
problematic, but there were lots of dragons who did. Dragons tended
to live much longer than the average human, but there was something
in the magic of bonding and the sharing of a scale that would
extend a human mate’s life. They would live as long as their dragon
did. Why Alex knew this piece of trivia and not his own name irked
him. He kept remembering little things, but none of the information
he needed.

Turning his eyes away from the woman helping
him, he pulled the bag of clothing up from the floor and opened it.
While the other bag had female clothing and essentials, this one
held male. He ripped open the pack of underwear and pulled out a
pair. At least she had gone for the dark-colored briefs and not the
plain white ones. It took him a moment, but he shimmied into them.
Next came the long-sleeved T-shirt. It was amazingly soft and the
same shade of blue as his dragon. Just the fact that she had chosen
something in his color made his dragon happy. The pants she had
gotten him were a little large in the waist. They would hang low on
his hips, but he could make them work.

Now that he was mostly dressed, Alex slipped
from the car to go in and help with the food. He also wanted to
make sure there weren’t any weird misunderstandings between them.
His random mood swing had thrown them both.

Pausing in the doorway to the shop, his eyes
landed on Terra, and he sighed contently. She stood back from the
counter, waiting. Something in her posture told him she was annoyed
with the older woman at the counter.

“So, I can’t use this coupon?” The woman
held out a crumpled piece of paper to the cashier.

He took it and looked at it. “No. This was
last month’s special.” He pointed to the bottom of the ticket where
the date was clearly printed on the paper.

“But that was only three days ago,” the
woman complained. “You can still give it to me for that price.”

Alex smiled as he saw Terra’s back stiffen
with aggravation as the woman argued on. Stepping up behind her,
Alex wrapped his arms around her and pulled her back into him.
God, she felt good
. Not quite as good as when he hadn’t been
wearing clothing, but good nonetheless.

Terra let out a squeak of surprise and
turned her head so she could see who’d caught her. “You scared the
daylights out of me!” she complained as he hunched over and rested
his chin on her shoulder.

“Sorry,” he apologized. “I just wanted to
come make sure you were okay. Things are a little weird for me at
the moment, and, well—”

“I understand.” She wrapped her arms up over
his and relaxed a little. “You’ve had a really hard day.” She
patted his arm reassuringly. “We’ll get you through this.”

Alex let out a sigh and resisted the urge to
kiss her. Even if it was just a thank you kiss on the shoulder.
Standing up to his full height, he looked around the shop. Other
than a picture of the large head of the shop’s mascot, there wasn’t
anything that could hold his attention away from the woman in his
arms. He turned back to her and drew in a deep breath. The smell of
cooking pizza masked her scent, but he could just pick up a floral
hint from her shampoo. Even that made his toes curl in delight.

Finally, the old woman at the counter had
placed her order and stepped away, grumbling about the young clerk
cheating her out of her coupons.

Alex let Terra go as she stepped forwards,
pulling free of his arms.

She turned to look at him with a question in
her eyes.

“I’ll be right back.” He winked at her and
turned towards the bathroom. Now that he was up and moving, he had
this undeniable pressure reminding him that he’d slept most of the
day.

***

Shaking her head, Terra turned back to the
poor, abused clerk and gave him her order. Three large pizzas. One
deluxe, one meat lover’s, and one cheese. If nothing else, they
could have pizza for breakfast in the morning. After tucking her
wallet back into her purse, she turned away from the counter and
looked around the small shop. The old woman had settled herself on
one of the benches, so Terra took a seat on the other.

“Your boyfriend really should be wearing
shoes,” the woman called to Terra.

Terra turned to look at the complaining
woman. “What?” she asked, shocked.

“Your boyfriend.” The woman nodded to the
bathroom. “He really should be wearing shoes. There’s no telling
what’s on the floor in there.”

Terra gaped at the woman. Yes. The woman had
just called the dragon man her boyfriend. “He’s not my boyfriend.”
The protest slipped out before Terra thought about it.

The woman huffed. “Well then, he shouldn’t
be hanging all over you like that.” She pulled her large bag into
her lap more and grumbled on. “Back in my day, men respected women
in public. And only a child would run around without shoes on.”

Terra bit her lip before something scathing
came out of her mouth.
How dare this woman complain about my
dragon’s bare feet? She doesn’t know what we’ve been through
today.

“You will have to pardon my lack of proper
attire,” the dragon man answered as he came out of the bathroom,
wiping his hands on the back of his pants. “As it is, I don’t
currently own a pair of shoes.” He dropped himself onto the bench
next to Terra.

The old woman glared at him. “You mean to
tell me that you don’t have any shoes at all?”

Lacing his fingers across his stomach, the
man leaned back in the chair. He stuck his bare feet out in front
of him and crossed his ankles. “Nope,” he said as if he was proud
of that fact. “In fact, if it wasn’t for the insistence of this
kind lady, I’d be running around naked, too.” To emphasize his
point, he reached out and pulled the size sticker off the leg of
his jeans.

Terra bit the inside of her cheek to keep
from laughing out loud.

The old woman looked scandalized at them.
“Well, I never!” She got up and stormed out of the shop.

A loud laugh slipped out of Terra as the
door swung shut. It had been a real pleasure to see him put the
woman in her place. “I can’t believe you just did that!” she said
as soon as she could get her breath back.

“I’m sure I missed something, but I didn’t
like how she was talking to you.” The dragon man toyed with the
sticker from his pants as he spoke.

Terra smiled at him. He was defending her
honor.
How sweet!
She slipped over on the bench until her
shoulder bumped into his. “It’s okay. She’s old and grumpy.”

He chuckled and leaned against her. “True,
but just because someone’s lived a long life doesn’t mean they
should be telling others how to live.”

Curiosity burned at Terra’s mind. So many of
the dragons that had gone missing were ancient; could her dragon
man be just as old as they were?

“How old are you?” The question came out
before she could stop it.

The movement of the sticker stopped as he
thought about the question. Slowly, he crumpled the plastic up
before turning to look at her. “I don’t remember.” He let out a
soft sigh as his eyes drifted back to his curled fingers. Closing
his eyes, he drew in several even breaths as he thought. “I have to
be as old as she is,” he finally said as he looked up at Terra, “if
not older.”

Sitting up away from him, Terra considered
him for a moment. The woman had to have been sixty or seventy years
old, but her dragon man didn’t look a day over thirty. His eyes
held a hint of fear as if he expected her to be appalled by his
answer. She shifted back to lean against him again. “As long as you
don’t get grouchy.”
It really doesn’t matter how old he
is.

The man chuckled as he slipped his arm
around her shoulder and held her closer to him. “I’ll try, but I
can’t promise anything. It may go against my character.”

That gave Terra a moment’s pause.
They
still had to find out who he was.
There was no telling what
would happen when they had that information. He would probably go
back to his old life and forget about her. That struck a sad note
in Terra’s heart, but she pushed it away. She would worry about
that later. For now, they just had to get their pizza and find a
place to rest. Tomorrow, they would worry about finding the past
and what that meant for the future.

“What do you mean, you’re out of rooms?”
Terra asked again. This was the fourth hotel they’d tried, and no
one had anything available.

The look the clerk gave her was apologetic.
“There’s a comic book convention in town, and everything is booked
solid through Monday.”

The dragon man placed his hand in the small
of Terra’s back, calming her down. “Could you check one more time,
please?”

The clerk let out an audible sigh and turned
his attention to the computer.

Terra glanced up at her dragon man.
Why
did his touch have such a soothing effect?
She pondered this as
he waited patiently for the clerk to check his records.

A curious noise came out of the clerk as he
tapped away on his console. “Well,” he said, “it looks like you’re
in luck. Someone just canceled an online reservation. It looks like
we do have one opening.”

“Fantastic!” The dragon man smiled at the
clerk. “We’ll take it.”

Terra laughed softly to herself. Her dragon
hadn’t even bothered to get any of the important information about
where they would stay. Pulling out her wallet, she handed her
driver’s license to the clerk so he could get them registered.
Hopefully it wouldn’t be too much. She had a decent amount put
back, but her mystery man was really hitting her pocketbook hard
today.

As if he could sense her reluctance to part
with her hard-earned money, the dragon man ran his hand down her
back again. He leaned in and whispered softly in her ear. “I’ll
make sure you get it back.”

Terra just snorted out a soft laugh and
shook her head, amused. Somehow, she knew that once they had
answers, he would do his best to keep his word. She leaned into his
side, a silent show of gratitude.

After a few minutes and some paperwork, the
clerk handed her a key card. “You’re on the fourth floor.” He
pointed to the elevators at the other end of the lobby.

Thanking him, Terra led the way back to the
car to park it and get their things. She was so ready to curl up in
a nice, warm bed and crash for the night.

***

“You have got to be kidding me,” Terra
growled as she stood in the entryway and stared into the room.

It was a nice room. There was even a small
fridge where they could stow the few slices of pizza they hadn’t
eaten. But it was the single, small bed that had Terra stopping in
her tracks. One bed?
One! And a full-sized bed at the most!
There was no way they could both sleep in that bed together. Okay,
so she had seen her dragon man naked on more than one occasion, but
that was a long shot from curling up next to him in the same bed.
Especially a
small
bed!

A chuckle sounded from behind her as the
dragon man looked over her shoulder to see what had made her stop.
“Don’t worry about it.” He leaned in and kissed the top of her head
before moving around her and into the room. “You take the bed. I’ll
sleep on the floor.”

Terra stood rooted to the floor.
What!
Did he just kiss me?
The thought ran around her brain, shorting
it out. Finally, the rest of what he’d said filtered in. That moved
her feet.

“You can’t sleep on the floor!” She went
over and dumped her shopping bags on the bed next to where he was
rummaging through his stuff.

“It’s not a big deal.” The man shrugged.
“It’s not the first time I’ve ever slept on the floor. Probably
won’t be the last.”

Pulling the leather bag off her shoulder,
she dropped it on the bed and turned towards him. “No.” She pushed
on his side so he would turn and look at her. “You’ve had a hard
day and need a good night’s sleep. Besides, this floor is probably
disgusting. You take the bed. I’ll sleep in the chair.”