Page 7 of Dragon's Midlife Secret Baby
“We’d been waiting for his first shift.” Chelsea had her left arm folded on the arm of the chair and her right one extended as she traced Corbin’s scales with her fingers. “With the power and personality indicated in his birth chart, I thought he might do this when he was still in a cradle. Of course, not knowing if he’d be a wolf or a dragon, I didn’t know how that might affect it. You’re the only dragon I’ve ever known.” Her eyes met Beck’s.
This was the closest he’d been to her since he arrived. That urge he’d had to pick up Corbin moved through him again, but this time he wanted to pull Chelsea close. In his mind, he could almost feel what it’d be like to wrap his arm around her curvy waist or run his hands through her hair. The feeling intensified in those couple of seconds.Mine,the thing inside him said.
It was all far too good to be true. It had to be a lie, some construct that his mind had created to keep him from completely breaking down, yet he could feel the weight of Corbin in his lap and the slight breeze as the boy experimented with his wings. He could smell Chelsea’s perfume, warm and sweet like coffee,vanilla, and flowers. The taste of the delicious food Erin had brought him still lingered in his mouth. If it were an illusion, it was a hell of a good one.
Corbin wriggled some more, and the little dragon began to recede. His scales retreated into his skin, which flushed the fresh creamy shade of pink it’d been a few minutes ago. The strong, reptilian arms and legs were once more the slightly pudgy limbs of a toddler, and his wild hair erupted from his head. He balled his hands—which no longer bore long claws—into fists and rubbed them against his eyes.
“I think it’s time to get you back to bed.” When Chelsea reached for him this time, Corbin practically fell into her arms.
He laid his head on his mother’s shoulder as she carried him back into the bedroom. Those sweet brown eyes stared at Beck as he alternately scrunched his hand and then splayed out his fingers in a childlike wave.
“Goodnight, buddy,” Beck replied, waving back.
Maeve sighed as the bedroom door closed behind Chelsea. “Corbin has always known how to steal the show. We should probably get back to you, though.”
“Me?” Beck whipped his head around to look atthe older woman. No, not older, not technically. Not if he was almost six hundred years old. “A boy turning into a dragon sounds a lot more exciting than some scroungy old man trying to recover his memories.”
“Ah, but you already mean a lot to that little boy,” Maeve countered quickly, her finger in the air as she made her point. “What kind of father can you be if you don’t even know who you are?”
“You have a point,” he said begrudgingly. Just as when Jace had first picked him up, Beck had the notion that he should be the one helping other people instead of the other way around. “You’ve already done a lot for me, though.”
“And so we’ll continue,” she replied. “I was thinking that perhaps we should try hypnosis. Theoretically, your memories should still be inside you somewhere. You might just need a little help recovering them.”
“How’s that going to work?” Jace asked. “I thought hypnosis was about being open to suggestion, like learning better habits or getting past anxieties, instead of just remembering stuff.”
“But the suggestion is that he lets go of whatever barrier is keeping him from his truth. At the very least, perhaps we could connect with hishigher self even if he can’t.” Maeve informed him. “I’m not saying it’s a guarantee, but I think it’s worth a try. If you’re willing.” This last part was directed at Beck.
He glanced toward the door Chelsea had closed behind her. If this could mean being with the two people he held such an affinity for, he’d try anything. “Yes.”
“All right.” Maeve lifted a chain over her head, holding the deep purple crystal at the end of it like a pendulum in front of him. “I just want you to watch this and listen to me. Try to keep your body relaxed, and let your mind go where it will. The secret here is not to try too hard at anything. Just listen.” Maeve began a slow, lilting chant of words he didn’t understand.
He focused his eyes on the crystal, which gently swayed and spun in front of him. His mind, however, wandered back to Chelsea and Corbin. Could he actually be lucky enough to have them? It was almost too much to wish for.
“Tell us who you are.” As he drifted off, Maeve’s words echoed in his mind as though they bounced off the walls of a cave.
“Beck Alexander.” It was his voice, but stronger and clearer. “Nephew of Kendrick Alexander, Alpha of the Alexander clan.”
“Good. Now I want you to go back to when you were living here in Salem, when you and Chelsea were seeing each other.”
“She has a sweet laugh,” the other version of Beck said. “I like the way she sees the world. I’ve waited a very long time to meet her.”
“And then you were taken away from her,” Maeve reminded him. “Tell us what happened.”
“Someone came to the door.” Beck heard the words, though no visual memories came across his mind. He knew he was saying these things, but it was like someone else was telling the story. “I didn’t recognize him. The world went completely black. When I woke up again, I was in a room. Not my room. Someplace old that I didn’t recognize. If I had shifted, I could’ve torn down the walls or the door, but my body refused.”
“Tell us who brought you there.”
“I don’t know. There were several of them, but they never said their names. They caused me great pain. They wouldn’t let me leave. I wanted to go home. Sometimes they brought me to different rooms, different places, but I still couldn’t leave.”
“And you couldn’t shift into your dragon?”
“A few times, yes, but it wasn’t thesame. It was painful, and I was weak. They were stronger than me.”
“How did you get away?”
“I bit one of them.” Suddenly, he tasted blood. “I got to the sea but couldn’t retain my dragon. I had to swim. It was such a long way.”
“All right. I’m going to bring you back now.” Maeve’s voice grew a little louder.
