Page 19 of Dragon's Midlife Secret Baby
Chelsea greeted him at the door and stepped back to let him in. “How was your walk?”
“Difficult,” he admitted. “My head hurts.”
“Mom said that might be the case. I can have Erin brew up something for you,” she offered gently.
“No. I mean, no thank you. I don’t want anything that will alter me in any way, not right now.” He could hear the gruffness in his voice, but he didn’t know how to get rid of it. “I think I just need to sit down.”
She shut the door and then hovered near it for a moment. “Do you want me to sit with you? Or would you rather be alone?”
He rubbed his hand on his forehead and looked at her. She’d done so much to help him, and now she was worried about the effects. “Sit with me. Please.”
They moved over to the couch. She held his hand as they sat in silence for a while, but then Beck couldn’t stand it any longer. “Did I miss anything?”
“Mom and I mostly talked about Corbin,” she admitted. “We had no idea that he could do such a thing. We already knew he had your dragon, but apparently, he has some magical abilities from my side, too. That makes him pretty special.”
“That he is,” Beck agreed. “I’m sorry I left so quickly afterward. I just needed to move, to go do something while all of this was swirling around in my head.” His mind had suddenly been too full, and he hadn’t known how else to handle it.
“That’s okay. I know it can’t be easy.”
“No,” he agreed. “Some of it is just fine. Our clan has moved from time to time, either for safety or ley lines or even just for a change of scenery. A lot of those memories are kind of nice.” Not that they weren’t without their own strife when members oftheir clan had passed away, or they’d seen some of the uglier parts of history. In general, though, he had more than enough information to affirm what he’d felt for the Alexander clan when Ewan had brought them to the clanhouse.
“I’m sure Kendrick will be happy to hear that. Before he understood what’d happened, he seemed genuinely offended that you didn’t remember him,” Chelsea noted with a small, amused smile.
“He’s a good man, and he cares a lot about his clan. There aren’t very many of our kind left. Not so long ago, within the past couple of hundred years, most of the clans were bloodlines only. Kendrick was one of the first Alphas to take in people who weren’t related and had no support system anymore. Lilith and Ewan are examples of that. They’re part of the family, but not by blood.” It’d felt good to know they were helping others of their kind who’d been left with nothing. It wasn’t easy to exist in the world as a shifter at all, but it was even harder as a dragon with such a long lifespan.
“I like Lilith. She’s so sweet. When I brought Corbin into the kitchen to find a snack, she dropped everything she was doing to make sure he had something he’d like. You can tell she really enjoys caring for other people. It made me feel welcome.” Chelseahad kept a little distance between them when she’d sat down next to him, but now she leaned ever so slightly toward him.
“Of course, you’re welcome. They were excited for me when I said I’d met my mate.” He laced his fingers between hers and squeezed. “Speaking of, I remember meeting you.”
“You do?” She turned to him, her face hopeful.
“That little coffee shop on the corner. I hadn’t been in there before, but as soon as I walked inside, my dragon was on alert. It knew something was happening, but at first, I didn’t realize what it was trying to tell me. I thought I was in danger or something.” Beck laughed a little. “Then we both stepped up to the counter when the barista called out for a caramel latte.”
She blinked slowly, like a satisfied cat. “I was working out of Tina’s shop that day, or at least trying to. I hadn’t slept well the night before. I don’t even remember why now; I just knew that I was tired. The carafe on the shop’s coffee pot had broken, so I went to the coffee shop instead. I figured one expensive drink wouldn’t hurt me, and instead, it brought me to the person I’d been looking for all my life.”
“It was like nothing I’d ever experienced before, even in all my years.” Beck ran his thumb along hers,allowing his mind to flood with the warmth of being with his mate. He’d had lovers over the centuries, of course, but he’d waited long enough that he’d started to wonder if he actually had a true mate waiting for him or not.
She turned more fully to him now, her knee touching the side of his leg. “Beck, you don’t seem happy.”
He sighed. It wasn’t like he could hide it from her. He didn’t intend to, but it was nice for a moment to pretend that only good things had come from the spell being broken. “I know what’s on everyone’s mind, and it isn’t my past as a young man or even what I remember about being with you. It’s what happened to me that day.”
She watched him expectantly.
“I’m afraid it’s a little disappointing.” Beck picked at the upholstery on the couch with his free hand. “I was at the apartment where I was staying. It wasn’t far from the clanhouse, but it was just enough where I could feel like I was living my own life. What both you and Ewan have recounted is true. I was supposed to meet with you for dinner, and I was going to ask you to take a vacation with me. I was having such a good time exploring Salem with you and learning about its history, and I didn’t want that feeling to end. I thought we could go some other place, someplace neither one of us had been, and explore it together.”
“That sounds nice.”
“I was nervous about it as I was getting ready. I wasn’t sure if you’d go. We hadn’t even met each other’s families yet, so it was quick. Anyway, there was a knock on my door. I answered it without even thinking about who it might be. I wasn’t worried about that. A man was there, and he said he wanted me to come with him. I just figured he was some crazy guy who’d gotten confused or lost, but before I could try to figure out how to help him, he zapped me.”
“Zapped you?” Chelsea repeated.
“I don’t know how else to describe it,” Beck replied honestly. “He reached out to touch me, and it was like being hit with electricity. I completely blacked out, so there are still some things that are genuinely missing from my memory. When I woke up, I was on his island. There’s an old house there, and that’s where I was most of the time. The same man was there. Things are still a little fuzzy, but putting everything together, I think he was experimenting on me.”
She sat up straight, alarmed. “Are you serious?”
“Yes.” It was a disturbing thought, but it seemed to be true. “He was casting different kinds of spells on me, maybe to see what effect they had.”
“Testing magic on shifters, maybe,” Chelsea theorized quietly. “Or on dragons specifically.”
