The following afternoon…
Hands were all over him, tugging on his body. Dario was shoved up against the brick wall, the fetid smell of the alley filling his nose. His pants were tugged down his waist as he fought back, trying to get the men to stop.
Nooo!
Suddenly, there was fire everywhere.
The scent of burning flesh filled his nose, and he nearly tripped over his pants. Dragging them up, he stared at the two huge bonfires, the sounds of screaming making bile rise up to his throat.
“And that’s when I woke up, screaming like a banshee,” Dario murmured to his therapist. Embarrassment filled him as he sat there, waiting for the man to respond. “I was covered with sweat, the smell of burning flesh still in my nose.”
“You haven’t had that nightmare for some time,” Doc said, his tone gentle, belying the strength the man had to have. He was a bear shifter, after all.
Yet Dario had never met a kinder man. Dr. Banyon had been a lifeline he’d held tight to the past few months.
“Is there something that’s happened recently to bring those thoughts back?” the doctor continued.
“I met someone.”
The doctor frowned. “Who?”
“A dragon,” Dario muttered before drawing in a breath.
“Is there a reason why meeting this shifter would’ve caused you to backtrack?”
Dario sat forward in his chair, resting his elbows on the armrests. He considered the answer to that. Saying the words out loud might bring it to reality. “He was… well, he was… just big. Aggressive. And I think he was… interested.”
Think? There was no doubt, especially when the guy publicly claimed me as “mine.”
“Shifters don’t tend to be aggressive with humans… unless they come face to face with their ma—”
“I like Gator,” Dario interrupted quickly. “I like him a lot. I think I might finally agree to that date he keeps asking about.”
Dr. Banyon was silent a moment. “And what’s behind this sudden change in course? For months you’ve said you weren’t ready to date.”
Dario rose to his feet and walked over to the bookcase, looking at the old tomes, not really seeing at all. Walking as he spoke worked better for him than lying on a couch most days. “I think the nightmare was telling me it was time to move forward. That I’ve spent too much time in the past.”
The therapist was quiet a moment. “Tell me more about the dragon.”
“Why?” Dario asked briskly.
“You brought him up. I think it’s something you need to explore.”
Something I need to explore… Dario scoffed and ran his fingers over the spine of one of the fancier bindings.
He sighed and realized the doctor was right. Ignoring what he was feeling wasn’t going to make it go away, no matter how much he wanted it to.
“I felt this weird…” He turned toward the doctor, searching for the right word. “Attraction… for lack of a better term.” He flopped down in the leather chair and eyed the doc. “He’s handsome, but no more handsome than Gator.”
Doc looked at him over the rim of his glasses. “Does this attraction feel stronger than what you feel towards Gator?”
Dario considered the question a moment. “I don’t know. Maybe. But Gator feels… safer.”
Dr. Banyon smiled. “Safer is always good.”
Dario returned the expression as he toyed with a loose thread on the side of his jeans. “Yet, there was something about him.”
“The dragon?”
Dario nodded. “I think we have some kind of connection.”
The doctor was quiet a moment, watching Dario closely.
Dario sighed.
“What do you think he is to you?” Dr. Banyon asked.
“You know,” Dario said, hedging.
“You think he’s your mate,” the doctor said.
Dario shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t know.” Yes, I do.
“That could be the reason behind the resurgence of the nightmares. You were hurt by two men… now you have two potential suitors in your life.”
Dario thought about that a moment.
The doctor leaned forward in his chair. “You’ve been coming to me for a few months now. And I don’t feel like you’ve had much forward momentum. You’re stronger than you know, Dario.” The shifter smiled. “You can throw fireballs that you materialize from thin air. You can protect yourself. As you’ve already proven. You didn’t allow those men to make you their victim.”
“I didn’t mean to murder them,” Dario said, his voice sounding small.
“It wasn’t murder,” Dr. Banyon corrected. “As I told you the first time you told me of this event—you defended yourself from a sexual assault, and that’s a very different thing. From what you’ve described to me, these men likely had other victims who’d come before you. If you hadn’t stopped them, they likely would’ve had even more after you. You saved yourself and others the minute you defended yourself.” Doc smiled. “You were your very own superhero, and the minute you can start to see yourself as that—that’s when you can start moving ahead with your life.”
Dario stared at the man, shocked to hear those words. For months, he’d berated himself for those murders, seeing himself as the villain. He couldn’t accept the doctor’s take on things.
He wasn’t a hero.
He was an uncontrollable weapon of mass destruction.
“What if… what if it happens again? What if I get close to someone and fire erupts from my hands? What if the next one isn’t a bad person we can discount and say they had it coming? I don’t want to hurt anyone else.”
“So we finally come down to the heart of the problem,” Dr. Banyon said. “You’re afraid you’ll hurt others you care about—so it’s easier not to care about anyone.”
Dario frowned. Isn’t that what he’d been doing these past months? He pushed Gator away in fear—not that Gator would hurt him, but that he’d hurt Gator.
He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if Gator became his next victim.
“What about Samuel?”
Dario lifted his head. “What about him?”
“You care about him.”
“Not in that way. He’s a friend.”
“But didn’t you tell me that you’d confused the feelings of brotherhood and comfort you had from Samuel for something more—and that you’d kissed him?”
Embarrassment heated Dario’s face. “But that doesn’t count. I was confused, and I didn’t love him, love him. He’s my best friend.”
“Confused or not, there was no fire. Samuel wasn’t hurt, nor were you. Your fire came out of your fear and panic.”
“How do you know?”
Dr. Banyon shrugged. “Call it a hunch.”
A hunch wasn’t enough to quiet his concern.
“From what I hear, the dragons are smoke and ice—so either one could handle your flames,” the therapist added.
“But Gator’s human.” I could hurt him.
The doctor smiled slyly. “I have a feeling your heart would prevent you from hurting Gator.” He sat back in his chair. “Gator and this dragon—”
“Jaeger,” Dario interjected.
“Gator and Jaeger—they’re not the two men in the alleyway.”
“Logically, I know that.”
Dr. Banyon smiled. “Talk to them. If you’re honest and up front and tell both of these men that you need to go at your pace, when you’re ready—if they care for you, they’ll listen.”
“And if they don’t?”
“Then they’re not worthy of you.”
Dario nodded, realizing it was past time to take a step forward. But with both? He wasn’t sure he could be with two men without being reminded of his assault over and over again. “You’re right.”
The doctor smiled.
“You’ve been an amazing help to me. Thank you… for always listening.”
“You’re welcome, of course. But it is my job, you know?”
“I know, but you make it easy. I appreciate that.”
Doctor Banyon grinned. “You’re making things sound final. Are you firing me?”
“Hell no,” Dario spat. “I’m nowhere near being perfect.”
“Perfect? Who is? We’re all a little broken inside. It’s learning to put the pieces back together and trying to keep it together that counts.” Doc smiled. “And we do that through forging relationships with others. The friendship you have with Samuel is proof of that.”
“I don’t know what I would’ve done without him.”
“I’m glad you have someone like him you can turn to. Next step, forging new relationships.”
Dario nodded. “I’ll work on it.”
“Good. I look forward to hearing about your attempts on our next visit.” Doc checked his watch.
“Time to kick me out?”
Doc grinned. “Just about.”
Dario rose from the chair, grabbing his jacket. “See you in two weeks,” he said as he headed for the door. After a smile and a wave, he headed out into the waiting room. Samuel sat flipping through a magazine, but Dario sensed the man wasn’t seeing a thing.
He hadn’t even seemed to notice Dario was out and ready to head home. “Earth to Samuel,” he murmured as he slid the fleece-lined flannel jacket on.
Samuel’s spell broke, and he lifted his stare. “Oh,” he said, closing the magazine and sliding it onto a small table at his side. “You ready to go?”
“Yep,” he said as he headed for the outer door.
Samuel fell into step beside him and followed him out into the building’s hall. Once they got into the elevator, he turned to his friend. “You’re really quiet today. More so than normal.”
“I’ve got a bit of a headache. And a lot on my mind.”
“I’m a good listener. After my session, I feel pretty talked out. So you can talk all you want.”
Samuel gave a wry smile. “I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”
Dario knew the look Samuel was giving. “Something between you and Cal? You guys okay?” Dario had sensed a bit of stress between the pair that morning at breakfast.
“We’re fine.”
“Have I worn out my welcome?”
Samuel frowned. “You know you’re welcome to stay with us as long as you want.”
“Cal really agree with that?”
“Cal has come to adore you as much as I do,” Samuel said.
“Liar,” Dario said under his breath.
“Okay, maybe not as much as I do, but he’s come around. I actually think he’s starting to get a bit of a soft spot when it comes to you.”
Early on in his stay with the pair, Dario had confused his connection with Samuel as love. After he’d been attacked and learned of his powers, he’d driven mindlessly to find Samuel’s farm. He hadn’t known where he was going, yet knew exactly where he’d been going the whole time.
Once there, he’d seen that Samuel was like him—an elemental. Samuel wielded the power of air. He could send a gentle breeze on up to starting a tornado. In the past few weeks, Samuel had even learned to levitate some.
Even with that power, Dario had felt a brotherhood with Samuel. There was a calmness to the man. He was thoughtful and kind. Samuel put Dario completely at ease. It had been easy to think himself in love.
He did love Samuel, but it wasn’t a sexual love.
They were bound through their gifts, bound by whatever reason they had received them.
Samuel was family.
While Samuel’s powers were growing, Dario was growing, too… growing frustrated. He couldn’t seem to get a hang of his fire. He’d rarely hit his targets and struggled for control. Sometime after he’d arrived, Sky had come to the farm—along with his power of earth. The man could make the flattest earth into a tower into the heavens. He could lift rocks and stone from the ground and use them as projectiles.
Even he was better than Dario.
It only made Dario feel more like a failure and had been a wall erected between him and the man. He and Sky didn’t seem to have the same easy friendship he had with Samuel—but that wasn’t Sky’s doing. Sky had been bending over backwards in an attempt to get closer to Dario over these last few weeks.
He had struggled with a bit of jealousy he had no right to have. It wasn’t Sky’s fault that Dario couldn’t wield his fire as well as the others.
After he and Samuel exited the elevator and headed for the front doors, Dario could see the large bank of windows ahead. Outside, chaos abounded. The leaves had all changed to brilliants reds, oranges, and yellows. The late afternoon sun shone upon them, making the electric colors stand out even more. Dario had always enjoyed the changing of the seasons, but out here in the valley, it was so much different than in the city.
Yet there was also a couple of inches of snow. The sun had melted most of it already, but some lingering ice hung here and there on the trees and leaves, making everything shine all the more. The world was stuck between two seasons, not sure which way to go. Dario understood that sense of chaos. It seemed as though that’s what his life always was.
The minute the door opened, the cold, late fall air hit him. Dario shivered, pulling the collar of his jacket up.
“While we’re in town, I want to stop by the clinic and see lightning boy,” Samuel said after they were both through the doors. Lightning boy was the nickname of a fourth elemental who’d arrived a few weeks before.
At least that’s what they thought he was. They weren’t sure.
He’d arrived on a flash of lightning, his body burned terribly. Since, he’d been unconscious and in a hospital bed at the clinic. The doctors there had been tending to his burns, waiting for him to come out of his coma.
So they could find out who he was.
They’d been expecting a water elemental, or so Samuel had assumed from the ancient native stories he’d researched. Samuel was air, Sky was earth, he was fire, and they needed water to make them whole.
But lightning was another form of fire.
Did his power over fire suck so badly that whatever force in the universe had given them these gifts had sent another to take his place?
“Is that your subtle way of changing the subject? I thought we were talking about you, not lightning boy?”
Samuel eyed Dario. “No… we’ll be okay.”
“We? So it is about Cal.”
Samuel sighed, shaking his head. “Those children that came to the base… it’s churned up a lot emotions for Cal, that’s all.”
“Oh. Why kids?”
“Cal was a kid himself when Zed abducted him. And then there’s his preoccupation with us not being able to have a child of our own.”
“Is it really a great time to be starting a family right now?”
“No, it’s more the fact that we can’t. Cal seems singularly focused on that fact for some reason.”
“Why can’t you? Sky’s already pregnant.”
“Lachlan’s a wolf. Wolves don’t need a third. Bears do.”
“Oh, is that why all the bears in town have triads? I just thought they were into polyamory.”
“Two bears have to come together with a third to have a child,” Samuel said. “One bear has one part, the other has to have the other. That’s why they have brother bears—they’re sets of bears with both halves. Cal wasn’t raised in Bear Mountain and hadn’t met his brother bear yet when he was taken.”
“Maybe that brother bear is out there?”
Samuel stared ahead. “To be honest, I can’t see someone else with us. The love I feel for him—it’s not something I can see sharing with another. Maybe that’s greedy of me, but I don’t want to share my mate. And if that means we have no children, we have no children.”
Dario understood that. He didn’t think he could love two men, either. It just wasn’t in his DNA. “As fucked up as the world is right now, who would want to bring children into it?”
“Indeed,” Samuel answered.
“If you two are meant to have a child, you will.”
Samuel frowned.
Dario watched his friend’s profile, sensing there was more. “What else is bothering you?”
Samuel glanced his way before coming to a stop in the middle of the village square. Dario stopped and turned around to face the man.
“What is it?”
Samuel let out a shaky breath. “If I tell you this, I need you to promise not to repeat it.”
“You know I wouldn’t.”
Samuel sighed. “I shouldn’t say a word. We don’t even know if it’s true or not.”
Dario could tell something was weighing on Samuel’s shoulders. “Get it off your chest.”
“Those kids… one—or more—might be Cal’s.”
Dario’s eyes widened. “What? How? He was locked away, right?”
“Those guys working for Project Zed are sadistic fuckers,” Samuel said. “I can’t go into all of it.”
Dario felt sick inside. He could easily imagine the worst and likely be right. He was torn up and broken because he was nearly raped—while Cal had likely experienced a lot worse. “Did he have a baby? They can get pregnant, too, right?”
“No, he didn’t carry a child, if that’s what you’re asking. That’s why he’s not sure. But someone else… someone else might have carried his.” Samuel stopped just outside the clinic. “Mum when we go inside, okay? I don’t want Cal’s business blabbed all over. I had no right to tell you as it is.”
“This could impact you, too. I’m sure it’s weighing on you almost as much as him. This would bring a third person into your relationship. A child is a huge responsibility.”
Samuel frowned. “I’ve wanted to talk it over with Cal, but I just can’t add to his worry right now. He’s got a lot on his shoulders as it is.”
“So do you. You should talk to him. And bear the weight together.” Dario lifted his chin. “Damn, all this therapy shit is starting to pay off.”
Samuel chuckled. “Appears so. That was pretty good advice.”
Dario grinned. From the corner of his eye, he saw someone he wanted to speak to. “Hey, while you go check on lightning boy, I’ve got something I need to do. Meet back at the truck in thirty?”
Samuel glanced around, and his stare fell on that particular something. “Ahh,” he said with a smile. “Tell Gator I said hello.” Samuel turned and headed for the clinic’s sliding door.
Dario felt heat flooding his face. Was he truly that transparent? Before heading over to the man in question, he gave himself a moment to gather his thoughts. Turning, he walked across the lot toward Gator.
The man was walking with another of the soldiers off the base. The two were deep in conversation as Dario approached. “Hey, Gator. You have a minute?”
A smile flashed over Gator’s face after he lifted his head. “Yeah. Of course I do,” he said in his deep, Cajun accent. The sound of it rolled right over Dario, making him shiver slightly.
Gator turned to the other soldier. “I’ll catch up with you in a moment, Lennox.”
The man nodded, eyed Dario, and then walked ahead. Dario recognized him as the same guy he’d seen Gator eating with some time before. He’d thought then that there was a chance he’d dragged his feet too long.
Were the two an item?
“Where are you two headed?” Dario asked in an inane attempt at small talk.
“We just got off duty and we’re gonna grab some chow at the diner,” Gator said.
“Don’t you eat at the inn up on the mountain?”
“Red and Quint make some amazing food, and I love it—but every once in a while, you need a change of pace.”
“Well, I don’t want to keep you from your date.”
“Date?” Gator asked, frowning. “He’s not my date.”
Dario tried to keep the smile from coming to his lips. “Oh.”
Gator tilted his head slightly, watching him. “You know, there’s a restaurant that opened up near the new construction across town. If you’re hungry, we could go—sit—talk.”
“Your friend is waiting for you.”
“We can stop by on the way and let him know not to wait.”
“You’d make him eat alone?”
Gator smiled. “For the chance to have dinner with you? Absolutely. He’s a big boy. I think he can handle one meal alone.”
Dario’s grin grew wider. He knew if he didn’t take Gator up on an offer soon, he’d lose any chance. Dragging his feet time was over. It was time to step up or go home. “Yes. I’ll have dinner with you.”
Gator’s eyes widened a little, as did his smile. “Yes? Seriously? You’re finally telling me yes?”
Dario nodded dramatically.
Gator looked up at the sky. “Lord, he said yes!”
“Stop it,” Dario said, blushing.
Gator looked down, grinning wickedly. “Let’s go, before you change your mind.”
Dario looked down at the hand Gator offered. He sucked in a breath before lacing his fingers through Gator’s. “We need to stop by and let Samuel know not to wait up.”
“As long as you don’t jump out and abandon me,” Gator said with a grin. “You’re stuck with me now.”
Dario smiled. There were worst things than to be stuck with Gator Arnaud.