Chapter Two
“Evangeline,” said the Dragon King with a smile. “It is indeed a pleasure.”
His voice was deep and laced with that singular intonation Evangeline had long since equated to powerful magic. “Mimi has told me a good deal about you.” He held out his hand in an offer to shake.
Eva was burning up inside. A grayscale fire was eating her alive. She’d never expected to actually meet up one day with the man who killed her father. She’d never expected to be standing so close to him, face to face. And she’d never imagined that when she did – if she ever did – he would be staring at her like that, that he would be so gods-awful beautiful, even in his human disguise. Or that she would be destined to become his queen.
Never had she dreamed such a thing. Who would?
But there he was. And she was a foot away. And her entire life came crashing in on her in that moment.
There were a million ways this could go down. A million destructive, combustible ways. But they were in a mall, surrounded by countless humans – and Mimi. So Eva did another thing she had never imagined she would do and steeled herself like she never had before. And she took his offered hand.
“Has she?” Eva asked. Her voice remained even. She glanced down at the young red dragon who was grinning ear to ear as she spooned up her next mouthful of yogurt. “Don’t believe any of it.”
“Oh I don’t,” said Calidum as he shook her hand. “It’s all good, after all.” He grinned, flashing white teeth. “And you can’t fool me.”
The words echoed in her mind, laced with radiant magic.
Taking his hand might have been a mistake. His fingers were curled around her in a powerful grip, and his magic flooded her at once. He didn’t do anything specific. There was no attempt to control her or put her to sleep or set her on fire or turn her invisible – all things the Great Gray was reputed to be able to do. He simply sent a thick cord of his power into her, a cord that shot through her body and wrapped around her from the inside, reminding her all at once exactly who and what he was.
It was a warning. It may also have been a promise. After all, he damn well knew who she was too. And so, he would know she was after revenge.
You can’t fool me, she recalled his words.
A weird, hot kind of chill went through Eva, hanging onto the coat tails of the Dragon King’s subjugative power. Calidum hadn’t yet let go. In fact, his grip had tightened. Eva felt heat flood her cheeks, and she had no idea why.
Mimi giggled. The Dragon King glanced over and winked at the younger girl.
At that point, Eva barely refrained from yanking her hand out of his.
Calidum was model gorgeous, of course, appearing before them as a brown haired six-foot-five man in a tight gray tee-shirt and tight worn blue jeans that hugged every ripped muscle in his beautiful body. He had brown eyes with amber rings around their irises. Mimi thought he was a red dragon, like her. In a vague sense, he resembled “Sam Winchester” from Supernatural. She knew a few fangirls who would have swooned in his presence.
But Evangeline knew better than to take him at face value. He wasn’t the vision standing before her looking so very handsome, and yet so fundamentally human. In actuality, the Great Gray could look like anything he wanted. He was neither night nor day, he was not set in stone. And because of this, he could be anything. Any dragon. Any man.
Granted, that was where the disguise stopped. He couldn’t be a woman. Well, not without surgery anyway.
His powers ran along the same lines as his chameleon abilities. They were extensive and unpredictable. Not even Eva knew where they started or stopped, though he was reputed to be able to do a few things that terrified her. She only knew for certain that he’d once used his power to end everything she’d held dear.
He turned back and smiled at Eva with those fake brown eyes. Eva tried not to allow any of her emotion to show on her face, but she was one of the few beings in any realm who knew what he really looked like – in his true human form. When he wasn’t busy pretending to be something else, when the shit hit the fan, when it came down to live or die, he was Korridum. And she’d seen Korridum up close and personal in all of his ash dark glory that would blow this human façade to smithereens.
She’d witnessed the coal black hair with its streak of white, the eyes that were the crackling hue of colorless fire – until he was angry. She’d beheld the visage of confident, radiant power that smiled a smile of fangs and dark secrets. She’d seen him. She’d been so young, but oh, she knew. And it was fucking killing her.
As Eva saw it, she had two choices. She could either confront the son of a bitch here and now and the world around them would most likely perish in a brilliant blaze… or, she could wait it out. Get her thoughts together. Figure out what the hell she was going to do.
Her fight or flight instincts were sparking like frayed wires in the rain. But Mimi was standing right there, smiling and young and innocent, and San Francisco buzzed around her with equal, mortal innocence. The mall churned, this great big beast of commerce with veins of people who were like blood cells; the red cells the shoppers, the white cells the mall rats there to people-watch. There were so many of them. And cameras too.
So she pushed her instincts back down her throat just as she had her emotions, and pulled strength from her core, where it was stoutest. Slowly, so as not to arouse suspicion, she removed her hand from his. As she did, Mimi stepped between them and turned to look beseechingly up at her.
The distance the child placed between her and the king was welcomed. And strangely enough, it also wasn’t.
“Let’s take a cable car and walk down to the Pier!” Mimi said, bouncing on her tiptoes. The yogurt was giving her a sugar high.
The Pier she was referring to was most likely Pier 39. Mimi hadn’t spent as much time in San Francisco as Eva had, and no doubt she wanted to soak it all in. But it was sure to be packed. It was June, and summer was the busy season for San Francisco. The temps in the Bay area remained more or less temperate, settling in at the mid-sixties to low-seventies, which welcomed anyone who abhorred heat. It used to be cooler. Eva remembered. She recalled high fifties to mid-sixties at most. But even at its warmer-than-usual state, it was preferable to the hundred degree scorch much of the rest of the country was experiencing.
Eva glanced at the Dragon King. “Pier, huh?” she asked softly. Yes, let’s do that, she thought with acid. Then I can shove your new friend in front of the car and hope he gets run over so I don’t have to kill him myself. But what she said was, “Are your peeps okay with you traipsing around San Francisco today?” She looked back at Mimi.
“They know I’m with Cal,” Mimi said with a look like Eva had just dropped several dozen points of IQ. “Of course they’re okay with it.”
Of course, thought Eva. He was the Dragon King. No doubt, they were just pleased as punch that their little Mimi was up close and personal with royalty. They had no clue that he was a murdering psychopath who had destroyed her entire existence when she was basically a baby.
Calidum hadn’t stopped watching her. In fact, the expression on his face was one of keen and calculated interest. The corner of his mouth was upturned slightly as if he could read her mind and found what she was thinking slightly amusing.
Eva didn’t know the scope of the Great Gray’s powers, so just in case that was what he was actually doing, she turned slightly away so Mimi couldn’t see her, and she narrowed her gaze at the man. You have her fooled, Korridum, she thought loudly at him. You have them all fooled. But I know who you are. I know what you did.
The corner of his handsome mouth turned up just a smidgeon more – and white fire flashed in his gaze. It was so fast, no one else would have noticed it. But she sure as hell did.
He turned to Mimi and grinned good-naturedly. “I think our friend’s onboard,” he told her casually. “So let’s blow this yogurt stand.” He gestured politely for the young dragon to lead the way out of the mall. Mimi turned and nearly skipped ahead of them in her excitement.
But Eva couldn’t move. She was suddenly mired to the spot in indecision and memories. They were like quicksand around her, and the more she fought them, the more they threatened to pull her under.
Up ahead, the very handsome man who called himself Calidum stopped and slowly turned back to face her. The distance between them seemed to shorten. The mall and its inhabitants flew to the outer perimeters of her consciousness. All there was now was Calidum and Evangeline.
“Are you coming, Eva?” he asked softly. So softly. It was almost no more than a whisper. And yet she heard him down that busy, crowded hall.
Eva was in pain. She was confused. But above all, she was stubborn as hell, and it seemed nothing would change that.
Her gaze narrowed on him. “I’m right behind you.”