Adrian

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Victor sat in the brush, rubbing his head, looking dazed and confused. As much as I wanted to kill him, I was half relieved he wasn’t dead. I didn’t need that on my conscience. Plus now I could beat the holy fuck out of him. He would pay for attacking Reese, there was no doubt in my mind, but not by death at my hand.

He looked up at us as we approached. “Fuck! Did you see that fucking monster?” Then he looked at Reese and back at me. I’m sure my eyes were flaming red with anger. As if a light bulb went off in his head he started to get up but recoiled like the snake he was. There was blood on his cheek, probably from some minor scrapes caused by landing in the brush. Other than that he looked fine.

He held his arm out with his palm facing me. “Adrian. Look man.” He shook his head. “Reese, I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I wasn’t going to hurt you. I swear. I would never hurt you. I was just having a little fun.”

It may not have been a fair fight with me as the dragon, but I was a man now, standing in front of the asshole who’d given the woman I loved a split lip and had been about to take liberties of her body against her wishes. That was putting it mildly. Fuck, he had been about to rape her.

“You’ve already hurt her, you son of a bitch.” I grabbed him up by the collar and swung my right fist, catching him in the jaw. He tumbled backwards and I caught him by the front of his shirt. His lip was cut and blood oozed from the corner of his mouth and he spit out a tooth before speaking again.

“Ah, fuck. Adrian. I’d just been tossed through the air by some fucking monster. You’re heartless enough that you’d hit a man after that?”

“No. I hit an asswipe, scum bag of the earth, rapist, and gave him a split lip that looks worse than the one he gave Reese.”

I grabbed him again and slugged him another time. He tried to block me, even threw out a punch, catching me on the cheek, right under my eye. Then I hit him in the stomach and pounded him in the face three more times and then, when I was sure he’d had about as much as he could take, I let him fall to the ground.

“Reese. Do what you need to do.”

I stood by and watched as she crouched down in front of him. She placed her hand on his forehead and a shit storm of agony swept through me realizing she had to touch him. He looked up at her with eyes swollen half shut. The air was still, not a breeze to be felt, and silence loomed around us like stagnant water.

When she was finished, she got up and stepped away from Victor and stood by my side as he puked all over himself.

“All done?”

She nodded.

“Good. Let’s go. We need to call 911.”

We headed back to her bungalow. “How will you know that you erased his memory of me?”

“That’s why he barfed. I told him to throw up if he thought dragons were a myth. I also told him that if he ever thought about sex again, his cock would fall off.”

I laughed. “He’s going to believe that?”

“Oh, he’ll believe it. Because whenever he thinks of sex, his cock is going to burn like hell.”

“You’re amazing. You know that?”

“Me? You’re the magnificent dragon.”

I squeezed her against me as we walked. “Pack your stuff. You’re not staying here. Not tonight. Not any night.”

She nodded. “Thank you. I don’t think I would have been able to.”

I dialed emergency while she packed up some clothes. “We can come back tomorrow with my truck to get the rest.”

After the police came and took Reese’s statement, they met up with Victor who was already being pushed on a stretcher to an ambulance. We stood by and watched as they handcuffed him and read him his rights. He’d confessed to attacking Reese the moment they asked him his name. He never mentioned the dragon.

When Reese and I were back at my place, and she’d made herself comfortable in my bed, I handed her a small bag of ice to place on her mouth. The cut wasn’t too bad and it looked like it would heal rather quickly. But every time I thought about how it got there, I wanted to beat Victor all over again.

I kissed her on the forehead and slid into the bed next to her, holding her close until I smiled at the sweet sound of her steady breathing against my chest as she slept. Tranquility coursed through my body as if I was floating on a cloud without a care in the world. Reese accepted me—as well as the beast within me.

“Reese.” I tapped her on the shoulder. She’d been sleeping in my arms all night. My dragon needed to be let out to spread his cocky wings and he wasn’t letting me forget it so I could sleep in and bask in the pleasure of having Reese in my arms. “Reese. I’m going to go for a swim.”

She moaned and opened her eyes. “What time is it?”

“Early. Too early for you. I just wanted to let you know I was going so you didn’t wake up and worry.”

“Oh.” She sat up and stretched and grinned. “Does the dragon need some space?”

I smiled. “Yeah, he does.”

“He’s sort of like having a puppy who needs to be let out first thing in the morning.”

“Ah. That’s like a thorn to my heart.”

She laughed. “I like your dragon. And the dolphin.”

I’d waited to hear those words from someone ever since the dragon appeared in my life. I’d never found a woman who I considered trustworthy enough to reveal him to. Now that Reese knew about him and seemed to accept him, maybe it was time they spent some time together.

“You want to come with me?”

Her eyes lit up with a sparkle so bright I almost climbed back into bed to tempt her into making sweet love with me, until I felt the dragon fidget.

“Can I?”

“Sure.”

She got out of bed and slipped a red flowered pareo around her, securing it with a knot above her breasts. Then she pulled her reddish locks up behind her head, securing them with an elastic band. I especially liked that she didn’t bother with any underwear. When she glanced at me, the grin on her face made my heart skip a beat.

“I’m glad you want to come. I want to take you somewhere.” I pulled off my shorts and handed them to her. “Hold on to these for me, will you?”

She nodded, and I left her standing by the water’s edge while I dove under the waves.

When I returned to her, landing in the shallow water as the dragon, she waded her way through the shoal toward me and I got down on both knees, giving her a place to step up onto my back.

Once I knew she was situated and secure, I took flight. Her thighs hugged tightly against me, making me crazy. And the way she wiggled her bottom against my back, so comfortably, so pleasurably, eased all my doubts about how she would react to my dragon. My chest ached with desire for her. There were so many things I wanted to tell her. The way she was wedged inside my heart broke me down into a million tiny pieces. I swear, I spent every waking moment thinking of nothing other than how I wanted to please her. It was a wonder I got any work done on the hotel.

I headed south. There was only one spot I wanted to take Reese to, needed to take her to. I needed desperately to share the only place on land where my dragon felt safe. A place where he could stomp around without causing anyone any harm.