To Date A Dragon: BBW Dragon Shifter Romance (Weredragon Warriors Book 1) (3 page)

“I'm home,” she
blurted out. How did she get home?

She shook her head and looked
around. Nope, no dragon in sight. Just one smoking hot stranger who
was standing much too close to her.

Oh, she didn't mind him
standing so close. In fact, she wanted to get closer to him,
preferably with their clothes out of the way…

“No, no, no,”
Amelia muttered and pulled herself away. She had met enough strange
men for one night.

This handsome, kind stranger
had probably gotten her home in a cab, thinking she was stoned or
drunk. What nonsense had she spouted in her delirium? She hoped she
hadn't muttered anything about monsters and snakes.

“Um, thank you,”
she said and managed to smile. “Thank you for...helping me.
See you around.” In a whisper, she added, “I hope.”

The man nodded and stood on
the sidewalk, watching her until she turned and clattered up the
stairs. She ran straight into her apartment and locked the door.

When she peeked out the
window, that hot, handsome Good Samaritan was gone.

Amelia stood under the shower
for an hour until she felt all the knots in her body and mind loosen.
Wrapped in her bathrobe, Amelia sat down at her kitchen table, her
hands around a mug of warm milk.

She convinced herself that
she didn't need to make an appointment with her psychologist. She
was okay. She wasn't a screaming mess. She couldn't lose her job.

Maybe she was stressed. Or
perhaps she was lonely. She had a few friends, but they were all
busy with their families. She, on the other hand, had no family.
Her parents, her adoptive parents, were all gone.

Amelia ran a trembling hand
through her wet hair. How could a child who had witnessed the
savage, horrific murder of her parents not be broken? Could she ever
heal and be whole again?

Amelia closed her eyes and
let her repressed memories flood her mind. The terrible images
swirled through her mind, and she saw them. Her parents sleeping in
their bed, and the snake-men who had come to kill them.

But she didn't scream. She
didn't scream that night. And she wouldn't scream now.

CHAPTER
SEVEN

Amelia saw herself waking up
in her old house. Her parents' old house.

She was four years old.

Unable to go back to sleep,
she slipped into her parents' bedroom and tiptoed across the carpet.
She didn't want to wake her parents up, so instead of climbing into
their bed, she crept into her mother's cupboard and sat there among
her mother's clothes and perfumes with her rag doll. She whispered
to her doll and pretended that they were hiding from some very scary
monsters.

Then she saw them.

The very scary monsters
entered her parents' bedroom and killed her parents. Amelia saw
their blades flash darkly as they raised them again and again.

Everything became red. The
sheets were red. The walls were red, but the monsters didn't stop.

Amelia stuffed her doll's
foot into her mouth and kept very quiet. She didn't dare cry even
though she was terrified. She watched the monsters through the crack
between the cupboard doors and wished they would go away. She wished
her parents would wake up, but they never did.

Her neighbors found her the
next morning. Mrs Ray carried her out of the cupboard and shielded
her eyes, while Mr Ray called the police. She tried to take one last
look at her parents but Mrs Ray held her tight and ran from the room.

Mr and Mrs Ray adopted her
and they gave her a warm, loving home. They had sought medical and
psychiatric help for her when she woke up screaming from her
nightmares almost every night and blabbered about men with scales,
fangs and snake eyes.

The police never caught her
parents' murderers. Her parents were soft-spoken, unassuming people.
They had few friends but no enemies. There was no motive for the
murder. It was just a random, unexplained act of violence.

The world was a crazy place,
but Amelia knew what she saw. She was not crazy. The doctors never
said she was either. They just concluded that her young, traumatized
mind had conjured up the image of monsters to demonize her parents'
murderers. She put a monster's face on the murderers as a way of
dealing with her anger and devastating loss.

The doctors, the police,
everyone tried to help her. She took their advice and locked those
monsters away at the very back of her mind.

But tonight, the monsters got
out.

She saw a monster in the
restaurant, sitting opposite her.

“Norbert Brown is not a
monster,” she said aloud. “He's not Mr. Right, but he's
no monster.”

Amelia gave a wry, brittle
laugh. She sounded crazy to herself.

And who would want a crazy
woman teaching their precious little kids?

Amelia sipped her milk and
gave herself a good hard mental shake. She was a kindergarten
teacher, and a very good one. She loved her job and she loved her
students.

She wasn't going to let the
monsters win.

Determinedly, she finished
her milk and went to wash her cup. Looking out the kitchen window,
she gasped and blinked repeatedly.

Something shimmered in the
sky before the clouds drifted in and the moon disappeared. The large
shape disappeared together with the moon.

Amelia shook her head and
rubbed her eyes. She could have sworn that she had glimpsed a dragon
in the sky.

The same dragon who had
brought her home.

She threw up her hands and
laughed in resignation. She'd always had an active imagination.
Maybe it was her imagination that had kept her sane all these years.

There were all kinds of
imaginary creatures. She just had to focus on the nice ones and wish
that the bad ones would go away. Forever.

Maybe tonight she would dream
of dragons instead of snakes. And it wouldn't hurt to see that hot,
sexy, good-hearted stranger in her dream either.

CHAPTER
EIGHT

Rohan stood in front of the
woman's building and watched her window. For an instant, he
regretted not going after her.

There was just something
about her, something that seemed to tug at him and his dragon.

Scowling, Rohan shook his
head to clear it and told himself that he should leave that nice
woman alone. His dragon disagreed. His dragon wanted to spend all
night with that female. But Rohan had a job to do. He had to keep
his people safe. And that sweet woman was far safer not knowing
about him and his people. If he brought her into his world, she
would be hunted like the rest of them.

But the woman had seen a
Slayor tonight. And she seemed to be able to see his dragon just
fine.

Either she had Dracan blood
in her, or she was a dragon's mate. But she didn't seem to know
anything about the Slayors and the Dracans. Some of the second and
third generation Dracans were almost fully human. To protect them,
their parents and grandparents never told them about their past.
They had human families, human friends and lived ordinary, safe human
lives. Just like that lovely, exquisite woman he had met tonight.

His people had settled here,
for better or worse, and for a few decades, they actually experienced
some peace and happiness.

Some of the Dracans even
mated with humans and had beautiful human children and grandchildren.
For almost fifty years, they lived quietly on Earth. They worked
and contributed to human society, but they didn't draw attention to
themselves. Some of Rohan's employees were Dracans, but the large
majority of his staff were human.

In the day, he was just a
regular guy in a suit. Yeah, he was the founder and owner of Draek
Holdings, but still, he worked in an office just like everyone else.
He attended meetings, took calls, signed documents. Then he tried to
beat the rush hour traffic so he could get home on time to have
dinner with his family.

But after tucking his little
girl into bed, he and his brothers armed themselves to the teeth and
set out of the house. They each had an area to patrol. They had to
patrol the streets and watch the shadows.

At night, the Slayors
slithered out of their hidey-holes and hunted the Dracans.

It was about twenty years ago
that the killings started. Dracan families were slaughtered in their
homes and some Dracans and their mates were killed out in the open,
their bodies left in pieces in drains and rubbish dumps.

The human police thought
there was a serial killer on the loose, but Rohan knew that the
Slayors had found them. The Slayors had come to Earth to finish what
they'd started on Korra. They had come to wipe out Rohan's people.

Rohan scanned the quiet
street and watched the moving shadows as he stepped away from the
curb. When he heard soft shuffling steps behind him, he spun round,
automatically reaching under his jacket. He gripped the hilt of the
knife strapped to his side and tensed.

An elderly lady was clutching
a bag of groceries and the hand of a young child as they walked
towards him.

When the woman saw him, her
eyes widened and she breathed, “Prince Rohan!”

Rohan rushed to stop her from
falling to her knees. He held her arm gently and said, “I'm
not a prince. I'm just Rohan Draek.”

The woman raised her eyes to
him and said adamantly, “You are the Crown Prince of Draca, and
now that King Rykor is gone, you—are my king.”

She sucked in a breath and
said, “King Rohan, Draca is gone, but her people are still
here. Your people, King Rohan.” She placed a fist over her
heart.

“Nana...” The
little boy stared at Rohan and tugged at his grandmother's skirt.
“Who is he?”

Rohan crouched down before
the woman could reply and said, “My name is Rohan. I knew your
Nana when she was a young lady.” The little boy was human, and
Rohan guessed that his grandmother had married a human male. She was
one of the young Dracans on the ship with him so many years ago.

The boy frowned. “Nana
was young?”

His grandmother laughed.
“Hard to believe, eh?”

“So you're Nana's
friend.” The boy grinned at Rohan. “I'm William. We
live two blocks down. Nana and I came out to get ice-cream and
chips. It's movie night! We're just waiting for Papa to get home.
He always works late but he promised to be home early today.”

“You should get home
then,” Rohan said. “I'm sure your Papa is looking
forward to spending the evening with you.”

The woman bowed. “Your
Highness...”

She gasped when Rohan shoved
her and her grandson to the ground. A knife whizzed past, spinning
as it sliced the air above them. It would have sliced the woman's
throat if Rohan had been a second too slow.

“Go,” Rohan
hissed to the Dracan. “Run home with your grandson. Keep
running and don't look back!”

CHAPTER
NINE

Rohan whirled round, two
throwing knives in each hand. The woman yanked her grandson across
the street and ran like the wind. Her paper bag lay on the ground,
spilling out two tubs of ice-cream and a big bag of chips.

Three large males emerged
from an alley. They were dressed casually in torn jeans and denim
jackets, and they looked human enough. But their eyes gave them
away. Their slitted, glowing eyes weren't human.

As they circled him, their
forked tongues darted out to taste the air.

As Rohan faced the three
Slayors, he wondered if the Slayors had lost their ability to
shapeshift in the Earth's atmosphere, like the majority of the
Dracans.

But the Slayors weren't
ordinary civilians of Syndor. They were highly trained soldiers of
the Syndorian army. Even if they couldn't shift, they were still
lethal, merciless killers.

“It's him,” one
of the Slayors said. “The prince.”

“Don't scar his pretty
face,” another Slayor said with a mocking laugh. “The
General has to recognize Prince Rohan's face when we bring him the
head. Maybe we should text him now so he can get our reward ready.”

Rohan tensed.

The Syndor Emperor hadn't
just sent a small unit to hunt the remaining Dracans down. He had
sent a Slayor General to lead the hunt.

Rohan's fighting instinct and
reflex kicked in as the Slayors charged at him. He wasn't just the
Crown Prince. He was a Lieutenant General of the Dracan army. He
might be outnumbered, but he wasn't outmatched. He could think and
move faster than these Slayors. He wasn't just a soldier. He was a
leader, and a leader fought with his mind. Mind was always stronger
and faster than matter.

Rohan waited until the
Slayors were almost upon him before moving. His movements was swift
and sharp, and he didn't miss his targets.

There was only a blur as
Rohan slashed his blade across the throat of a Slayor. He spat and
cursed when black blood spurted across his face. Whirling round, he
kicked a blade out of the hand of another Slayor and stabbed his
knife into the Slayor's chest. He left his knife there and turned to
face the third Slayor.