Eternal Embers

A loud bang broke up his reverie, had Matthew jumping before he could stop himself. He glanced around wildly for a second, trying to figure out where the noise had come from.

He didn’t have far to look. Caitlyn had just landed on the hood of his car. She’d hit it with enough power to not just get his attention but to also put a crater sized dent in the hood. He tried to get angry about that fact, but couldn’t, not when she was crouched down and staring at him through the window, her turquoise eyes swirling dangerously.

Terrific. Just what he needed to make the day complete. A pissed-off, territorial dragon determined to make him pay for what she believed was an invasion of her territory. Not to mention one who gave every appearance of wanting to roast him after his disappearing act six decades ago.

When he didn’t immediately leave the car, she pounded twice on his windshield with her fist, a blatant demand if he’d ever seen one. Fantastic. Matthew rubbed a weary hand over his eyes before reaching for the door handle and letting himself out of the car. He had no idea what he was going to say to her, but it wasn’t like staying in the car and praying for everything to just disappear was really a viable option.

“Can I help you?” he asked, walking around to the front of the car. Keep it pleasant, he told himself. Don’t piss her off any more than she already was. Though he knew he’d win, he had no desire to get tangled up in a fight for dominance—especially not with a woman he had once made love to.

She stood up slowly so that he was forced to bend his neck to look up at her. She followed his every move with her eyes, her body poised to strike at any second. “Who are you?” she demanded.

“I’m no threat to you or yours.”

“That’s not what I asked.” She leaped down off the car in one smooth movement, landed lightly at his feet. As she did, he smelled the same mixture of plush gardenia and sweet, wild, desert wind that he’d associated with her for the better part of a century.

“Maybe not, but that’s what you meant.” It was strangely exhilarating to stand this close to her, to see again all the pent up cravings that lived inside of her. Even her anger was passionate.

“You don’t get to decide what I meant.” She moved even closer, until her face was a mere inch from his. Like most of her kind, she was tall and he remembered liking the fact that her eyes were on the same level of his, that she didn’t need to look up at him to make eye contact. Or strain her neck when he’d kissed her.

She’d tasted like cherries and vanilla—dark and sweet and just a little bit dangerous. It was a combination that had swept him off his feet, had him responding to her in a way he’d never responded to another woman, even the wife he had once adored. Was it any wonder she had freaked him out so completely during that one weekend in Flagstaff?

“If I don’t get to make that decision,” he asked. “Who does?” Though it was stupid, and completely the wrong thing to do, he found himself pulling her tail just to see if she would roar. He kind of hoped so, and how sick was it that he was actually looking forward to seeing Caitlyn lose her temper? He grew hard at the thought. If the swirling sparks in her eyes were anything to go by, it would be a spectacular one. “You speak, I interpret meaning. It’s called communication. Conversation. I know this isn’t your first time participating in the ritual. Though we spent most of our time together otherwise engaged, I do remember a few sentences occasionally being exchanged. Besides the obvious, I mean.”

He stepped back and waited for the explosion. It didn’t take long. For a second, he thought her head was actually going to spin around.

But when she spoke, she was disappointingly cool. Calm. Collected. “You know, Matthew,” she said in a patient voice that set his teeth on edge. “I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but you need to leave my clan out of it. You don’t belong here.”

That was the understatement of the year. But then, again, he didn’t belong anywhere, and after his latest failure, maybe this was as good a place to be as any. It could even be better, if it got him this close to Caitlyn again. Though she might not agree—yet.

“So, where do I belong, then?” The question slipped out before he knew he was going to ask it, and though he tried to play it off like a joke, he could tell by the look on her face that she understood uh more than he wanted her to.

“I’m sorry, Matthew, but that really isn’t my problem.”

Of course it wasn’t. What the hell had he been thinking? “I never said it was. You’re the one who came looking for me, after all.”

“Because you’re trespassing,” she snarled. “You need to get the hell off of our land.”

“Why? I’m not hurting anyone, not disturbing anything.”

“You’re disturbing me.”

He grinned, he couldn’t help himself. She was so fierce—eyes narrowed, hands curled into claws, her gleaming white skin flushed a delicate rose as her long blonde hair whipped around her in the wind. “Oh, yeah? And why is that?” He didn’t give himself a chance to think, just reached out a hand to see if her skin was as soft and dewy as it looked. As it had been all those years ago when he’d kissed every inch of her.

She slapped his hand away with a growl. “You don’t want to do that.”

“You’re probably right,” he agreed. “But I can’t seem to help myself.”