Amazed, page 13
Zee walked into the room at that moment, his brother Markos at his side.
Mia huffed when she saw them. “What are you two doing here?”
Zee grinned. “Getting pampered, of course.” He sauntered over to Ashlynn’s side, settled into the empty chair at her right and leaned over to peer at her nails. “Nice.” He held up his hands. “I could really use a manicure myself.” He leaned closer and murmured into her ear, “Someone’s flames scorched them clean.”
Ashlynn blushed.
“What do you think? Matching nails?”
Ashlynn smirked. The possibilities were endless.
Another fairy flew up and settled across from Zee. She grabbed his hands and got to work.
Zee waggled his brows at Ashlynn. “So. What color were you thinking?”
“Pink, right, Ashlynn?” Markos leaned forward to wink at her from where he had settled next to Cassie.
Though Ashlynn really wanted to agree with Markos, if only to see whether Zee would actually follow through and allow his nails to be painted in pastel, pink was a color she’d never wear, not even to aggravate a dragon. “Sorry, Markos, but no. Gray. Or maybe black.”
“Ah. A woman after my own heart.” Zee grinned.
“Black,” Mia said from the other side of Ashlynn. “It will be an amazing backdrop.”
“Backdrop?” Ashlynn asked.
Mia grinned. “For the flames.”
Zee chuckled as Ashlynn blushed again.
Over the next hour, as they all had their nails done, Zee continually leaned into Ashlynn’s space, murmuring flirtatious tidbits into her ear about how careful they needed to be, lest their combined flames burn down the world.
Ashlynn had never giggled or blushed so much in her life.
And when she wasn’t doing either of those things, she was laughing at the brothers, who continually razzed each other in between Zee’s bouts of outrageous flirting.
Ashlynn was so caught up in Zee, she wasn’t paying attention to her nails at all. She simply responded automatically to gentle suggestions of where to place a hand or hold a finger and trusted the fairy to work some magic while she sank deeper and deeper into her infatuation with the hilarious man-dragon at her side.
So when her nails were finally done, and Ashlynn actually got a glimpse of what they looked like, she was completely blown away.
Mia had been right.
The black made an amazing backdrop for the flames that Orelia, the fairy, had painted in tiny perfection on eight of her ten nails. Her index fingers, though, boasted miniature, incredibly detailed, flame-bright phoenixes.
“Wow,” Ashlynn whispered.
“Look!” Phoenix squealed as she bounced over to Ashlynn’s station, holding out her forest green nails covered in vines and a couple miniature koalas.
“That’s adorable,” Ashlynn said.
“So are yours,” Phoenix exclaimed. “And oh my gosh, it’s so cute that you guys have matching nails!”
Ashlynn looked over at Zee and sure enough, not only were his nails black, but there were tiny flames marching across them as well.
“Not quite identical,” Zee said. “Mine have dragons.”
“Oooh, let me see!” After admiring Zee’s dragons, Phoenix raced over to Mia’s station to check out her nails. “Her dragons are bright blue and green,” she called back to Ashlynn, who had already noted that Zee’s dragons were the same brilliant reds and oranges of her phoenix.
“Is that what your dragon looks like?”
He grinned. “Anytime you want to see my dragon, you just let me know.”
A wave of heat rushed through Ashlynn’s body again and she could feel her face turning red. Again!
“Hey, you got fairies on yours,” Phoenix exclaimed in the background. “Look, guys.” Phoenix dragged Cassie over to Ashlynn. “Look at her fairies.”
Ashlynn smiled when she saw Cassie’s bright yellow nails. “I like the color.”
Cassie shrugged. “It seemed appropriate.”
“So why fairies?” Mia asked as she joined them.
“I just wanted something different,” Cassie responded.
It hadn’t even occurred to Ashlynn to tell Cassie she wouldn’t mind if they had matching nail art, and now she felt kind of bad about it.
“Well, they’re super pretty,” Phoenix said. “I might get fairies next time too.”
As the others chatted and compared their nails, Ashlynn couldn’t get past her last thought. Why had she assumed Cassie’s nails would match her own?
Unless the rumor was true.
Could Cassie be the phoenix Ashlynn had come here to find?
Chapter Nine
“SO.” ZEE SLUNG an arm around Ashlynn’s shoulders and pulled her into his side, making her stomach dip and heat spread. “What’s next on the agenda?”
“Seriously?” Mia glowered at her brother. “Don’t you have somewhere else to be?”
Ashlynn smiled up at Zee and shrugged. “It’s up to Mia. She’s our guide for the day.”
“I can be your guide,” Zee rumbled.
Ashlynn blushed. She was pretty sure his idea of tour guide was vastly different from hers.
“I was thinking Chaos,” Mia said.
Zee shook his head and Markos let out a bark of laughter. “You know Zee hates that place, Mia. You just said that to annoy him.”
“Like you don’t?” Zee growled at his brother.
Markos grinned and winked at Ashlynn, making her laugh.
“What’s Chaos?” Cassie asked.
“Troll bar,” Mia said.
“Those fuckers are always showing off,” Zee growled.
“Oh, like your dragon isn’t?” Mia scoffed.
“We should go to the Cavern instead,” Markos said.
“And that’s why you’re my favorite brother.” Zee slammed his fist into his brother’s shoulder. The force behind that blow would have sent Ashlynn to the floor, but Markos didn’t budge an inch.
“Wow,” Cassie muttered.
Ashlynn grinned at the look on Cassie’s face. Seemed she’d finally noticed Markos was hot with a capital H-O-T.
Mia sighed. “Fine.” She grabbed Ashlynn’s hand and pulled her from beneath her brother’s arm.
“Hey!” Zee complained.
Hooking one arm in Ashlynn’s and the other in Cassie’s, she dragged them out the door, pausing to thank the fairies on the way.
“Yes, thank you,” Ashlynn and Cassie echoed.
“Did we tip them?” Cassie asked. “We should have tipped them.”
Mia laughed. “Please. Those fairies are paid very well. Tips just aren’t a thing in the other realms. Mostly because no one will work somewhere they’re not paid their worth.”
“True.” Markos came up on Cassie’s side, slung an arm around her shoulders and dragged her away from his sister. “Trust me. No one wants a pissed off fairy on the loose.”
Zee came up on the other side of Ashlynn at the same time, and with a move that echoed his brother’s, smoothly slid an arm around Ashlynn’s shoulders and knocked his sister’s arm from hers.
Mia huffed. “Fine then. I’ll just walk all by my lonesome.”
Markos and Zee looked at each other over the heads of the women they were holding, nodded to each other and said in unison, “Switch sides.”
Zee spun Ashlyn from one arm to the other in a move that was so sexy, it was stunning. Trying to catch her breath, she looked over to see Markos had accomplished the same with Cassie.
The two men reached out their free arms, caught Mia between them and dragged her back so she now stood at the center of their group, her brothers’ arms around her shoulders.
“Poor Mia,” Zee rumbled.
“Are you missing your mate?” Markos asked.
“Don’t worry. Your brothers have your back,” Zee said.
“You’ll never be lonely with us around,” Markos agreed.
The two of them leaned over and kissed their sister on either cheek.
Mia hissed and laughed at the same time. “Stop it, you goofs!”
“We look like a cancan line,” Ashlynn said, peering down the line at Cassie, who nodded and said, “Totally.”
“What’s that?” Zee asked.
So Ashlynn and Cassie demonstrated and that was how the five of them ending up cancanning all the way to the Cavern.
Zee and Markos were hilarious with their high kicks and swiveling hips.
By the time they arrived at the Cavern, Ashlynn was breathless from all the laughing, not to mention the dancing.
Jarlo stood outside the Cavern, waiting for them. “Seriously?” He demanded, glaring at Zee and Markos. He stepped forward and swept Mia into his arms to kiss her. “Took you guys long enough to get here.”
“Hey. You were planning to come here all along,” Zee accused.
Mia sent him a laughing glance over her shoulder. “Of course I was. You don’t think I’d take these two to Chaos on their first visit, do you?”
They discovered the rest of the dragon brothers waiting inside at a table large enough for the entire group. They spent the evening laughing, eating, drinking and dancing, with the men competing to impress the ladies.
Zee scowled every time one of his brothers stole Ashlynn from him for a turn on the dance floor and made short work of stealing her back.
The night was filled with laughter and as the hours slipped by, Ashlynn realized she was falling in love with a dragon. How was that even possible? She’d only known him a day, but it felt like her entire life had been building toward this moment, this man, this dragon whose fires burned in all the right ways.
It wasn’t until the wee hours of the morning that they stumbled out of the elevator into the hotel on their side of the realms.
Cassie gave Ashlynn a drunken hug before heading off to her room.
“She makes my skin itch,” Ashlynn said once the elevator doors had closed behind Cassie and Markos, who insisted on walking her to her room.
Rumbles of agreement from all the dragons around her.
“It’s her fires,” Zee said. “They brush up against mine.”
Ashlynn nodded. Even though Cassie was a phoenix like Ashlynn — and they still needed to talk about that — it made sense that her fires would aggravate the dragons too.
“I need to go back to my old suite,” Ashlynn announced as the elevator spit them out onto the third floor.
“Why?” Zee asked. “It’s pretty much a goner.”
“I need my ID and cash.”
“Uh, doubt they survived, darlin’,” Velos said.
“Oh I always carry my important documents in a fireproof pouch.”
“Huh.” Zee grinned. “You’re smart. It’s sexy.”
His brothers hooted and Ashlynn blushed. She needed to stop doing that! Being a redhead was such a pain sometimes.
“Come on.” Zee grabbed her hand and started to lead her down the hall.
“Oh, you don’t have to come with me,” Ashlynn said. “It’s kind of a trek.”
Zee grinned down at her. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
“We’ll also join you,” Velos said.
Zee threw a scowl over his shoulder. “Go. Away.”
“No way,” Liel said. “You two can’t be trusted in the non-fireproof sections of the hotel.”
Ashlynn groaned. She could already tell. They were never going to live that down.
Zee grumbled a bit at her side, but didn’t argue further.
Fifteen minutes later, Ashlynn stood inside her former rooms and just stared. The walls were blackened with soot, the floor was covered in ashes and there was absolutely nothing else in the room. All the furniture, her backpack, the hangers in the closet, everything was gone. Or rather, turned to ash.
Ashlynn whimpered. This was going to cost a fortune to fix.
“Eh, don’t worry about it, sweetheart,” Zee said. Almost as if he knew what she’d been thinking. “We have a dragon crew arriving tomorrow to take care of everything. By the time they’re done, this room will look like new.”
“It’s a miracle we didn’t burn down the hotel. What about the rooms below and above and to either side? Oh, no. Was anyone hurt?”
“You guys had the fires pretty contained to this room when we arrived,” Bowen said.
“Yep,” Kormal agreed. “And when they started to get a little out of hand, we helped with containment.”
Ashlynn shook her head. “I haven’t lost control of my fires like that since I was a kid.”
“It’s pretty common when mates meet for the first time,” Liel said.
“What?” Ashlynn looked toward Zee just in time to catch him making a zip-it motion to Liel. “What does he mean? Mates? Like with shifters?”
“Sort of,” Zee hedged.
Velos made a scoffing sound. “Don’t listen to him. It’s exactly like with shifters.”
“Our dragons let us know when they’ve met their mate,” Liel said.
“They’re pretty adamant about it actually,” Kormal said.
“So, what’s your dragon saying, Zee?” Ashlynn pulled away to stare into his eyes.
Zee growled at his brothers. “Seriously? You couldn’t give us privacy for this conversation?”
Bowen hooted. “Privacy? In this family? You’re nuts.”
“Zee.” Ashlynn glared at him. Why was he avoiding this question?
Zee looked her in the eyes, settled his hands on her hips and pulled her toward him.
When she stood directly in front of him, hands resting on his chest, he lowered his forehead to hers, stared into her eyes and murmured, “My dragon recognizes you, your phoenix, your flames, as his. He wants you to recognize the same in him.”
Ashlynn gulped. “And what about you, Zee? What do you want?”
Zee growled low in his throat. “I am my dragon. My dragon is me. And we are yours.”
Ashlynn lunged forward and he caught her in his arms, lifted her and kissed her breathless. Her fires rose to the surface of her skin and—
“None of that now!” A hand on her arm yanked her away from Zee.
“Ow!” Liel yelped, shaking out his hand as he leapt away from her.
Zee roared and lunged toward Ashlynn, but his brother Velos slid between them. “Now, Zee, you need to control yourself. There’s nothing left in this room to burn. You guys catch fire now and there’s no way we can contain the damage to just these walls.”
Zee growled. “Move.”
Velos sighed and stepped to the side.
Ashlynn threw out a hand before Zee could grab her again. “He’s right. Let me just find my pouch and we can go. This discussion needs privacy anyway, don’t you think?”
Zee growled, but just said, “Where do you think it is?”
“It was in my backpack, which was on a chair in that corner.” She pointed to the opposite corner from the door.
Liel stalked over to kick through the ashes. A moment later, he leaned over, picked something up from the floor and brought it to her. “This it?”
Ashlynn grabbed the black pouch, unzipped it and peeked inside. Drivers’ license, debit card, cash. “Yes! I’m telling you, this was the best purchase I ever made.” She turned to Zee. “I’m ready when you are.”
He grinned and lunged forward, scooped her up into his arms, turned and bolted for the door.
“Zee! I can walk, you know.”
He grinned down at her. “But this will be faster. Hang on!” And he broke into a run.
“Hey, wait up!”
That sounded like Velos and then came the sound of thundering feet as all of Zee’s brothers gave chase.
“They’ll never catch up,” Zee assured her. “I’m the fastest of the lot.” He barreled around a corner, hit the stairs at a run and raced up them, three steps at a time.
Ashlynn was amazed at his strength and stamina. He wasn’t even winded!
Five minutes later, they were entering a room she’d never seen before. “This isn’t your family’s suite,” she observed.
“Nope. Mia got you your own room. She thought you might appreciate the privacy.” He walked into the living area and plopped down into the large armchair sitting there, settling her onto his lap. “I told her you wouldn’t need privacy from your mate, but she rolled her eyes and said, ‘Yes, but what about privacy from our brothers?’”
Ashlynn laughed at the way he mimicked his sister, raising his voice and speaking in ultra snooty tones. “Mia doesn’t sound like that at all!”
Zee laughed with her. “Okay. You’re right. Anyway, that’s when I decided she was my favorite sibling.” He grinned at Ashlynn. “You don’t want privacy from me, do you?”
Ashlynn shook her head. “Not if you’re really my mate. Are you?”
“I am. Doesn’t your phoenix recognize me?”
Ashlynn shrugged. “Probably. I don’t let her out that often.”
“Why not? That’s not healthy, suppressing your other side.”
“I know, but it’s dangerous. Shifting is dangerous in today’s world and the fire thing. Well, let’s just say I got a reputation for being a fire-bug when I was little. We had to move a lot. Three different fire chiefs told my parents they needed to keep an eye on me or I’d turn into a full-fledged arsonist one day.”
Zee rolled his eyes. “Humans. They just don’t get it. Why weren’t you living in a phoenix community?”
“I don’t know. My mom said there weren’t many left. Phoenixes I mean. And I guess she was right because I’ve been searching for a while and Cassie’s the only one I’ve ever met.”
“Cassie?” Zee exclaimed. “No, that’s not right.”
“What do you mean?”
“Sorry, sweetheart, but Cassie’s not a phoenix.”
“Well, what is she then?”
“She’s a dragon.”
“What? I was sure—”
“Yeah. I was surprised too. We’d been told no dragons lived in the earth realm anymore. Too dangerous.”
“Exactly!” Ashlynn exclaimed. “Well, that just sucks. I guess I really am all alone.”
“You’re not alone, baby. You’ll never be alone again. You have me.” He kissed her, and just like that, all the flames came raging back to the surface. Zee pulled back a little. “Though I’m sorry to say, that also means you have my entire family. Mia’s all right. And Aiden’s awesome. His sisters are a little crazy, but also incredibly cute. The rest of them though. Eh.”
