Dragons on the Other Hand Read online

  “Was there another reason you came to the library to see me?” he asked, resting his forehead against mine as he attempted to bring his own breathing back under control.

  “Lunch. I’ve... I’ve made lunch,” I managed to get out.

  “Did you put dressing on it?” he asked, nibbling my neck.

  “Yes. Why?” My brain was a little addled, and I couldn’t quite understand his line of questioning.

  “Because it could’ve waited a while had you not.”

  With a grumble, he pushed me reluctantly off his lap and stood. “We have to eat it now. If we get through it fast enough, then maybe I can have my pudding in bed.”

  I laughed. The man was insatiable. And I loved that I could make him that way, although I was not sure I liked being compared with pudding. Squib had once compared me to Yorkshire pudding, a very unfavourable comparison, and though Jake was fast to say he preferred a Yorkshire to French fries, the image of myself as one of those greasy, bulbous lumps stayed in my head.

  We hurried into the kitchen where the meals sat in our usual places, Jake’s serving a good deal bigger than my own.

  As we sat down, the dog flap clunked and the sound of toenails scratching on the tiled floor greeted us. My newest family member, a half-grown mixed-breed pup, rushed in to greet us, closely followed by my smaller pets, a half-feral cat called Percy and a ferret called Fred. Somehow, in a very short time, they’d all become firm friends. Which was odd because, up until then, Percy and Fred had been more adversaries than friends. As a couple, they were the animal version of Daphne and Squib or me and Jake.

  After giving Rex’s ears a stroke, I suddenly became aware of the stench coming off his long, golden fur. I smelled my hands and pulled a face.

  “Ew! What have you been rolling in?!” I exclaimed, wrinkling my nose.

  There was no way I was going to be able to eat the rest of my lunch with dirty hands. Nor did I want to spoil the meal with the smell wafting off the dog. Had I finally uncovered the reason he’d been dumped? Maybe his penchant for rolling in what I assumed was sheep droppings was what had driven his previous owner to oust him. Constantly bathing a dog would get old, fast. At least he’d turned out to be house-trained, which had been my first worry when I came home to find him sitting in the kitchen with a puddle beside him.

  I grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and led him into the mudroom. Picking up what I was about to do, the smaller pets dived into the old crate they used as a cubby house. It had started out as a cage to keep a recovering Percy immobile, but once the lid was off it had turned into a good spot to cosy up. Even Rex Jr liked to squeeze himself into it with the others. I had some really cute pictures of them all scrunched up asleep together. But clearly the camaraderie the pets shared didn’t extend to solidarity when one faced eviction.

  As I closed the kitchen door on the doleful face of the pup, I felt like the worst kind of villain. When he began whining pathetically, I had to grit my teeth to keep from opening the door again.

  “He’ll live. Don’t be such a soft touch,” Jake said with a laugh.

  Nodding unhappily, I went to the kitchen sink to wash my hands. For good measure, I sniffed at the crate where the other two were curled up innocently, trying to convince me they were asleep. There was no bad smell coming off them.

  Returning to the table, I started eating again. But the whimpering and then the heart-felt howl put me off my food.

  Jake finished before I did and took his plate to the sink. “I’ll give him another bath while you eat. Then you can pay me back for my efforts.”

  “Out of my earnings from the sale of my paintings?” I asked sweetly.

  He growled, lowering his eyelids to half-mast in what I called his classic bedroom-eyes move. “No. Services rendered.”

  I fought to keep a smug grin from my face. “You want me to sell my sexual services to you in return for washing my dog?”

  “I’ll make the payment more fun than washing the dog will be for me,” he promised silkily.

  I realised that maybe prostitution wasn’t a good thing to joke about, given how his mother had earned her living.

  “Stop worrying. I’m not offended,” he told me, accurately guessing why I suddenly seemed uncomfortable.

  “Are you a mind-reader?” I challenged, forcing myself back into flirtation mode.

  “More like body-reader. You always show every emotion on your face or in your body language. I’m very good at reading it these days.”

  “After less than two weeks?” I scoffed.

  “After a few days,” came the cocky rejoinder. “You’re an open book to me, my lass.”

  I sauntered over to wrap my arms around his shoulders. “I like being your lass.”

  He lowered his head until my eyes were level with his. “You’ll always be mine, whether I’m with you or not. And I’ll always be yours.”

  The sadness in his voice had tears pricking my eyelids. I hated when he talked about leaving. It was like he was intentionally reminding us both that this short interlude couldn’t last. He had to go back where he belonged. Back to the seedy streets of Leeds, and to the crime-boss who kept him tethered there.

  Once again, I wondered what tied him to Johnno. I could understand Old Jake’s contentment with his job collecting debts, acting as body-guard, and cage fighting, but now I thought New Jake was starting to want something else. Yet he seemed unable to make the break and take what he wanted.

  “Why do you have to go back? Why can’t you stay here with me?” I asked softly.

  He stood up, breaking our connection. “You’ve only known me a few weeks. After a while you’d get sick of me, I promise you. I’m like chocolate cake, too much of it makes you sick.”

  It was the argument I’d used myself, but in reverse. I thought he’d get bored with ordinary old me, after the excitement of his life. People might like to take a breather from their life; it didn’t mean they wanted to stay sidelined forever.

  “What you mean is you’ll get sick of me,” I threw back angrily, pushing away from him so I could put some distance between us.

  It hurt how easily he accepted the need to let me go. Why couldn’t he fight to stay with me?

  Jake moved so fast I barely saw him cross the two steps separating us. He wrapped me up in his arms tightly enough to make me squeak.

  “No! That’s like sayin’ I’d get sick of my heart beatin’ in my chest. Never think me leavin’ is because you aren’t good enough. It’ll never be about that. Never.”

  I tried to let his words soothe me. I could tell he meant every one. Yet if they were true, why was he so determined to leave me? Yes, our relationship was new, but that didn’t mean it didn’t have a right to be explored.

  “Does Johnno have something on you?” I said softly against his chest.

  His body went rigid. “Why can’t you just enjoy what we have? Who knows if we’ll even survive the feckin’ dragon. We both saw what it did to the Watkins’ crew. What it nearly did to you.”

  I nodded. He was right of course. Life after the dragon was just a possibility. Definitely not a probability. I needed to focus on the now and appreciate every moment I had with this incredible man.

  “Then you better go wash the dog while I do the dishes and slip into something more comfortable.”

  It was a joke. The old jeggings and oversized tee-shirt I wore were as comfortable as it got. In fact, I rarely wore anything else. The only thing less comfortable was my bare skin.

  Jake’s face broke from craggy cliff-face into a sunny day. His eyelids lowered once more, and he growled appreciatively.

  “The more comfortable the better,” he rasped seductively just before he claimed my lips again.

  Only the dog’s insistent whining got us to come up for air. Resignedly, Jake headed for the mudroom and the dog shower he was more than likely to get once he’d finished bathing the beastie.

  I hurried to wash up and head upstairs.

  A few minu
tes later, as if on cue, the phone began to ring as I was passing it. Phone calls were never good news. With a heavy sigh, I stopped to pick up the receiver.

  “Ahman Hall,” I answered in my best posh voice.

  “Put Jake Landers on,” came the gruff and abrupt order in a broad northern accent. It was hard to tell exactly where the speaker hailed from on so few words.

  “Whom may I say is calling?” I asked politely.

  “Tell ‘im it’s Johnno,” came the curt reply.

  I almost dropped the receiver. How did Jake’s boss know to call him here? Had Jake told him he was staying with me now? That didn’t seem right.

  Instead of worrying about something I had no possible way of working out on so little information, I hurried back to the kitchen. Jake was just finishing up with the dog. He opened the back door and pushed Rex outside. Quickly, he closed the door after the pup in case he decided to shake before he got to the bottom of the stairs.

  “Jake, Johnno is on the landline,” I told him worriedly.

  The change in his expression was terrifying. His jaw clenched, and his eyes grew hard. Straightening to his full six foot two inches, he strode past me towards the atrium and the phone. I scrambled to keep up with him.

  Standing close so I could hear the other end of the call, I watched Jake’s face. He knew what I was doing, and for a moment I thought he might push me away. Instead, he wrapped an arm around me and pulled me in close.

  “Johhno, what are you doing calling me on this number?” Jake demanded brusquely.

  “You weren’t picking up on your mobile.”

  “The reception up here is bad. What do you want?”

  “Now is that any way to speak to your boss?”

  The voice was jovial and far less broadly accented, but there was a note in it I didn’t like. As if it wasn’t genuine. I could almost imagine the smile that would go with those words. A shark’s smile.

  “What do you want?” Jake repeated through gritted teeth.

  “I need your services. Yesterday. Get yourself back down here, now. I’ve been a patient man, givin’ you plenty of time to sort out whatever’s goin’ on for you. But my patience has run out. If you’re thinkin’ of joinin’ Arthur Watkins crew, think again. The plods are all over him.”

  “Watkins and his organisation are done. I saw to it.”

  There was silence on the other end for several long heartbeats. “Done? You mean dead or in gaol?”

  “Done as in burned to a crisp.”

  “Why would you take on somebody like that? You thinkin’ of startin’ your own crew back in Bradford? Not a good idea.” There was a threat in his voice.

  “I wouldn’t touch his business.”

  “Then what?”

  “He killed me dah and got me mah int’ game. He got what was comin’ to ‘im.” Jake’s voice was so cold I hardly recognised it, and his accent was thick.

  “Fair enough. So if it’s done, come home.”

  “It’s not finished. When it’s done I’ll be back, not before.”

  “Jake, don’t push me. You know I push back,” Johnno warned, his voice icy steel.

  “And you know threats mean nothin’ to me. You want me back, you wait for me to finish here.”

  There was another long pause. “Not good enough.”

  The buzz on the other end told us both the call had ended. Jake placed the receiver down carefully, as if he was afraid if he didn’t his rage would overflow onto it. He might slam it down over and over again until it was nothing more than plastic and metal pieces.

  I cuddled him closer. For the first time, I was starting to see what Jake was up against. This Johnno was a force to be reckoned with, and he wouldn’t let Jake just walk away.

  “Come to bed,” I whispered into his tee-shirt.

  “I need to get back to the book.”

  He tried to peel me off him. I clung.

  “Jake, come to bed. I need you.”

  I had never said that before, and I was so afraid he’d reject me again. It wasn’t even clear in my mind what I was trying to do. Was I using my body to seduce him away from his terrible thoughts, or was I trying to use sex and closeness to drive my own fears away?

  Whatever the real reason, Jake soon gave in. I was starting to believe I had a power over him that was greater than I could have ever credited. With a tired nod, he took my hand and led me up the curved staircase to my room.

  Chapter Three

  Being the instigator of our sexual activities was still new to me. I tended to be more of a submissive than a dominant. I knew those terms from the more titillating romances I’d read. Those same books had given me lots of ideas about what sex might be like. They hadn’t even come close to what being with Jake was like.

  At the side of my bed, I began pulling Jake’s tee-shirt from his jeans. He stared down at me, a look of pleased bemusement on his sexy face. As I dragged the shirt up, I caught a glimpse of his gorgeous six-pack and chest covered by a light sprinkling of crisp curls. Once it was all the way off, I got to see the vast array of tattoos decorating his upper body, from the druid mark on his pectoral to the waterfall of images that covered his shoulders and upper back. I shouldn’t like those marks. They broadcast to the world what he had been: a dangerously bad man. But somehow, I did like them. A lot.

  I kissed my way across his chest, circled one flat nipple with my tongue until he squirmed. Only then did I move my mouth lower. All the while, with shaking fingers, I undid his belt.

  After a few false starts, I got the belt undone and the zipper of his jeans down. His hard erection jutted out to greet me, a sight that was still a little shocking, for all the close contact I’d had with it over the last weeks.

  One thing I hadn’t done, during all that time, was to take him in my mouth. He’d gone down on me often enough, though I’d been shy about him doing so at first, but I’d never gotten around to returning the favour. Which is probably odd, given my submissive role in our partnership.

  I dragged his jeans down to his thighs as Jake pulled my curly mop from its tie. With unsteady fingers, he combed out my brown hair until it fell around my shoulders in a mantle. The smell of the apple shampoo I’d used that morning didn’t cover the tart scent of man. My mouth began to water in an oddly unusual way.

  “You don’t have to do this,” Jake croaked out.

  Looking up, I noted his expression revealed conflict.

  “Don’t you like it?” I asked uncertainly. “Or is it just my lack of skill that worries you. Afraid I might take a chunk out of you by mistake?”

  I kept my tone light and joking, but it had concerned me from the start that I hadn’t done this for him. From all I’d read, men seemed to enjoy it as much, if not more, than actual intercourse.

  Brushing my cheek along the length of him, I felt the heat and silky hardness there. His intake of breath told me he liked it too. So, what was the problem?

  “I do,” he answered scratchily. “I just associate it with... It’s stupid.”

  When he seemed unwilling to explain, I stroked my cheek against him again, letting my loose hair slide over him. The soft moan told me he liked that, too.

  “What’s stupid?” I whispered against the hot skin of his cock.

  “Thinkin’ like that. Seeing this as somethin’ only whores or bad girls do. It’s just how I’d normally start a hook up, you know? Forcing a woman to her knees in front of me, feedin’ her my cock until I was good and turned on.” His admission seemed to embarrass him.

  It embarrassed me a little. But the image of him forcing me to my knees did odd, squirmy things to my insides. I wanted him to feed me his cock.

  Running my fingertips along his hard length and bulbous head, I didn’t think he needed much more turning on. Or maybe being hard wasn’t all there was to being aroused for a man.

  “Are you turned on enough now?” I asked in confusion.

  Jake moaned and laughed. “God, you drive me insane with your innocence, Fire
cracker.”

  I drew away, not sure if I’d been insulted or not. Jake gently brought my head back to his crotch, as if he couldn’t stop himself.

  “I don’t need a blowjob to get me hot for you,” he growled, the confident predator coming out again. “You just have to look at me that way you do, and I’m ready. You make it hard work to last, which was never a problem before. But it’s worth it.”

  Smiling smugly, I glanced up at him. “So, can I do this?”

  He grinned wolfishly down at me as he stroked my hair back from my overheated face. “Lass, have at it. But just let me pull away in a hurry, awright? You’ll need to work up to swallowing. It’s a skill that takes some masterin’, and most women never do.”

  That sounded like wise advice to me. Again, from my reading, I knew swallowing was not always pleasant. The taste was an acquired one, and the force of the cum could make a woman choke if she wasn’t ready for it.

  I nodded, feeling my inexperience yet again. But Jake’s admission that he didn’t need this from me to get aroused, encouraged me.

  Experimentally, I ran my tongue up the outside of his cock, along the ridged vein there. Jake’s fingers tightened in my hair. Taking that as a good sign, I began lapping gently at the point where that vein hit the mushroomed head. A sharp intake of breath had me knowing I was on the right path.

  My fingers began exploring the sacks beneath his cock. They were an oddly vulnerable part of him, when every other part was hard and unyielding. I knew to be careful with them, and I stroked and pulled gently down on the balls as I continued to lick Jake like a lollypop.

  Then licking wasn’t enough. I needed to know what it was like to have him in my mouth. From his size, I knew I wouldn’t be able to take too much of him, but I assumed as long as I managed the head, it would be enough.

  Closing my lips around him was the most outrageous thing I’d ever done. It ramped up my own arousal another couple of notches. I tasted the saltiness of his pre-cum, and I liked it. Experimentally, I began to explore with my tongue. Jake trembled beneath me but kept ramrod still.