Firefighter Dragon: BBW Dragon Shifter Paranormal Romance (3 page)

"And it's a neeeew woooorld record!" Chase announced to the world in general, raising his clasped hands above his head as if posing on a podium.

"Out of the way, featherhead," John rumbled as he squeezed his seven-foot bulk out of the rear seats with some difficulty. He crossed the distance to Dai in two long strides, holding out his enormous hands. "Are you hurt, kin-cousin? Shall I take her?"

"I'm fine," Dai replied, reflexively holding the woman closer as his inner dragon snarled at the thought of someone taking her away from him. "I'll look after her. Where's Hugh?"

"Setting up on the other side," said Fire Commander Ash, jumping lithely down from the fire engine. "He's not geared up, so I want him to stay back."

The Fire Commander's dark, calm eyes swept the scene, taking in every detail at a glance. "Daifydd, get the casualty to Hugh. Chase, stay on the radio, warn us when the police are about to arrive. John, let's take advantage of our lack of mundane onlookers. I'll contain the fire. Can you call the rain?"

The other shifter nodded, the charms woven into his long blue braids clinking. "The clouds are melancholy tonight. I shall sing their tears down."

"Good. Let's get to it, then, gentlemen." Turning to face the burning ruins of the barn, Ash flung his arms wide as if to embrace the fire. It leaped unnaturally in response, stretching out to the Fire Commander as if straining to reach a long-lost lover.

Ash slowly brought his hands together, and the fire grudgingly concentrated itself into a white-hot circle. John tilted his head back, beginning a droning hum in his own language as Ash chivvied stray flames back into the herd.

Dai was happy to leave them to it. His own talents lent themselves more to the "Rescue" side of the work, and it always made him feel inappropriately morose to have to put out a perfectly good fire.

"Hugh!" he called, striding round the truck. "I have a casualty for you!"

"Put her down here." Hugh's distinctive silver hair gleamed in contrast to the red fire engine behind him. He'd already unrolled a blanket and opened up a first aid kit.

Dai carefully lowered her down to the ground and stepped back to give Hugh access to the patient, though his inner dragon growled at having to move even an inch from his mate. He forced down the dragon's possessive instinct as Hugh crouched next to the woman, his intense blue eyes narrowed in assessment.

"Hello," Hugh said to the woman. "I'm a paramedic. Can I help you?" His clipped, upper-class English accent made it sound like he was merely making polite conversation, but Dai knew he was assessing the woman's ability to respond.

"Throat," rasped the woman. "Hurts."

A tiny crease appeared in Hugh's forehead at her tone, and Dai's heart missed a beat. His dragon rose up, desperate to fight whatever threatened his mate.

She's in good hands
, he told his inner dragon as Hugh tugged off one of his disposable plastic gloves with a smooth, practiced motion.

Hugh touched the woman's neck lightly. As his bare skin brushed hers, she winced—and so did Hugh. His mouth twisted in a distinct grimace of pain as he slowly slid his hand down from jaw to collarbone. After a moment, he drew back his hand, flexing his fingers as if shaking out pins and needles.

"Can you tell me your name?" he asked the woman.

"Virginia." She looked startled at her own voice, which was much clearer than before. She drew in a deep breath. "Virginia Jones. Wow, that feels better." She rubbed her own throat, staring at the paramedic in wonder. "How on earth did you do that?"

"Mild irritation from smoke often clears up quickly," Hugh said, his curt tone dissuading any further inquiry. He snapped his glove back on before taking her pulse, expression back to his customary reserve. "Can you tell me what happened, Virginia?"

"Uh." Virginia's brown eyes went from Hugh to Dai and back again. "It's all a bit...confused."

"He knows about dragons too," Dai said. "He won't think that you're crazy."

Virginia let out a brief bark of half-hysterical laughter. "
I
think I'm crazy." She wrapped her arms around her knees, hugging them to her chest. "That monster...it can't have been real.
Dragons
aren't real!"

"Alas, if only that were true." Hugh murmured as he checked her for any further injuries. Catching Dai's dirty look, he added, "You can't deny we'd all be a lot less busy." He sat back on his heels. "Virginia, you don't have any burns, and you don't have a concussion. However, you've gone through a lot of trauma tonight. For safety, I would like to call an ambulance to take you into hospital for observation and any further treatment."

Virginia's hand suddenly flew to her coat pocket, gripping something through the fabric. "No. I want to go home. I feel fine. Can I just go home?"

Hugh sighed. "One day, one of my patients will actually
want
to go to the marvelous temple of modern medicine. Yes, you can go home,
if
," he raised one long finger forbiddingly, "you can call someone to both take you there and take care of you tonight."

Virginia's face fell. "Oh." She rubbed her forehead. "I'll...think of someone."

*Can you give us a minute?*
Dai sent to Hugh.

The paramedic's pale eyebrows rose, but he got to his feet. "I'll go report to Commander Ash. Let me know when you decide what to do." Flashing Dai a curious glance, he left.

"Please, allow me to watch over you tonight," Dai said to Virginia, as casually as he could with his inner dragon roaring in eagerness. "It's not safe for you to be alone, and not just for medical reasons. The dragon threatened to return."

That bothered him. If she'd never seen a dragon before—and clearly she hadn't—how could she have taken something from one's hoard? Had the other dragon been lying? He pushed the thought away; there were much more important matters to deal with now.

Virginia's eyes widened. "It—what?"

"Shh, shh!" Dai grabbed her shoulders as her breathing started to go shallow and panicky. "It's all right. I'm here to protect you."

"From
dragons
?"

"Yes. It's, ah, sort of my specialty."

She stared at him, apparently taking in his uniform. "But you're a firefighter," she said blankly.

"Yes. But I'm also a dragon..."

That monster
, she had said.

"...hunter," Dai finished.

It
was
true. Just not...the whole truth.

"A dragon hunter." Virginia made a choked hiccup of strangled laughter. "I managed to call a firefighter who's also a dragon hunter. Boy, is it my lucky day. Apart from the dragon, of course."

"Well, it wasn't exactly luck," Dai said, rubbing his thumbs over her shoulders soothingly. She was still looking rather wild-eyed, but at least no longer on the verge of a panic attack. "Our dispatchers know to send the, ah, unusual calls to our crew. We're used to handling this sort of thing. I really can protect you from the dragon."

Virginia bit her lip. She seemed to waver for a moment, then shook her head. "This is crazy. Everything is crazy. I don't even know your name."

"Dai. Daifydd Drake." Dai exaggerated the soft
th
sound of the
dd
—from her accent, she was American, and they always seemed to have difficulty pronouncing Welsh names.

He stuck out his hand. "East Sussex Fire and Rescue. At your service."

Now, and forever
.

––––––––

T
his is crazy
.

Of course, compared to all the crazy things that had happened this evening—finding Brithelm's burial mound, the confrontation with Bertram, the
motherfucking dragon—
inviting a strange man to stay the night seemed positively sensible. Nonetheless, the taxi ride back to her rented apartment was long enough for some of Virginia's shock to wear off, allowing second thoughts to creep in.

Am I being stupid, trusting a man I've only just met?

Virginia knew that she should have meekly gone to the hospital and let the doctors take care of her. But that would mean delaying investigating her find. Virginia once again touched the thrilling weight of the gold nose-guard safely hidden in her pocket and shook her head. She couldn't afford to wait—and it wasn't just to satisfy her own burning curiosity. She doubted that it was mere coincidence that the dragon had appeared after she'd found the artifact.

Virginia was familiar with many dragon legends from across Europe, and a common factor in them all was the great wyrms' lust for gold. Somehow the beast must have sensed her removing the treasure from its hiding place, and come to retrieve it. But how? Virginia mentally added it to the long list of questions to ask Dai later.

She cast a sideways glance at Dai's profile, half-seen in the dim, strobing glow of the streetlights passing by outside the taxi's window. She hadn't even gotten a good look at his face yet, with all the smoke and confusion at the site of the fire.

I don't know anything about this man.
Apart from the fact that he'd pulled her out of a burning building, which anyone would have had to admit was a pretty excellent character recommendation.

However, there was still something about the set of his powerful shoulders that projected an aura of danger. Even his tiniest movements seemed controlled, deliberate, as if he had to keep himself tightly in check at all times. He'd opened the taxi door for her as carefully as if he'd been worried he might absentmindedly tear it off its hinges.

Yet despite all that contained strength, Virginia didn't feel the slightest bit uneasy around him. Sitting next to Dai was like huddling next to a roaring campfire—something fierce and dangerous that nonetheless provided life-giving warmth, and protection against the encircling dark.

Virginia shook her head again, more ruefully.
If the paramedic hadn't given me a clean bill of health, I would suspect that I have a concussion
.

The taxi slowed to a crawl, pulling into a street of close-packed Victorian townhouses, and stopped outside her building. Dai was out of the car and opening her door even before Virginia had managed to get her seat belt unbuckled.

"I'll pay the driver," he said, in that lilting Welsh accent that seemed incongruously gentle coming from such a big man. Virginia could feel the calluses on his long, strong fingers as he offered her a steadying hand out of the car. "Do you need help up the stairs?"

"I'm fine," Virginia said, though in truth she had to haul herself up the few steps to the front door.

Her legs had definitely had enough tonight, and were threatening to mutiny from her body. She surreptitiously leaned on the wrought-iron banister as she fumbled for her keys, grateful that she had the ground-floor apartment.

She let herself into the high-ceilinged lounge, and some of the lingering tightness in her chest eased. Even though it was only a temporary rental rather than a home, it was comforting to be in a space of her own. The research papers scattered over the worn sofa were just as she'd left them this morning, back when the world had been a rational place. It felt like an aeon ago now.

Virginia took the nose-guard out of her pocket, eager to see it in decent light. For the second time that evening, she found herself unable to breathe. It made every piece of Saxon gold work she'd ever seen before—even the famous Sutton Hoo helmet—look like cheap costume jewelry.

Down the length of the nose-guard, the thick gold was chased with exquisitely carved spiraling dragons, writhing round small cabochon rubies. A much larger cabochon ruby took pride of place at the top of the piece, which would have placed it centrally on the forehead of the warrior wearing the helmet. The ruby seemed to glow through the dirt veiling it, a rich blood-red with a dazzling six-pointed star captured within its depths.

Virginia bit her lip, glancing out the bay window. The taxi was just pulling away, which meant that Dai would be entering the apartment at any moment. Where he would find her standing with a king's ransom in the palm of her hand...

And I really don't know anything about this guy
.

Even if Dai wasn't the sort to be personally tempted by a hunk of solid gold set with precious gems, there was still the fact that he worked in emergency services, alongside the police. Who would already want to be asking searching questions about how the fire started, and why she'd been up on the Downs in the middle of the night in the first place.

If Dai found out about the artifact, he'd probably feel obliged to inform the police, and then they'd find out that she'd been illegally metal-detecting without the permission of the landowner. In the best case, they'd confiscate the artifact, and she'd lose all chance to work on the find.

In the worst case, it would end up in Bertram's hands.

Best if Dai just doesn't find out about this.

Cradling the treasure, Virginia glanced around. Her tools and specimen boxes were set out on the small dining table, where she'd been working on some coins and minor finds from other sites, but that that didn't feel like a safe enough hiding place.

Hearing boots coming down the hall, she dashed into her bedroom and yanked open the drawer of her bedside cabinet. She tucked the nose-guard carefully out of sight behind a packet of tissues, a tube of hand cream, and a box of aspirin. As an extra deterrent to casual snooping, she made sure her favorite vibrator was right at the front.

There. That ought to do it
. 

"Virginia?" Dai called from the lounge. Virginia heard him shut the door behind himself. "Are you all right?"

"Be out in a sec!" Virginia called back.

She tiptoed into the en suite bathroom and flushed the toilet, just in case he was wondering at her absence. Catching sight of herself in the mirror, she wrinkled her nose at her charred hair and soot-smeared face. Shower battled sleep on her list of priorities...but neither was as important as finally getting some answers. She pulled off her ruined coat, dropping it in a corner as she left the bedroom.