Page 2 of Accidentally a Dragon Daddy

Hating myself for it, I reached forward and clamped a hand over Lizzie’s mouth. “If you’re quiet, you’ll get some cake when we reach where we’re going. Okay?”

Lizzie frowned at me, her little brown eyebrows lowering as she scrunched up her face, her hazel eyes full of suspicion.

“I promise,” I whispered, my voice barely audible. “Whatever flavor you want, okay? But you can’t say any words at all. No noise.”

The child contemplated my offer for a few more seconds, then nodded. As I started to relax, there was a loud whooshing as something flew by overhead.

My hand clamped down over Lizzie’s mouth as the child inhaled in startlement and opened her mouth to ask a question. I shook my head at her warningly, holding one finger of my other hand to my own mouth. If she spoke now, we were all dead. The dragon would incinerate us with a single breath.

We waited in silence as seconds turned to minutes. Was the dragon out there, perched on a building, waiting, toying with us to make it seem safe? Or had it truly moved on, content to terrorize and nothing more? There was no way it hadn’t seen us.

Cautiously, I handed Lizzie to her mother, who immediately clamped a hand over the little girl’s mouth before she could speak and give us away. Fear for her children filled her eyes, but she nodded at me as I mimed I was going to take a look.

Closing my eyes, I licked my lips and took a deep breath, trying to steady myself. This wasn’t the first time I’d run the gauntlet of the border. We were less than a mile away from safety. An entire armored division waited nearby, tasked with keeping the dragons bottled up inside New York and Newark.

Not that they’d do any good if the dragons pushed west instead of south toward Philly.

But that was a different worry. For a different day.

Peeking my head out of the forest green armored vehicle, I slowly looked around, inspecting rooftops and the gaping holes in the buildings for any sign of movement or scales.

I couldn’t see anything.

“It’s gone,” I whispered, motioning for the mother to come forth.

Reluctantly, she edged toward the hatch, passing Lizzie off to me. I lifted the girl into my arms, and then, with a nod at her mother, we were off again. Building to building. Ignoring the devastation around us. None of it mattered now. All that mattered was getting to the border. My focus was split between my feet and the sky, my neck constantly twisting this way and that to ensure we weren’t snuck up on.

“Mommy, look!” Lizzie cried, that time pointing straight ahead.

I breathed a sigh of relief as a group of soldiers poured out of an abandoned storefront, waving frantically at us. Behind them, tanks drove forward, their long barrels raised toward the sky.

None of them, however, crossed the cleared line on the road. That was the “border,” such as it was. Undefined by either side. However, the dragons had yet to push past it, content to let the Army sit on the other side and build up its defenses. We just had to make it past the open area.

“One last push,” I told the mother. “We can do it, come on. No slowing now.”

We ran for it.

Chapter Two

Elanya

“Bye!” I said with as much energy as I could muster, waving at Lizzie as she followed her mother as they were escorted by a pair of uniformed soldiers.

“That was awfully brave of you.”

I glanced at the speaker to see a short, muscular soldier with a huge barrel chest. “Thanks.”

“You Spec-For or something?” he asked, looking me up and down. “You don’t look like it.”

“Blue Star,” I said, flattered he thought I could be a special forces operator even for a second, even if a closer inspection showed I was too short and lacked the muscle to be a soldier.

His eyebrows rose as he fell in step next to me. “What’s an emergency relief folk like you doing sneaking people across the lines?”

“Being an idiot,” another voice said.

I rolled my eyes at the speaker, a tall, thin man with a receding hairline and no shame about covering it up. “Thanks, Rob. Your support is welcome, as always.”

The soldier looked between us.

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