Page 32 of Kiss of Fury

“When is Mom coming home?”

“I don’t know. A lot of patients need help. She could be very late.” He hoped not. He missed her, too.

“You’ll have to tell me a story, then,” Brody said.

He chuckled. “I do, do I?”

The kid waited.

“All right. Let’s go.”

After he was tucked in, Fury asked, “What kind of story do you want?”

“A good one. About dragons.”

“Dragons, huh?” He stalled, dimming the lights in hopes Brody would get sleepy. He didn’t know any bedtime stories except for the ones he’d overheard Verity tell him.

He perched on the edge of the bed. Brody gazed up at him, his attention rapt.

“Once upon a time…a…dragonslayer, a fierce and furious dragonslayer was born. He was an expert at slaying dragons. He didn’t look like a dragonslayer, you see. He looked like an ordinary person. He could sneak up on them, and the dragons never suspected until it was too late.”

“Why did he want to kill the dragons?”

“Because the king ordered him to. The king feared the dangerous dragons would blow fire and burn downthe palace, and then the king wouldn’t be king anymore.

“But the dragonslayer started to wonder. Wereallthe dragons bad? What if some were good dragons? Sometimes he doubted the king was being honest. As his doubts grew, he didn’t want to killanydragons anymore. But he owed his fealty to the king; he had to do what the monarch said. Then, one day, when a chance presented itself, he escaped. But he got captured. The furious king ordered the dragonslayer be put to death.

“The king’s men put the dragonslayer on a spaceship to be jettisoned onto a fiery planet where he would be incinerated, but he escaped again. This time, he stole a small spaceship and flew to a planet far, far away where the king could never reach him.

“On this faraway planet, he met a beautiful red-haired princess with a young princeling, and he fell madly in love with both of them.”

“And they lived happily ever after,” Brody said.

“The dragonslayer hoped so.”

“Tell me another story!”

“Another time. Go to sleep.” He patted his shoulder, handed him the alien doll he slept with, doused the light, and tiptoed to the door.

“Mike?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re not mad at me anymore, are you?”

“Mad?” Fury turned. “I’m not mad. Why would you think that?”

“The night Mom and I came, when I wanted a story, you said the little boy who wouldn’t go to sleep made the adults angry.”

Jesus.“No.” He strode to the bed. “I’m not angry. I promise. I never should have said that. I’m sorry.”

“Okay.” He smiled.

Fury leaned over and kissed him on the forehead. “Everything is good.”I have to watch what I say.He tiptoed toward the door again.

“Mike?”

“Yeah?”

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