Page 30 of Dragon Slayer

Kate waved her off as she stepped inside, juggling the handles of the three rolling cases expertly. “No, no, I’ve got them.”

Mia closed the door, locked it, and reached for one of the suitcases – which her mother promptly pulled out of her reach. She didn’t want Mia exerting herself, not even wheeling a bag across the floor. It stung more than it should have, her pride getting the best of her.

“I can still do normal things, Mom.” Except for drive. Or ride unsupervised. Or leave the house without texting someone before and after. Fuck. She was an invalid.

“I know sweetie, I know,” Kate hummed. “Where am I sleeping, on the foldout?”

~*~

Mia hadn’t spent this much time with her mother in years. Kate had always been the best kind of sick-patient parent: always trying to find normal, distracting things to do, not hovering or making her feel like she was made of glass. They played countless games of doubles solitaire at the kitchen table sipping wine; watched all their old favorite rom-coms; went for long walks on the nature trail that started just at the edge of the apartment complex’s property, enjoying the first cool touch of fall on sunkissed summer skin. Mia hadn’t realized just how much she missed her mom until now.

But Kate being around all the time meant that Val couldn’t be, and that…bothered her more than it probably should have. She debated telling her mother about her spectral visitor, but ultimately decided “Mom, I’m in love with a vampire who can only visit me mentally” wasn’t the best way to prove that her tumor was under control.

Val had other ideas, though.

“I’m very charming, though,” he said, pacing back and forth across the living room rug one afternoon while Kate was at the grocery store. He wore the velvet today, sable cloak – she’d asked, and he’d said it was real sable, inspired by his adventures in Russian dream-walking – flung out behind him with one long arm so that it rippled around his calves in dramatic fashion. He turned to her, posed with his shoulders and hips cocked, head tipped to the side, grinned toothily and winked at her.

“Hmm, yes, very charming,” she deadpanned.

He huffed. “Very. Women love me. Men, too. Who wouldn’t?” He tossed his hair, and she couldn’t hide her laugh anymore.

He smiled in response, a smile that started cutting and wicked and all playboy…and melted into something soft and true.

It warmed her. “You know I would love to introduce you to Mom. But, um, I think she might…”

“Run screaming?” he suggested.

“Probably, yeah.”

He sighed and threw himself at the counter, sprawling all the way across it like he’d swooned. “Always so terrifying,” he said with mock anguish. He cracked an eye and looked up at her through a screen of hair. His tone changed, became serious. “You’renot terrified of me, are you?”

“No. Why would I be?”

“Hmm, no. Of course you wouldn’t be.” Another tone shift. Now he sounded airy, dismissive. Like a prince. A shield, she thought. Or a disguise. “I’m not here after all, am I? So I can’t very well…” He opened his mouth, and as she watched, his fangs seemed to elongate, descending so that they were unmistakable.

She thought she understood, then. “I’m not afraid of you because – and don’t take this the wrong way – you’re not scary. I trust you, whether or not I can actually touch you.”

His mouth closed slowly, and he pushed up so he was propped on his elbows, expression morphing into one of wonder. “Do you mean that?” he asked, a little breathless.

“Yes.”

He smiled, small and pleased, and his cheeks turned a delicate pink. “Oh. Well. That’s…” He cleared his throat. “Say, did I ever tell you about the Scottish laird who thought I was a woman?” He gave her the cheeky, salacious grin again, and that was fine, because she’d seen the real one.

~*~

Val liked to talk. He seemed to like the sound of his own voice – and why not, it was a lovely voice – and he enjoyed telling stories. In their stolen moments, when Kate was out, or even, sometimes, when Kate was asleep and Mia couldn’t seem to keep her eyes closed, they sat up against her headboard and whispered back and forth. Val told piecemeal stories from his childhood and his captivity. He bragged, and he ragged on his brother, and he never said anything too deep, too personal, too painful.

But Mia was beginning to form a picture in her mind gathered from the scraps, filling in the blank places with all the things hedidn’tsay. And she was starting to think that something far more terrible than simple imprisonment had happened to him.

It started to bother her, like a sore tooth, or a hangnail; a small, but tender kind of pain that nagged and nagged.

During one of their late-night chats, she turned to him, fixed him with a serious look, and Val cut off mid-sentence. “Hey,” she said, wishing she could lay her hand over his in reassurance. He looked startled. “You know that if there was ever anything…anything really bothering you” – shit, she was so lame, saying this all wrong, but pressed on – “that you could tell me about it, right? You can tell me anything.”

He stared at her a moment, gaze tracking over her face, searching. Then glanced away. Swallowed. “Yes, I know.”

“And I really do mean anything. If…if there’s anything you think talking about would help with.”

“Yes,” he said again, faraway now. Drawing into himself.

---