Peanut Goes to School (Elder Races #6.7)(5)

Eva put one dark brown hand on her knee in a gentle pat. “Your baby just went off to school. You go right ahead, and cry all you want to, sugar. Today you get a free pass on anything you want.”

Pia nodded, wiped her eyes and stared out the passenger window as Eva drove them back home. The majority of work was finally done on the house, and the focus of construction now centered on the office complex by the lake.

The site where Dragos had been so badly injured last month.

Pia didn’t intentionally set out to avoid the area, but for one reason or another, she never went down there after Dragos’s accident. She kept telling herself that things would be different once the complex was completed. For now, whenever she stepped through the trees and looked at the scene, all she could remember was the horror and terror she felt when she thought Dragos might have died.

After they parked, Eva gave her a tight hug. “Let me know if you want to talk anything over.”

“I will. Thanks.” Returning the hug, she went inside to find Dragos.

He was in his office, sitting at his desk and conducting a meeting via the secure telecom system he’d had installed. After days of fierce concentration as he had tried to think of what the other Dragos—the Dragos before his accident—would have done, he had finally managed to recreate the password on his computer. As she heard the voices, she recognized two of his sentinels, Graydon and Constantine.

That was how he approached anything to do with his injury and subsequent memory loss. He treated it like a battle and brought all of his formidable attention and tactical skills to the field with the intent to win. Pia found it both exhilarating and exhausting to watch.

Reluctant to interrupt, she hovered in the doorway, but as soon as he caught sight of her, Dragos said to his screen, “We’ll have to talk more later. I’ve got to go now.”

“Sure thing.” Constantine’s voice sounded clearly over the speakers.

Graydon said, “Text me when you’re ready to pick this up again.”

Then Dragos strode around the corner of his desk, wearing a look of concern on his hard features. He frowned. “You’ve been crying.”

She gave him a twisted smile. “Yeah, I got emotional after I watched Liam go into the building. He didn’t want me to come with him, and he ran in without a backward glance, and I was so glad that he was strong and secure enough to do that. . . . Then I cried like a baby all the way home.”

He pulled her into his arms, and she went gladly, soaking in the feeling of his fierce energy as it wrapped around her protectively.

She found her favorite spot, the slight hollow of breastbone in the middle of his chest where she could rest her cheek. They stood like that for moment and then she said, “I don’t want to be a helicopter parent, but you know, if he keeps growing like this, he’s going to be . . . What, like a twenty-eight-year-old when he’s actually two? That bends my head, and it makes me worry.”

She felt Dragos shaking his head. “Tough as it is to adjust your thinking, we’re never going to be able to judge him by normal standards. He’s too much of a prodigy.”

“I know, but my own past was so human, I don’t understand how he knows the things he knows.”

His fingers threaded through her hair. “The first-generation of the Elder Races were all fully formed when they came into being at the birth of the world. Magic has long since settled into balance, but in the beginning, it was nowhere near as defined. It ran hot and wild, and crazy things happened. It’s possible the only reason Liam is having any kind of childhood experience at all is because he was conceived, and he didn’t form spontaneously as the first generation did.”

She thought back to her shock when she first found out she was pregnant. She muttered, “His conception seemed kind of spontaneous to me.”

She could hear the smile in Dragos’s voice as he continued, “He’s also the product of two very rare and magical parents, and the combined Power he has inherited from each of us is quite unique. If he had been conceived at the beginning of the world, he might have sprung into existence fully formed too. As it is, he has to contend with the laws of nature as they are now.”

As she listened to him, she calmed. He was always so much warmer than her. She reveled in his body warmth, in the hard strength of his arms resting around her, in all the sensual evidence of his presence. “I love listening to stories about how things were in the beginning. It sounds fascinating.”

“It was a dangerous and unpredictable time,” he told her. “And, yes, it was fascinating too.” He rested his cheek on top of her head. “At any rate, all this talk about Liam is pure speculation, as we have virtually nothing else to compare him to.”

“We’ll just have to accept whatever the future brings us, and it’s okay,” she murmured. “I’ll adjust. The main thing is that he’s healthy and happy.” Tilting back her head, she gave him a wry smile. “One thing’s for sure—it’s never dull around here, is it?”

His sexy mouth widened. “No, it never is.”

“Anyway, I’m sorry I interrupted your meeting.”

He cupped the back of her head in one big hand. “You should always interrupt me. If I’m in the middle of something urgent that can’t be put on hold, I’ll let you know.”

Her gaze slid over to one corner of his office. Crates and stacks of books dominated that area of the room. The large round conference table was piled high with even more books, and there were more crates waiting his attention in the library.