Last Immortal Dragon (Gray Back Bears #6)(9)

Clara’s eyes flew wide, and she shook her head. “I think that’s a bad idea.”

“Agreed, it’s a great idea.” Willa lifted the phone to her ear. Shhh, she mouthed, flapping her hand to quiet everyone down. “What do they say about atoms?” She waited with a vacant grin on her face. “Never trust ’em. They make up everything!”

“Dork jokes?” Matt scoffed, snatching the phone. “Let a pro handle this. Hey, Damon, is your refrigerator running?” Matt grinned at Clara across the fire. “Well, you better go catch it!”

The Gray Backs and Mason all groaned in unison. Willa jerked the phone away from her mate and back to her ear. “Hey, Damon, you’re Womb for Hire is down in the Grayland Mobile Park getting sloshed. Better come get her before she makes horrible life decisions.” Willa hung up the phone, and the firelight reflected off her grin.

“I’ve had one beer,” Clara argued as her cheeks flushed with heat. “And a little bit of vodka, but I’m not making any horrible life decisions tonight or any other night.” He wouldn’t come down from his house for her. It was late at night, and Damon didn’t give two craps about her. Womb for Hire was right. She was nothing more to the man.

Clara looked over at baby Rowan, still asleep in her mother’s arms beside her, but couldn’t bear it for long so she ripped her gaze away and picked at the edge of the label on her beer.

“Do you want to hold her?” Gia asked.

“Really?” Clara asked, trying to stifle the hope in her voice.

“Yeah.” Gia stood from her neon green plastic chair and settled Rowan in Clara’s arms.

“Ooooh,” Clara said on a breath as she moved the corner of the baby blanket away from Rowan’s face. “She’s precious.”

“You know,” Creed said thoughtfully, “if you’re wanting a baby, you could do much worse than Damon as your child’s father. You and your baby would never want for anything.”

“And he would be the safest kid on the planet,” Matt chimed in. “Bullies at school? Daddy Damon would swoop down and eat—”

Willa nudged him hard.

“Eat what?” Clara asked, searching their faces one by one. They’d all gone comically blank, even Mason’s. “Eat what?” she repeated, louder.

Beaston met her eye. “Damon protects the Gray Backs and the Boarlanders. Damon protects the Ashe Crew. Even C-team, he gobbles up our enemies.” Beaston relaxed into his chair, slipping his arm easily over Aviana’s shoulders beside him. With a predatory smile, he murmured, “Chomp.”

Clara sighed, utterly disturbed. “Fantastic. And if I could get over all the fire-breathing, people-eating, romancelessness of all of this, I can’t even imagine what having an actual dragon baby would be like. Or egg? Do dragons hatch from eggs?”

Gia giggled and shook her head. “Your child would be a hybrid and mortal, so no hatching from an egg. If you want to imagine what a dragon shifter child looks like, look down. You’re holding one.”

Clara’s face went slack in surprise, and she jerked her gaze down to tiny Rowan in her arms.

“Someday,” Beaston said, “our Rowan is going to be a fierce Gray Back. Silver scales and fire. Good to her bones because her parents are good to their bones. You would be lucky to mother a dragon.”

“But honestly,” Creed said, his dark eyebrows arched high, “you’ll probably have a bear cub. Baby dragons are rare. Damon probably has your odds written out in your paperwork.”

Mason shook his head and warned Creed with his eyes.

“My paperwork?”

“The…file he has on…you?”

“Shut. Up,” Mason muttered out the side of his mouth.

“No matter,” Clara gritted out, choking the neck of her beer bottle. She would not let this ruin the otherwise enjoyable night. Nor would she imagine what kind of dirt they’d dug up for that file because she would not be here to—

Whoosh!

Something enormous flew overhead, pushing the air down until the trees around the trailer park bent and cracked. The fire blew out, and Clara huddled her body over Rowan’s to protect her as the others scrambled around her. For an instant, it felt like a hurricane, and then the pressure was gone. Rowan fussed in her arms, so Clara handed the baby back to Gia.

“What the hell was that?” she asked, searching the woods for danger as her instincts kicked up to survival mode. The fine hairs on her body were electrified.

“That would be your beau coming to protect you from those horrible life decisions,” Willa said.

Matt and Jason rushed to re-light the fire while Creed righted a pair of toppled lawn chairs. And by the time the glow of the firelight was illuminating the trailer park once again, Damon himself stepped from the woods wearing dark dress pants. He was still fastening up the top few buttons of his white oxford shirt.

“Wait, did you bring a change of clothes for your Shift?” Jason asked. “Like, you carried a suit in your gigantic claws and flew through the air with it?”

“Don’t make it weird.” Damon lifted his churning, silver gaze to Clara. She could’ve sworn she saw worry in his features, but it couldn’t be because he still wore his mask of indifference. But… he did look different somehow.