Light Dragons 01 - Love in the Time of Dragons

again,” Isleif commented as they headed off. “The ninjas in the movie had special armor. We will need the same.”
    “Aye.” Eirik’s voice drifted back to me. “We will find the local ninja store, and use the weasel gold to buy everything they have. . . .”
    “Heaven help the local shops,” I murmured before taking a deep breath and tapping at the door. I waited a moment, but heard nothing, opening it just a smidgen, enough to poke my head in to see if Imogen was up. The long living area was devoid of anyone. Perhaps she and her Gunter were out getting morning coffee and breakfast.
    “Best thing is to just wait for her,” I said, ignoring the fact that my stomach did a few excited back flips as I entered the trailer. “Ben is not here, stomach, and Imogen has a boyfriend. Stop being so excited. Ben won’t be up and about until it’s dark.”
    Unless, of course, Imogen’s boyfriend wasn’t staying with her. Which meant . . . I glanced down the narrow passage to the door that marked Imogen’s bedroom. It was quiet, very quiet—the sound of quiet that comes when no one else is around. Perhaps, I decided, I should just double- check to make sure no one was in Imogen’s bedroom. Just a quick peek to ease my mind and calm my unduly excited stomach.
    I opened the door the bare minimum amount needed to slid through so no sunlight could sneak in and harm any vampires who might be sleeping therein.
    The room was dark and warm. A muffled grunt came from the bed.
    “Ben?” My heart beat wildly, and my stomach did flip-flops. It was him! He was right there in front of me. I should leave. I should run away as fast as I could. I should put him from my mind and heart.
    I groped my way along the bed to sit on one end of it, pulling off both sets of gloves before reaching out to find him. My hand touched bare flesh.
    A light clicked on at the exact moment that I realized the man wasn’t Ben. I snatched back my hand as two surprised hazel eyes met mine. “Was ist es?”
    “Er . . . hi. You’re not Ben.”
    The man pulled the blanket up over his naked chest. “Who?”
    “Ben. Benedikt. Are you Gunter, by any chance?” I asked, hastily getting off the bed and backing toward the door, my face redder than a baboon’s butt.
    “ Ja. You are Imogen friend?”
    “Yes, I’m Fran. I’m sorry to disturb you. I thought you would be out with Imogen. And then I thought you were Ben, but clearly you’re not. Where is she?”
    “He?”
    “No, she, not he. You know, the word ‘she.’ She is female; he is male.”
    He blinked at me. “In trailer,” he said, waving a hand toward the window. “Tattoo trailer.”
    “Oh. OK. Thanks. Sorry again about waking you up. Nice meeting you.” I slipped out of the room, closing the door behind me, leaning against it for a moment while I covered my burning cheeks with my hands. “Just when I think you can’t be a bigger idiot, you top yourself. Nice job, Fran.”
    I all but ran down the line of trailers until I reached one with familiar artwork. I’d never had much to do with Gavon, who did tattoos and custom piercings at the Faire, mostly because he struck me as somewhat creepy, but I had a faint memory of Imogen being friends with him.
    I knocked on the door, mentally writing an apology to Imogen for barging in on her boyfriend when the door opened. A woman stood in the doorway. I stared at her bare legs, stared at her thigh- length silk robe, stared at a pretty face topped with a cloud of soft, curly brown hair. This was not Imogen.
    “Yes?”
    I gawked at her for a minute. I’d always thought Gavon was gay. . . . Maybe I’d been wrong, and this was his girlfriend? “Is Imogen here?”
    “Imogen? No. Her brother is.” She continued to stand there, looking me over with narrowed blue eyes. I suddenly felt every inch my six-foot, built-like-a-linebacker self, not to mention the wrinkled T-shirt and pair of jeans I wore.
    “Ben’s . . . here?” My stomach turned a complete somersault. I groaned to myself. Somehow in the conversation with Gunter, we crossed our lines regarding pronouns. “Right here?”
    “Yes. You wish to see him?”
    No. I absolutely did not want to see him. I had not gone through the hell of the last year for nothing. I had made a decision, and I was going to stand by it.
    “Yes, please,” I heard someone say, and realized with horror that it was me.
    “He was sleeping when I left him,” she said in a voice with a faintly French accent.