"Shh, shh!" Dai grabbed her shoulders as her breathing started to go shallow and panicky. "It's all right. I'm here to protect you."
"From dragons?"
"Yes. It's, ah, sort of my specialty."
She stared at him, apparently taking in his uniform. "But you're a firefighter," she said blankly.
"Yes. But I'm also a dragon..."
That monster, she had said.
"...hunter," Dai finished.
It was true. Just not...the whole truth.
"A dragon hunter." Virginia made a choked hiccup of strangled laughter. "I managed to call a firefighter who's also a dragon hunter. Boy, is it my lucky day. Apart from the dragon, of course."
"Well, it wasn't exactly luck," Dai said, rubbing his thumbs over her shoulders soothingly. She was still looking rather wild-eyed, but at least no longer on the verge of a panic attack. "Our dispatchers know to send the, ah, unusual calls to our crew. We're used to handling this sort of thing. I really can protect you from the dragon."
Virginia bit her lip. She seemed to waver for a moment, then shook her head. "This is crazy. Everything is crazy. I don't even know your name."
"Dai. Daifydd Drake." Dai exaggerated the soft th sound of the dd—from her accent, she was American, and they always seemed to have difficulty pronouncing Welsh names.
He stuck out his hand. "East Sussex Fire and Rescue. At your service."
Now, and forever.
Chapter Three
This is crazy.
Of course, compared to all the crazy things that had happened this evening—finding Brithelm's burial mound, the confrontation with Bertram, the motherfucking dragon—inviting a strange man to stay the night seemed positively sensible. Nonetheless, the taxi ride back to her rented apartment was long enough for some of Virginia's shock to wear off, allowing second thoughts to creep in.
Am I being stupid, trusting a man I've only just met?
Virginia knew that she sh
ould have meekly gone to the hospital and let the doctors take care of her. But that would mean delaying investigating her find. Virginia once again touched the thrilling weight of the gold nose-guard safely hidden in her pocket and shook her head. She couldn't afford to wait—and it wasn't just to satisfy her own burning curiosity. She doubted that it was mere coincidence that the dragon had appeared after she'd found the artifact.
Virginia was familiar with many dragon legends from across Europe, and a common factor in them all was the great wyrms' lust for gold. Somehow the beast must have sensed her removing the treasure from its hiding place, and come to retrieve it. But how? Virginia mentally added it to the long list of questions to ask Dai later.
She cast a sideways glance at Dai's profile, half-seen in the dim, strobing glow of the streetlights passing by outside the taxi's window. She hadn't even gotten a good look at his face yet, with all the smoke and confusion at the site of the fire.
I don't know anything about this man. Apart from the fact that he'd pulled her out of a burning building, which anyone would have had to admit was a pretty excellent character recommendation.
However, there was still something about the set of his powerful shoulders that projected an aura of danger. Even his tiniest movements seemed controlled, deliberate, as if he had to keep himself tightly in check at all times. He'd opened the taxi door for her as carefully as if he'd been worried he might absentmindedly tear it off its hinges.
Yet despite all that contained strength, Virginia didn't feel the slightest bit uneasy around him. Sitting next to Dai was like huddling next to a roaring campfire—something fierce and dangerous that nonetheless provided life-giving warmth, and protection against the encircling dark.
Virginia shook her head again, more ruefully. If the paramedic hadn't given me a clean bill of health, I would suspect that I have a concussion.
The taxi slowed to a crawl, pulling into a street of close-packed Victorian townhouses, and stopped outside her building. Dai was out of the car and opening her door even before Virginia had managed to get her seat belt unbuckled.
"I'll pay the driver," he said, in that lilting Welsh accent that seemed incongruously gentle coming from such a big man. Virginia could feel the calluses on his long, strong fingers as he offered her a steadying hand out of the car. "Do you need help up the stairs?"
"I'm fine," Virginia said, though in truth she had to haul herself up the few steps to the front door.
Her legs had definitely had enough tonight, and were threatening to mutiny from her body. She surreptitiously leaned on the wrought-iron banister as she fumbled for her keys, grateful that she had the ground-floor apartment.