Sassy Ever After: Her Warrior Dragon (Kindle Worlds Novella) Read online

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  This work was made possible by a special license through the Kindle Worlds publishing program and has not necessarily been reviewed by LATIN GODDESS PRESS INC.. All characters, scenes, events, plots and related elements appearing in the original Sassy Ever After remain the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of LATIN GODDESS PRESS INC., or their affiliates or licensors.

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  Her Warrior Dragon

  Ariel Marie

  WARNING: Due to the explicit language and graphic sexual scenes, this book is intended for mature (18 years +) readers only. If things of this nature offend you, this book would not be for you. If you like a good action story with hot steamy scenes with dragon shifters, then you have chosen wisely…

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Ariel Marie

  1

  He closed his eyes briefly as he glided higher into the sky. His massive wingspan allowed him to pierce through the dense clouds as his elevation increased. Vander blew out a snort, as his dragon was in full-blown battle mode, ready for combat. He loved the exhilarating feeling of gliding through the air, allowing his dragon to be in control. But, tonight would not be a night of pleasurable flight.

  He was on the hunt for one black dragon that had attempted to annihilate an entire farming village.

  Gamair, the Death Lord, was a dragon who was pure evil, obsessed with death. Vander, The Warrior, was a dragon shifter, and one who would put a stop to the evil monster. He would not allow the Death Lord to wreak havoc on entire communities of innocent people, all because the black dragon had nothing better to do. Vander had fought Gamair for centuries, and knew most of the black dragon’s tricks, but this time, he had gone too far.

  Dragons had long been champions of the human race, but rarely revealed themselves to the world. When they did, they used their magic to distort the human mind. To humans, dragons were a myth, a legend.

  Tonight’s battle of dragons would be distorted to any human that would happen to look up and see the massive creatures in the clouds.

  His dragon sensed two large presences in the sky near him. He glanced around and found Jodos, his best friend since childhood, gliding next to him, while his older brother, Feno, swooped in to his right, flying alongside him. Gamair would not stand a chance on this night.

  Vander turned his attention back toward the sky, only to realize he’d lost sight of Gamair. His keen eyes searched the dense clouds, but there was no sign of the black dragon.

  “There!” Feno’s voice broke through telepathically. Vander looked in the direction of his brother’s stare, and he could see the tail of the black dragon, but it disappeared again in the midst of the dense clouds.

  “I’m going up higher,” Vander informed Jodos and Feno.

  He couldn’t afford to let Gamair get away. He pumped his wings, gaining momentum as he went higher into the sky, intent on finding the dragon and taking him out. If they didn’t stop him soon, he would destroy more lives, and Vander would be damned if he would let that happen.

  Gamair came into view, and Vander’s dragon didn’t hesitate. He opened his large mouth and breathed fire. Flames danced along Gamair’s scales as he flew closer. The black dragon flipped out of the path of Vander’s flames, and threw a massive white ball of power toward him.

  He tried to dodge the attack, but the energy hit Vander square in his dragon’s chest. The energy paralyzed him, leaving his dragon unable to pump his wings. Both man and dragon panicked. The wind blew past his face as his body began to head toward the ground. He felt himself lose control over his dragon.

  The sound of his brother’s voice yelling his name filled his head, but he was unable to respond as he fell through the clouds. He knew that he was in trouble when he felt the shift begin.

  You have got to be fucking kidding me, he thought as his human arms appeared. His dragon left, and his full human body came forward. He blinked his eyes and let loose a curse at the speed in which he was falling.

  “This is going to hurt,” he muttered as the ground rushed up, then everything went black.

  Faye looked at the clock and groaned. She had six more hours until the end of her twelve-hour shift. The life of an emergency room nurse was rewarding, but taxing on her body. Tonight was her fourth night in a row. She had picked up some extra shifts, trying to earn extra money to pay down her student loans.

  Six more months of double payments and they would be paid off. Financial freedom was her goal, and she was almost there, so this sacrifice would be well worth it. Just the thought of being free of major debt put a little more pep in her step.

  She was transporting a patient who came into the ER with chest pain. His tests came back abnormal, so she had to escort him to the cath lab so that the interventional cardiologist could do an invasive test to check for blockages in the arteries surrounding his heart.

  He wouldn’t be coming back to the ER. He’d either go to the cardiac floor to be admitted, or the operating room, if what they found it warranted an emergency surgery.

  “Okay, here we go, Mr. Sullivan,” she said as she opened the doors for Mike, the nursing assistant. She quickly followed behind and reached the side of the cart. The sounds of his heartbeat on the machines echoed down the narrow hallway.

  “Thank you, Faye,” Mr. Sullivan said, reaching out for her hand. He was an older gentleman in his late sixties, with salt and pepper hair, and a warm smile. The entire night, he hadn’t complained, not once. It was his wife who had insisted he come to the emergency room when he had argued it was only heartburn. “I appreciate everything you’ve done for me.”

  “Oh, it’s not a problem,” she replied, squeezing his hand. This was why she became a nurse. Sometimes, patients just needed a comforting hand and a smile to help get them through the scary times. “I just want to make sure that you’re good enough to get back to that pretty wife of yours,” she added with a smile.

  “I mean it. Don’t you stop smiling,” he said as Mike wheeled him into the lab where the team of nurses and physicians were waiting.

  “I won’t. Now, I’m leaving you in good hands.” They quickly grabbed the monitor and exited the room with a wave so that the team could proceed with the procedure.

  “What are you doing this weekend?” Mike asked, holding the door open for her.

  “After I wake from my work-induced coma, I may go out with my friend, Jenna, this weekend. She’s wanted to go to this bar she heard about. You and Nina have any plans?”

  “I have no clue what she’s planning, but me? My focus will be on the playoffs this weekend.” He laughed.

  Faye rolled her eyes at her coworker. She knew that Mike’s wife would be dragging him out to wherever she wanted to go this weekend. They made their way back to the emergency department and found everything calm. She enjoyed working with this team. Everyone was professional, and worked together well.

  “Hey, Faye!” her charge nurse
, Tim, called out from the nurse’s station. “You’re up for the next trauma.”

  “Sure thing, Boss.” She walked over to the nurse’s station and leaned against the counter. “Just let all emergency calls know that they can only come after I grab a bite to eat and get my coffee,” she joked. She batted away the balled up paper Tim tossed at her.

  “Sure thing. I’ll let all the squads know that Faye needs a diversion until after her break,” Tim said as he stood.

  “I knew you were my favorite charge nurse,” she said in a singsong voice. She turned away from the counter and headed toward the break room.

  The smell of freshly brewed coffee greeted her as she pushed the door open.

  “Somebody loves me,” she exclaimed, making a beeline straight for the coffee pot.

  Faye grabbed her cup from the dish rack by the sink and moved the carafe out of the way before sliding her mug beneath the flow of beautiful, black, liquid gold. Coffee was a nurse’s secret weapon to surviving the evening shift. Once her cup was filled, she grabbed her flavored creamer from the fridge and doctored her coffee to perfection. Who needed food when they had this liquid perfection?

  Her lunch was forgotten as she grabbed the remote for the TV and sat at the table, putting her feet up. It was Friday night in Blue Creek, and so far, nothing much was going on. Hopefully, she could make it through the rest of her shift without any action.

  In a town like Blue Creek, where there was a healthy mixture of the supernatural population, one never knew when things would jump off. But, tonight, she would keep her fingers crossed and pray there was no action.

  “Level one trauma!” The operator’s voice came through the overhead speaker. Faye groaned. Quickly taking a healthy sip of her coffee, she paused to listen. “ETA, five minutes.”

  “Shit!” she exclaimed, her feet hitting the floor as she jumped up. Hating to waste any coffee, she tried to gulp as much as she could down, but it burned the crap out of her mouth. She tossed the coffee into the sink and placed her mug on the counter.

  “All I know is this person better be dying,” she muttered as she rushed out of the break room.

  2

  “What do we got?” she called out, just as the man was ushered into the trauma bay. She’d been a trauma nurse for years and loved the thrill. The adrenaline rush was better than sex. Well, almost better. It had been a while, and her handy-dandy, battery-operated boyfriend was the only action she’d been seeing lately.

  The first thing that caught her eyes as they wheeled in the new patient was that he was naked. Usually, they had to cut the clothes off unconscious patients, but this one was already as naked as the day he was born.

  A few of the guys in the room chuckled as they all tried to avoid his groin area, but Faye caught a peek. Her eyes widened at its size, and she swallowed hard. Whoever this guy was, he was large everywhere, and certainly blessed.

  “I think we have a shifter,” Moe, the paramedic answered, as one of the other nurses threw a clean sheet over the man’s private area.

  The team immediately got to work assessing the newcomer, as the paramedic informed the room of what he knew of their patient.

  “What kind of shifter?” Dr. Franks, their staff emergency room physician asked.

  “Not sure.” The other paramedic shrugged his shoulders. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

  Curiosity filled her as she began hooking him up to the heart monitor, taking in his badly bruised body. It was well-toned and muscular, and the bruises covered almost every inch of his body.

  What in the world happened to him? she wondered to herself. After placing the last lead onto his chest, the sounds of his racing heartbeat filled the room.

  Dr. Franks barked out orders for the crew, guiding them in their lifesaving measures. The team functioned as a well-oiled machine.

  “Whatever happened to this man, being a shifter certainly saved him,” Dr. Franks said, shaking his head in awe as he stared down at the patient. “There’s no way a human could have survived whatever happened to him.”

  “He sure is lucky,” Faye announced, hanging up the telephone. Due to the patient arriving as a trauma, the radiology department bumped other patients on the schedule, and were waiting to hear if they needed them. She navigated around the room, and came to stand next to Dr. Franks. “I just got off the phone with radiology, and they can take him now for the CT scan.”

  “Good. Let’s get him down there so we can make sure he doesn’t have any internal damage.” He nodded at her. “Page me when you all return.”

  “Yes, Doctor.” She turned to find the other nurses, Angela and Teresa, finishing up the preparations for the trip to radiology.

  “You need us to go with you?” Angela asked as she unplugged the oxygen tubing from the wall before connecting it to the portable oxygen tank on the bed.

  “I don’t think I need both of you. Dr. Ramsey is coming with me, and I think with Mike, we should be fine,” she said, nodding to the ER resident.

  “Yes, I’m going. I can’t wait to see the images,” Dr. Ramsey added.

  “I’ll go, Angie,” Teresa volunteered. “Cover my patients for a little bit. This shouldn’t take long.”

  “No problem,” Angela said with a salute as she disappeared from the room.

  Faye turned back to her patient and sighed. This was going to be a long night. “Let’s roll out.”

  “One hundred and fifty bones are fractured,” Dr. Franks announced, staring at the bedside computer screen.

  “That’s almost all of his bones,” Faye gasped as she finished hanging a new bag of intravenous fluid for the John Doe. Her eyes flew to the patient who had yet to awaken. It was like someone had picked him up and threw him from a very high building.

  Who could survive something so traumatic?

  There was no other explanation for how he had so many broken bones. Someone didn’t want this man to live.

  “There’s nothing we can do right now but wait,” Dr. Franks said, shaking his head. “The only explanation for why he’s still alive is that he’s a shifter, and as a shifter, he’ll just need time, and his body will heal itself.”

  “Should we consult orthopedics?” Dr. Ramsey asked.

  “Not right now. Let’s see what he looks like in the morning. Shifters’ bodies heal rather quickly. We’ll rescan him in the morning…” Dr. Franks voice faded as the two physicians stepped out of the room, leaving Faye alone with her charge.

  She logged into the computer to chart a few things on her patient. The intensive care unit didn’t have an open bed right now, so it looked like he would be with them in the emergency room for a little while longer. A noise grabbed her attention, and she paused her typing as she glanced over at the man. She walked over to him, and was finally able to get a good look at him.

  She tilted her head to the side, trying to look past the bruising, and she could see that he was handsome. Very handsome, now that she was looking closer at him. He could be downright gorgeous. His dark hair was just long enough for a girl to glide her fingers through. He had long eyelashes that any woman would pay big money to get. And his chest—

  She had to look away and catch her breath. What was the matter with her?

  “Who are you?” she whispered, turning back to him. She reached out and moved his dark hair from his face. Her hand shook slightly as she moved to adjust the oxygen tubing in his nose. She didn’t understand why, but she was absolutely captivated by him. “What are you?”

  She jumped as his eyes fluttered. She pulled her hand away quickly, embarrassed at almost getting caught touching him. He released a groan, and his eyes opened. His golden irises mesmerized her.

  He was definitely a shifter.

  “Come closer,” he moaned, his eyes shutting tight. With her heart beating erratically, she leaned in, barely able to hear what he was saying.

  “What is it? Are you okay? Do you need something?” she whispered frantically. He took a deep breath and she
waited to hear what he was about to say. Would he whisper his last dying words? Who would she contact to tell that he died, and that he left his last request with her? She was two seconds from hitting the code button as she waited for him to speak.

  “You smell so good,” he murmured.

  “What?” she drew back in shock, taking in the large grin that had spread across his face. “Are you serious?” she sputtered, unable to believe that she thought he was dying, and he was sniffing her.

  “You do smell good. I couldn’t wait for those doctors to leave the room,” he announced, his eyes filled with a devious look.

  Oh, without the bruises, he would be one hot panty-melting shifter. She swallowed hard as she took a few steps away from the bed. She had heard plenty of stories of shifters and knew that she should stay far away from him. Who wanted nights filled with hot unbridled passion? Multiple orgasms? What woman would want sexual satisfaction that no human man could match?

  Nope, not her, she tried to convince herself, but failed. And the look he was giving her now told her that he wanted to swallow her whole. Her body released a shudder with just the thought of him tasting her.

  “So, let me get this straight. You’ve been awake this whole time?” She stomped her foot with her hand on her waist.

  “I woke up when I was in that machine,” he said, as he attempted to stretch his arms out, but stopped and winced. She watched, amazed as he slowly sat up. He grimaced slightly as he turned, setting his feet on the floor.

  “You shouldn’t be getting up,” she exclaimed, rushing to his side, his flirtation forgotten as the nurse in her kicked in. “Almost every single bone in your body is broken!”