Chapter Sixteen

Garwald's Pub looked like anybar directly out of Good Ol' Boy Americana: sawdust and peanut shells on the floor, dimly lit green-shaded lamps suspended over mauve vinyl upholstered booths, and tall cushioned barstools at a long, shiny bar. Coors and Budweiser neon signs blinked from the wooden walls, hanging next to hubcaps and license plates, and some fishing paraphernalia. The requisite pool table was in the back, lorded over by a huge elk head on the wall.

The juke box was pumping out a Doobie Brothers oldie as Jacken entered, Nyko close on his heels. The two of them threaded between the tables in the center of the room, heading toward a booth in the back, Jacken bumping recklessly into a couple of empty chairs. That earned a few glances, but otherwise everyone kept to their own drinks and conversations. Thirty-seven years ago, when the three Brun Brothers had first arrived in ??ran?, that wouldn't have been the case. Then, one of Jacken's dark moods would've sent many people slipping rapidly, if discreetly, out the back door. But the townsfolk had long since learned that, although Jacken was far from a chummy person, he did know how to control the … baser aspects of his unique bloodlines, as did Nyko. Shon was a different matter.

Speaking of his younger brother …. "Where's Shon?" Jacken asked, scanning the bar as he sat down in the empty booth.

Nyko claimed the seat opposite to him. "My guess would be at The Shank Tooth."

"What?" Jacken scowled. "You're fucking kidding me."

"You want him here when he's in one of his moods?" Nyko grabbed a handful of peanuts out of the bowl and started cracking them open.

Jacken gave his brother a heated look. "Shon's a member of the Warrior Class, Nyko. He shouldn't be hanging in Stanga Town at The Shank Tooth. He patrols that town, for Chrissake."

Nyko shrugged. "It's where Shon goes when he feels bad. C'mon, Jacken, you know that." He tipped his head back and trickled the shelled peanuts into his mouth from his fist, the tattoos on his neck rippling.

Jacken exhaled hard, rubbing a hand over his brow. Well, hell, he didn't want Shon beating himself up over what had happened with Toni today. Okay, yeah, it was Shon's fault that Jacken and Nyko were here at Garwald's on some unscheduled R R when they didn't want to be. The youngest Brun had caught an up-close-and-personal whiff of Toni today and gone apeshit, which had prompted Roth to insist that all the Bruns take a night off from guarding the exceptionally fragrant women. Roth had been trying to do them a solid by giving them this break; for men who'd taken the vow the Bruns had, it was especially torturous being around Toni. But it would've been nice if the man just let them do their fucking jobs.

"Howdy, boys." Luvera Nichita sashayed up to their table, pulling a notepad from her apron and a pencil out of her black-haired bun. "What can I get you two princes tonight?"

Nyko smiled at her. "Couple of longnecks ought to do it."

"Well, heck, I don't need to write that down." Luvera shoved her notebook back in her apron. "I shoulda figured, anyway."

The Bruns generally only drank beer; hard alcohol, and just about any other chemical stimulant or intoxicant, was never a good idea for men of their unique bloodlines.

Luvera winked at them. "Be back in a jiff'."

Nyko watched her go, his smile turning wistful. "Luvera's real sweet, you know. She'd make a guy a great mate."

Jacken hiked a brow. "You saying you want the job?"

Nyko whipped his gaze back over to Jacken. "No, of course not. I mean, uh … if it were possible, I certainly wouldn't kick her out of my, um …." His cheeks reddened as he stumbled about on unfamiliar ground. They rarely talked about women … sex, children, family, a home, the future. What would be the point? "I'm just saying it'd be nice if we could get some human Dragon males down here. The women of our breed deserve a chance at a family, too."

Jacken shrugged. "Soon as a guy pops up with Peak 8, we'll go get him." Kidnapping a male would be interesting; more so trying to keep control of him down here.

Luvera plunked down two longneck Budweisers on their table. "Here ya go, boys."

"Hey, that was fast." Nyko smiled at her again.

"You're my favorite customer, Nyko Brun." Luvera tweaked his nose, then bustled off.

Blushing, Nyko picked up the bottle and took a swig of –

He choked halfway through the sip.

Jacken felt it, too, like a ramrod straight up his spine.

His back was to the door, but Toni's entrance hit the entire place like a sonic boom, rolling through the bar like a punch to each man's gut. Some men jerked upright and tightened their jaws, while others slid low in their seats, their eyes rolling up into their skulls.

It slammed into Jacken in such a physical wave of ball-clenching sex vapor, he almost bit his tongue from clamping his teeth hard enough to keep from moaning.

Nyko set down his beer with exaggerated care. "When will that woman be able to wear the mud?"

Jacken took a hard pull on his beer, contemplating chewing his way through the rest of it. "Dr. Jess tested her today to see if she's allergic." Please have the Universe be feeling kind and let her pass that test with flying colors. A few dabs behind Toni's ears of the sulfuric mud which bubbled up in the cave and her scent would be cut in half. Once a woman was mated, her scent diminished, thank Christ, for anyone save her husband, but until then, the smell of an unmated Dragon woman running amok was equal to one long communal, never-ending ball massage …. minus the happy ending, of course. Insanity.

Raucous voices pulled Jacken's attention over to the pool table. Thomal was introducing Toni to a group of his friends, and she was smiling and shaking hands with everyone. Jacken's stomach cranked over. She had the kind of smile that made a man want to conquer worlds, if only to see that smile aimed at him in gratitude and awe. Either that, or fuck her silly.

"They make a nice couple," Nyko mused. "She'd do well to choose Thomal, I think."

"Yeah." Jacken tore at his Bud label. "They're the picture of perfect blond-ness together."

Nyko jerked his eyes back to him, but Jacken only gave his brother a view of the top of his head.

"Uh, huh." Nyko shoved out of the booth.

Jacken snapped his head up. "Where do you think you're going?"

"To get Shon."

Jacken scowled at him. "Don't be a pussy, Nyko."

"Sorry, but I can't handle it." Nyko pushed his beer over to the salt and pepper shakers. "Why don't you come along?"

Jacken curled his lip. "The hell if I want to go into Stanga Town on my night off." It was probably absurdly transparent that he really wanted to watch out for Toni without "officially" guarding her.

Nyko blank-faced it, though, which was awfully nice of him. "Be back in a few, then." He tossed off a salute and left.

Jacken leaned back in his booth and stared at the dart board across the bar, trying to talk himself into leaving Toni to the care of her Protection Team. Breen and Gábor were posted in the pub, Jeddin would be outside. Jacken managed the incredible feat of keeping his eyes glued to the board for a full count of ten before he shifted his gaze back to her. He gripped his Bud and took another long pull. Jesus, she looked fantastic tonight.

Not that he didn't doubt somebody could tie Toni to the back of a Jeep and drag her through horseshit for two days straight, and he'd still want her with a kind of hunger that bordered on crippling. But tonight … she looked like something out of a dream. The jeans she wore shaped her ass perfectly and rode provocatively low on the sweet curve of her hips. Low enough that a peek of her slim waist showed beneath a short-sleeved red sweater that was just tight enough across her tits to make his eyes want to boing out of their sockets.

It only upped his torture that he'd fed on Syrian a few short hours ago, putting his strength at its highest and his senses at their most finely honed. Every little detail about Toni was magnified a hundredfold to him: the little freckles sprinkling her arms, the way her long, tarnished-blonde eyelashes curled at the tips, the shimmer of certain strands of her hair, as if they were peppered with gold dust, others alight with living flames.

She was wearing it up in a youthful ponytail tonight, exposing the vulnerable sweep of her neck and the downy little hairs there. Even from this distance, he could pick out each one with the same acuity as if he were standing right over her, head bowed to her neck, nuzzling that peachy fuzz in the last breathless moments before driving his fangs in.

He wrapped his hands around his knees and squeezed them hard under the table, saliva filling his mouth. Damn it all to –

His whole body jerked as Toni's laughter echoed across the bar, the musical quality of it sending the already twitching mass of barely contained males into a near orgasmic seizure.

Toni clearly found humor in her inability to master the game of pool, even though Thomal was doing his level best to teach her the finer points of it … and finding every opportunity to touch her in the process. The little prick.

Ellen and Pedrr were a part of the group, as were Maggie and Luken, and the two couples couldn't keep their hands off each other, either. Every little piece of byplay seemed to be a reason to laugh up into each other's eyes, to pass some secret message of love and adoration. Grinding out a curse, Jacken braced his elbows on the table and bowed his head, jamming his thumbs against the bridge of his nose. The hell if he was going to watch one more minute of a scene that held about as much relevance to his life as knitting.

You want some balloons for this pity party, Jacken? Damn, but he hated it when he got all whiny. Yeah, okay, so he'd been handed a shit deal in the genetics department. No kids for him. Ever. So what. No wife, no love, no nothing. Whatever. He was here in ??ran? with friends, his brothers, and comrades. Gratitude was the only thing he should be feeling. Because by all rights he should still be living among the Om R?u.

Escape from their town had been impossible. Unless a person knew a direct route through the lengthy labyrinth of passageways which stretched from the Om R?u town of O??rat to ??ran?, he wouldn't get through fast enough. He'd end up cooking inside the tunnels that plunged so deep toward the earth's core they were, quite literally, hot as Hell. If his mother hadn't done the impossible and stolen a map of the Hell Tunnels from Lorke's lair, and then smuggled Jacken and his brothers out, a sacrifice which had ultimately led to her death, they'd all still be there.

A shudder crawled up the back of his neck. He still had nightmares about the heat they'd endured during their escape, along with life itself in O??rat: the sparse food and water, the caved-in buildings, the stench of unwashed bodies and running sewage, the violence that had ruled any given day, providing the landscape for the most horrific of his nightmares – the unbridled brutality raging in the streets, men raping the women at will, beating the crap out of each other. Yeah, Om R?u weren't exactly known for their mercy or self-control. He'd lost count of how many times he'd been beaten into unconsciousness over something as stupid as a chicken drumstick, and how many times he'd had to pound someone until his fists were raw and broken just to survive.

And then there was the unmatched terror of his father's abuse ….

Jacken wrenched his eyelids tighter. In all of his fifty-six years of life, he'd never told a soul about his father's little tattoo parties. Even he and his brothers didn't talk about it anymore. But he'd told Toni. A bolt must've come loose in his brain for him to have done that, though it might've been worth it if he'd succeeded in driving the infernal woman away. She was supposed to have been disgusted by who he was and run like hell for the door. But instead she'd done this … thing where she'd shared one of her own vulnerabilities to make him feel better about confessing his.

To mess him up even further, she'd looked all helpless and sad during the telling of her story, probably just like when she'd been six-years-old and her bastard of a father had bailed on her. The sight of her like that had carved out a weird soft spot in the center of his chest that –

"Do you have a headache?"

He slammed upright at the sound of her voice, knocking his beer bottle into a wobble across the table.