Page 6 of Dragon’s Golden Mate (Shifter Nation: Enchanted Over Forty #2)

Maeve noticed Kendrick’s eyes on her and turned away, raising her chin and inhaling the fresh spring air.

It hadn’t been easy to be in such close proximity to him, fighting to hold her concentration as she looked through all those texts.

Maeve had always been good at research, but she usually did it alone, not next to a handsome dragon.

Clearly, she hadn’t been thinking when she’d suggested they go to Tina’s.

“I’ve always liked spring in Salem,” she said, deciding idle chitchat would be safe.

He made a low grumble, a noise that came from him fairly often and seemed to mean he was listening. Was that a dragon thing, or a Kendrick thing? She wasn’t sure, but she liked it.

“I thought everyone liked fall in Salem the best, given its reputation,” he replied.

“Don’t get me wrong. It’s lovely. The coloring on the trees is breathtaking, and the magic is so thick in the air that you can feel it everywhere.

That was one of the great things about Salem when I first came here back in the seventies.

It was one place where I could truly feel like myself.

” She smiled a little as she remembered those first few walks through the city that would soon wrap her in its arms.

“Spring is nice, but that sounds much better,” Kendrick noted.

“Well, the tourists are what changes everything,” she admitted.

“Not that I don’t appreciate them. Many of those in our coven, such as Tina, rely on tourism dollars to keep their businesses open.

The interest in Salem keeps it alive. You have to add an extra hour if you need to drive anywhere,” she laughed.

He nodded. “I’m finding that I prefer walking, to be honest. Everything here is beautiful. At this point in my life, I like slowing down and taking it all in.”

Kendrick was looking at her again, making her stomach tighten. “I’m sure all of this with the gargoyles is nothing compared to the more important things you’ve done.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” He scratched his arm, and his knuckles brushed ever so slightly against her. “Some of the smallest things we do in life can be the most important.”

“Such as?” She liked listening to him talk. His voice was like the sound of distant rolling thunder, the kind that didn’t bring the threat of a storm. It just reminded you that you were alive and part of nature.

“Raising children, for one. It’s a series of tiny decisions, and you can’t know the outcome until many years later. You’re constantly forming someone’s future, but in the moment, it simply feels like you’re trying to get through the day,” he theorized.

“You’ve…raised children?” she asked delicately. Beck, Kendrick’s nephew, had taken over as Alpha of the Alexander clan when Kendrick had stepped down a few months ago. No one had mentioned any direct heirs.

He nodded slowly as they turned the corner. “I have. A few of my own, and plenty of stepchildren or those that the clan took in. There was a time when my people were heavily persecuted, so few of us remain today.”

“I’m sorry.” Her throat choked up at the idea of losing children. Maeve couldn’t imagine what that would be like, even if those children were hundreds of years old at the time.

“Please, don’t be,” Kendrick replied softly. “Loss is a part of who we are. We each have to learn to deal with it. I’m sure that you’ve had your own challenges in raising your daughters.”

Though she was curious, she wouldn’t push him for details.

Especially not there. Her girls were an easier subject, though.

“They’ve certainly been challenging! I wanted them to be tough and fierce, to be able to stand up for themselves and handle anything.

That makes them a bit hard to deal with as a parent, though,” she laughed.

“It seems to me that you were up to that challenge,” he said. “I know Chelsea a bit better than Kristy or Tina, with her living at the clanhouse. She’s a woman who isn’t afraid to stand up for what she believes in. I think I see a lot of you in her.”

“She’s got plenty of her father in her, too, and not just that fiery red hair.

” Maeve laughed, but she cut herself off as she realized she was about to go into all the ways that she could see Patrick in her girls.

There was Chelsea’s hair and Kristy’s eyes.

She could swear that Tina’s business sense had come from Patrick.

He was the sort of man who knew how to talk to anyone, whether he knew them or not.

Patrick was a good man. Whenever Maeve heard someone say there weren’t any good men left in the world, a small part of her had to agree because he was no longer around.

He was a kind and generous panther shifter, and he truly loved his daughters.

He’d worried just as much as Maeve had over how to raise them right.

Many nights, they’d lain awake in bed, discussing how to encourage them to be fierce and yet understanding.

Kendrick’s gentle voice cut through her guilty thoughts. “How long has he been gone?”

“Oh, quite a few years now.” Maeve waved her hand in the air, wishing she could wave away the last several minutes of conversation and start over again.

She’d talk to Kendrick about the latest restaurants opening in town, or his work, or maybe even just the weather.

“It’s nothing I really need to think about anymore, but I do. ”

“I wouldn’t say that.” He paused as they waited for traffic before crossing the street. “It can stay with you over decades. You don’t really forget about things like that, and I don’t believe a person should. It makes you who you are. It’s part of you.”

Maeve swallowed. She’d been devastated when Patrick had passed away, and no one had blamed her for that.

But after a while, it’d only felt right to move on.

Not in the sense of finding someone new, but in staying strong for her daughters and her coven.

Maeve still had to get out of bed every morning, and she couldn’t turn and stare at his empty pillow forever.

As they walked along, she realized that she’d been pushing down the last vestiges of her grief for Patrick, trying hard to keep them out of view. Here was someone who understood pain, loss, and mourning better than anyone else she’d met before. “I suppose that’s true.”

“It’s at least what I try to keep in mind. I’ve had a little more time to think about it now that I’m retired, though. I suppose that means I’ve become one of those old men who believes he knows everything,” he chuckled.

“You’re not old,” she corrected him, studying his face and still unable to see all the years that he claimed. “If you are, you could make a fortune selling your skincare routine.”

“I don’t think people would be very interested in hearing about a boring old bar of soap,” he laughed. “And you’re one to talk!”

“Me? I’m a crone. It’s not an insult, either,” she said quickly when she saw him open his mouth to reply. “Not in my world, anyway.”

“Nor should it be, if it describes you.” His eyes moved over her face, studying her, absorbing her.

Maeve wanted to kick herself. Every time she thought she was getting away from any kind of conversation that could bring them closer together, she just steered right back into it again.

She felt like they were each only a sentence or two away from saying something they might regret, something that was far more than polite conversation between two elders.

“Do you miss it?” she blurted out.

He blinked. “Miss what?”

“Running the clan,” she said. There. That was common ground that they could talk about for a long time without ever mentioning looks, attraction, mates, or deep feelings.

He considered this for a moment. “There are days when I do. You can’t do a job for that long and then just stop, not when it involves people you care about.”

“I’m sure you’re right.” Maeve had never even considered ‘retiring.’ She knew she’d be involved in the coven one way or another, no matter what. It was impossible to think of it as something outside of herself.

“Beck is doing a wonderful job, so at least I know I don’t have any worries there. Chelsea, too. The two of them are great together. We’re a small clan, and we don’t need a lot of structure to keep it going. Really, we’re just a family,” Kendrick explained.

“No wonder you looked so uneasy when I brought you through the covenstead yesterday,” she pointed out. “There are quite a few of us.”

“It wasn’t just the numbers,” he said with a smile. “It’s the way they all looked at me. Curious, but ready to pounce on me if I said so much as an impolite word to you.”

Maeve laughed. It was too loud, but no one looked. “I don’t know about that!”

“I do!” His accent came out a little stronger when he spoke enthusiastically. “If you’ve ever had any doubts as to whether or not those women would fight for you, just bring a relative stranger into their midst and see what happens. If any man says he’s not intimidated, he’s a liar!”

Now she was laughing so hard that she could barely see. “I was just imagining someone like Colette marching up to a big man like you and telling you exactly what she thinks!” Colette was one of their youngest members and probably the most petite, but she had a killer glare and a sharp tongue.

“I’ll be sure not to cross her, then!”

When Maeve heard a rumbling, she thought it was just Kendrick’s laughter.

But then she stopped laughing when she felt the ground writhing under her feet.

She threw her arms out, automatically reaching for the strength and security of Kendrick, but it was too late.

She went down, her right knee slamming hard into the cobblestone.

Light radiated in her eyes, and she reeled with pain. “What the hell just happened?”

“It wasn’t just you.” Kendrick was next to her now, one arm around her back and the other reaching for her hand. “Are you all right?”

“I’m sure I’m fine.” She gritted her jaw against a wave of dizziness, brought on by the horrific pain that radiated from her knee. It jolted through her bones. “I just need to walk it off.”

“I’ll help you.” His arms were strong, and he easily brought her to her feet.

Maeve hardly had to use her own strength at all.

That was good, since she had so little of it.

The fall and the pain had drained her completely.

She grunted as she tried to put weight on her right foot.

The pain in her knee exploded. Her head spun and she could hardly breathe.

Maeve collapsed against Kendrick’s side.

“I’m sorry,” she panted. “I think I need a minute.”

“Take your time.” His arms were still clamped around her.

Maeve knew that even if she stopped trying to hold herself up completely, Kendrick had her. But how embarrassing! As if she wasn’t already conscious of her age, now he was holding her up.

Fortunately, she could fix this. Through the fog of pain, Maeve reached down.

She spread out her fingers so that the tips surrounded her kneecap.

She summoned energy, feeling it flow up through her body.

There was that telltale tickle in her palm that she and Kristy had discussed with Nia.

Maeve controlled her breath and focused on healing.

She moved her mind into a special place that she’d found through her years of practice, one that allowed her to focus this energy on fixing wounds and reducing inflammation.

She felt the energy move up her fingers, but where she expected to see it flow out of her hand and into her knee, she only saw sparks.

“What the hell?” Desperation bloomed in her chest. Of all the times for her magic to fail, why did it have to be now?