Dralle's Bride (Crystal Glass Dragons 4)

He was going to kill my brother.

The thought hurt, and I didn’t sleep for the rest of the night.

I wished instead for one of those dreams about the big, beautiful castle I used to see in my sleep as a child. It had endless rooms and men and women in beautiful ornate clothing. Everything seemed to shimmer like it was made out of gold and copper, and it had the most delicious and beautiful food I’d ever tried. Eventually, those dreams stopped, and I chalked them up to the fantasies of a little girl who had to sit through too many princess movies with her mom as a kid.

Pulling my hair up into my tight tiny ponytail, I walked downstairs and into the shop thirty minutes before opening. If I didn’t live above it, maybe I would have taken the time to eat or have some type of life, but why do that when I can get back to doing the family business?

It was excellent in the morning before the first customers. I started a pot of coffee and clicked through the pre-booked appointments for the day. A couple of oil changes, more work on a truck brought in last week, an engine that needed to be looked at.

Simple things.

We used to close on Sundays, but what’s the point of that?

There was a knock on the garage door, and I glared in its general direction. I didn’t want to have to deal with customers until I’d had time to start my day. “We open at ten,” I said loud enough that I was sure they’d hear.

“That gives you about half an hour for breakfast then.”

His voice had a smile in it, but I still knew who it was.

Chills went up and down my arms and neck, and I wasn’t sure if it was because of the dreams or… no, I couldn’t be attracted to him, not after what I’d seen.

“Go away.”

“What will I do with all of this food, then?”

My stomach turned, and I couldn’t help but admit I was hungry.

I shouldn’t accept food from strangers, but something was smelling good, and I had a long day to look forward to, running off of maybe three hours of sleep. Ugh, fine.

Letting him in, I was a little annoyed with how good he looked this early in the morning. He was put together and looked like he’d already been up for a couple of hours. “What do you have?”

“French toast and some other baked goods.”

“Did you make this?” I couldn’t disguise the shock in my voice since the containers he was bringing in looked like they were from someone’s kitchen.

“No, it was made for us.”

Cryptic.

Hm.

I was too hungry to argue with him, though.

“Coffee?”

It felt weird trying to be polite, but I needed to know more about him. If he was someone who was really going to kill my brother, maybe if I figured out more about him, I could stop it. That’s what I told myself, though. I didn’t want to admit I’d been so easily won over by French toast.

“Sounds good.”

I poured us a couple cups of joe while he unpackaged all of the food and even pulled out cutlery.

“So, who are you?” I tried to sound candid.

“Dralle.” He said his name like he was introducing himself again. I rolled my eyes and tried not to laugh at him for purposefully being dumb.

“Okay, but Dralle, why are you trying to win me over with French toast and baked goods? Also, wait-” I had another thought as I brought over the mugs of black coffee.

Billy came down from my apartment and stopped wagging his tail the moment he laid eyes on Dralle. I watched him cautiously, wondering if my dog was about to go all Kujo on this stranger.