Funny Scenes from "Wild Ride"

"I woke up funny.” Cindy said tightly.

"Funny how?" Mab said.

"Stuff has been happening."

"What kind of stuff?"

"Are you listening to me?" the woman demanded. She turned to the guy in the Coke-bottle glasses. "Stop eating that damn waffle and do something about that disease-carrying bird."

The man lifted his head from his ice cream and said, "The bird is fine." Then his glasses became round shiny eyes and his body began to elongate, looming over her, muscles rippling as his pin-striped suit turned to scales, his coattails shooting out to become a long, thick, lashing -

"Dragon," Mab said, fascinated.

- tail spiked with green trilby hats, just as he opened his mouth, filled with rows of serrated teeth.

"You, on the other hand, are a pain in the ass," the dragon said calmly.

The woman froze, staring at him, and then toppled off her stool onto the tile floor, out cold.

"I can't stop doing that," Cindy whispered to Mab.

"Uh-huh," Mab said, still staring at the dragon, the muscles moving under its beautiful scales, the grace in the way it turned its head on its long strong neck to look at her, the heat in its sharp gray eyes.

Then it disappeared and the guy with the glasses was back. He looked away from Mab and down at the
woman. "Now what's wrong?" he said to her unconscious body.

-------------later in the book-------------

 

She turned off the water and reached for a towel, and then registered that there was a towel there. Somebody had unpacked her things and set up the trailer for her. Somebody had taken care of her. She felt tears start again and scrubbed them away with the towel, and then she put on her old blue terry cloth robe with the ducks and went out into the hall.

“Here," Oliver said from the bedroom, and she stepped inside and he pointed to the bed, already made up and now piled high with blankets. "Get in," he said, and she did, and he pulled the covers over her, and then stood there uncertainly while she shivered under the covers.

"Cold bed," she said, trying to explain away her wimpiness.

"Okay," he said, "scoot over," and climbed in with her, pulling the comforter over her head, shielding her wet hair from the air.She curled against him, tentatively at first and then closer - he was putting out heat like a furnace, which made sense since he'd been a dragonand he put his arms around her as she snuggled against his nice hard chest and buried her face in his shirt. It smelled of soap and heat and him, something indefinably pleasant and right, something that sent a primordial tingle down her spine. This is good, she thought, knowing her brain was addled from exhaustion and cold. This is really good.

He rubbed her back. "Go to sleep, you're all right now."

He was taking care of her. Mab felt the tears start again. She was turning into a needy watering pot. Pull yourself together. Act normal. She sniffed and said, "So you're Weaver's partner?"

He reached behind him to the bedside table and got her a Kleenex. "Here. Yes, I'm Weaver's partner. Go to sleep."

That sounded like a good idea. She blew her nose and then stuffed the Kleenex under her pillow and snuggled deeper into the bed, closer to him, sucking up his heat, relaxing in his arms until she was practically boneless. She was dry and warm and sleeping with a dragon. "You were a great dragon."

"What?"

There was something she was forgetting, something that nagged at her as sleep fogged her brain. Something
important. Then she remembered and woke up a little, pulling her head back to look up at him. "You should call your wife."

He frowned down at her. "I'm not married." He put his hand on her forehead. "Are you delirious?"

"No. Who's Ursula?"

"My boss."

"Oh." His cool gray eyes were warm on her now, his face so close. He had a great mouth. A great, unmarried mouth. "Good," she said, and snuggled up against him again and sighed with exhaustion, safe in his arms.

His unmarried mouth quirked a little. "Why is that good?"

"Because I don't sleep with married men," Mab said, and fell asleep.