Page 93 of Dragon Her Heels

TWENTY-TWO

“Did you just yell at two dragons?”

The day after returning home from the Iroquois Stakes, Yuless showed up at my home armed with the Devil, who drove his truck and trailer. “As you have won the wager regarding the pie, I am taking you to a livestock show. We will also be picking up the subject of your bargain with Zach, who has your bill for the purchase ready and is negotiating with the vet regarding pricing.”

Ack. I hadn’t planned on having a direly sick horse already. “Let me go do my rounds, and then I’ll ditch my boss for the day and tell him I have more important things to do than deal with his assholery.”

Mr. Durant had started the show with a list of small, medium, and large businesses he wanted me to evaluate for potential. Some of them were even within my wheelhouse, which would make that portion of my work easier. However, all of them shared a few commonalities destined to drive me insane: the owners defined what it meant to be unethical.

The Destroyer of Georgia, having run out of cities to fell, wished to devour corporations and make the greedy pay for their crimes against humanity. For the most part, I even appreciated his efforts when he wasn’t adding numerous hours of tedious labor to my week.

I wanted to play with my animals, check on the baby alligators, and do anything other than spy on a bunch of asshole rich people doing asshole rich people things. I counted my blessings, however: thus far, I could do the work without having to meet with anybody in person.

Yuless sighed, shook his head, and settled in to wait with Lucifer while I handled my morning business.

I headed from door to door, skipping Ashley’s place as she got her eggs delivered to her claimed refrigerator every morning. Isaac, quite possibly being a saint rather than an incubus, asked me to give his woman his eggs, which he’d steal from her as needed. The pair of dragons, who tended to flit around underfoot as scaled menaces, likewise asked me to funnel their goods to their woman.

At the rate her three men were going, they’d have her pampered to the point she could take off time from work and truly finish healing from her husband’s death. For the moment, I’d give her comfort and security while she went about the process of preparing her home for sale.

The sign had already been put up, and I chuckled at my real estate agent’s name on it.

Later, I’d have to thank him for his failure to talk me out of my slice of heaven—and jump on Isaac’s property and annex it into my homestead. I hurried about my route, not bothering to knock on doors. Fortunately for me, my neighbors had figured out when I didn’t bother to knock I had somewhere I needed to be, and for the most part, they left me alone.

For the most part. My fortunes soured when Donna Leanne stepped outside her door and regarded me with a rather predatory grin. “Well, well, well. I see you are back from your little group trip. But that transport is back? What is the meaning of that transport?”

I could only assume that the neighbors had been gossiping about the motley assortment of people and equipment coming and going from my place. “It’s a horse transport, and it can haul more than my truck. I needed Zenzi for a demonstration, which meant Moon needed to come, and Moon is big enough he needs his own stall. That put me at more horses than my trailer could handle, so a friend helped haul.”

“I see. What sort of demonstration did you need that new horse of yours for?”

“We did a ride at Churchill Downs.” I handed over the woman’s bounty, which involved a twelve pack of eggs and a huge bag of fruit, as the trees were determined to drown me. Fortunately, the collection of men invading my home, fourteen of which were dragons, one of which was an incubus, and one of which was an unknown other, tended to make the bounty vanish as they waged war over who could be first to make an edible pie.

It amazed me that the stubborn lot of idiots couldn’t, between the sixteen of them, figure out how to read the directions and do as told. I blamed the dragons.

The dragons refused to be defeated, and following the instructions counted as defeat to them.

The new dragons, who had shown up shortly after we’d unloaded the horses, would be the cause of my final descent into madness.

If all the dragons refused to leave and took up residence in my home, our gravestones would be memorable, for I would take them all out with me when I went.

“Churchill Downs? The place that does the Kentucky Derby?”

Well, at least she knew that much about racing. “Yes, there. I raced on my new mare, and I had Alligator Bait out on a jaunt.”

“I see. Don’t let the defeat get you down, okay?”

I stared at her, wondering if there was a polite way to inform her that my horse had bagged me just under a hundred and ninety thousand dollars. Sometimes, I needed to just bite the bullet. While I wouldn’t brag about the purse money, I’d hold my ground for a change. “We won both races.”

Donna Leanne raised a brow. “Did you, now?”

I gestured to her pocket, where she kept her phone. “The standings are already posted, and the demonstration race was recorded for your entertainment. The demonstration race was divine, shifter, heavenly, and hellish breeds. Zenzi is a hellish breed, Aramathea, my new mare, is a heavenly breed. Someone else rode Zenzi. I raced Alligator Bait in the Iroquois Stakes.”

Sure enough, rather than take me at my word, the old nag got out her phone to confirm my statements. “Well, I’ll be damned. That’s impressive. And here I thought you just liked animals a little more than sane or wise, but you’re actually doing something with that horse operation of yours.”

As I could be a good sport about my issues, I grinned at her comment. “I do like animals more than sane or wise, but yes, I do actually work some of my horses on my homestead.” I pointed down the way at Ashley’s home, aware they were likely gossiping a storm. “Ashley needed some care, so she’s moved into my place, and Isaac is helping her out, so you’re going to see some changes down the street. I’m buying Isaac’s land because we share a line, so I can annex it.”

Donna Leanne, in what I viewed as compassionate enough for her, made a sympathetic sound. “She didn’t handle that man’s death well at all. That’s mighty good of you to help her out. But surely Isaac’s in a better league than a washed out widow?”

“Don’t say that where any of the dragons can hear you,” I recommended. “They like the widow more than they like the incubus, and they get touchy.” A roar, rather close, drew my attention to my home.