Love Burns Read Online Free Page B

that he smiled. “Unflattering ones.” His smile vanished, and he turned and stalked off.
    Tabitha glanced over at Olivia. “Olivia Cabrera,” she said. “My son Calder mentioned you when I spoke to him this evening. Your name came up several times.”
    “So apparently I succeeded in annoying the living heck out of him,” Olivia said.
    For some reason, that thought bothered her. Why should it matter what he thought of her? Stupid stuck-up gorgeous dragon. He’d been a good foot taller than her, with the broad shoulders of a linebacker and silky black hair that begged to be tousled. And he’d been way too aware of how hot he was.
    “I’m not so sure.” Tabitha looked her up and down, then turned and walked out of the room.
    Well, that had been strange. But no stranger than any of the other goings-on since Olivia had come back to town.

Chapter Four
     
    Saturday Night
    Calder stood with Mayor Tom Tompkins, surveying the crowd, watching the high-school aged fire and ice dragons flying overhead in the aerial version of lacrosse.
    It was a huge draw for both humans and dragons, and brought in a lot of money for the town. Dozens of concession booths on either side of the field sold food and T-shirts and cups and duffel bags with team insignias, along with dragon toys and dragon jewelry and every other kind of dragon-themed item imaginable. The ice dragon food carts and booths sold ice cream in every flavor and frosty drinks, and the fire dragons sold hot drinks and hot food.
    Vromme was there in the crowd, and so far everybody was behaving themselves reasonably well. The dragon citizens of both towns had been warned. There were the usual shouts and taunts, but there hadn’t been any flame and ice fights. Yet.
    Calder especially had his eye on the food booths being manned on either side of the field. Darlene, the tourist ambassador for North Lyndvale, stood there glaring at Laetitia, the tourist ambassador for South Lyndvale.
    The two of them had a history, and unfortunately shared a tourist booth right on the border between the two towns. There was a partition between the two sides of the booth, but it didn’t help much. Last week, someone had “accidentally” set the ice dragon’s side of the booth on fire, burning it neatly down the middle so the ice side was destroyed. And in an amazing coincidence, the next day when Laetitia had showed up for work, it had turned out that the fire dragon’s side was completely encased in a block of ice.
    Calder glanced over at Barnum, who was hitting on every woman in sight, whether they be fire dragon, ice dragon or human.
    “Do you think you could ask your son to stop making passes at everything female that walks on two legs?” Calder asked Tompkins with annoyance.
    “I could ask,” Mayor Tompkins said cheerfully.
    Calder rolled his eyes. Obviously whatever the mayor said to his son would roll off him like water off a duck’s back.
    “He’ll settle down when he finds the right woman,” Mayor Tompkins reassured him.
    “I’m more worried about right now. When he might accidentally say the wrong thing to the wrong woman and get punched in the face. Well, carry on, then.” Calder turned and walked off, keeping an eye out for people trying to set each other on fire.
    Principe Teague stalked over to Calder, with two of his centurions by his side. “I haven’t forgotten that you arrested my daughter,” he said angrily.
    “Neither have I. I also haven’t forgotten the way you grabbed her arm at the station. I don’t expect to see that kind of behavior ever again, especially from the Principe,” Calder said.
    Teague let out a puff of icy vapor and his eyes went ice blue, but one of his centurions elbowed him and glanced to the side. Vromme was standing about twenty feet away, watching them.
    “Great!” Teague said heartily. “Glad to hear it!” He reached out and pumped Calder’s hand enthusiastically, squeezing harder than necessary. Calder grinned and squeezed