Southern Fried Dragon Read Free Page A

bird, and broke her fast. With her hunger abated a bit, she licked her chops, flapped her great wings, and headed to shore.
    The bird did little to satisfy her hunger. Maggie’s delicious southern fried chicken had spoiled her taste buds. Maggie promised to teach her how to make the succulent meal that made their tavern famous.
    Returning to the clouds, she gave one last look toward the retreating battlements. Like a grand Scottish castle overlooking a strategic headland, Fort Sumter appeared destined to turn into a great fortress. The thick walls and armory would protect Charleston from any invaders. She’d seen the cannons off-loading on the dock beside the fort’s main gate.
    Time to get back , she sighed to the wind.
    Anticipation of serving the men who lived at the smaller Charleston-area forts made her scaled lips twitch. Men from Fort Moultrie, one such nearby fort, frequented the small tavern where she had taken a room. Speaking with the well-dressed federal soldiers helped her shed her shyness.
    She had slowly grown accustomed to living among humans. However, she had no idea how she’d react if a certain handsome lieutenant walked in.
    The one she’d kissed like a wanton woman.
    Dru had quickly grown comfortable with the human body she’d borrowed from a young woman who had the unfortunate destiny to accidently die. The poor girl’s bad luck turned into a fortunate find.
    For me.
    Once Dru had set her mind on crossing the ocean, the American coastline—Charleston Harbor, in particular—had looked like as good a place as any in which to settle. For that bit of magic, she required a human body to fulfill the shift. The dead woman's stature, coloring, and age matched Dru’s idea of the human existence she coveted. She slipped into her life and incorporated the woman’s memories. She found her way to the Milltown Restaurant on Kings Street where Dru lived modestly, worked hard, and earned a living.
    I don’t necessarily call it living.              
    Not with loneliness making the days pass slowly. Nights spent in her human form were cold and forever long. The roving eyes of men deep in their cups had kept her to herself most nights. She’d never been kissed by a human male until last week when Shaw Stenhouse took her in his arms.
    Blazes!
    The lieutenant’s kisses shocked her at first touch, when he feathered soft, warm lips against hers. How odd. She’d expected a man to feel hard and cold, not like silk and filled with passion so sweet it made her nearly swoon.
    Dragons do not swoon.
    But, a dragon had not kissed Shaw back. A young woman had wrapped her hands around his neck and pulled him down to her hungry mouth. Dru was that woman. The exquisite taste and tingly sensation even now filled her cold-blooded body with a heat not born of dragon flames.
    If she hadn’t left Scotland and found a new home in America, she would never have met the attractive lieutenant. Odd that he could attract a dragon. His sparkling gray eyes seemed as drawn to her as she to him. He certainly filled out his uniform. She would swear on a mountain of ancient dragon treasure that his interest prodded her belly through the crisp cloth of his breeches.
    Dru had not wanted to leave her home across the sea. She had enjoyed life around the cave beneath the Isle of Skye, but hunters from the coastal Scottish clans had grown in number. They roamed over the land with their sharp-tipped arrows or bobbed too close to her home in their sea craft. Food sources had turned scarce.
    They were not hunting her, but it was only a matter of time. The chance of discovery grew as the population on some of those forsaken islands grew. And the sheep! She found she disliked their wooly taste as much as seals. A new home suddenly proved imperative.
    Life as a human had its high points. As a serving girl, Dru earned a few coins working at the Milltown Restaurant on lower King Street, near the docks. Her meager wages came with a cozy room