Free Once Bitten by Kalayna Price

moment shifted, became incredibly surreal.
    Slowly, Domino reached for her cold, damp hand. "Come down, little one. I won’t let him hurt you."
    She blinked hard. Nobody protected her. Her father had always done whatever he wanted to her, and nobody had ever stopped him. "You can’t," she said simply, stating a truth she’d learned with painful repetition.
    "I can. I will," he said harshly, his grip firming. "He won’t hurt you. I won’t let him."
    The moment stretched out, unreal, uncertain, but somehow his offer raised a fragile trust in her. She remembered the boy in the lab who had carried her to the couch, who’d spoken such intense, alien words to her. It was that boy who eased her to her knees, who helped her to sit stiffly on the examining table, and it was a mixture of that boy and this man who cupped her cheek, then slid a slow kiss from the crest of her cheek to the corner of her mouth. "Let me help you, little love."
    What was he doing to her? Calm radiated from his touch, slowly seeped into her blood. He soothed her, enspelled her with his compassion. How could he be patient with her now? Slowly her wits returned to her. She glanced at Skye, still unhappy with his presence.
    Domino’s thumb stroked her cheek. "We don’t have to do this now. Why don’t we wait? I can take you home right now if you wish."
    His words brought a final draft of calm to her tortured mind. Drawing a deep breath, she squared her shoulders and shook her head. "No. I’m here now. I need to know...."
    He stopped her from looking at Skye. "Then look at me for a moment. Talk to me. Did you know your eyes are turning gold? I will miss the blue. You have beautiful eyes."
    She hissed at the bite of the needle, but he wouldn’t let her look. Trembling, she shook her head. "I’m not beautiful."
    He grinned. "You’ve lost the case if you’re trying to convince me of that."
    Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Skye take the syringe and slowly fill several tiny dishes with it, which he then slid into a series of machines. She watched him broodingly, her vision dimming as she recalled the many times she’d watched her father do the same.
    "What do you want for dinner?" Domino said casually, forcing her to return to the moment.
    "I don’t know. I’m not hungry," she said irritably.
    "I am. I’ll call the cook at the club and have him fix something savory. You’ve barely had a taste of Draconian cooking. I’ll enjoy spoiling you."
    She frowned and would have answered, but Skye returned. Unperturbed by her glower, he canted his head. "We need to check your hearing. Listen and tell me if you hear this. His mouth moved, but she didn’t hear a thing. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Icki wince and rub his ear.
    Skye smiled. "Draconians have sonic communication abilities. Your profile said you once had it, but if you don’t know, it’s an indication that your hearing has returned to normal human parameters."
    For some reason, that made her frown. She’d come to take certain things for granted, and, useless as it had been, her hearing had been one of those things.
    Skye canted his head and crossed his arms. "Have you noticed anything different about your vision?"
    She frowned. It had been a minor thing, but now that he mentioned it.... "Things seem a little odd around the edges, like I’m seeing a fog of color...." She trailed off, trying to examine the effect. Her eyes had been darting around all day, chasing ghosts, but she’d been too harassed to really notice it.
    "It’s a normal experience for a Draconian," Skye explained. "Our emotions color the edges of our vision, making them hard to ignore. On the bright side, we have better tolerance to bright light than humans." He took a small flashlight and shined it in her eyes. To her surprise, she didn’t flinch.
    "It doesn’t hurt!"
    A slight smile tilted his lips. "Congratulations." He felt her pulse, examined her color and checked the glands on her neck before consulting