Topper's Magical Christmas: My Crazy Alien Romance, Book 4 (Magic, New Mexico 40) Read online

  Recent weather research kept pointing to the hottest, driest area in New Mexico being near a little town in the middle of the desert called Magic.

  Dedicated to her goal of getting the Podunk town to agree to host the dome, Lena was grudgingly on the tiny road heading toward it now, as fast as the speed limit allowed.

  If things went well, maybe she’d make it home for New Year’s.

  Or not.

  She certainly wasn’t going to miss her sister’s nagging annual lecture about her ‘thirty-five-year-old barren womb’ and unmarried state. Her studies had led to too much comfort food and too little time for dating. None of that bothered her half as much as it did her family. Lots of women didn’t do real relationships until they were past forty these days. She had bigger things to do than diet herself down to a dating size for a bunch of men who weren’t interesting enough to live with.

  No, what bothered the normally sassy, self-confident version of herself were her colleagues tormenting her with the rumors about there being more strange things than just incredibly hot weather happening in Magic. Everyone at the college knew she was far too scientific-minded to let their jokes about UFO sightings change her mind, but nothing kept their ridicule from bugging her.

  Now all those naked guys in the middle of the road up ahead? Okay, they had Lena questioning her sanity—at least a little. Mirages in the desert usually involved water. What the hell were five naked guys doing in the middle of the road?

  Lena slowed the van and stared out at quite the assortment of eight-pack abs and impressive man sticks hanging proudly. Seeing the five of them definitely eclipsed her memories of that one time she’d played with a set of hunky twins during her graduate work. Granted, her current sex life was pathetically laughable, but that was still no reason to let a bunch of handsome hunks with impressive junk scramble her brain. She needed to stop daydreaming about the ‘good old days’ and focus more on reality.

  “Girl, get your mind out of the gutter and back on your science business,” Lena said as she wrenched her gaze away from them.

  A towering and very handsome blond with a great smile held up his hands in a sign of peace as he slowly moved toward her side of the vehicle. Like every other woman who hadn’t had sex in over a year would have done, Lena grinned as she braked to a stop to keep from hitting the naked dummy.

  Not being a complete fool, Lena fished her pepper spray out of her purse and tucked the tiny container into her palm before rolling down her window to see what Naked Hunk #1 had to say.

  “Greetings. Can you tell us how far we are from the location of Magic, New Mexico? We are not yet familiar with your planet and have left our navigation instruments behind with our clothes. We did not anticipate arriving somewhere other than our intended location when we passed through the portal.”

  Lena looked him up and down before glancing at the other four who all smiled and waved at her. They’d all passed through a portal alright—probably the door of some local mental facility if she had to make a guess.

  Since they spoke politely in stilted English, it could be they were foreigners who were visiting. She was no jet-setter, but Lena knew not all countries were as prudish as the US of A. Seeing no man sticks pointing north reassured her, so Lena smiled back and waved while she pondered what to do.

  Stopping to help a bunch of strange men—no matter how hot they were—was a pretty idiotic action for a woman traveling alone.

  Hand on her pepper spray, her gaze returned to Hunky Blondie #1 still standing patiently by her door. She got no bad vibes from him at all, and he seemed to just genuinely be asking for her help. She couldn’t just drive away and leave them all to sunburn themselves out in the middle of the desert, could she? The temperature had to be above a hundred already.

  “What’s your name?” Lena demanded.

  “Mars—at your service,” he said, bowing his head.

  “Like the planet?”

  He looked confused, but then one of the others shouted something to him. Lena didn’t hear the words well enough to understand, but Mars nodded in gratitude.

  “Yes. Like the planet,” Mars concurred, never losing his smile.

  “Tell me something, Mars. Are you guys members of a gay nudist colony or something?”

  Mars held up a finger. “Please allow me to check with my companions before I respond to your query. I do not wish to tell you an untruth.”

  Lena chuckled at the weirdly formal response, especially from a man who was naked. She watched Mars’s bitable ass shift with his movements as he quickly walked back to his friends.

  Maybe she was being judgmental. Guys she’d dated in the past had told her it was one of her worst flaws. Maybe the naked men were simply Swedish or some other culture where men liked their junk to swing in the breeze.

  Like perfect Nordic stereotypes, all five men were tall, muscled, and had some variation of blond hair. In fact, they were so fair-skinned their skin nearly gleamed silver in the sunshine.

  Still… nothing about their appearance in any way explained how they came to be walking through the desert without any protection from the sun. Lena could only imagine how painful a sunburned Johnson would be. Feeling sympathy for the crazy nutbags, she found herself hoping they hadn’t been out in the sun long enough for that to happen.

  Mars was gone for a full two minutes doing his consulting thing. She could hear all five men debating with each other in some kind of language unfamiliar to her ears. Tired of melting while she waited, Lena rolled up the van window to conserve all the cool she could.

  When Mars finally came back, Lena grinned and rolled down the window again. Mars was all but smirking. This ought to be good, she thought, returning his smile.

  “Our consensus is that we are definitely a colony of nude men. None of us could agree about whether our positive attitudes qualified us to be considered gay. Please forgive me for giving you an incomplete answer.”

  Lena burst out laughing. This was too much nuttiness to take seriously. “Okay. Well, this is your lucky day, Mars. I’m heading to Magic myself. Luckily, I’m driving a rental van and don’t care what you five get on the seats. Go get your naked buddies and hop in. I’ve got just enough seats for the five of you.”

  Smiling his gratitude, Mars bowed low and hustled back to his group.

  Lena laughed and imagined the story she was going to get out of this adventure. She doubted anyone would believe her without a picture, but she was not taking a selfie with five naked guys. She would never risk her career over nothing more than a good laugh.

  Calix knew he had no one to blame for his situation except himself. He could have stayed in the dragon military. He could have, but instead, he’d come running to his cousin Theo’s hometown of Podunk Ville, New Mexico—which Theo made him properly call Magic—so he could help his cousin keep the peace there.

  After spending the early morning rounding up a missing werewolf teenager who’d gone wild with his first shift, his bossy Sheriff cousin had then sent him out to settle a stupid dispute over cows. Being hungry was never a good state for a dragon to be in, but at least the dispute about ownership had ended quickly when Calix had threatened to eat the cow they were arguing over.

  His threat had solved the disagreement, but it had unfortunately not gotten him any food. Calix was planning to take care of that oversight just as soon as he reported to Theo. He was heading into the Sheriff’s office when a giant white van pulled up out front.

  Bracing himself to be polite to the human he instantly smelled inside it, Calix muttered under his breath as he watched a mocha-colored female climb out of the driver’s seat and slam the door.

  When she was about three feet away, his dragon suddenly reared up inside him as wild as the teenage werewolf he’d wrestled earlier. Why in the world did his dragon want to make an appearance? And his forehead now hurt.

  He reached up under the brim of his deputy’s hat and rubbed the small horn he found protruding through his skin. The tiny h
orn had come a few times before, but lately, it had been getting bigger. It was the reason he now kept his hat on so much. Well, that and some of Magic’s elderly residents thought he was turning into a demon.

  Sheriff Theo was his older cousin by a few months. Theo had gone through his last dragon shift transition over a year ago. Theo had warned Calix that the horn was a sign it was going to start happening to him soon. The reality was a lot more inconvenient.

  Down, he ordered his beast, when it reared up again as she came closer. The human female was a stranger, but that didn’t automatically make her dangerous. Like many of her kind, the female wore glasses to correct her imperfect vision, but Calix could see a twinkle of amusement in her chocolate eyes as she watched him. He wasn’t in any way afraid of her and wondered why his dragon had reacted like it had?

  The woman looked soft all over and definitely nothing like the men in black. After spending a whole summer and most of the fall working as Magic’s deputy, Calix had seen those meddling government agents far more than he’d expected to in his time here. More than anything else he’d been doing, dealing with the harassing visits from the men in black had shown Calix exactly why Theo had wanted another dragon to protect the town.

  “Hello, Sheriff.”

  “Deputy,” Calix corrected quickly, hoping like hell Theo hadn’t heard her with his dragon hearing. His cousin didn’t like people calling anyone sheriff but him.

  “Deputy. Right. Okay.” Lena drew in a breath. “Where’s your local mental health facility? I believe I found some escapees from it on my drive here.”

  “Escapees?” Calix repeated, his dragon horn aching when his brows rose. Magic was a town full of every kind of paranormal on Earth, and now it had aliens as well. He wanted to laugh at what the woman had said but figured the human female would get mad at him for it.

  His dragon roared to get his attention again. Shut up! Calix barked the order in his head as he willed his beast to submit to his control. He could barely hear the woman talking over his dragon snorting and roaring. His inner beast had never done that before, and it was beyond annoying. He was going to have to remember to take time to eat in the future. He wasn’t at his best when he was hungry.

  Lena stuck out a hand. “I’m sorry. I’m sure talking about escapees sounded very strange without the whole context. Let me introduce myself. I’m Dr. Lena Verglas from the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. I emailed your office not too long ago about wanting to talk to your town.”

  Calix immediately recognized her name and sent out an internal call to Theo—a dragon to dragon one—but only silence echoed back. If Theo had sent him out and stayed home to get laid this morning, Calix was going to be seriously upset at Magic’s otherwise honorable sheriff.

  Dr. Lena Verglas was yet another academic who’d set her sights on doing something experimental in Magic. Theo had assigned him to babysit the university professor when she showed up, but in the midst of a hundred other issues happening lately, both of them had forgotten about her crazy request. He and Theo hadn’t yet had time to share the news of her request with the town council… or its reigning coven.

  It wasn’t hard to see how both he and Theo could have forgotten about the silly human professor and her completely crazy idea. He’d just recently taken on being the first line of defense in thwarting the men in black’s now bi-monthly visits. Calix was certainly not looking forward to keeping tabs on the nosy human academic as well. It was just too much to expect of any dragon, no matter how committed Calix was to protecting Magic and its people.

  “I remember you now. You’re the dome woman,” he said flatly, unable to hide his frustration.

  Lena let her hand drop. “Yes, that’s right. Is my arrival a problem for you, Deputy?”

  Calix forced himself to smile. “Why would an academic who wants to burden our town with a host of strangers on a regular basis be a problem for Magic’s sworn protectors? I know Sheriff Theo loves running people like you off. I’m still new to the work, but I’m learning to like it as well. No offense—ma’am.”

  Lena’s smile became a smirk. “Progress comes to every town eventually. New people moving in means new revenue. I’m sure Magic could use the money my funding will pay as well as any other town I might consider would.”

  “Maybe so, but you best be moving on to your Option Number 2 location. Magic won’t be letting you build your whatever-you-call-it dome here.”

  “There’s no need to be overly scientific. It’s basically a snow dome,” Lena said, pushing up her glasses. “It’s a bio-dome capable of manufacturing snow and ice from recycled water.”

  “Folks won’t care. I know I don’t. If we wanted to spend a fortune on ice, we’d build a skating rink.”

  His dragon roared in protest over his mean words to her and Calix felt his eyes shift into slits as his conflicted emotions climbed high. Theo was right about the transition. He felt it coming. He hoped when it happened that his dragon would double in size like Theo’s had.

  Calix grinned when Dr. Verglas backed up while he struggled with his beast. Humans who hadn’t turned off their instincts always recognized how dangerous he was. Every creature on the Earth naturally feared dragons—with only a few exceptions as far as he knew.

  Topper didn’t seem to care what he and Theo were. His dragon stayed silent when she was around. Calix didn’t understand his beast’s reaction, but he trusted it. Theo had warned him from day one on the job not to respond to Topper’s fearlessness as a challenge unless Calix wanted to be turned into a baby donkey-dragon. So far he’d stayed completely respectful and in his natural form.

  The aliens who’d invaded Magic recently didn’t seem impressed with him or Theo either. His beast stayed on guard around them, much like it did in the presence of dragons who weren’t family. Something was unsettling about the alien’s constant politeness and levelheadedness. Calix hadn’t been able to figure out what it was about them that bothered him or his beast, but Frost, Stark, and even the very friendly Thor always triggered his senses.

  Still thinking about the odd people he was protecting, Calix glanced at the van and saw a bunch of male hands raise in greeting.

  Were the men in the van part of the crazy academic’s plan? Or were they really strangers she’d picked up on her way here like she claimed?

  It had been a hard day for him already. A van full of crazies was the last thing he needed, but what choice did he have except to deal with all of them?

  “Okay. Bring your escapees inside, I guess. Maybe Sheriff Theo will know what to do with them. I’ll lock them up until he can figure it out.”

  Lock them up? Lena swallowed her nervousness and shook her head. The Deputy’s attitude put her on edge but it didn’t change her desire to do the right thing by the men she’d rescued. The naked guys had proved to her they were not any sort of threat. They’d been perfect gentlemen with her the whole time.

  “You don’t want to do that, Deputy. Let me drop them off where they belong. I don’t mind the trouble, and they’re already in the van. Maybe I can spare you one more bad thing to handle today.”

  Her kind rebuttal brought Calix’s walking away from her to a stop. He turned back and studied her eyes to see if she was sincere. “Why would you want to go to all that trouble for a bunch of strangers?”

  Lena cleared her throat and moved closer to him. Smelling the bristling deputy’s musky cologne went instantly to her head—and her nipples. She crossed her arms to hide her reaction. “I found them out in the desert in the hundred degrees heat buck naked and talking about portals. Those poor guys can’t be right in the head, but they don’t need to be put in jail over it.”

  Calix looked at the van again and saw all the hands raise once more. “Portals? Are they well-built guys and polite as fuck?”

  Lena frowned at the rude description, dropped her arms, and nodded. “Yes. I guess that describes them well enough.”

  “Man, this day keeps getting worse and worse,” Cali
x said with a grunt while walking briskly to the van.

  He opened the sliding door on the passenger side and out climbed aliens who apparently had been counseled on who—and what—Magic’s law keepers were. No wonder his cousin had wanted another dragon as his second. Seeing his uniform, the aliens were calling out greetings and bowing before their naked Johnsons had even stopped swinging from their exit.

  Calix sighed. Dr. Verglas had nothing to worry about. Locking them up wasn’t an option. The aliens would bust out if not magically constrained and put to sleep.

  His long-suffering sigh over not being able to go to lunch after all was loud. Calix was surprised smoke wasn’t puffing from his nostrils as well. His beast was close to the surface.

  “Come on,” he said, motioning to them. “Let’s get you all inside until I can make a couple phone calls. Don’t you all wear clothes on your freaking planet?”

  “Planet?” Lena repeated, chuckling as the hunky naked guys paraded by her one by one. They each smiled and bowed their head to her before disappearing inside the Sheriff’s office. Mars was the last to go inside. He waved before disappearing.

  Calix shook his head as he watched the human female’s stunned reaction to them. She’d probably faint if she knew the truth. His mouth twisted into a wicked smile just thinking about it. “Yes, Dr. Verglas. The naked men you picked up in the desert are aliens from another planet. Can’t you tell?”

  Lena rolled her eyes at the disgruntled deputy’s teasing. It was more than obvious he was having a rough day. “Sure. Aliens. What else could they be? People where I work did warn me about the UFO sightings here in Magic.”

  His dragon roared happily about her teasing him back, and again the unsuspecting Dr. Verglas backed up. Grinning, Calix tipped his hat like he’d seen his cousin do before taking his polite leave of someone.

  “I better be getting inside and tending to them. The inn is three streets over if that’s where you’re staying. Your email didn’t say when you were coming so we never got a chance to mention you to the town.”