I padded to the window and looked out. The city was quiet, the bustle of the day replaced with peaceful stillness. Streetlamps cast pools of golden light on sidewalks lined with shops with striped awnings. A motorcar rumbled past on its narrow tires. Music drifted from a building on the corner. The door swung open, and a man and woman emerged. Their smiles were visible even with the distance between us. The man put his arm around the woman’s shoulders and pulled her close. Her sleeveless dress fluttered around her calves, and a black feather was tucked in one side of her beaded headband.
A flapper.She looked like she’d stepped out of an old black and white movie, except she was real. At least, for now. She was exactly where she was supposed to be.
But I wasn’t.
Dropping the curtain, I went to the nightstand. The chronomancer’s bag was in the drawer where I’d left it. I carried it into the bathroom and placed it on the wide marble countertop. Then I studied my reflection in the mirror above the sink.
My hair had dried wavy, and the day’s “activities” had tousled it even more. A stubble rash faded on my neck, another on my chest. I’d slept for hours, but the sleepy, sated look in my eyes advertised exactly how I’d spent the morning.
I looked like I’d been well-fucked, which was exactly what I was.
And I didn’t know what to do about it. Because with every passing moment, it was harder to deny that Tavish and Albie were my mates. Not that I’d ever truly believed they weren’t. My dragon had known from the first moment. She’d been trying to tell me all along.
But accepting it meant accepting all the complications that came with it.
I looked at the velvet bag.
On the first jump, I’d traveled backward in time. But the second jump had sent me forward. What if the next one landed me in my own time?
What if I finally got home…and Tavish and Albie weren’t there? My hand flew to my mouth as the thought took hold.
Tavish and Albie weren’t alive in 2048. I knew every dragon shifter in the world. Thanks to my fathers’ matchmaking attempts, I’d met every unmated male of my species. But I’d never heard of a dragon shifter named Tavish Ramsay or Albie MacLean.
Because they didn’t exist in my time. They were dead, lost to the sorrow and madness brought on by the Curse.
Unless being with me changed that. Another thought crashed through me, and I gripped the edge of the sink as the floor tilted under my feet.
What if meeting me had changed the future for Tavish and Albie? I’d already interfered in their timeline, disrupting the natural course of their lives, which were supposed to end without a fated female.
Oh gods, what if I was supposed to accept their mate bond and stay in the past? I would never see my parents again. I’d never share clothes with Mum or laugh with Malcolm when wereminisced about him trying to raise a litter of kittens in his bedroom closet.
Was that really it? Two impossible choices: Reject the mate bond, see my family, and condemn Tavish and Albie to death. Or accept the bond and lose my family forever.
“Portia.”
I jumped, my heart slamming against my ribs.
Tavish leaned against the doorframe wearing nothing but a kilt slung low on his hips. Moonlight from the bedroom haloed him, turning him into the pagan god once more.
Then he ruined it by lifting a dinner roll to his mouth and tearing off half in one bite.
“Where did you get that?” I asked.
He chewed and swallowed. “The humans left it on a plate in the corridor.”
I knew my disgust showed on my face. “On the floor? You’re eating room service leftovers?”
“I don’t know what any of that means, Princess, but there’s nothing wrong with this bread.” One corner of his mouth lifted. “I worked up a fierce appetite earlier.”
My face heated, and it was an effort to keep my eyes off his chest. For one thing, there was somuchof it.
“Do you choose your clothing?” I asked, searching for a distraction. “When you shift, I mean.”
He glanced down as if just noticing what he wore. “I’m not certain how it works, if I’m being honest. It just appears.” He shoved the rest of the roll into his mouth.
Exasperation made me ask, “Do you ever stop eating?”
He smiled as he chewed and swallowed. “I fear I’m insatiable.”
