“They weren’t given to him,” she reminded him.
He gave a short, knife-sharp smile. “Whether given directly, or he intercepted them on their way to you, makes no difference. They are his.”
“On their way to me—” She swallowed. “I thought it was only the necklace. But all this … how long has this been going on?” She looked down at Tomás and tried to stop her voice from trembling. “How long have you had all these treasures, sweetpea?”
Tomás blew out his cheeks. “Hoo!”
“I last visited my clan’s vaults after—some months ago.” There was a strange bitterness in his words and Maya wondered whether he’d been about to sayafter you left.Her breath caught in her throat. He continued, his voice eerily calm. “There was nothing missing then.”
“So they knew I had left, and they—whoever they are—” She stopped before her unsteady voice upset Tomás again.
Corin’s expression was veiled. “Someone has known all this time where you were, and sent you piece after piece of the most precious treasures from my family’s hoard.”
For a dragon, that had to count as a deadly insult. “Why?”
His jaw worked. “If you’d seen these as they arrived, you would have been terrified. One after the other, and you had no idea where they were coming from.”
But she hadn’t been terrified when she thought they’d come from him. She was terrifiednow, sure, but… “I would have blamed you.”
“And when the next one arrived?”
The tightness in her throat retreated. She frowned. “I would have confronted you about it already, so I would already know it wasn’t you sending them, and—we’d be in the exact position we are now!” She gestured, wide-eyed, only then taking in the ridiculousness of the situation: her with her baby dragon and a ratty old suitcase of priceless treasure in her lap, her ex-boss sitting opposite. On the floor of her son’s nursery. Way too close to the greasy spot on the rug where Tomás had spent an industrious morning rubbing cookie dough into it.
She should have tried harder to wash that out.
But that was only her guilty surface thoughts talking. Behind them, her mind was ticking away, falling back into the familiar routine of sifting through Corin’s business dealings and upcoming meetings to divine hidden dangers. Even before she’d known he was a dragon shifter, she’d known that there was more going on in his world than could be seen on the surface.
She’d assumed then that it was just normal, ego-driven business bullshit, but now…
“They wanted you here,” she said slowly.
“What?”
“However long it took, however many pieces of treasure they had to send here after they stole them, they wanted to draw you out here.”
The fire in his eyes changed. “Then I shall give them what they want.”
“But—”
“They made you part of their plot. I left you unprotected. I will not do so again.”
His words still echoed in her head an hour later. Tomás, worn out by a morning of horrible bananas and showing off his hoard to a big, strange dragon, had exploded with exhaustion. Now he was asleep, the house rang with silence.
And there was nothing to distract her from what Corin had said.
She crept down the stairs. Corin was waiting at the bottom; she’d banished him to the living room when Tomás announced his loud and immediate need for a nap, and he’d gone. Almostmeekly.
I left you unprotected. I will not do so again.
His words made her squirm. They made her want what she could never have. What he certainly didnotwant.
He didn’t even want to be here. The only reason he insisted was staying was the treasure. And everything about leaving her unprotected, or whatever, was just … more draconic bullshit. It had to be. She washisex-employee, and that meanthecould mess with her, but no one else was allowed. Leaving her unprotected was like … like leaving his side open. Forgetting to guard a weakness against an opponent.
Yes. That must be it. It was totally fine for him to chase her across the country, but anyone else, nuh-uh.
God, he was such a—such a…
She should have finished that thought before she opened the door to the living room, because once she caught sight of him, there was only one way it could end.
