Maya’s heart was in her throat. “Has he told you why he’s here?”
“Only that he wants to talk to you.” Apollo waved a hand airily. Sparks followed the gesture. “Also some stoic rumblings about making things right, but I didn’t pay any attention to that.”
Making things right? What didhehave to make right? She was the one who’d run away with stolen goods. “How did he get here?”
“He flew in, the show-off.”
Apollo didn’t mean on a plane. Maya frowned. “Isn’t that dangerous?”
Felicity wiggled her fingers. “He has this shadowy magic that kept him hidden in the clouds. And once he was in town, our magic kept him hidden from anyone outside, of course.”
Maya had no interest in keeping a mental spreadsheet of what she knew about Corin’s magic, but she filled it in, anyway. A dragon shifter with ‘shadowy magic’. As opposed to Apollo, with his sparkling hearthfire magic. And the only other dragon she knew of, Felicity’s old boss Montfort, with his classic ‘breathe a lot of fire’ magic.
Trepidation trickled down her spine and she looked down at Tomás. Just the fact that he could transform into a dragon was enough, wasn’t it? Would he have more magic, too?
“Shadowy magic,” she repeated uneasily.
“Alas for him, it did not keep him hidden fromourmagic.” Apollo pulled Felicity close and kissed the top of her head. “I wondered if we would have an opportunity to practice throwing invaders out again—but he was surprisingly polite. Knocked on the perimeter and sat waiting with his tail around his paws until we answered the door.”
If he can fly in dragon form safely, why did he chase me in human form?Maya had fled in her car after Tomás stole the watch from Corin’s desk. He’d followed in his own vehicle. If he’d flown, she never would have escaped.
She gnawed her lower lip, troubled.
Did he not want to catch me?
Apollo misread her hesitation. “He’s here on sufferance,” he reassured her.
“Yeah. If he upsets you, he suffers,” Felicity said with a wicked grin.
Maya smiled weakly. “Thanks, both of you.”
“If you’d like some backup in there—”
“No. But could you look after Tomás? I’d like to talk to him alone.”
She opened the door and went through.
And forgot how to breathe.
Maya spent half her evenings at Felicity and Apollo’s place, sharing an early dinner before walking home with a sleepy dragon toddler over her shoulder. She’d sat at this table more times than she could count. She’d sat there surrounded by friends, by magic she’d never dreamed of, and frequently covered in a thin paste of whatever Tomás had been eating.
But seeing Corin there…
Had the kitchen gotten smaller since she was last here? Or was it just that Corin Blackburn could loom even when he was sitting down?
It took all her resolve not to hesitate in the doorway. She forced her pace to stay even as she walked in and sat down at the dining table opposite him.
Her pulse thudded in her throat. He was exactly the way she remembered him, exactly how he appeared in her goddamn dreams. Even when he wasn’t moving, there was a sense of restrained power in every angle of his tall, athletic body. His black hair was swept back from his face, drawing attention to the sea-glass shimmer of his eyes. She’d seen those eyes sharpen with interest or humor, darken with frustration—but they’d always seemed somehow veiled when he looked at her.
Not now. Now, they were piercing.
He’s here. For me.She couldn’t think of anything else. Even if it wasn’t true.
Itcouldn’tbe true.
“Mr. Blackburn,” she said coolly.
“Miss Flores.” His eyes had snapped onto her the moment she set foot in the room. The fire in them was banked, but she knew it could flare up at a moment’s notice.
