I’m going down.
9
ROARK
“Fucking hell.” Her phone clatters to the table next to my empty plate and I dive for her, catching her head before it bounces on the floor. She’s out cold. Out cold because I dug into her brain looking for the passcode of her phone. I got it, of course.
What I wasn’t supposed to do was touch the candidate before the ceremony. Now we’re fucked. And she’s passed out. This sort of thing doesn’t happen with humans. Normally I can page through their memories like an old-fashioned leatherbound encyclopedia. Though most of their brains are full of moth holes with a touch of mold. Not hers, though. Damn.
I lift her from the floor and carry her over to the table. I could put her down on the floor. Or hell, why not the table? Instead, I sit down and nestle her head to my chest while she finishes taking her little sleep. The damage is already done. There’s no reason to not continue what I started,which is mainly to find out what this candidate’s about and why the hell her phone keeps buzzing.
I haven’t had enough sleep. I flew straight through the night. The intel from my sources on the hell-bent Firested says that their queen is up to something again, that our tentative peace in the realm is about to explode into chaos—chaos that I need to shield my thunder mates from.
My dragon picks up theLunessa’sheartbeat. It’s slow and steady. Her warm breath coats my chest, and I shouldn’t, but I move my left hand from her shoulder up to her hair, holding her tight against me. There’s a zing zapping through my body, it’s like my marking on my left arm is on fire, and the way her delicate ass is pushing against my cock, I couldn’t stop it from hardening if I tried—and I’m not trying.
With my other hand, I enter her passcode. It’s the birth date of her... wren? Whatever that means—bird, I guess. I punch it in, and immediately it starts buzzing in my hand again.
There’s a string of texts from a Jeff. The last forty or fifty have all been one-sided—lots of “you up?” and “let’s meet for a drink.” I scroll backwards, all the way up to the top. In the beginning, the conversations were more two-sided. Flirty, even. Who the hell does this guy think he is, playing out of his league? But they definitely had a thing going.
Here it is, the part where Leopold must have contacted her. She tells Jeff she’s going to be out of town for six months and that if he doesn’t want to be serious with her, they should just take a break, go their separate ways. Dude takes it well at first, but then— What the hell? I stare at the phone. He sent her a pic, his chest with just the tiniest bit of his dick showing. And when I mean tiniest bit, I mean his whole tiny dick.
I don’t know what possesses me, but I hold the phone out and take a picture of her sleeping on my chest. It frames up nicely, from the bottom of my nose to my beard, her sleeping on my bare chest, my tatted arm wrapped around her. I look at it, shrug, and hit send. I don’t fucking care what I look like, but I see how the jaws of the women in the village drop when I walk by. I could wallpaper the great hall with the phone numbers that are slipped into my pocket at the local pub.
I grin at the photo, how she’s nestled against my pecks. This is the most fun I’ve had in weeks.
I put the phone down on the table just as Leopold comes in.
“Welcome home. I’ll fetch your coffee.” His eyes linger on the candidate and flick back up to me. “Is there anything I can bring Miss Fischer?” he asks.
“She’ll be fine in a minute.”
I’ve eaten half my plate of eggs and meat by the time Leopold returns. Oh, he doesn’t like the whole breakfast buffet setup.“Things are better hot, sirs,”he says.“I can make things individually. It’s not a problem.”
But the three of us don’t like all the fussing. Just putting it out is easier.
Leopold puts my coffee in front of me. I throw it back like it’s a shot of Dragon Ale, then look up at Leopold. “Do you think I could get some more eggs, please?”
He places what must be her coffee at a half-eaten plate of food and nods. “No trouble at all,” he says and vanishes into the kitchen.
That’s the thing with Ancestrals: they have more power than the highest of Fae or the Council of witches, but they use it for service. And somehow, among the lucky beasts that we are, they’ve decided that dragon shifters are worthyof them. There are plenty who have forgotten this, but dear old Leopold will outlive all of us. He’ll know my grandchildren as well as he knew Kieren’s grandmother.
I’ve cleared my plate when I realize my left thumb is absently drawing circles on her cheek and smoothing her hair. Uh oh. There have been plenty of candidates I’ve played with and plenty that I’ve excitedly watched leave. But one thing’s for certain: no matter what, she’ll be our last candidate. I’m done. If the fates don’t want to show us our mate, there’s no forcing it. We’re just wasting time here on Earth when we should be protecting Crest Wing and preparing for Kieren’s sister to take over instead of us.
Oh, she hasn’t found her mates yet, but there isn’t the same time pressure on her as there is on us. We’re an old thunder. We should have found our mate by now. And pressure never creates anything good. Fuck the whole diamond shit.
I’m surprised she’s not awake yet. I drop my other hand to her wrist, counting the beats of her heart. It’s good. From the looks of her, this one’s American. She’s quite pretty in a plain way—long legs, curves, which I appreciate—and her dark, silken hair falls around her face. There’s something about her scent that makes me want to push my nose into her hair and inhale deeply, and I don’t stop myself.
Fuck. She’s good—I’m dizzy from her scent. Well, if Kieren or Evander haven’t already claimed her as their toy, there’s nothing wrong with one last hurrah.
Her eyes haven’t fluttered open by the time I’ve finished my meal. Leopold’s brought me two more coffees, but I need rest—just like Sleeping Beauty here on my lap. When Leopold comes in to check on me again, his eyes linger longer on her.
“Where is she sleeping? Where are her quarters?” I ask.
“Across from Kieren,” Leopold says.
My eyebrows shoot up. “A little presumptuous? I wasn’t even here yet. Hadn’t laid eyes on her, let alone touched her.”
Leopold shrugs. “This one just seems right.”
