“Theo?” I whisper, afraid if I say his name too loud he’ll disappear. The muscles beneath the scales shift, and then I’m eye to eye with a beast. Smoke huffs from his nostrils as he sniffs down my body. “I’m here. I’m alive. You need to come back to me.”
He nudges me backward with his snout, and a smile breaks out across my face.
“It’s me,” I repeat. “Come home.” For a moment, I believe I can detect speech, sounds with significance, but they are snatched away when my body jerks. Theo bellows his displeasure. What’s happening?
“Daphne, wake up,” Nash shouts.
I’m dreaming?
My hand strokes up the scales on Theo’s nose. “I’m coming for you. Try not to eat anyone.” He blinks down at me, and a moment later, I wake on the enormous bed with a scowling dark knight hovering over me.
“What were you dreaming about?” Nash asks.
“Dragons.” I glance around the chamber, finding a distinct lack of twins.
“Theo?” he asks.
I shrug. “I think so, but it was a dream. Where are Malachi and Hart?”
“Gathering breakfast. We thought it best if we eat up here, giving you more time to rest.”
My hands wrap around his neck, and I brush my lips against his before pulling away and noticing the light spilling through the closed curtain. “Wait, it’s morning? I meant to nap.”
“You’re exhausted. Not unreasonable, given what you’ve been through.”
“Still, there were things I wanted to do.”
His grin is as wicked as they come. “And those things aren’t going anywhere.”
My nose twitches as a soft floral scent invades it. “What is that smell?”
“I ran you a bubble bath for your back.”
I blink. “A bubble bath?” He nods. “For me?” Another nod.
Something warm and gooey expands in my chest.Love,I realize. They aren’t along for whatever wild ride a lifetime withme entails. They love me. Me, Daphne Stone, architect of the realm.
Nash’s thumbs sweep against my cheeks, spreading a dampness to my temples. “Why are you crying? You don’t have to get in the bath.”
I shake my head. “Don’t you dare.”
He leans his forehead against mine. “Then tell me why you’re crying, or the bath gets emptied.”
“You play dirty, Nash Stirling.”
His lips brush along mine, with not a signal of heat or floof-fondling times. Which—I shuffle my legs. Yep, naked as the day I was born—means this kiss is a vow. It destroys me on a different level.
“Tell me, Daphne Stone, what’s making you cry?”
“I just never imagined a future where anyone loved me for me. Where I wouldn’t have to temper myself to fit into their world and be someone who got baths run for them because their back hurts.”
“You still don’t see your own worth.”
“I do. I’m just lucky that Prince Poopfloof chose my sister to fondle.”
He pushes a strand of my hair from my forehead and tucks it behind my ear. “No, you don’t. If you did, you would know that we are the lucky ones.”
The mattress rumbles beneath us and blows out the longest groan I’ve ever heard.
