Page 40 of Ash and Burn

For now, he would simply hold her.

In the silent dark, with her warmth seeping into his bones, he allowed himself to believe that forever was not just a dragon's desperate dream. It was a possibility that was sleeping safely in his arms.

FIFTEEN

ARVID

Arvid woke up to something she had never experienced before—profound safety. Not the brittle, controlled safety of her apartment in Dallas, where every surface remained spotless and every routine stayed predictable. This was different. This was the bone-deep contentment of waking in strong arms that had held her through the night, of breathing in the scent of spice and clean rain and masculine warmth, of feeling her heartbeat sync with his in a rhythm that felt ancient and inevitable.

For three years, she had built a life around survival. Functional. Manageable. Enough to get through each day without examining whether those days added up to anything resembling happiness. But this morning, wrapped in Calix's embrace with dawn light filtering through the windows of his sanctuary, she suddenly understood the difference between existing and living.

She had admitted to him last night that she was falling in love with him. The words had tumbled out, honest and raw and completely unlike her usual careful control. But lying there in the aftermath, feeling the steady rise and fall of his chest beneath her cheek, she knew it was more than falling. She had already landed, heart-first, in territory she had sworn never to explore again.

Calix noticed everything about her. Not just her competence or her usefulness—though he valued those too—but the way she took her coffee, the way she worked through problems by pacing, the way she needed silence to think and food when she forgot to eat. He anticipated her needs before she recognized them herself. He saw the flawed woman beneath the scientist, the pure heart beneath the armor, and he seemed to want it all.

Maybe, after she solved this outbreak, she could stay longer. See where this impossible connection led. The thought made her chest tight with equal parts longing and terror, but for once, she felt brave enough to want something beyond mere survival.

Movement beneath her cheek drew her attention upward. Calix's eyes opened, meeting hers immediately, and the smile that spread across his face was devastating in its warmth. It was the kind of smile that could make a woman forget her own name, the kind that promised mornings just like this one, stretching into a future she had never dared imagine.

Dangerous thinking, she warned herself.

But the warning felt hollow when what she wanted was right here, solid and real and looking at her like she was his salvation.

"How did you sleep?" His voice was rough, intimate in a way that sent heat curling through her belly.

"That was the most peaceful sleep I've ever had."

His smile widened, but something shifted in his eyes—a flicker of nervousness that seemed out of place. "I have something I need to tell you, and I can't wait another minute."

The tension in his deep voice made her stomach flutter with unease. They had already shared so much—his loneliness, the deaths of his father and brother, the betrayal with Sarah.

What could possibly remain that would make him look so carefully guarded?

"What is it?" she asked softly.

"Remember when you asked about fated mates the other night?" he said, choosing his words carefully.

"Yes. That sounded pretty intense," she replied, her voice tinged with confusion.

"Well, I wanted to tell you that night, but I wasn't sure how you would react. But I need to tell you now." His green eyes held hers steadily. "Arvid, you are my fated mate."

She sat up instantly, pulling back from his embrace, the sheet clutched against her chest as if it could shield her from the implications of what he had just said.

"How can you be so sure?" Arvid said, her voice coming out slightly breathless.

"A dragon knows instantly when his mate touches him. That first day when we met and I grabbed your suitcase, the mate bond activated. I knew you were my fated mate immediately."

She scrambled to her feet, wrapping the sheet around herself like armor. Her mind raced, connecting dots she had been too distracted to see before. The way he had reacted like he was overwhelmed. The way she felt drawn to him. The strange sense of recognition. The intensity that defied logic or time.

"That seems impossible," she said firmly.

"No." He sat up, his voice taking on that commanding edge. "It's very possible, and it's very real. And I was hoping you would choose me. Choose to accept my mate mark. Because I choose you. All of you."

The mate mark. Forever. Bound together with no possibility of escape. Her chest constricted, and suddenly the room felt too small and the air too thin.

"But you said that would bind us together forever. That it can't be broken."

"That's right." His voice gentled, but the certainty remained. "I was hoping you would choose forever with me."