Page 92 of Dragon’s Rebel

Rebel snorted. “I hated that room. I wasn’t allowed out of it at all. Every day I could see kids playing in the garden, and I begged the woman who watched me to let me go down, but she said I couldn’t.”

That was probably dead now. Everyone in the coven might be dead. She wondered if some of those kids she’d seen playing had been her cousins.

She added, “I tried my damnedest, though. I finally climbed out the window and down the drainpipe.”

Thorne gave a huff of laughter. “Of course you did.”

“They got me before I reached the garden, and I was taken before the Lady and given a stern lecture.”

“Did that make you behave?”

“Nope. I just did it at night after that. Clearly I was destined for a life of crime.”

Of course she was. “Show me,” he said.

Rebel used her abilities again, and they walked straight through the house—through the front door and across a huge reception hall, and out a back door to the terrace. There was a knee-high lawn and then acres of what must once have been fantastic gardens.

Rebel pointed up at one of the third-floor windows. “That’s the room where I stayed,” she said. “When I climbed down that night, there were no kids, but there was this private garden I’d seen from my window, all walled up like it was a secret. There were fountains, and a fish pond that sparkled in the sun. I’d gotten kinda kid-obsessed with it, so I set off into the garden to find it.”

“All by yourself?” He was impressed.

“Yeah. I was never scared of the dark. I liked the night. And I felt like an adventurer in a fairy tale, going to find the magic garden and get the treasure.”

“So you did read fairy tales.”

A frown creased Rebel’s forehead. “Yeah,” she said. “I guess I did. I must have stopped after everything went to hell, and I figured out there was no happily ever after.”

That sent a shard of pain through Thorne’s heart. “I wish I could give you a happy ending,” he said.

She put both hands on his chest and tilted her head up, pressing a light kiss to his lips.

“I don’t know,” she said. “It seems like I was born into a fairy tale, whether I knew it or not. Maybe someone in it gets a happy ending.” She stroked his hair back from his forehead. “I hope it’s you.”

He wrapped his arms around her and held her against him. The only way they could both have their happy ending was for her to fall totally, completely in love with him. And he still wasn’t sure that would happen.

He kissed the top of her head and moved away from her. “So did you find your secret garden?”

Rebel nodded.

Thorne looked at her face, soft with remembering. “Okay,” he said. “Show me where it is. If you were so drawn to that place, maybe that’s where we start.”