Page 12 of Dark Dragon’s Mate

All that silky blond hair that begged him to slide his fingers through it, wrap it in his fist and pull her head back to kiss the pulsing vein in her throat.

Cornflower-blue eyes filled with sassy perverted humor and… a deep-down goodness. Caring.

And a love of romantic Earth books about dark brooding men in lonely castles. True love. And happily ever after.

All wrapped around that tantalizing darkness inside. The killer. The wolf.

His dragon didn’t know what to make of her.

Neither did he.

But he knew he was going to browbeat the chef into whipping up a formal dinner in under an hour.

And he’d better send someone to tell Tristan Barnes and the Reillys that they were expected for dinner too. More people, to keep him from doing something really crazy, like shoving the dinner on the floor and getting Trish naked on the huge dining table.

Fuck. Stop thinking about that.

Maybe he should invite Mayah too. He wouldn’t lose control if she were there. Probably. Hopefully.

He hoped she’d be well enough to come. He wished he knew what was causing these episodes. She’d seem to be getting better, and then for no reason she’d have a total meltdown, complete with hallucinations.

Her dragon had receded deep inside her—she didn’t even Change anymore. They were both wasting away—him from his physical wound, and her from her mental ones.

He had to save her. All these years, since he was three years old, he’d protected his little sister. It was the only accomplishment he had to be proud of in his whole damn life.

If she slipped away into the darkness, his entire existence would have been worth nothing.

He went upstairs to his study and pulled out his in-house communicator, a round golden ball about two inches in diameter, powered by magic.

He called the kitchen and put in his dinner order, cutting off the chef when the sputtering, complaining, and cries of “But this is impossible” got too boring.

Then he sat down in his desk chair with a sigh, running his hand through his hair.

He was still buzzing from the storm lightning. It charged him up, gave him back some of the energy the wound was sapping from him. It was a temporary fix, but it should last for a few days, maybe a week.

Hell, he should get Silverlake to send him one of the generators they were using to power their research equipment, and just hook himself up to that.

Graft some scales from a river raka onto his wound, and turn himself into FrankenDragon, like that movie he’d watched with Flynn and Kira and Xander.

If only that would work.

There was a hollow, musical sound, and the larger communicator on his desk lit up. He sighed and plucked the ball out of his stand.

“Al-Maddeiri here,” he said. “Whatever the fuck you want, can’t it wait until tomorrow?”

A disgruntled voice came back. “Oh, am I disturbing your exalted Highness? So sorry I didn’t have time to call during business hours. I was busy slaving away in your mine, adding to your great wealth and earning my own pittance.”

Emon rolled his eyes. “Zakerek,” he said. “What do you need to whine about today?”

Zakerek and his two cohorts were Wild Dragons who had once worked for Ragnor, the evil fucking wizard who’d held Emon and Mayah prisoner here for decades.

The red dragon’s face appeared on the surface of the communicator. “Me?” he said. “I’m not the one who left a message whinging about losing a couple of mangy sheep, and accusing us of taking them.”

“It wasn’t a couple of sheep,” Emon said. “It was nineteen. Two were pregnant ewes, and several were slated for shearing.”

“Whatever,” Zakerek said. “We still didn’t do it, being ever so happy to subsist on the scraps you so graciously give us.” Sarcasm dripped from his voice.

Emon growled. “Don’t piss me off, Wild Dragon. Just because I didn’t kill you after the battle, doesn’t mean I can’t do it now.”