Page 54 of Kiss of Frost

I’d thought I knew dragons. But I only really knew Callum, and he was only eighty-one years old. He quoted Yoda and liked eighties fantasy movies about princesses. He was a modern man with a twenty-first century view of the world.

Graeme was not a modern man. He didn’t watch movies about princesses. He locked them in towers.

But maybe he could be reasoned with. “Let’s talk about this.”

“If I have to carry you down from here, I will.”

Okay, so he couldn’t be reasoned with. I drew myself up. “If you think you’re carrying me—”

“You have five seconds.”

“Have you lost your mind?”

He started toward me.

“What happened to five seconds?” I cried, backing up and bumping into the battlements. Another rough caress swiped over my back, and I half-turned and scowled at the castle. “Stop licking me!”

Graeme reached me. Before I could move, he bent and tossed me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

For a second, I was too stunned to move. Then indignation rose, and I kicked like a mule. Graeme clamped a thick arm around my thighs and kept walking. A second later, he ducked through the door and started down the staircase.

“Put me down!” I demanded. As the stairwell started to spin around me, I realized that kicking and screaming was one of those things that sounded good in theory but was difficult to implement in reality. Every step jolted my stomach, shoving breath from my lungs. Graeme’s arm banded around my thighs like a vise. My hair dangled in my face and found its way into my mouth. I spit it out as blood started to pound in my head. “Fine! I won’t go to the top of the tower.”

He didn't respond, just continued down the stairs as if he carried reluctant women over his shoulder all the time.

“I will pull the air from your lungs, dragon!”

His voice rumbled against my stomach. “If you were capable of doing that, you would have done it already.”

Dammit. He’d called my bluff. My parents had been capable of delivering on that threat, but I certainly wasn’t. I swiped at the air, trying to catch a current, but the scant wind slipped through my fingers.

As we reached the bottom of the stairs, my anger gave way to worry. Where the hell was Callum? What if he was hurt and needed my help?

“Graeme, please,” I said, letting my concern fill my voice. “I need to find Callum.”

“I’m right here,” Callum said. “What the fuck is going on?”

I pushed up as much as I could and twisted around to see Callum standing in the middle of the corridor with an arrested expression on his face. He looked a little disheveled but otherwise unharmed as he ran anxious green eyes over me.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “Did he hurt you?”

Graeme growled low in his throat. His arm tightened around my thighs as he stepped toward Callum. “Don’t ever let me hear that accusation coming from your mouth again, boy.”

Callum blinked. Then he stepped forward, a curious look gleaming in his eyes. “You’re the one holding my mate on your shoulder, and it’s pretty clear to me that she doesn’t want to be there.” Callum’s voice went silky. “Old man.”

Graeme edged forward, his growl rumbling against my stomach. “What did you say?”

I suppressed a groan. Save me from testosterone. They were seconds away from a dick measuring contest.

“You heard me,” Callum said. That inscrutable gleam in his eyes glowed brighter. “That’s my mate. Put her down.”

“The mate can speak for herself,” I said loudly, struggling against Graeme’s strong grip. For a second, he hugged my legs like a stubborn toddler might cling to a toy. Then he grunted and swung me to my feet. My head spun, and I stumbled into him as I swayed and almost lost my balance. He caught my arms, and my head ended up pressed to his chest, where his heart thumped so hard and fast it felt like it might burst through his ribs.

With a gasp, I wrenched back. “Your heart…”

He went utterly still. The anger drained from his face, and his pale eyes turned so stark and vulnerable that I swore my own heart throbbed with an echo of his pain. Slowly, I placed my hand over his sternum. His heartbeat kicked against my palm, every pulse an affirmation.

Mine.

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