Page 8 of The Dragon's Distraction

“Do you?”

I did, but anger didn’t just turn off like a tap. I understood that too. There was no point trying to calm her down. It would be a disservice to her right to feel freely. The anger would ebb naturally in its own time.

“My primary drive is to protect you. To cherish you. To make you happy. I thought I was making the best decision to achieve those things. I… I just can’t bear the thought of you living a life without love and companionship.”

“And I can’t bear the thought of never knowing what it feels like to be fully bonded with you. To always wonder what that would have been like. You are my fated mate. I only get one chance to feel that and it’s with you. If you die….”

She choked up for a moment, and I let her take her time to regain her composure. It was hard not to scoop her up and soothe her again. But I could see she needed to say this.

“Then I’d rather have experienced that and lost it than never have felt it at all.”

Her eyes met mine, and we lost ourselves in each other for a long moment.

“I understand and accept that, my dearest Sunbeam. I apologise.”

She gave her body a wiggle, as though shaking off the last of her anger.

“Good. And what is your opinion on the matter after hearing mine?”

Her eyes still glistened with tears. It was like a physical blow. I felt like a wretch. I never wanted to cause her pain like this. But her ferocity just made me even more attracted to her.

“My opinion,” I stepped towards her and moved to her ear to whisper in it.

“Is that I am going to fill you like you have never been filled up before. And then I will fuck you into oblivion, giving you so much pleasure that you don’t know who you are, or which way is up anymore. The gods themselves will envy the love that we make.”

She shivered and let out a tremulous breath. I moved away and met her eyes.

“But until then, you are just going to have to imagine it, Sunbeam.”

Her mouth drifted open, but no words came out. Her eyes wandered down to my lips. I had accepted her argument, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t torture her a little bit before giving her what she wanted. I only hoped we got a next time before everything went to hell.

Chapter 7

Lyla

It had taken me a long time to fall asleep. Thoughts of Falkon consumed me. I was exhausted. But that didn’t stop me from dashing straight to find Ella as soon as I had the chance the next day. No one knew where she was. It was lunchtime, but I knew she’d been spending time in her room having naps when she had a break. I’d been worried about her, but now I wondered if there was a different reason for it. I arrived at her door and stopped. Should I knock? Would I be interrupting something? Before I could decide, I heard a moan. A very sexual moan.

Well, that answers that question.

I turned and ran the opposite way, trying not to make any noise, giggles bursting out of me. Naughty little Ella. Not that I was one to talk after my private yoga session yesterday.

I raced across to the guard station and waved to Delaney, who was fiddling with the alarm system.

“What?”

He’d been so aggressive lately. He’d always been a pain, but he was extra intense right now.

“You ok?”

“Yeah. What do you want?”

“Oh, I need to get across to east wing for my callisthenics class. Can you unlock the main door for me, please?”

He stopped what he was doing and rummaged for his keys. Not many people moved between wings. The warden believed it was safest to keep them isolated in case of trouble. But I’d rolled out my classes across half the prison now. I’d like to have done more, but there was only one of me and many hundreds of prisoners. I glanced at the wires Delany had been tugging on.

“Alarm problems again?”

I tried to sound cheery, but Delaney glared at me.

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