Page 43 of To Match A Dragon's Fire

Laughter and footsteps drifted away. I rolled my head to the side, still trying to fully wake up.

Soft light filtered through the screen of an open window. I lay on a cot in a row of cots covered with clean white sheets in a long room.

“She’s awake.” Riley’s face filled my field of vision. The bruise had faded, but there were dark circles under her eyes.

Still, seeing her was a relief. She was the only one of us with medical knowledge. I trusted her with my life. If Riley was here, I’d be okay.

“Do I look awful?” My voice cracked as I spoke.How long has it been since I used it?

I sat up, moving slowly as I tried to take inventory of my body. Riley guided the straw of a cup into my mouth.

Besides the soreness in my throat, I felt okay. Actually, better than okay. My back didn’t hurt like it normally did when I woke up in the morning.

“You look well-rested,” Riley said as I sipped the cool water.

“How long was I out?” I looked over to Willow, who stood at the other side of the bed. Her face twisted with worry as she swiped through her phone.

“It’s been three days.” Willow glanced up.

“Three days?” I coughed, trying to climb out of bed. There was so much we still had to do. But I needed to figure out if—

“Stop moving.” Riley pressed me back against the pillows. “I guess almost dying played on Mr. Tall-Dark-And-Handsome’s heartstrings. He stocked the pantry in the cabin and gave us free rein of his gardens.”

“He’s letting us use his Wi-Fi too,” Willow’s voice was strained as she put away her phone. “Em, it’s bad out there. They did it. Portland is under martial lawand almost every other major city too. There was an eight-pointer in D.C. the other day. Washington is leveled. The White House just crumbled under the pressure.”

“We left right in time,” Riley sounded relieved, but I pretended not to see the conflict on her face. I hated that Drew had been right about one thing.

And I didn’t have the heart to tell them that we might have to leave here too. “Has Kieran asked for anything?”

If he did, I’d have to give it to him.

Riley shook her head. “We weren’t sure why he was being so nice until he told us you were here. Did he do anything to you?”

“He did not,” I growled, fed up with lying down. I crossed my legs underneath me and sat upright. “But those bastards in town set a trap for outsiders and I drove right into it like an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot,” Riley rushed to say—a little too quick to be believable.

I glanced at Willow. She leaned out the doorway, looking down the hall.

“Did you let Harper go with him?” I wasn’t trying to mom shame her, but my anxiety was ramping up. Until I knew what his angle was, I didn’t want to be in anyone’s debt.

Though technically I already was.

Damn it.

“She went with his cook. Agatha is a sweet lady.” Willow turned to smile at me, lowering her voice to add, “Don’t worry, no one here is going fast enough to cause any harm.”

I didn’t have time to ask what that meant.

Riley moved to the head of the cot, making room for a frail old woman in a matching pink tracksuit under a white lab coat to come to my side. Her outfit looked so out of place that I wondered if she put the coat on just for my benefit.

“Our patient is awake.” Her blue hair was rolled into tight little curls and glasses hung on a beaded chain above her braless chest. “Took you long enough.”

Riley narrowed her eyes as I choked on a laugh. No-nonsense old people were my favorite. I loved serving them at the bar. That was the best part about aging, something that some never achieved.

I couldn’t wait to skip over the line of not caring what anyone else thought. I was hoping it’d be after menopause when my body stopped trying to do all the things.

My breeding hormones hadnothelped me make the best decisions in my life, and I couldn’t wait to be done with them too.

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