Page 79 of To Match A Dragon's Fire

A look of horror flashed over his eyes. It wasgone so quick I would’ve missed it if we weren’t sharing the same breath space. “It’s a—”

“Do you mean friend?” I cut him off, trying to understand.

Words were important. And I wasn’t normally this grammatically correct, but we weren’t in a friendzone position right now, not with his length pressed against me and my hands sliding up the rough fabric of his shirt, needing to feel the skin underneath.

The low rumble of his laugh had bumps raising on my skin as he closed the distance between us, speaking against my lips. “No. I mean mate as in mated partner. You’re mine. My lover. My future. My forever. The woman made for me. There’s no one else but you, and there never will be.”

Whoa. That was a lot.

I knew I should take a step back and process this, to think through what this really meant. My body was on board, but my heart was....

You know what?

Screw it.

Life was short and I didn’t want to waste whatever time I had left by not taking a second chance on love.

“So, what does that mean?” I asked, still staring into his beastly eyes. “What does forever look like for a dragon?”

“It means I claim you and bind us together. Then you’ll never be rid of me again. That I can never leave you because doing so would be to tear out my own heart and bleed to death.”

Mymouth popped open in a silentObefore his lips crashed into mine.

I was old enough to embrace this intensity, to meet it with a response of my own, so I kissed him back like I was dying and he’d be the last breath I took.

In a poetic way, that was our reality.

The earth trembled beneath us as we kissed. Really, it shook. We broke apart with a groan.

I was so tired of earthquakes.

Kieran let out a frustrated growl as he pressed his forehead against mine, breathing heavy. “We’ll make this work.”

“I sure hope so.” I winked at him, ready to accept whatever came next despite the worry he seemed to be feeling.

I blamed the economy for my point of view. When things were this bad, it didn’t pay to question something good. Whatever a dragon/human pairing looked like, I was down for the ride.

I was just about to tell him that when the sound of a man yelling from the caves stopped the words on my tongue.

That voice messed with my nervous system, making my muscles clench and teeth grind.

“Tony is here.”

Kieran smiled as he let go of my hand, taking a step back and offering his arm like a perfect gentleman. “Surprise.”

∞

The coolness of the cave washed away the afternoon heat. Shadows danced before us, chased off by the beam of my flashlight.

Kieran’s hand in mine was an anchor through the darkness until we entered the open cavern on the right where he lit a lantern.

My stomach bottomed out at the sight.

“Ember!” Tony croaked my name with cracked lips.

His sheriff’s uniform was ripped open. Filth and blood coated his exposed skin. His belly was much larger than it’d been when we were together and more facial hair covered his dirty face.

“Get me out of here,” he begged.

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