Page 28 of To Ignite a Dragon's Desire

This was spiraling fast.

She shrugged. “See, now you can kidnap me and declare me your mate without having to answer to any potential father figure.”

“I… I…” For the first time in centuries, I was struck speechless. Things had gotten dark.

Even for me.

“Geez.” Riley rolled her eyes. “I figured you could take a joke.”

A what?

“Never mind.” She turned and kept walking, leaving me gaping like a fish as I stared after her. “Where are we going anyway? The parking lot is in the other direction.”

11

Riley

Arts & Crafts

A craft store? Seriously?

Yep. He’d taken me to a craft store.

Lights flickered on as a generator started humming somewhere in the back.

The young male clerk, who looked barely old enough to drink, rolled down the grates behind us and addressed Lucan by his name, seemingly excited to see him. It was just like at the clothing store where the done-up female sales associate had tripped over her own heels to please the massive dragon shifter standing at my side.

It wasn’t only because he tipped well, either.

I’d seen the way she stared at Lucan’s ass. The hunger in her eyes when he smiled at her. And, yes, I might’ve held onto Lucan’s arm as we walked away to establish he was with me… for the time being.

I didn’t know why I’d done that.

Lucan wasn’t flirting back, not like Drew would’ve done. Though I’d stopped being jealous of my ex-boyfriend years ago. Right around the time I swore he started cheating on me.

But I couldn’t prove it.

It was hard to prove anything.

I did stop sleeping with Drew, holding to whatever shred of dignity I had left.

That only made things worse.

The nitpicking. The silent treatment. The mental gymnastics I had to jump through for each explosive fight, trying to maintain calm while getting screamed at and then exploding at the smug face of a man who’d listen to what I had to say if I’d just learn to “get control of myself and my emotions.”

It was easier to shut my mouth and walk on eggshells than to piss him off again.

My phone was burning a hole in my back pocket.

I’d already deleted two texts from unknown numbers, but I knew they were from Drew.

Connecting the phone to the cell booster on Lucan’s motorcycle had been a mistake.

If it wasn’t for the reminder of my past, I’d actually be having a great time today. It’d been a while since I did something nice for myself, and since Lucan was paying for the whole kidnapping thing, I didn’t feel all that guilty.

The nagging voice in the back of my head kept reminding me to enjoy this while it lasted because it was all coming to an end soon.

Thankfully, Drew had no clue where I was.

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