Page 27 of Dragon's Revenge

Sivney waited until he was certain he had himself under control again. “Erwan told us you haven’t been king long.”

“Coming up on three months now.”

“None of this is on you.”

“Technically not, but that doesn’t make it any easier. And Gregor blames himself for not doing more.”

Sivney sighed. “There’s a lot of that going around. He should talk to Erwan and his brothers. They know a thing or two about guilt.” Then he winced. “Though maybe not right now, not while Rhene is still missing.”

“You have no idea what’s going on?”

Sivney looked around to make sure no one was within hearing distance. “Our current theory is that the dragon slayers are behind it.”

“The dragon slayers? You mean Duff Bás?”

Sivney did a sharp intake of breath. “You know him?”

“I know about him, and so does Gregor. He’s the last one standing, the last remaining dragon slayer. All the others have been killed. And he’ll do anything to go down in a blaze of glory and take as many dragons with him as possible.”

ChapterEleven

Oliver had gathered all his courage and asked Adar and Delton to dinner. Much to his surprise, they had accepted. That had only induced the next round of stress, of course, as he worried over what to make. Should he go all-out and fancy and make them a five-course meal? The chances of that backfiring were big though. It was very easy to fuck something up in that scenario, plus it would communicate certain expectations. Besides, they weren’t five-course-dinner people.

No, he needed something simple but yummy. Something filling—Adar ate twice as much as Delton and Oliver combined—and homey. Something that showed Oliver could cook without venturing into pretentious territory. And boy, that was a lot to put on the shoulders of one meal, but he couldn’t help it.

In the end, he’d settled on pasta with meatballs. Adar loved pasta. Delton had mentioned once he liked Italian, and Oliver’s homemade red sauce and Italian meatballs had gotten a lot of praise from the others. His roommates had graciously excused themselves and found solace elsewhere so they could have privacy, and Oliver was as ready as he could possibly be when Adar and Delton arrived at the same time, albeit fifteen minutes after their expected arrival time.

“Sorry we’re late,” Delton said.

“It was my fault,” Adar said. “The new dragon omegas arrived, and I got caught up in running extra security checks. I’m sorry.”

An alpha who apologized. Would Oliver ever get used to that? He doubted it. “It’s no problem. I waited to cook the pasta until you guys were actually here so it would be fresh. The sauce only gets better the longer it simmers.”

Adar’s eyes lit up. “We’re eating pasta?”

“That was a lot of words,” Delton said at the same time. “I’m proud of you.”

Then, they each swiveled their head to look at the other before chuckling.

“There, in a nutshell, is the difference between you and me,” Adar said.

“You mean you’re food-oriented and I’m people-oriented?” Delton joked and how Oliver loved seeing this easy camaraderie between them. He kept quiet, not wanting to interrupt it.

“That’s one way of looking at it. I was gonna say you always notice things I don’t, like you have this ability to somehow see beyond the obvious. I mean, I heard pasta, and you heard Oliver speaking.”

Delton took Adar’s hand. “Both are fine.”

“Well, that’s debatable.”

“Nope, it’s not. If everyone was like me, nothing would ever get done since we’d all be analyzing everything to death.”

Adar blinked. “I hadn’t looked at it like that, which proves my point.”

“And with that meta-analysis, let’s refocus on Oliver,” Delton said with a grin. “Well done on the talking, baby.”

Baby. Oliver’s night was already a success with that single word. As long as Delton kept calling him that, everything would be okay. “Thank you. It’s easier with you two. Not as much pressure.”

“That makes me very happy,” Delton said.

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