Page 38 of Dragon in Denial
Chapter 9
The chills woke him. Ketu’s entire body shook while his teeth clacked together like a nutcracker with nothing to bite down on.
Damn, he was freezing, despite being covered with warm, soft bedding. Why the hell…oh, yeah, that’s right.
Darius. And that fucking dragon’s blood. The scuffle, and then Darius had poured that shit down Ketu’s throat.
Reeve’s son or not, Darius needed to be dealt with. Ketu was going to kill him.
Just as soon as he could get this damn shaking under control.
The bed shifted and something warm pressed against his side as arms wrapped around his middle. A body. A feminine one. “Shh,” someone whispered near his ear. “I got you. It’s going to be okay.”
Antoinette.
He sank into her warmth, sighing as the shivering slowly subsided. Turning toward her, he nuzzled against her cheek then buried his face in the crook of her neck and drifted off to sleep again.
***
The next time he surfaced, it was to a loud growling sound. He pressed a hand to his abdomen. Holy hell, had his stomach made that obnoxious noise?
He was on his back, one arm trapped under the body sleeping next to him. He glanced over at Antoinette, whose head was on his chest, her body curled up and pressed against his.
His dick started swelling.
Ignoring it, he took stock of everything else. His head was clear, no images of his dead sister that had felt far too real. There were no overexaggerated noises. The room was dark, with a frame of dull gray light around the curtains covering the window. It was pre-dawn, maybe.
All of this was completely and blessedly normal.
The drug was apparently out of his system. Thank the gods.
His stomach rumbled again, and Antoinette’s hand slid across his quivering muscles, her fingers splayed. He sucked in a breath and held it.
She lifted her leg, draping it across his thighs. And then she rolled her hips.
Ketu squeezed his eyes shut and willed her to go back to sleep. Or to wake up and hop out of bed. Anything, anything other than continuing the sweet torture of her hand stroking the peaks and valleys his tense muscles created.
Her hand drifted lower until her fingers found that narrow muscle over his hip bone. They teased along the ridge, heading south, and, fuck, he needed to stop this before lust overrode sense and they did something they might not regret on the surface—but honestly, they needed to talk first. Acknowledge the mating before they solidified it made it permanent.
And he couldn’t mate himself to a dragon’s blood dealer.
He started to edge away from Antoinette, but her fingers dug into his flesh. He turned his head to the side. She lay there, eyes open, watching him.
“Morning,” he said, clearing the frog from his throat.
“How are you feeling?” she asked.
“Starved, but otherwise, I think it’s run its course. Thanks for staying with me. I shouldn’t have asked you to.”
“I’m glad I could be here for you.”
She kept staring at him, hardly even blinking.
“Um, we should probably get up, get something to eat, and then head over to my parents’ house.”
She hooked her leg more firmly around his thighs while her fingers danced along the elastic band on his shorts. “It’s not even dawn yet. There’s no hurry.”
“Antoinette, what are you doing?”
