Page 23 of Driven By Dragonblood
Chapter 9
Primrose
The exhaustion of staying out until the middle of the previous two nights kept me abed until close to ten the next morning. Heart racing and a small smile on my lips, I readied for the day to meet my mate, taking care to cleanse myself thoroughly. Freshly showered and hair gleaming, I walked to the hospital a few minutes before noon.
For the first time in my life, my knees weakened from the shots of adrenaline my human body insisted on releasing whenever I thought of my beta. We would soon be together, never again to be separated. Together, we would locate our alpha.
But in the meantime, I would finally find out what kissing felt like, what a man’s physical touch did to a woman, and he would teach me all of the sexual positions I had read about in some of the racier books in my family’s massive library deep in the bowels of my ancestral home.
Warmth sprang to life between my thighs, and I wondered again over the power of my first orgasm. How much better would it be with him rutting between my legs?While I knew enough to expect some pain, I looked forward to giving myself to him with the fierceness of a dragon.
I made my way down the sidewalk, cloaked and invisible to the humans I passed. My smile faded as I neared the hospital without the expected tether of energy radiating from the eastern wing. Alarm skittered down my spine, and my inner dragon held her breath along with me, with every step bringing us closer to Lockwood.
The gate remained closed as usual, but with people constantly coming and going through the daylight hours, slipping past once it opened to allow a car entry was easy. Hesitant steps took me closer to the front doors, the lack of awareness of my beta causing a riot of questions in my mind.
Had he been hurt and sedated? Became violent and attempted to escape, causing the doctors to medicate him?
Or was he no longer here…
I’d planned to sneak into my beta’s wing, slipping past the first doctor to enter his room, and wait until they exited before announcing myself.
I expected my beta would need a lot of explanation for the sudden appearance of a woman he would doubtless feel a connection to, and I planned on honesty, hiding nothing, hoping he would be able to read the truth within my eyes of who and what we were to each other.
While I’d never had to cloak anything bigger than a duffle bag clasped to me, I hoped to adjust to rippling my capabilities through our clasped hands so we could walk out as easily as I would enter.
I bounded up the front stairs, skirting two people exiting to slip past them through the automatic doors into the reception area, and still no hint of my beta’s energy reached toward me. The air smelled of bleach and a sickening odor that reminded me of food but didn’t tempt my mouth to water. Nose wrinkled, I scanned the entryway, hoping for mymate’s senses to flood over me. Surely, if he’d been medicated and was unaware, I would still be able to smell him with my dragon’s heightened senses I called forth.
Nothing teased at my nose or enticed me deeper into the hospital’s bowels.
My inner beast whimpered her concern, an echo of the ache in my heart.
I turned toward the eastern wing where he’d been imprisoned, my steps a little more sure even though I feared what I might find. The third door from the end of the hallway stood open, a cart with cleaning supplies parked beyond. I pulled up on the threshold to find a man in white humming beneath his breath and balling up linens he’d removed from the closest mattress where its bed stand sat empty.
A few personal belongings lay on the one beside the far bed, pristinely made with tucked edges and taut blankets.
I stepped back as the man drew near, but lifted my nose to breathe in the scent of the linens he carried past me and tossed into the hamper on his cart.
Yessss.
The scent of my beta’s cum wafted past, filling my lungs. Musky and sweet—and insanely arousing. My knees went weak as wetness roused to life in my core.
Still humming, the man walked off, pushing his squeaky cart, and I slipped into the room he hadn’t locked behind him. No physical trace of my beta remained, but I felt certain the stripped mattress had belonged to him.
Had he been given his freedom?
Hurrying back into the hallway, my mind raced and heart beat faster thanks to another shot of adrenaline through my system.
I’d only just found my beta—I couldn’t lose him so quickly.
Driven by need, I rushed toward the reception area.Tension riddled my body, hands fisted at my sides, and tears stinging my eyes as I stood before the receptionist’s desk. Stairs led down and up in the back wing, and double doors on my left allowed entrance into the western wing.
From my outside strolls, I knew another building connected to the far side of that wing. Inhaling until it hurt didn’t reveal a hint of my beta, only more of the sickening smells from the cafeteria, which my nose led me to believe lay straight ahead. Regardless of that part of the hospital’s stench, I began my mission of traversing the entire campus, combing through every room in search of what belonged to me.
I started beyond the receptionist, first and second floors, then the basement area, my hope slowly sliding toward despair with every passing second.
Next, I entered the western wing, performing the same type of sweep, often having to wait what seemed an eternity to enter the doors leading to various public rooms. TVs, game tables, couches, and dozens of people, including two males with inner dragons whispering to me as they stared out windows, blank eyes revealing empty souls. A dark-eyed female jerked her head toward the door when I slipped inside, but not feeling my beta’s presence, I fled before two seconds passed and our dragons could communicate with each other.
My shoulders sagged and my feet dragged, but I wouldn’t leave without searching every last room. While quite a few had been locked—bedrooms included—I didn’t need to do more than sniff at the doorjambs to know if my beta lay within.
