Page 5 of Her Purr-fect Christmas Mate

“Peony. Like the flower.”

“I didn’t know there were flowers called peonies.”

She colored and looked away. “Well. There are.”

“They must be beautiful.”

Her eyes met his, wide with astonishment.Is this actually going well?he dared to think.

Too soon.

Something flared in her gaze, bright and fiery and sharp—and then her eyes shuttered.

“I don’t have time for this,” she muttered. “I can’t… notnow, please. Will you just go? I can get you a taxi, an Uber, whatever you want.”

“No need.” His voice crackled with ice. “I won’t bother you any further.”

The store’s big double doors swung shut behind him as he stalked off.

Rejected.

It happened. He had little to do with local shifter communities, but his grandmother had stories. The way she told it, their whole family would have been better off if she had rejected her own matebond. If his parents had never met. If he had never existed.

Was it any surprise that his mate would find him lacking, too?

What are you doing?his dragon asked, trying to make him look back over his shoulder at his mate.Why are you leaving her?

You heard her.She wants nothing to do with us. She— Stop that. We have to keep walking.His dragon kept an iron grip on his legs. Frustration lanced through his veins.Are you doing this because I never shift into dragon form? You’re taking over my body now?

You’re leaving her!

I’m saving us both from more heartbreak,he snapped.You heard her. She lives and works at the Hypatia. I’m here to destroy it. There is no possible world in which this ends happily.His breath puffed out in wild plumes of white vapor, almost as though he was breathing smoke.

What if we didn’t destroy the Hypatia?his dragon suggested.

An old wound tugged inside him, so deep and hidden he’d forgotten he’d ever had it. Or how deep it had been to leave such a scar.This is our life’s work. Our purpose. Our family’s revenge on the people who betrayed us.He breathed out another long, slow plume of vapor.Would you like to explain to Grandmother why we failed?

No,it said hurriedly.

Well, then.His shoulders sagged.

So much for his moment of victory.

Let’s go,he told it.I have the papers in my pocket for the rest of those assholes to sign and get this whole sorry thing over with. There’s no point in delaying.

His legs still refused to move.

Dragon,he snarled in warning.

She’s still there,it said.

And if she sees me standing out here? You think that being caught lurking will make this any better?

There was no way he could explain himself to her. The reasons he had for what he was doing had been part of his life for so long he wasn’t sure he could put words to them anymore. He knew he was the villain in this story. He was the villain in every story. What else was he meant to be?

As for his inner dragon, and the magic that made him and Miss Fisher soulmates…

Peony. Peony Fisher. His beautiful mate, who smelled of flowers.

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