“Be quick with it because like you. . .I’ve realized with every fiber in my body that I am maddeningly, insanely in love with you. . .in a way that has no boundaries. No morality. No fucking conscience. Nor guilt or logic. And it is not a calm feeling in my heart. It is a storm. Wild. Raging. Constantly craving more.”
The dragon-shadow’s gold eyes glowed.
I shivered.
“And there’s nothing I wouldn’t do. Nothing. To make sure that it remains.”
“You willnotkill her.”
He tilted his head and watched me. Part of me was scared that in his head he decided to kill her anyway.
The dragon-shadow left the ceiling, lowered a foot, and studied me too.
Both of their eyes on me at once. The man's brown gone almost black, dark as river stones beneath deep water. The dragon-shadow's molten gold, ancient, magical, and mysterious.
The man and the beast.
The lover and the killer.
The two halves of the same impossible love.
Pinned beneath the weight oftheirgaze, my breath went shallow. My heart hit my ribs hard enough to bruise. My skinwarmed everywhere at once, like every nerve had risen to the surface to be witnessed.
I had never been looked at like this in my entire life.
Studied like a sacred thing.
Guarded like a treasure they would burn cities to keep.
Held by two sets of eyes that were really one set of eyes, because the man was the beast and the beast was the man, and both of them belonged to me.
They were both mine.
And I was theirs.
The dragon-shadow lowered its enormous head closer until I could feel its presence as cool weight against my chest, settling there like a guardian. Its breath, if shadows breathed, was the breath of a creature too vast to fear anything alive.
And it was breathing for me.
Watching for me.
Waiting for me.
Meanwhile, the Dragon's mouth was a careful line, but his eyes held a hunger I recognized now.
The hunger to protect.
The hunger to keep.
The hunger to make sure his Tiger would never know terror again unless he was the one giving it to her.
I felt the obsession of it. I felt the worship of it. I felt every second of being chosen by a creature whose every choice carried the weight of fate, and a man who loved beyond measure.
A tremble started at the base of my spine and rolled all the way up.
I was wanted.
Watched.
