Kellan nodded, and I faced Griff, beaming at him, hands on my hips. “What next?”
He smiled back. “Well, it’s early, but why don’t we go take a tour?”
“Can I steal some clothes to sleep in?” I asked, stretching lazily in a yawn as we entered Griff’s room. “Mine are getting a bit funky. I need to do some laundry while I’m here.”
Griffin snorted. “Like Ma would let you do your own laundry. She already thinks you hung the moon. She’ll be stealing your clothes at the first opportunity. Take whatever you want out of my closet. What’s mine is yours.”
“What’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine.” I laughed, throwing a pillow at him.
“Who decided that?” he asked indignantly, batting the projectile away with ease.
“That’s my fee for saving your life,” I said, sticking my tongue out at him as he chuckled.
“I can’t argue with that. Go shower, stinky!”
After grabbing a clean pair of underwear and a large T-shirt, I took a quick shower, saving the shampooing for another time. The borrowed shirt covered my ass, and the simple black panties didn’texpose much cheek. Griffin would survive if he saw a bit of my ass, anyway. He might have joked, but we weren’t into each other like that.
Once done, we sat on the bed, passing snacks and whiskey back and forth.
“Doesn’t this remind you of the time we were lost in that shitty little town in Oklahoma?” Griffin asked with a chuckle. He was sober; alcohol hardly touched dragons, whereas this veryhumanwoman was already feeling the effects of the single-malt.
“When we raided those dinky vending machines? These snacks arewaybetter,” I declared, holding up the cookies Ma had made earlier, insisting we take some with us after I’d stitched up Kellan.
Griffin got up, grimacing. “Yeah, if memory serves, we had good ol’ Evan Williams whiskey that night.”
“Ugh, yeah. That shit gave me a killer headache the next day. You stupid dragons were doing fine, of course.”
I laughed as Griffin flopped back onto the bed, grinning up at me. “It’s not my faultyou’rea weak human.”
Faking shock and indignation, I kicked him in the side—hard. It practically bounced off him, and he just kept cackling.Stupid dragons and their stupid muscles.
“Hey! Not?—”
Griffin was cut off by the bedroom door slamming open. In the doorway stood a giant, hulking man. An Alpha. He looked around the room, nose flaring. Everything about this man screamed power, from the heavy set of his jaw to his wide stance and intense, black eyes.
One thing was clear—he waspissed.
Every single muscle in my body tensed. The guy’s eyes darted between Griff and me, taking in my semi-dressed state and the bottle of whiskey in my hand. I could feel the fury radiating off him, hot and directed right at my best friend.
“Alpha Orsen, what—” Griffin started, but the Alpha didn’tlisten. Instead, he lurched forward, barreling toward Griffin, grabbing him by his shirt and reeling his enormous fist back.
The sound of the punch was sickeningly loud.
“Griffin!” I shouted, jumping off the bed, but I didn’t dare intervene. An Alpha could easily tear me to shreds. Two dragons fighting was a messy business, and I didn’t want to be collateral damage. But this was Griffin. How was I supposed to let this guy just beat on him?
“Stop!” I called out.
This new dragon didn’t seem open to reasoning; he landed blow after fast blow, propelled by some unreasonable anger. Where was the rest of the horde? Surely there was someone who could come to Griff’s defense who wasn’t a pants-less, human healer?
The Alpha pulled back and snarled at Griffin, rage strong enough to melt steel as he growled, “What the fuck are you doing with my mate?!”
Rowan
Mate?
What the hell was he talking about, “mate”?
Griffin didn’t get a chance to reply before the Alpha grabbed him again, throwing him against the wall with a loud growl.
