And God, had I.
“You’ll live as long as he does,” Cinder had said, his voice matter of fact in that way people got when they’d already processed something earth-shattering and come out the other side. “The mate bond changes you. Not overnight—it’s gradual. But your body will match his timeline eventually. Dragons aren’t immortal, but they live for hundreds of years. Taz is over five hundred.”
I’d nearly dropped my beer.
“What about my family?” I’d asked, and my voice had cracked on it because that was the thing, wasn’t it? That was the price.
Cinder had been quiet for a moment. “That’s the hardest part,” he’d admitted. “I won’t lie to you about that. Your mom, yourbrothers—they’ll age. You won’t. Not at the same rate.” He’d taken a sip of his beer, his eyes distant. “But your brothers are older than you. You’ll have decades with them. And when you reach whatever age your body decides to settle at—could be your forties, could be later—that’s what you’ll look like. Forever. Or there abouts.”
“Forever,” I’d repeated.
“Yeah.” Cinder had looked at me then, really looked, and something in his expression was both kind and unflinching. “Every so often, dragons have to move. Reinvent themselves. New city, new names sometimes, new lives. It sounds terrifying, and honestly? It is, at first. But you won’t be playing hockey then either. You’ll have had your career, had your time. And then you get to figure out what comes next. Together.” He’d smiled. “And you will always have all of us.”
“Does it get easier?” I’d asked. “The knowing?”
“No,” Cinder had said honestly. “But it gets worth it. Every single day, it’s worth it.”
I lay there now, feeling Theron’s heartbeat against my spine—steady, strong, alive—and thought about centuries. About watching my brothers grow old while I stayed the same. About leaving Denver someday, starting over somewhere new, being someone else on paper but always beinghis.
It should have terrified me.
It didn’t.
Because the alternative was not having him at all, and I’d seen what that looked like. Had lived through those hours in that chair, those endless minutes believing he was dying in a room full of poison. Nothing—no amount of time, no sacrifice, no complication—was worse than that.
Theron stirred behind me, his arm tightening, his nose pressing into the curve of my neck. I felt the exact moment hewoke up—the shift in his breathing, the way his body went from relaxed to aware in the space of a heartbeat.
“Morning,” I murmured.
His response was a low rumble against my skin—not quite words, more like his dragon acknowledging me before his human brain caught up. His hand spread flat against my stomach, thumb stroking lazy circles.
“How long have you been awake?” His voice was rough with sleep, that particular gravelly echo that did things to me I wasn’t prepared to examine this early.
“A while. Thinking.”
“About?”
“Centuries.” I turned in his arms so I was facing him, and the sight of him—sleep-soft, hair a mess, those gray eyes still half-lidded—made my chest ache. “Cinder told me. Last night. About the bond. About how long—” I swallowed. “About time.”
Something careful moved across his expression. “And?”
“And I’m terrified,” I admitted. “About my family. About watching them—” I couldn’t finish that sentence. “But I’m not scared of the rest of it. Of being with you. Of whatever comes next.”
His hand came up to cup my face, his thumb tracing the edge of the bruise on my jaw that was already fading to yellow-green. “I was going to tell you today. All of it. Everything.”
“I know. And you will. But right now, I just—” I leaned forward and kissed him, morning breath and all, because I needed to. Because after everything we’d been through in the last week, I needed to feel him alive and whole andhere.
He kissed me back slowly, thoroughly, like we had all the time in the world. Which, apparently, we did.
When he pulled back, his eyes were fully open now, that faint copper glow warming the gray like embers banked in ash. Helooked at me the way he had in the kitchen two days ago—like I was something he couldn’t quite believe was real.
“You’re sure,” he said. Not a question, exactly. More like he needed to hear it one more time.
“I’m sure.” I ran my fingers through his hair, marveling at how it had already started growing back—thicker than before, the salt-and-pepper coming in with more silver at the temples. Dragon healing was something else. “I’m sure about all of it. The centuries, the moving, the reinventing. All of it.”
His expression did something complicated—relief and joy and a vulnerability he rarely let anyone see—and then he was kissing me again, deeper this time, with intent. His hand slid from my face down my neck, across my shoulder, trailing fire everywhere it touched.
I arched into him, already half-hard from nothing more than his proximity and the lazy heat of his mouth. He smiled against my lips—I felt it, the fucker—and then he was moving down. Kissing my jaw, my throat, the hollow behind my ear that made me shiver.
