Page 31 of Dragon Me Through Space

They moved fast, alright. “Sure.”

“Do you know what you want to do?” he asked.

“Actually, let me think about it a little bit, if that’s okay? I’ll let you know at breakfast tomorrow so you can plan accordingly.”

He smiled and nodded. “Okay. Have fun on your date with Zeke.” Spinning around, he walked away, headed towards the jungle room.

“What was that about?” Zeke asked as he walked into the kitchen.

“Oh, he is putting a hammock up for me and I told him I couldn’t come because of our date and then he asked me on one tomorrow.” If they wanted me to be open and honest with them all, I would be. Hopefully, the more open and honest I was about what we did together, the quicker they’d tell me I didn’t need to tell them anything anymore.

“You know what you’re doing on your date with him?” Zeke asked as he walked to the sink and washed his hands.

“I’ve got ideas for each of you,” I admitted. “But I’m not one hundred percent settled on the others yet.”

Zeke waved me over. “Come wash your hands. Cleanliness is very important when making food.”

I obeyed, walking over to take his place at the sink. I thought he’d move once I came over, but he hovered next to me, his huge body like a wall. And yet, I felt no fear being so close to such a large creature, man, dragon, Dragonkin.

“Are you sure you’ve not been around other Dragonkin before?” Zeke asked softly.

After drying my hands on the towel he offered, I stepped back so I wouldn’t have to tilt my head so far back to look up at him. “What?” I asked.

His cheeks gained a slight pink tint across their tops and he walked over to the cupboard. “Nothing.”

What in the galaxies could he be thinking about that caused him to blush? Now I was super curious. So, so curious.

“What are we going to make?” I asked instead of commenting on it. These dates would be the perfect times to get to know each of the four a bit better. To find out if they really were as good as they claimed and seemed. Having them separated from one another, alone time, would allow me to better find any weaknesses or lies, to try to get them to mess up and say something different than the others.

Maybe, just maybe, I could get one of them to admit what they were searching for.

“Since this is your first time cooking, I wanted to go with something easy.” He pulled out a few items from the cupboard and set them on the large island in the center of the kitchen. “And I wanted to share one of my favorite recipes with you.”

Looking down at the items on the counter, I frowned, not sure what it was he had planned. Marinara sauce, some weird bread in a bag, a couple cans of vegetables I’d never heard of, and he was going to get more things from the freezer.

“What’s it called?” I asked and tried to look around him to see what else he was grabbing.

“Pizza,” he answered. “Well, a flatbread version anyway.”

“I’ve heard of that!” I said, my eyes wide in excitement. “I met an Earth lady once and she raved about it. I’ve been wanting to try it ever since she mentioned it, but no one knew how to make it or what ingredients to use.” Every planet I’d gone to, I had asked and searched to no avail.

“We were on Earth for a few weeks and learned how to make it from one of the locals. He even showed us this alternate version which is easier to get ingredients for while traveling.”

That was one downside to traveling around by spaceship a lot, your fresh food options were much more limited. The replicators made good food, but actual, fresh food was so much better. It was also a ton more expensive and something I rarely had the option to experience.

“What do we do first?” Stepping right up to the island, I waited for him to give me instructions. I was even more excited about this date now than I had been before.

“Get the oven preheated to three hundred seventy-five degrees,” he instructed.

The oven they had was thankfully easy to use and with a few buttons I had it preheating.

He took out a tray and put foil on it, then put five of the round bread things … flatbread, on it. “Use the spoon, it’s next to the marinara, and put one spoonful of the marinara on top of each flatbread.”

“If you guys aren’t siblings, how did you come to be a group?” I asked as I followed his orders.

“We were all born on the same day,” he said. “Our parents were friends, too, so we spent most of our childhood together as well.”

“So, you guys get to decide who is in your group before you start your search for a mate that you’ll share?” I asked. “It’s not assigned?” There were some creatures who were put into assigned duets to find a mate. I’d heard that those races were deciding whether to abolish the practice since it had resulted in issues where jealousy caused them to attack each other and more frequent deaths was not helping them rebuild their population.