Page 24 of Dragon Heir

I’ve been so wrapped up in my own stuff, I have no clue how he’s been doing. I don’t even know if he’s courting anyone, if he likes his program. Part of that is because he’s evasive when I ask, and I didn’t want to put pressure on our relationship. But another part is because I’ve been selfish.

“There is something going on with me, but it’s really embarrassing,” I admit.

“Did you finally pass your first moon blood?” I can hear the smile in his voice, and I nudge him for it, feeling momentarily better before I remember how thoroughly I fucked up.

“Way more embarrassing.”

“Hey…” Pax grips my hip and rolls me over to face him. His arm curls around my waist, and though it’s a familiar position for us, I have to work to ignore the fact that he’s holding me on a bed while our legs are tangled together.

“I…” I have to close my eyes to continue. “I decided that I was going to lose my chastity this semester.”

Pax stiffens. I can feel it through his whole body and his hold on me, and a growl enters his voice when he asks, “Did somebody hurt you?”

“No.” My eyes snap open and I grab a handful of his shirt for emphasis. “No. Not at all. It’s actually the exact opposite. No one touched me.”

“Okay…” He draws out the word, leaving it almost a question.

“I’ve been acting like a huge idiot. I came up with a mission to have no strings attached sex. Just to lose it, to see what it’s like for once and for all.” I press my face into his shirt. “I even thought about asking you.”

“That would be impossible,” Pax says, and even though I figured this out at the carriage station, the resoluteness in his voice makes my stomach drop and pain knot in my heart.

“Yeah, I know, Pax. I’m sorry for even considering it—”

“Not…” His hand scoops under my chin, bringing my gaze up to his. “Not the idea of you and me. The idea that there wouldn’t be strings. I can do no-strings with someone random I just met at a party or a pub. I couldn’t do that with someone I’ve loved since the learning to walk.”

My stomach is having a very different reaction now. It’s fizzy and tingly, and I suddenly wish I’d brushed my teeth and bathed in the last seventy-two hours.

“Really?” I whisper, wanting to lift my face to his, but knowing I have dragon breath.

“Really,” he whispers back, stroking my hair behind my ear. “It’s meaningless with anyone else, Nessie. Not with you. Never you.”

His fingers trace down my cheek, rough callouses against smooth skin. “That was a week ago, though. Something else happened since then to make you like this.”

Fuck.

I can feel my face heating under his palm. “I screwed up, Pax. I don’t think I can ever return to class.”

“Start from the beginning.”

So I do. I start from the moment I discovered Professor Sinetar bending Professor Mitchel over her desk, how turned on I felt watching them and how I just stood there with his gorgeous eyes pinning me as he released his seed inside her. I tell Pax about each time I thought Professor Sinetar was flirting with me, repeating the exact words he said and how I got it all so mixed up and wrong. Then I detail that last horrible moment when Professor Sinetar told me that I would have to work for my grade just like everyone else.

“The guy is a dirty demon dick.” Pax spits the words, his cheeks flushing with anger.

I knew he’d be angry on my behalf, but I was the one who totally screwed up the whole situation in my head. “He didn’t do anything wrong,” I point out, feeling the need to defend him for some reason. “Maybe he enjoyed the admiration from a dumb village girl, but when I actually came on to him, he wanted nothing to do with me.”

“He shouldn’t have said any of that stuff,” Pax fumes.

My cheeks flame with humiliation at the memory of my last day in the library. “He couldn’t have pushed me away fast enough when I tried to act on it, though. I’m starting to think I have sex-repellant rather than sex appeal—”

Pax cuts me off with a bark of laughter, and I glance up into his eyes. The guy is bald-faced laughing at me.

“I’m serious, Pax,” I say, shoving his shoulder.

He only laughs harder.

I’m not sure if I should be complimented or insulted by his mirth. “No one at school is interested,” I point out, laughing through my humiliation. “At least, no one I’d consider. I was approached by two creeps, but you and True scared them off. I’ve thrown myself at three guys, and they all rejected me—harshly. You, then Professor Sinetar, and when we first got here, True.” I lower my voice to a whisper. “Which, I admit, is pretty shitty of me. Oh phoenix feather! I really am desperate.”

I hide my face in Pax’s chest, but he keeps quaking with mirth.