Page 57 of Dragon King’s Duty Bride

She is ours.

Lucas turned onto his side to face away from her and tried to quiet the restless energy that coiled in his chest. At some point in the night, he woke up.

He didn’t know what roused him, but Sia was curled against him.

One arm was tucked between them. Her knee was bent and reste lightly against his thigh. Her face nestled between his shoulder blades as though she had sought him in her sleep.

Lucas went completely still. The line between propriety and desire had already blurred. But she made a small, contented sound and pressed closer.

His dragon surged, fierce and triumphant.

Mate.

The word was no longer a whisper. It was a claim.

Lucas closed his eyes. Slowly and carefully, he shifted and turned toward her instead of away. He slid an arm around her waist and drew her fully against him. She sighed, soft and warm against his chest, and instinctively tucked her face beneath his chin.

He didn’t know if she was fully asleep. He didn’t ask because he didn’t care. His hand rested at the small of her back, and he had never felt so divided.

Half of him wanted to hold her and never let go, but the other half still feared, to some extent, the permanency of that.

Lucas lay awake for a long time as he breathed in the faint scent of her hair and memorized the feeling of her in his arms. When sleep finally claimed him, he did not loosen his hold.

The next evening, Sia returned to the bedroom from the art room flushed with color with joy lighting her face. She spoke animatedly about light and shadow and how the mountains changed tone at dusk.

Lucas watched her and suddenly it was crystal clear. He had known in pieces before. In glances. In the way his dragon quieted only when she was near. But watching her now, alive in a way he always wanted to see, something inside him settled.

She was not a passing desire or temptation. She was the one his heart reached for when he wasn’t holding up the walls.

She stepped closer as she spoke, unaware of the tension coiling through him.

“Lucas?”

He realized she had asked him a question.

“What?” His voice was rough.

Her gaze sharpened. “You’re somewhere else.”

No. He was exactly where he was supposed to be. He reached for her before he could overthink it and cupped her jaw. He felt her breath hitch.

“Sia,” he said, and her name felt like a vow.

His dragon rose, powerful and certain.

Mate.

She searched his face. “You don’t have to hold back with me,” she whispered.

It was trust. The last of his restraint snapped in surrender and he kissed her. Slow at first until she leaned into him without hesitation.

The kiss deepened and heat flared between them, fierce and undeniable. His hands slid into her hair and hers fisted in his shirt. The world narrowed to just the two of them as he lifted her without breaking the kiss.

She wrapped her legs around his waist. The dragon roared in triumph when he carried her to the bed as though she were something sacred. When he lowered her onto the sheets, he paused.

“Are you certain?” he asked, voice unsteady for the first time in years.

Her answer was a kiss that held no fear, only fire. She left no room for any doubt that she had made her choice.