Page 26 of Billionaire Dragon King’s Rejected Mate

The thought came unbidden, low and possessive and entirely unacceptable. It was followed immediately by something hotter. Jealousy.

He waited until Josh strolled in the opposite direction before he stepped around the corner. He couldn’t stop himself. He didn’t even care if Randi knew that he had been standing there listening.

She had a smile on her face when she looked up. He watched it slowly dwindle away as he approached.

He wanted to fire her on the spot or fly Josh out over the ocean and drop him in the deep water. But he also wanted to beg her to call off the date so he could claim her as his own.

A cold, steady glare met him before she looked away as if he were nothing more than an inconvenience in the hallway.

He knew that look and he had earned it. Something inside him reacted anyway with a sharp, rising heat that curled low in his chest and threatened to expand outward.

His dragon did not like the easy way Josh talked to her or the implications of their date.

Mine.

The word came again, louder this time, edged with something dangerously close to a growl, and he had to lock his jaw to keep his expression from shifting into something that would raise questions he had no intention of answering.

Because this was absurd. He had chosen this.

“You can’t look at me after your little boyfriend called me stupid?”

Her eyes snapped back to him. “Oh, now you can look me in the eyes. Now it matters. Where was that half an hour ago?”

“I was running my company.”

“You were punishing me,” she threw back at him. “And you know you were being totally unfair.”

“You need to grow a thicker skin.” He found it difficult to be intentionally mean to her, but it needed to be done.

“And you need to quit being stupid,” she snapped back. “And if you say one word to Josh about what he said, in confidence I might add, you’ll regret it.”

Her fiery temper just intensified his attraction.

“Where is he taking you?” he asked with a tone deceptively mild. “It’s good you finally have a date. He’s been staring at you like a sad puppy for weeks.”

She blinked at him once, slow and unimpressed. “Are we in middle school now, or did I miss a memo?”

“I’m asking a simple question.”

“No, you’re being nosy and weirdly petty,” she said flatly. “Also, for the record? I asked him out.”

That stopped him.

“Excuse me?” The words were controlled, but just barely.

“I know, shocking,” she went on, a little too sweet now. “A woman making her own choices. Groundbreaking.”

He exhaled once, sharp, already turning away because this conversation was veering somewhere he didn’t want it to go. He moved past her without waiting for a response and without allowing himself another glance.

“That’s right,” she added under her breath. “Run away, chicken.”

He stopped and turned.

Before logic, restraint, or literally any better instinct could catch up, he closed the distance, grabbed her by the shoulders. He crushed her lips with his own in what was supposed to be a punishing kiss.

Instead, she melted into him.

No hesitation, no resistance, just heat and breath and the immediate, devastating realization that she wanted this too. Her lips were soft and yielding and her hand gripped his sleeve as her mouth moved against his like she’d been waiting for it. The small sound she made, half surprise, half something else, went straight through him.