Page 25 of A Matter of Dragons

Damn it. I couldn’t let Mad Scarlett destroy this town. Not even when I was on the cusp of what would have been an absolutely glorious night. I swallowed my sigh, placed a hand on Rayne's shoulder, and tried very hard not to think about the fact that I wasn’t wearing pants.

“Can you find your way back to your inn?” I asked.

She blinked, then nodded.

“You need to leave,” I said. Regret clamped around my ribs like a vise. “It’s not safe. You need to get back to your inn.”

With that, I released her shoulder and turned toward the mountains. Magic shivered beneath my skin; my draconic form had been silent for years, but now it screamed for release.

“Where the hell are you going?”

I spun around at the harsh tone in Rayne's voice. Our eyes met in the light of the thin moon and the distant fires. She hadn’t sheathed her dagger, I noticed. Nor had she made any move to leave the garden.

Shit. Did she think she was in danger if she left? Or was she pissed off that I’d basically just shoved her out of the garden without so much as a goodbye kiss?

Either way, I needed her out of here. Now.

“I’m going inside,” I spat. “This is my house.”

She rocked back, her eyes wide. But she still made no move to leave the garden. Mad Scarlett screamed again. I craned my head and saw her dark shadow still rising against the night sky. Screams rippled through the air around me as the people of Cairncliff realized what had been living in the Knife’s Edge mountains.

Oh, damn it all. I had to get rid of Rayne, shape shift into my dragon, and get the hell up there before something else went horribly wrong. I spun back to face Rayne; regret ripped through me like the jagged edge of a serrated blade. It had been years since I’d shared a bottle of frost wine with a woman. With anyone. The last human lover I’d taken had married someone else ages ago. She probably had grandchildren by now.

A huge and horrible aching loneliness spread through my chest as I realized what I could say that would get rid of her forever. What I had to say.

“I can’t have you come with me,” I growled, forcing the lie through my clenched jaw. “I’m married. My wife is in there.”

Rayne's eyes widened, then narrowed. Her cheeks flushed, and a soft little gasp flew out of her opened lips. Then she flew forward, and an explosion of pain turned my vision white. My head rocked back; the sound of her slap rang through the garden like a bell. My eyes watered and my cheek burned. I ran my tongue over my teeth and tasted blood. She’d split my lip. Damn, the woman had quite the backhand.

I raised my palm to cup the side of my face. My skin was hot and angry where she’d slapped me. Rayne glared at me in the darkness. Without a word, she spat on the stones at my feet. Then she spun on her heels and stomped across the gravel, her skirts hissing as she went.

Oh, by the Mothers. I felt like she’d sunk her dagger into my gut. I hadn’t wanted to lie to her, but damn it all, I’d been up against a wall. Trying hard not to think about what I could have been doing right now, what Rayne and I could have been doing together, I sprinted into the trees along the side of my house. Fresh bolts of pain lanced through my reddened cheek with every step.

Fire blossomed in the sky above me, the flames exploding from Mad Scarlett’s hovering silhouette. No time to spare. I cast one last look over my shoulder, but Rayne was nowhere to be seen. Gone from the path, gone from the garden, and gone from my life. I turned my gaze upward, to Mad Scarlett. Nothing but us dragons now.

I drew a deep breath, said a silent goodbye to the shirt I was somehow still wearing, and released my dragon.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Rayne

“Fuck,” I spat as I stomped down the little gravel trail and out of the walled garden.

The fact that this night wasn’t even my worst date was a pretty sad commentary on my pathetic love life. Damn it. Being interrupted by a rampaging dragon and then discovering the man who’d just given me two of the most amazing orgasms of my life was fucking married was just another horrible romantic experience in a depressingly long line of horrible romantic experiences.

I stopped in front of the little wooden door that Doshir had unlocked what now felt like an entire lifetime ago. This was his house? His garden? I bit my lip; that would explain why he’d known so much about the place. And how he’d gotten the blanket. But who in the hells pretends to sneak into their own garden?

Well, the same kind of asshole who pretends to be single.

Snarling, I kicked the wooden door. Pain exploded across my toes; the door didn’t even budge. “Ow,” I whimpered.

Another roar split the sky above me. I watched the dark form of the dragon spread across the stars. She was terrifying, yes, but there was something about her ragged wings and serpentine neck that made my heart feel like it was tugging against the inside of my chest, almost like there was something inside me longing to be released. She was beautiful up there, that dragon, in all her glorious, destructive freedom.

Another sound rippled across the garden, something like the brush of enormous wings. A breeze danced through the trees, making the leaves above me whisper. I turned toward the ridge where I’d just been standing with Doshir, the row of pines we’d walked beneath, and the little open field between the ridge and the house. His house. The house he shared with his wife.

I froze. My breath caught in my throat. There, between the house and the ridge, something dark and unspeakably massive was rising from the trees. I thought of an earthquake, a volcanic eruption, a new mountain range pushing itself from the ground. But the only sound in the walled garden was the rush of air, and the slow, leathery beat of—

Wings. Oh, by the King’s holy name, wings. A pair of wings that seemed larger than the half-hidden house unfurled above the trees. Four legs lifted into the air, the dim moonlight sparkling off their wicked claws, followed by a thick, spiked tail.