Page 61 of The Dragon’s Good Girl

I ran because some part of me believed him.

The realization keeps me on the living room floor for a while, staring at nothing while the feeling slowly comes back into my legs.

Eventually, I get up.

I don't call him. I think about it, more than once, but I wouldn't even know what to say yet. Sorry I safeworded and fled because you told me I mattered to you seems like something I should probably understand myself before attempting to have it with the dragon involved.

I don't book another session either.

For once, I leave the problem alone.

The hardback I bought is still on the coffee table, abandoned a few chapters in when my brain became incapable of concentrating on anything that didn't breathe fire. I pick it up, find my place and discover that if I force myself through the first few pages, eventually I stop rereading the same sentence.

An hour later, I've finished two chapters and haven't thought about Soren for at least ten consecutive minutes.

I'm calling that progress.

A little before ten, I'm curled into the corner of the couch with the book when someone knocks on my door.

I look up.

Nobody knocks on my door. Tess would text, Bree would call from downstairs because she'd forgotten which apartment was mine, and my mother considers arriving without warning an offence when other people do it.

I mark my page and cross the room.

I check the peephole and stop.

For a second, I genuinely think my brain has finally given up.

Soren is standing on the other side of my door.

I stare at him through the tiny warped circle for several seconds before I remember that doors are generally supposed to be opened.

I unlock it and pull it back.

I've only ever seen Soren at the mansion, where everything around him seems designed to make him look even more imposing. Dark clothes, old stone, low light, a house full of monsters where a six-foot-something dragon with gold eyes somehow makes perfect sense.

He looks very different standing in my apartment hallway.

He's wearing jeans and a dark sweater beneath his coat, his hair slightly out of place, and there's something so strangely ordinary about seeing him under the terrible hallway light that I can only stare.

Then I notice what he's holding.

The peonies.

Not the fresh ones he gave me. These have been pressed beneath glass, their pale pink petals flattened and preserved.

I look from them to him. "Hi, what are you doing here?"

Soren's expression shifts slightly. "I was hoping we could talk."

"How do you know where I live?"

A pause.

"Your client file."

My eyebrows go up.