Page 37 of Knotted by the Mountain Man Dragon

“You set the bed on fire and now you’re purring about it.”

“I am not purring. Dragons don’t purr.”

“You are absolutely purring. You sound like a diesel engine full of feelings.”

“That is not what’s happening.”

“It’s exactly what’s happening and I love it.”

I tighten my arms around her. Press my lips to the mark on her neck. Already closing. Already scarring into something beautiful. A crescent of raised skin that will tell every supernatural being who gets close enough: she is claimed. She is loved. She is mine.

Her fingers trace the scorch marks on the mattress, then come up to touch my jaw.

“Don’t buy new sheets.” She’s smiling. Her eyes are wet and warm. “I want to keep these.”

“You want to keep the burnt sheets?”

“Evidence.” She grins. “For when I tell your friends you literally combusted.”

“You are not telling anyone.”

She laughs again.

My dragon settles. Deeper than he’s ever settled. Quiet in a way that isn’t empty anymore.

Mine. Mate. Marked.

Epilogue One

Mara

Three months later

Iam looking at seventeen blankets.

Seventeen.

I counted. Twice. Because the first time I thought maybe I miscounted, but no. There are seventeen blankets stacked on the end of our couch, folded with precision, arranged by weight and texture. There were six when I moved in. When I asked Cage about it last Tuesday, he looked at me like I’d asked why he breathes air.

“You get cold,” he said.

“I got cold once. One time. I mentioned one time that my feet were chilly.”

Long pause. “Your feet should never be cold.”

This is my life now.

I’m sitting at the kitchen island in Cage’s flannel, which is technically my flannel now because I stole it and he responded by buying six more so I could steal those too. My laptop is open in front of me. My coffee is next to it, made with cream and two sugars, because Cage now keeps a supply of both that could sustain a small cafe.

Outside the window, Blackridge is doing its usual thing: rain, fog, mountains disappearing into low clouds, woodsmoke curling from chimneys. The trees on Cage’s property have a dusting of snow and the whole valley looks like something from a painting.

I live here now. In a cabin on a mountain with a dragon who sets sheets on fire when he comes too hard.

We’re on our fourth set. He refuses to discuss it.

My phone buzzes.

Cage: Do you need anything from town?