Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 107619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 538(@200wpm)___ 430(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 538(@200wpm)___ 430(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
I will remember.
Stop it, Emma tells me. You’re distracting me.
The man—Artie—demands to know what my Emma is doing here at the pool house. The pool house…so that is where I am. The visual of what a pool is in Emma’s mind does not match my surroundings. There is no water here.
Drained, Emma replies to me. Now let me focus. She smiles sweetly at Artie. “Since I was sick yesterday, I’m trying to pick up some of the slack and doing a few more chores around the place. Carol has me doing dragon-feeding duty.”
He grunts a response and asks Emma if she will suck on his knob when she’s done with me, like Carol always does.
Disgust fills my mate’s thoughts. “Um, no? Use your damn hand.” I changed my mind, Zohr. You can totally kill this one.
I smile, baring my fangs. With pleasure.
“I’m not here to do anything extra-curricular. Azar never told me I had to, just that I answer to him and no one else.” She keeps her voice calm and steady.
The male that will die—Artie—grunts a response and tells her to be quick. He comments that she smells anyhow and she’s not worth it, but he’s lying. I can smell the tang of his fear in the air. He’s afraid. Of my Emma? My fragile female?
No, I realize. He is afraid of the one they call Azar. The Salorian. The one that avoids me.
I remember the Salorians, but only vaguely. It feels like trying to hold smoke when I concentrate, and I growl in frustration when I can recall nothing more than the word and a distant feeling of evil. Of anger and loathing.
That one will die, too, I decide. For holding me captive and for daring to threaten my mate.
I watch with hungry, avid eyes as Emma slowly climbs down into the pit—the pool—and steps forward. The choking, cloying scent of her perfume cannot cover the true scent of her, and I can taste her on the air. It fills me with intense joy to breathe her in, to fill my lungs with the musky scent of my mate. To reaffirm that she is mine. I can smell my venom running through her veins even now, and her scent carries the brand of my claim on her.
Her movements fascinate me. She moves forward, her steps light and sure, her hair brushing against her shoulders. She wears a thick white bandage over her head, and I can smell dried blood there. Her wound. There are circles under her eyes and she looks tired, but even so, she is beautiful to me. Her eyes are dark and full of life, her figure taut and muscular. She wears far too many of the strange, colorful skins to cover her body, and I wish she was naked like she was when she came to me.
But then I think of Artie and Azar, and my fists clench with anger. I decide that I am glad they do not get to look upon her.
Emma’s gaze lands on me and she visibly flinches, misery on her face. Oh, Zohr. It looks worse every time I see it. She kneels beside me, and her scent washes over me. I close my eyes in bliss, biting back the growl of pleasure that threatens to rise in my throat. It escapes when she touches my skin lightly, tracing one broken wound at the edge of my cuff. You’re tearing yourself up. I thought dragons couldn’t be harmed?
My two-legged form is far more vulnerable. All the anger and frustration that has been building inside me dissipates at her small touch.
“Tsk,” she says aloud, under her breath. “They may be holding you captive, but it’s bullshit the way they’re treating you.” Her small fists clench. “Makes me so mad.”
I am delighted at her building fury. Is it because it feeds my own rage? Or because it makes her dark eyes spark? When we are freed, they will pay in blood, I reassure her.
“I’m down with that,” Emma mutters. She takes a bit of her shirt and tears at the hem, pulling off a long strip of the material. When she’s done, she gently places it between my skin and the cuff of one arm. “Hopefully this will help a little. But you’ve got to quit twisting so much.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “We don’t want them to realize that we’re together. Maybe keep raging, but make sure it’s vocal and not physical? I don’t like seeing you hurt yourself.”
Her fingers skim over my skin again, and I realize with pleasure that her touch is no longer as cool as it once was. Her blood has heated to match my own.
Just knowing this is making my cock rise. You should stop touching me if we do not want others to know you are mine.