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)
She looks miserable at the thought. “That’s awful.”
I suppress a shudder, an old memory playing at the back of my mind. I think it has happened in the past. I do not recall, but it seems familiar. Terrible and familiar.
Emma caresses my chest with her small hand. “How do you break free again?”
I do not know.
And it worries me that I do not.
EMMA
The desert air is warm against my scales. I spread my wings in the sunlight, soaking in the heat. It will be a lazy day, I think, with no plans but to sun myself on the nearby rocks.
But then…she calls.
I take to the air, gliding away from the distant, jagged mountains and heading over the reddish sands. Toward the central nest, where the sands give way to gardens of the most incredible greens. I pick up her scent on the breeze and follow it in. She is there, sitting near a fountain, her fingers touching the cool water. Her scent is the most incredible thing I have ever smelled and I am impossibly drawn to it. I dive, changing to two-legged form just before I hit the ground, and bow at her feet.
When I look up, I see her. She is more beautiful every time I gaze upon her. Reddish-golden skin, long, flowing hair crowns a perfect face, and the most lovely, warm smile I have ever imagined. Her eyes are closed, but I know they will be gold with feeling as she looks down upon me. She extends her hand to me—
I wake up, staring at the ceiling of the warehouse store.
Just a dream. Not even my dream. Zohr’s.
He’s dreaming of the woman again. I fight the jealousy and anger surging through my system, because it does no good. He’s clearly dreaming of another place, another time. The place I see in his dreams is not like anything around here. The woman’s clearly a drakoni. He’s dreaming of before he came through the Rift, before he went mad and lost years and years to insanity.
There’s no reason to be jealous. If he loved this woman, it was long ago. He gave me his fires. He bonded to me.
Of course, that’s a whole other problem.
Zohr turns over and he presses his face against my neck, his arms going around my waist. Even in sleep, he draws me against him, and it’s hard not to melt at that. I try to keep my thoughts calm so I don’t wake him, because the middle of the night is the only time I get to truly think on my own without him hearing them.
He wouldn’t like what I’m thinking, either.
I can’t stop replaying the scene from earlier in my mind. The dragon tearing open the roof of the bookstore, determined to get to me. Zohr climbing the outside of the building and launching himself at her to attack her. Both of them falling through, limbs tangled as they sought to destroy each other. It was a battle of teeth and claw and wing and inhuman strength.
And me, what did I do? I threw a fucking book.
Looking back, it was really dumb. I know better than that. But I saw the female bite down on the back of his neck and I panicked. She didn’t hurt him, but I can’t get past the fact that I panicked. Rule number one of survival, as Jack would have reminded me, is that you never panic. You stop and you think things through. You don’t let emotion get the best of you. Jack never did, and he survived just fine until cancer got him.
Me, I’ve been an emotional mess ever since. I’ve made nothing but bad choices. I gave up my nice safe store when Sasha and her dragon showed up and scared me out of there. I let Boyd intimidate me into joining Azar’s gang. I let them use me to lure a dragon, and then I let that guilt compel me to stay. Just earlier today, I let my fear and emotion cause me to jump out of a perfectly safe hiding spot and throw a fucking book at a fucking dragon’s head.
I’m going to get myself killed one of these days, and it’s all going to be because I’m an emotional wreck right now.
I close my eyes and lie quietly, trying to think of what Jack would do in my situation. If he knew that Azar’s men—and Azar’s dragons—were going to be hunting me because through me, Azar can control Zohr. What would Jack do if I was a target at his side?
Actually, I know what Jack would do. I’ve always known. He’d have us separate. We’d part, because Jack would be safer on his own, and it would be easier for me to hide if I was alone. There’s safety in solitude, he always reminded me. When you don’t depend on anyone else, you know what you’ve got to work with.