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“Staring at my butt. Thinking sex thoughts about me.”

“Mmm. No promises.” He pulled out a large sauce pot, a pasta pot, and then grabbed cans of Italian tomatoes and mushrooms and such.

“Hmph. So, what will you tell the beaver?”

“Yarrow? I’ll tell him the truth. That the other family who lived here is gone, but that you guys aren’t bad folks.”

Cullen tugged out the stuff to make a salad, it looked like. “Will vamps hurt a beaver shifter?”

“Yeah. Yeah, they will.” Those bloodsuckers would be almost anywhere and, wherever they showed up, it was a nightmare. They were a blight, and he just didn’t understand. Surely there was a place where they belonged, where they weren’t hurting anybody. “I guess they all think we’re their prey.” He glanced at Cullen. “What do you think?”

“I think the last time that I ended up coming face-to-face with any of them—and I have a number of times—it didn’t go well.” There was an ice-cold fury in those eyes now. “I don’t do prey particularly well.”

Okay, so hot.

“Would you stop it?”

“What? I can’t help the fact that you’re superhot.” Orion winked over, waggling his eyebrows. “Do you have any onions? And what about fresh garlic?”

“You act like I cook.”

“With this kitchen, you cook.”

No one had this kind of amazing kitchen without cooking. This house, even more than the big one that they came through, screamed with magic. Somebody’d created this home to be exactly what he wanted it to be.

“Yeah. Here are the onions.” A beautiful sweet onion was plopped in front of him. “And the garlic’s in the red container, the one marked garlic.”

It was easy to find the cutting board and the knife, and he got to work, whistling softly as he chopped.

“What are you doing here?”

Orion shrugged. “Honestly, I came because Yarrow asked me to. Now I’m here for you.” Because he’d never seen anything this wonderful, and he wanted to learn everything there was to learn about this pretty little dragon fae. Drafae? Fragon? Fragon was cool.

“Would you stop? I kind of like drafae. It’s a little bit aggressive, but so absolutely accurate.” Cullen winked at him, playing.

Orion was in love.

And they were hearing each other seamlessly. Which was super interesting and had all sorts of implications…

“Hmm. Do you still see your parents? Maybe you should ask them if there’s a name for it.”

“Oh, very nice segue into digging into my family.”

Orion raised an eyebrow now instead of waggling. “Was I unsubtle?” He slid the aromatics into the warmed oil in the pot so he could get it all fragrant.

“You’re as subtle as a jackhammer,” Cullen said, slumping down on a stool on the other side of the island, chin on his hand.

“Eh, I’m a unicorn. We’re not exactly shy and retiring.”

“Really. That seems odd. I mean, aren’t you supposed to be all sparkly and innocent and searching for virgins? If that’s what you’re into, dude, I got to tell you, I’m not it.” Cullen stared him down as he stirred onions.

“No? Are you suggesting that you might have been soiled by another?” he teased.

“No, I’m suggesting that I really like to fuck, and I’m pretty good at it.” Cullen twisted his lips. “Not that I’m suggesting that you and I ought to…”

“Oh damn, and things were going so well. I’m disappointed.” Orion made a wide-eyed face.

“I was kind of suggesting that we might…at some point. It’s not like I find you distasteful.”