Chapter Nine
S ard held Julie’s hands and put every ounce of sincerity into claiming the one woman he truly loved and making her understand just how fiercely he loved her since she still seemed to be confused.
Her soft lips parted, and a blush colored her freckled cheeks.
He drew her forward, mesmerized by her. Her lashes lowered, and his cock pulsed with readiness. He had crossed galaxies to reach her, and he would not hesitate to cross the last few inches now, after all this time.
But she pulled back and nailed him with a hard glare, her fierceness matching his. “I let myself believe everything you said once, but now I know better. What are you not telling me? What are you conveniently forgetting or glossing over?”
He shook his head, his heart pounding. “I didn’t tell you about my engagement because I was trying not to involve you. It’s too late for that now.”
“Isn’t dragon society matriarchal? What does the head of your family say?”
“Mother doesn’t care.”
“She doesn’t care you’re tossing aside a high-class dragon wife for a human fling?”
“Julie, you are much more than?—”
“Just answer the question.”
Sard sat back. His chest was already feeling better. The warm meal of strange circular noodles in red sauce had given him energy, and simply being in Julie’s fiery presence once more made him feel a sense of hope again.
“Mother has twenty-six other dragonlets to occupy her notice. I am, by far, not her favorite. My union with my ex produced no grand dragonlets, and she released me without any demands. The dissolution went incredibly well for our family, and Mother recognizes that. The only people who are upset are two of my brothers.”
“And your mom doesn’t care those two brothers are now trying to kill you?”
“She doesn’t care if we ‘roughhouse.’ Once someone is killed, there will probably be consequences.”
“Roughhouse…” Julie frowned and rubbed her forehead. “I can’t get used to how dragons think. I’m not going to be okay with Copper trying to kill any of his siblings.”
“He’ll have a strong dragon father to take you aside and explain how it’s fine.”
Her eyes snapped open, and she glared daggers at him. “Oh, he will, will he?”
“And, as your other dragon husband has not taken the role of reassuring you, I will do so.”
Sard got out of bed, pulling the blanket off with him and wrapping it around his waist because he knew humans cared about nudity.
He walked carefully into the main room, checking Copper’s location—sleeping on the rug before the fire—and glanced out the windows.
Peaceful white snow greeted him. No sign of Copper’s father yet.
He returned to her bedroom, pleased with his increasing mobility.
It was proof that dragons were hardy and strong.
“I’m not angry you chose another dragon for your husband.”
She stood, eyeing him warily. “Oh? That’s good.”
“Even though I was out across the galaxy doing everything I could to keep you safe, it’s only natural that a woman like you should be wooed and hunted by hordes of eager dragon males.
” Her eyes flashed, but he continued. “The only thing I now question is your judgment in choosing a husband who has not already hunted us down! I would go to the ends of the universe for you. How dare you show such bad judgment in choosing a weaker and less determined male to father your dragonlet?”
“Maybe I was still reeling from finding out I’d given away my virginity to a man who already had a fiancée!”
“And? That should have made you more careful in your selection! Just because a male tells you sweet words doesn’t mean he’ll provide security.”
She jabbed him in the chest, above his injury. “I figured that out after you left me.”
“Apparently not, because you slept with another dragon!”
“Oh, please.” She went toe-to-toe with him, despite being so much smaller. “How many times did you sleep with your wife?”
“Not once,” he growled.
“Don’t lie!”
“I don’t need to lie. Every word I speak is truth.”
“Except for all the words you don’t say.”
They stood so close, it felt like they were falling into the same gravity well, circling and spinning around each other.
Her wild feminine scent, flushed through her body, made his cock hard and throbbing, and he wanted so badly to clasp her and take her as before, to tear away all the barriers between them and mark her as his.
Her chest heaved, her breasts rising and falling, and he could almost taste them.
And yet she thought the worst of him.
“We did not lie together,” he told her softly, even though his chest burned with fury. “I told my ex on our wedding day that my soul already belonged to another. She was surprised at first, then relieved because she felt the same.”
“No way.”
“Yes, ah, ‘way.’” He frowned at his own use of slang. “It is the reason she made it so easy to dissolve our marriage. And it’s why I was able to assist with the revolution. We were allies in the same cause.”
Julie rested on her heels, softening.”You liked her.”
“Only because of our similar situations. Had I never met you, I would’ve been insulted, probably.”
Julie stared at him for a long, hot moment, so much so that he almost forgot himself, again, and moved straight to crushing his mouth to hers.
Copper made a noise in the other room.
She let out a sigh and stepped back, putting air and distance between them, and went to her son. Sard watched her care for the baby dragonlet with confidence and expertise, changing his diaper and offering him small pieces of cereal from a box.
Copper started crying and flew to the ceiling. He’d gotten free of the line she’d tied around him. Julie hopped to reach him but couldn’t.
Sard captured the sobbing baby, holding the small form to his chest and rumbling with the sound that used to ease his younger siblings. Copper arched his back and twisted, then slowed his movements and finally yawned.
“He’s tired,” Julie murmured. “But he doesn’t want to miss anything, so he’s always fighting sleep.”
“I was the same.” Sard made the deep rumbles as he walked the small child, and the boy abruptly transformed back into human and slumped over his shoulder, heavy with sleep.
Julie reached up to take the dragonlet. Sard eased the boy into her arms, then watched her arrange the child into a kind of travel bed.
Her cheeks were flushed with heat, but the ache in his chest grew more painful.
She was a caring and beautiful mother. Not for the first time, he cursed the engagement that his family had arranged.
It had been a fact of his life for as long as he could remember, like the color of his scales or his position in the family.
But now it had prevented him from being here for Julie, keeping her away from whatever wretched male had used her body and left her on her own.
Normally, this was when he would double down on his determination. He’d snarl and declare that he would overcome any obstacle and claim her as his wife, insist Copper be adopted as his dragonlet. Whatever was hers, or valued to her, he wanted to place under his protection.
But if the past two years and his marriage had taught him anything, it was that some feelings could not be overcome by will or determination.
“Was he handsome? His father.” Sard gestured at sleeping Copper. “He must have been. He had the guts to approach a beautiful woman like you.”
She straightened slowly and didn’t answer.
“Was he bigger than me?” His tone sounded bitter in his own ears. He shouldn’t torment himself, but he couldn’t stop from asking. This should’ve been his family and his life, and she’d gone and made it with another dragon. “Was he better?”
She closed her eyes. “Stop.”
He wanted to. But the poisoned words spilled out. “You bore his dragonlet, and yet he’s not here. He must have tricked you.”
“I forgive him,” she said softly.
“I don’t.”
She smiled faintly and pushed him.
He reluctantly let her guide him back toward the bedroom, leaving her dragonlet to his sleep. “When he comes for you, I’ll make him regret what he did.”
“He already does, I think.” She directed him onto the bed.
He lay back with a pained groan. “You do love him.”
She swallowed hard. Tears glistened in her eyes. “So help me, I do.”
“I’ll hunt him down and destroy him.”
“You can’t.”
He fisted his hands in the blankets. “Why not?”
“Because.”
She swung her leg over his waist, the bedsheet between them, straddling him. And his frustration instantly disintegrated. She could tell him any reason when she was touching him like this, but he never expected her next words.
“It’s you.”