Page 3 of Drawn by Dragonblood (Blood Born #1)

Jonathan

T he man standing at the edge of our camp held me captive like a deer in headlights.

Couldn’t take my damn stare off him. He had inky black hair and eyes so pale I couldn’t discern their color.

Wide shoulders and arms, even with the dark gray sweatshirt encasing them, hinted at muscles twice what I’d managed to build—and I wasn’t exactly a skinny little shit.

His hello had caused goose bumps to ripple across my skin, some sort of inner buzzing like a light switch about to short circuit inside me.

Something about the stranger…excited me?

I couldn’t quite figure it out, but the man exuded energy like a tractor beam, making me want to close the distance between us. Fall to my knees?—

I blinked, shaking my head. That couldn’t be right. I’d never been attracted to a man, but I couldn’t deny the lust shooting through my balls.

Unable to find my voice, I dipped my head in greeting.

He took a few hesitant steps and paused less than ten feet away from me. “Sorry to intrude,” he said, his voice a deep bass, the kind women swooned over.

My legs went weak as visions of crawling toward him flooded my brain.

Frowning and locking my entire body up tight, I cleared my throat. “National forest is free to everyone.”

His gaze flitted down over me as if sizing up all six-foot-two of me.

I should have been wary, my usual cynical self.

Should have been on edge, but nothing about the stranger or the images flashing through my mind threatened me.

I’d always been pretty good at reading people, and even though the man could probably bench press five hundred pounds, his demeanor or stance didn’t appear alarming.

His pale eyes sat deep beneath thick brows. A thin, yet strong nose overlooked full lips, and a few days’ worth of stubble covered his jawline. He was the type of pretty face found on a runway model, yet rugged enough to enter the World’s Strongest Man competition.

Talk about intimidating—and hot as fuck. Even my straight ass couldn’t deny that fact.

What human wouldn’t want to be his sex slave?

We stared at each other for a full minute, neither of us moving.

His nostrils flared a few times as though breathing the late summer air deep into his lungs, bracing himself for something.

I swore his body heat emanated over the short distance between us, licking at my scruffy face and bare arms, causing goose bumps to rise along my skin.

Dakota’s familiar humming traveled my way as she rounded the boulders she had gone to squat behind, and I tore my attention off the stranger to glance over my shoulder. Head down and rearranging her long-sleeve T-shirt over her leggings, my wife approached.

“Hey, Jon,” she said, lifting her head, “did you—” She pulled up short, her jaw snapping shut as her gaze landed on our visitor.

Her pupils dilated, and the pulse in her neck I loved to see throb heightened.

Even her nipples tightened into luscious buds.

She stared at him, totally enthralled with a man like she’d only been twice in the years I’d known her.

Once, when our eyes had first met, and the other with the blond douche who’d been the reason we’d broken up for a short time.

I tensed, waiting for jealousy to knife me in the gut, but nothing stirred, not even a hint. Instead, I understood her reaction to the dark man…there was no denying the warmth of want tingling in my own groin because of his close proximity.

Dakota crossed her arms over her unbound breasts and, blinking, turned her focus on me, gaze troubled. She waited for me to throw a nutty, get all caught up in my head over her looking at someone other than me with even a hint of interest.

But I did. Not. Care.

“This is…uh…” I turned back around toward the monstrous man, one eyebrow raised, my insides a swarm of what the fuck .

“Elijah Tolzman.” He stuck his hand out.

My feet moved me forward as though he held me on his fishing line and reeled me in. “Jonathan Ebel.”

Our palms meshed together with a slow glide, sending a buzzing jolt up my arm and straight down to my dick. I’d expected a battle of the manly squeeze, but he merely clasped his long fingers around mine in a firm but seemingly intimate shake.

Another fantasy lit in vivid color inside my mind from his touch but with darker tones…chains and cuffs. Pain with pleasure.

Lust radiated from my palm to my cock, and I swallowed hard against the sudden lack of moisture in my mouth. Since when did that shit turn me on?

“Nice to meet you,” he said, his low voice sending another bout of shivers across my flesh. His pale eyes—blue as a crisp winter day—skittered over my face as though searching out my thoughts, desperate for them even.

Although he’d clearly been surprised by something at first eye contact with me, the stranger had shut down all emotion on his face except for his inquisitive gaze that caused my body to want to drown in pleasure.

Dakota stepped forward, startling me back to reality.

I tugged my hand away from Elijah’s, remembering that this man and I weren’t alone. How the fuck he’d managed to make me even briefly forget the love of my life, I had no clue.

“My wife, Dakota,” I rasped, putting my hand on her lower back, suddenly feeling the need to physically connect with her and let him know she belonged to me. Or perhaps I needed a reminder that I belonged to her .

“Wife.” A frown flitted over Elijah’s brow, so quick I thought maybe I imagined it. “A pleasure,” he murmured with a slight nod but didn’t offer her his hand.

Dakota’s lips parted as she stared at him.

A sensual smile curved his lips as he studied her wind and sunburned face.

I rubbed my fingertips along her spine, and she glanced up at me, her greenish eyes unsure and hesitant as though fighting off her desire to continue drinking in the dark stranger.

Smiling down at the love of my life came easy when I should have been annoyed as fuck she’d been checking him out.

I offered her reassurance while my footing teetered on what felt like the edge of a cliff.

She had been mine since the seventh grade.

My one and only, and three months earlier, she had vowed before a Justice of the Peace to love me in sickness and in health, in good times and bad—and bad they had been ever since.

We had planned a honeymoon in the Bahamas so she could search for the mermaids she wished existed in real life rather than just the fantasy books she read, but I’d been dismissed from my job mere days after we’d gotten hitched.

Definitely not for a lack of work ethic or having been found at fault of jack shit.

My only friend outside Dakota had trusted me with being in charge designing software for a start-up company we’d dreamed to fruition and he’d financed.

He’d been a goddamned flirt, but I’d ignored my inner voice suggesting I put space between the three of us because he signed my paychecks.

That poor choice led to my demise when he’d approached me about a threesome without Dakota’s knowledge.

I denied him even though we’d shared just about everything else, and he’d sent me packing the next day via a certified letter, dismissing me from his company.

The lessons I’d learned?

One, trust my instincts. Second, rich and powerful men took advantage of anyone and everything to get what they wanted. And finally, never start a new job without clearly lined expectations and a goddamned contract.

But Dakota didn’t know the real reason behind my being fired, and I wasn’t about to tell her the truth of why we struggled to make ends meet. All due to trusting the wrong fucking guy.

Finding work since then had proven impossible, and were it not for her support and love, I probably would have jumped off a bridge over my inability to provide for her. All because I couldn’t stand the thought of anyone having a sampling of what had been mine since childhood.

She was the one good thing I had to my name, and I wasn’t going to open a can of worms by allowing a third person’s lust to tear us apart.

My friend had claimed he simply wanted to fuck, but I knew better. One taste of Dakota, and he would have been addicted for life, same as I was. Her nurturing spirit was calming, her beauty breathtaking, and her sweetness impossible to ignore.

Dakota Ebel was craving personified.

“W-would you care to join us for breakfast?” Dakota asked, pulling me back to the present, her breathless tone betraying her unrest and arousal that should have had me raging with jealousy.

“I’m sure he’s just passing through,” I said at the same time his low, rumbled “I would love to” pebbled my arms again.

Dakota’s smile didn’t reach her hazel-green eyes as she slipped her hand into mine with a tight squeeze of reassurance. She peered up at me in question as though seeking my direction as she often did before making decisions, and being the sap that I was, I nodded.

Did she not know by now that I would give her anything she wanted, everything I could?

“Join us,” I echoed her invite without looking at the stranger, my words easing the tension on my wife’s face. “Please.”

“We’re just having instant oatmeal and some dried fruit,” Dakota said, bending to rummage in my pack and putting her ass on display.

In my peripheral vision, I caught Elijah enjoying the view too.

Again with the lack of jealousy slithering through my guts, but I forced a frown and cleared my throat, feeling the need to show who the alpha was on the small, treeless hill we’d camped upon.

Elijah’s focus flitted to my face. An intensity resided in his gaze, like an ancient wise one who could read souls and futures. The power in those unsettling orbs wasn’t something new to me. I’d been too fond of fortune tellers in my younger years before responsibilities had settled in.

One palm reader had called me a beast, curiosity in her watery eyes as she’d peered at me.