Page 8 of Drawn by Dragonblood (Blood Born #1)

What I had witnessed the night before and heard less than an hour earlier promised my mates were hardly innocent, but their fresh faces roused both me and my beast in a way I fought hard to keep contained.

He thrashed at the hold I had on him, desperate to burrow deep inside both of our mates.

Mark and claim so they could never leave us.

My lungs constricted, and I tore my gaze from their entwined fingers to move back into the kitchen.

“Make yourselves at home,” I managed a calm tone once they reached the landing.

I busied myself with making their hot drinks as they moved behind me, settling onto the couch in a whisper of rumpled, comfortable-appearing clothing I’d rather have stripped off their bodies.

Once I had full control over my hungry beast, I gathered the drink tray in hand and turned.

The unique blend of their scents wafted past my nose. Dakota’s sweetness settled over me like refreshing morning dew on grass, and Jon’s more earthy musk reminded me of a brisk, fall day I enjoyed more than any other season. A perfect blend, delicious and groin-tightening.

Saliva pooled in my mouth at the thought of having their taste on my tongue, their warm skin beneath my fingertips. Sitting with them would prove an even greater temptation than outside where my home’s energy wouldn’t affect all three of us.

But I would bear the pain of shackling my beast for the sake of my future—or theirs.

Mine .

I wasn’t sure what my dragon specifically referred to that time and chose to ignore his grumbling.

“Coffee,” I said, handing Jon’s mug to him.

Sitting before me, his bright blue eyes gazing upward into mine brought on images of him on his knees, submitting to me. Hands resting on his thighs, mouth opening, and tongue waiting to be fed.

Yessss .

I bit my lower lip to steady myself against the darkness prowling beneath my skin.

“Thank you.” Jon’s fingers brushed against mine, and that same electrical current I’d felt when shaking his hand earlier in the day at their camp sent a rush of blood straight to my groin.

I tore myself away from the tether hooking my libido to find his beautiful wife curled on the cushion beside him, legs tucked beneath her lush body.

“You seem more of a green tea type than coffee,” I said, my voice lowered due to the strain from keeping my inner beast hidden and groin from fully rousing in a display of my rekindled need.

“How did you know?” Her dazzling smile was like the sunrise on my face.

Touch. Please.

Breath held, I offered our female the mug in a way that required contact between our flesh.

Her fingertips grazed over my knuckles.

The dragon inside melted rather than bursting free, and I released a rushed exhale, half-giddy over the fact she would rule my feral beast with such ease.

Dakota stared up at me, eyes wide, lips parted from a quiet gasp. The pulse thrummed in her neck, and her nipples hardened beneath the oversized shirt she had donned after her shower.

I wanted both of our mates on their knees before me, gazing up at me with the world in their eyes.

But only because they chose to, not because they’d been coerced.

Moving away from them felt like muscle ripping from bone, ten times more painful than shifting into my true form.

Jon and Dakota kept their attention on me rather than the mugs in their hands as I sat on the other end of the sectional, angled to face them. Their gazes dropped to the semi-aroused bulge in my pants I wouldn’t be able to hide even if I’d wanted to.

They both swallowed as though their mouths filled with saliva at the sight.

Feed , my dragon purred his suggestion followed by a slight chuckle. They hunger.

I ignored him. “Does the classical music bother you?” I asked, drawing my mates’ attention to my face.

Dakota’s tongue flicked over her lower lip before answering, her gaze once more troubled. “I like it, but it’s not Jon’s favorite.”

“Yeah,” Jon said, lifting his mug to his lips, “but I can deal.” He sipped, and I stared at his Adam’s apple as he swallowed.

Lust for him burned like hot coals, but my desire for learning about them was just as bright. I wanted to inquire after their pasts, their families, and home, but I got the sense Jon would better appreciate knowing about me before I pried into their lives.

“Would you like to hear the tale about this cavern and the creatures who crafted it into a home?” I asked.

“Creatures?” Jon echoed with a huff of laughter. “Go ahead and make my wife’s day. Fill her mind fuller than it already is with fantasies about mythical beings that exist for our pleasure.”

“Jon,” she chided quietly, pink flushing her face.

“Dakota?” I murmured her name, enjoying how bumps rose across her arms as though my voice caressed her flesh.

“I-I would like to hear that story if you don’t mind,” Dakota said and sipped her tea while Jon settled back against the cushion, taking another swallow from his mug.

“Goddamn, that’s the good shit,” he moaned.

I grimaced over the fact he drank the bitter brew black while my inner beast whimpered his need for more of those noises to fall from our beta’s lips.

My own sweetened and blond coffee in hand, I propped one ankle over the opposite knee and began. “Centuries ago, dragons ruled the land while man fought for existence.”

“Dragons?” One of Jon’s brows rose as he smirked, revealing his dimples I wished to lick. He glanced at Dakota. “It’s like Elijah plucked that fairytale straight out of your brain,” he said with a light chuckle.

“I love dragon everything ,” Dakota said, smiling at me, her eyes alight with glorious happiness.

The beast inside me purred. “Then you will enjoy this story.”

Rain continued to fall. Thunder rumbled over the mountains, and lightning flashed through the one-way windows overlooking the mountains that usually flooded the interior with light, but my human guests sat in comfort as I shared the story of the Blood Born’s downfall.

Rather than openly declaring myself a direct descendent of those who lived in the cave before me, I spun the magical into the reality of inheriting the home my fathers had built for my mother—but kept the truth of me being the offspring of a triad rather than a couple to myself.

Leaving out that my birth occurred nearly five hundred years earlier seemed appropriate until they were ready to hear the truth of what I was—and who they were to me.

Dakota stared, her dreamy expression proof of her love of supposed myth. I could imagine her daydreaming I was the last of the dragonblood I’d told them about.

Jon seemed more settled in what humans saw as truth, one eyebrow arched again, a flashed grin over what he thought to be nothing but a false tale to perhaps enchant his lovely wife.

“Dragons and fated mates—right up Dakota’s alley.

” He laughed again, but his amusement didn’t ring true to my ears.

“It must have cost millions.” He changed the subject, glancing around the massive cave I hid myself in when not needing to travel to Manhattan or Europe for business.

Wariness had crept into his tone and eyes, making me wonder over his thoughts, insecurities, or suspicions.

“It cost enough,” I agreed, thinking about the ease with which a dragon could melt and move rock.

I wondered—no, I hoped —they would both come to learn the extent to which I would reshape the earth to please them both given the chance.