Page 41 of Ensnared (The Dragon Captured #1)

“You never do as you’re told.” He’s smirking. “I thought it was a human thing.”

“I’m going to sleep alone. Having you in here means something to humans, and it’s not something that reflects what we are.”

“But you never did what I asked,” he says, standing.

I sigh. “What’s that?”

“You were supposed to teach me to kiss.” His eyes drop to my mouth again.

“I already told you—that’s not something I can teach. When you feel a certain way about someone, it’s just something that happens.”

“When I think about it, about you feeling that way about someone, it makes me angry.” He steps closer. “Isn’t that meaningful in some way?”

I shove him. “Not at all. You already told me you feel possessive, like you own me.”

“We’re connected,” he says. “You can’t deny that.”

“I’m connected to Gideon by choice,” I snap. “He’s been by my side, protecting me, since we were children.”

Axel grabs the edge of my dresser and squeezes.

It shatters.

Wood shards drift to the ground.

“Look what you did,” I say. “You really need to go while I have a room left to stay in.”

“You said you’d do anything I asked.” Axel doesn’t look like he cares about the dresser at all. “That was part of our deal.”

“So, what? Now part of that deal is teaching you how to kiss?”

He shrugs.

“Alright.” I pick up my hand and turn the back of my hand toward my mouth. “Take your hand like this.” I pucker up my lips and press my mouth against it. I make smoochy sounds. “There. Now you know.”

Axel grabs my wrist, circles it lightly, and drags the back of my hand toward his mouth.

“No,” I say. “Not like that.”

But it’s too late. He’s pressing his mouth against the back of my hand. Every part of my body lights up, and I practically squirm out of my own skin. It’s like someone connected live wires to my entire musculature, and now they’re zapping me.

I’ve never, not once, not ever before felt like this .

“How was that?” He doesn’t release my hand, but he does look right into my eyes. “Am I getting it?”

I drag in a breath. “I mean, it’s fine. I think it’s a good first lesson.”

“So you think I’m ready for this?” He grabs my hip and pulls me closer slowly.

I could pull away.

I should pull away.

I ought to dead sprint out of the circle of his arms. This isn’t Axel the tolerant earth dragon. This isn’t the playful shifter I made a deal with.

This is Azar, Prince of Flame.

His hands are almost unbearably confident as he drags my body closer, pressed against him from thigh to waist. His hand shifts, curving around my side and squeezing.

His other hand fans across my jaw, wrapping around my cheek and cupping under my chin, tilting my face upward.

His eyes are on my mouth, and he inhales quickly, and then his head dips until it’s just above mine.

“Is it supposed to feel this natural?” His words sound almost like a prayer.

“Maybe it’s the bond.” His head lowers so slowly that it feels like he’s killing me.

Not a heart attack.

A form of dragon torture.

He’s deconstructing me from the inside out.

With the way my heart’s racing, it could give out at any moment. His mouth stops when his lips are just a hair away from mine. “How long do you usually wait?” His breath feathers over my face, and I can’t help it.

I whimper.

“Oh, I like that. Do it again.” His mouth’s curving upward, now. “Please.”

I can barely breathe, and my hands curl around his arms right where his elbow bends, gently scraping the muscle of his bicep. “Axel.”

“Azar,” he says. “Call me Azar now.”

“Azar,” I whimper, like he’s pulling his name from the depths of my broken, shattered soul.

“Yes.” He closes the distance, his mouth finally pressing against mine.

My heart flips and spins. My hands squeeze tighter, wanting more, my fingernails digging into the muscle of his arms.

“Oh,” he says against my mouth. “Yes.” This time, he’s the one groaning.

I move my mouth against his, hungry for more. My tongue brushes against his lip, and he growls, lifting me up in the air like I weigh nothing at all. A strange vibration starts then, but I’m not sure where it’s coming from. It’s nice, like someone tickling my back, but stronger and soul-deep.

It’s coming from the bond.

Azar grazes my bottom lip with his teeth, both his hands now circling my waist, and he murmurs, “I should have done this earlier. Much, much earlier.” And then he kisses me harder, like he’s a starving man, and I’m his only sustenance.

“Azar, I think something,” I whisper between kisses, “is happening.”

He drops his mouth to my chin, and then he trails kisses down my neck slowly, his lips practically branding me with their heat. “Yes, something I never knew existed.” The vibrations deepen, and then shift, and this time, Azar freezes, finally feeling it too.

“What is that?” I murmur.

“It’s. . .” And then his body arches and mine does, too, his hands still holding my waist. “It’s the bond.”

It twists, and then like our hands before, the bond shifts and clicks into place.

What once was rope that bound me to him is now more like interlocked fingers.

What before was a thread of connection, a way to get a sense of his direction, a feel for his temperament, is now a conduit of energy, flowing from him to me and back again.

“What’s happening?” I cry out, not in pain, but not entirely in pleasure, either.

The thrumming gets stronger and harder, too. Azar pulls me closer and presses my body against his. “Our records say that sometimes, but it’s very, very rare, ensnared can become entwined.”

“Entwined?” I don’t understand. “What’s that?” A burning pain begins in my other shoulder, just like the first time. Only, this time I squirm back and peel the fabric of my shirt down to look.

A large, metallic red brand appears on the back of my right shoulder blade. It’s a flame surrounded by a dragon, and its mouth is consuming the flame.

Or is it creating it?

It’s hard to tell.

I check my other shoulder, and the first mark’s still there.

“Now I have two?”

“I have two affinities,” Azar says. “It makes sense.”

As he says that, my back bows out and there’s a flash of pain in my head I don’t remember happening the last time. “Ahh,” I cry out.

“Your hair,” he says. “It’s. . .”

I can see it myself. It had become a deep golden, but now it’s bright red. The color of a burnished flame.

Azar sighs. “There’s no way around it.”

“What?”

“You’re clearly bonded to a flame blessed, now.”