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“We’ll see about that.” The rush was already beginning, her muscles clenching and her body tingling all over, but it dissipated as quickly as it had begun.

She rubbed her clit harder, chasing the sensation she was so ready for—she just needed a little bit more to get there.

Her jaw clenched in the effort to find it.

She sped up her motions and tweaked her nipple harder, grabbed her other breast and teased, but nothing.

She was there ! Why couldn’t she come? It had never been hard for her to have an orgasm. If she wanted it, all she had to do was this … exactly what she was doing. Usually it was easier and better if someone happened to be fucking her at the same time, though that had never been a requirement.

“Why aren’t you touching yourself?” she asked, breathless and pausing to let her tired muscles rest for a moment.

“I can’t.” Kris slumped back against the wall and looked down between his thighs at his cock like it was some foreign beast he couldn’t quite comprehend.

“What do you mean? You can’t touch me and you can’t touch yourself either? How do you bathe ?”

He laughed. “Well, I can … technically, but I learned years ago that it did no good. I can’t bring myself off. And you won’t be able to … ah … come … while you’re here.”

“Let me guess … dragon magic.” Erika settled back against the wall, too exhausted to keep trying, even though her pussy screamed for release.

He smiled ruefully. “Yes.”

“So you’ve never had an orgasm? That’s tragic.”

“I have, but only in my sleep. They send me dreams sometimes. It’s how I knew you and your team were the ones I was meant to bring. I dreamed of all of you the week before I met you. Especially of you. Probably because you are the leader.”

They’d sent him dreams. Had they sent her dreams, too? Were those dreams she’d had her entire life more than mere fabrications of her subconscious mind? More than some secret, erotic wish?

She stared up at the illuminated carving on the door.

The polished red and purple colors beckoned to her and she reached out, tracing her finger over the upraised surface of the design.

The smooth stone was only slightly cooler under her heated touch, and the colors mesmerized her.

Jade came in an array of colors, Eben had said, and was also one of the toughest minerals, nearly impervious to breakage, which the pristine quality of these carvings attested to.

It had to have taken years to carve it all; the entire place was decorated entirely in it.

This door included a bas relief image depicting two dragons coiled around what looked like two human figures.

It was like looking at a page of the Kama Sutra, the way the angles were just a little off, but it was clear enough for Erika to understand what the image was meant to convey.

Two humans, a man and a woman, engaged in passionate coitus with two dragons.

Though she had to blink a few times to register the shapes of the dragons.

Sometimes they looked like scaled, long-tailed beasts, but if she shifted her eyes the right way, they looked almost human.

“What the hell did you put in our food, anyway?”

“Some spices I cultivated myself known to awaken the senses. Other than that, nothing but the water here. It’s been steeping in their magic for hundreds of years. Their need to awaken is very present. This is the time for their ascension.”

Kris seemed so earnest, but his need wasn’t enough to sell her. She stood up and straightened her shirt.

“I think you’re playing us somehow. I have no idea how, but I’ll figure it out. Put your fucking pants on.” Before I go nuts.

As she walked back toward the doorway to the main chamber, she heard behind her, “Erika. You can’t leave this place until you’ve completed the ritual. I didn’t trap you into this, but it’s the only way to leave.”

“Oh? Then why does it feel like I have no other options?” she shot back over her shoulder.

“I’m more than just a guide, so I know it was always your quest to be here. This is where you belong—where we both belong. You know it’s true, deep inside. Just translate some of the text and it’ll be clear, I promise.”

Erika paused for a single step and clenched her fists.

If he was playing them all for his own ends, she’d figure it out, but he wasn’t lying about her quest. Still, Kris’s words were too much fantasy for her to reconcile.

She’d found it. That was enough. All she needed to do now was catalog the artifacts and transport the pieces suitable for study and display, then write her dissertation on the entire expedition.

After it was published, she would reap the rewards and bask in the professional limelight. End of story.

Except deep inside, she knew there was so much more to the story than that, and more to her dreams. Her father had never been after glory, but his research had led her on this quest, and her dreams had pushed her to complete it.

Maybe there was more for her to find besides artifacts.

Maybe Kris was the key to uncovering the deeper secrets of this temple.

Before she’d walked through those doors at the surface, she would have argued that only science could convince her of the truth.

Now she wasn’t so sure. With each step farther away from the doorway she’d just left behind, the weaker her hold was on her own convictions until what she wanted had shifted entirely.

She raised her hand up to fondle the small red jade figurine at her throat.

It was a childhood dream come true. More than that, it was her life’s work realized in spectacular fashion, not to mention her heart’s deepest, most secret desire.

Her entire body buzzed with the understanding that this was what she really wanted. To open that door and find her dragon.

And Erika was used to getting what she wanted.