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Modern life had gotten complicated. His usual habit was to focus Power on averting aircraft when he flew or, simpler yet, just file a flight plan with the local air traffic control. With his outrageous wealth and position as one of the eldest and most powerful of the Wyr, life scrambled to arrange itself to his liking.
Most of all, Rune had a gift for diplomacy that Dragos had never achieved.
I’m sorry I had to take your penny. Here’s another to replace it.
larcenous
They’d had regular escape-from-New-York drills
Oh, and Rune? Bring back Twizzlers and a cherry Coke Slurpee. He wanted to know what these things were.
“There are plastic bags with zippers on them. I’ve seen them in commercials,” Dragos said to her. He snapped his fingers, trying to remember the name. “You put food in them.” “Ziploc bags?” she asked in a cautious voice. He pointed at her. “Yes. I want one.”
“Sleep,” he told her. Just like that, from one moment to the next, she was asleep. No one was around to witness when he experimented with pressing his lips against her forehead. He decided he liked that too.
He sighed. “I am old and I am often cruel and calculating, and it is not safe to be around me when I am in a rage. I do not apologize for what I am. I am a predator, and I rule other strong-minded predators. But I did not mean to distress you.”
He smiled. She didn’t realize he was still on the hunt. Good. It was better that way.
She enunciated, “I think you are a lunatic.” “Since you are too, that works well enough.”
“Still waiting for it to pick up speed,” he told her. “Any day now. What is it, a POS?” “What’s a POS?” “Piece-of-shit car.” She started to laugh. “It’s a Honda Civic, and it’s a fine car. Very fuel efficient.” “Well, we know why, don’t we?”
He had learned to pick locks as soon as locks were invented. People liked to lock up all kinds of pretty things that he wanted.
atavistic
Alrighty. She threw up her hands in an I’m-going-already gesture, spun on one heel and ran for her life.
“That’s my long, scaly, reptilian tail. And it’s bigger than anyone else’s,” Dragos said in a voice that was deeper, larger, yet still recognizable as his. One huge eyelid dropped in an unmistakable wink.
“If it helps any, I was hungry and ate one.” Another whuffle.
Pia was his mystery. No one else’s. He intended to solve her all by himself.
“Thief or not, she is mine and I’m keeping her. If a single hair on that young woman’s head is harmed, you four bastards better be slaughtered and in pieces when I find you.”
Sudden anger burned. “I am not a problem,” she announced. She finished painting her little toe. “I am a ‘tactical consideration.’ ”
She said on impulse, “I am being treated with extraordinary graciousness, my lord. While I did not want to, I actually did commit a crime. Dragos has heard the circumstances of what happened and what compelled me. He’s chosen to forgive me. I would respectfully ask that you consider doing the same for him. No harm has come to you from his actions. But a great deal of harm has come to him from mine, which I very much regret.”
“What made you stop?” “I had a conversation with somebody. It was an epiphany.” His voice was rueful. He rocked her. “From that point on I swore I would never eat something that could talk.”
ebullience.
“First, I’m so sorry about what my uncle Urien did to you guys. I hate him, he killed my family, and we’re going to cut off his head, and then I have to be Queen, but before that happens let’s do lunch, okay?”
“When she’s in her manic phase, she’s a little like trying crack for the first time,” Rune said.
“I know about them classes. Cardio Kickboxing,” said Graydon. “Turbo Dance. I watch the infomercials.”
His head jerked up. He had one of the most startling and unwelcome thoughts of the last century. Am I a boyfriend?
She had said, I’ll have to think about it. Again. Just like she had yesterday when she’d told him, I guess I’ve got a lot to think about. What the fuck did she have so much to think about?
took a deep breath and nodded. Mating. Hmm. He was a solitary creature by nature.
The last couple of days had been so full of extremes, she felt like she was suffering from some kind of psychic whiplash. Everything was strange, full of hidden currents and nuances, with bouts of intense joy and sudden sharp spikes in anxiety and isolation. Reality had become a kaleidoscope that kept breaking up and re-forming.
enigmatic?”
“A dragon just gave me a piece of jewelry,” she said. She took another swig and handed the bottle back to Graydon. “Have I been added to his hoard?” He shook his head and drank too. “No, cupcake,” he said. “I’m pretty sure you’ve replaced it.”
“I need a friend to talk to.” The gruff gryphon’s voice turned gentle. “What am I, chopped liver? You beat the crap out of me this afternoon. That pretty much makes us pals in my book.”
“Now Rune’s scouring the city for a Wing Ding expert for us to train with. We’re all gonna learn to go with the flow or whatever the fuck it is you said you did. Think we’ll look as pretty as you did doing it?”
“So,” the gryphon said at last, “tell Uncle Gray all about it. Dragos hurt your feelings or something?”
“Thank you, Gray. You’re a good listener and a wise man.”
I love you, she almost said. But he had already confessed he didn’t know what love was. Her hands fisted. Maybe he never would. Maybe this was as close as she could ever get if she accepted him as a mate. If she had to choose between being alone with him and being alone without him, she would far rather have what she could of him. She would have to learn to adapt to whatever relationship he was capable of having. It would have to be enough.
“And Graydon’s the one who gets to call me cupcake—you don’t. You haven’t earned it. Now I’m going to do what I came here to do. You’re going to do your job or Dragos is going to want to know why you didn’t.”
She changed into her clothes, giddy with both relief and hunger. She could eat a horse if it weren’t somehow cannibalistic. She bent and tied her shoelaces. Pregnant. Mate. I’m going to have a dragon baby.
She pressed her hand over her abdomen. Oh, peanut, I always had the sneaky hope I might have a child someday, but I have to tell you, this timing sucks.
“Ex. Ex-boyfriend,” she said. “I swear to God, I’m never going to live that down.”
I love this quote, so real
It scared centuries off my life.”
