When I opened the front door, drawing in the sweet, floral scent coming from the hundreds of magnolia trees in full bloom, I heard an insufferable sigh behind me.
“What are you doing now?” Killian asked.
“I’m walking home.”
One step.
Another.
And another.
Then he cursed. “Come on, I’ll fly you home.”
I grinned. Maybe Killian was a nice guy after all.
Until I turned and saw him glaring at me.
“Then you will answer any further questions I have.”
I didn’t have a chance to glare back. His arm slid around my waist, drawing me in close. I caught his scent—pine trees in the thick of winter— a scent so pleasing, a sigh escaped me before he shot into the sky.
The road came up fast on the way down from the sky, but Killian landed in front of the bookshop as gently as he took off, the morning sun beating down on Charleston. Old vampires still didn’t enjoy the sun, but they could stand it for short periods of time without issue.
I drew in a big, deep breath of his delicious aroma and stayed in his arms longer than necessary. Goddess, he smelled good, he felt good. I broke away, stepping back from the warmth of his power. His fingers dragged down my spine to my hip and lingered, drawing my attention to his face. His glowing eyes met mine, but the distrust in their depths extinguished any heat there.
I turned to the front door and realized I didn’t have the keys. “I had locked the door when I closed up this morning.” Through the door’s window, I spotted the keys near the back door to my apartment on the floor. “The keys are in there.”
“Step back,” Killian said. He grabbed the handle and gave the door a hard push and the lock snapped, the wood shattering as the door opened.
“Why do I even bother with a lock?” I asked, stepping through the threshold.
“To keep the humans out,” Killian said, following me inside.
Except Charleston didn’t have any humans living in town. While there was a peace treaty between humans and vampires, humans were still wary, knowing they were food. Any humans involved with vampires long-term lived lavish but hidden lives. They came and went, enjoying the wealth earned from their blood donations away from the vampire-ruled cities. Every so often, humans would come for a weekend getaway to get a peek at the dangerous new world of Charleston, but those visits were rare.
Killian leaned the broken door against the doorway and then scanned the area. “Is this where you were attacked?”
“Yeah.” I sighed at the broken bookshelf. “I need to—”
“I’ll get someone here to repair the door and the bookshelf so you can reopen.” He reached into his back pocket, taking out a cell phone and firing off a text.
Before I could take my next breath, two vampires appeared with cleaning supplies and a tool kit. Killian began giving them instructions, and I studied the gorgeous vampire, wondering if maybe he wasn’t all grumpiness.
Until he opened his mouth again.
“I don’t want your mess to become my mess.”
“Believe me, it won’t,” I said, moving toward the door that led to my apartment. I grabbed the keys off the floor, and Killian followed me up the staircase to the next door. The second I opened it, light gray scales danced between my legs in a blur. “Okay, okay, I’m home. Stop, Ambrose, you’re going to make yourself dizzy.”
My dragon finally plopped his butt at my feet, smiling up at me, big sharp teeth glistening, his tongue dangling out the side of his mouth. Dragons hailed from the caves in the Carpathian Mountains in Romania but had been captured and tamed by magic wielders over the centuries. Before supernaturals came out to the world, dragons were hidden, only flown at night and kept safe in underground lairs. Now, for the safety of humans, dragons were bred selectively for temperament to make them more trainable, and very few supernaturals could pay the steep price a dragon cost. The laws were strict; dragons were not allowed to live in big cities, and every dragon was recorded with the Dragon Registry, a division of the Assembly. That was the governing body of witches. Each coven had a high priestess who led them, the strongest witch of the coven, and their rule among witches was final.
I knelt and kissed Ambrose’s warm nose, finally feeling like the ground was returning beneath me. Most dragons only stayed Ambrose’s size—on par with a border collie—for a couple of weeks, but Ambrose had flaws. We were alike in that regard. I never grew into my magic, and he never grew into his size or his flames.
“What’s wrong with it?”
I whirled on Killian. “Pardon me?”
“The dragon”—he gestured to Ambrose—“what happened to it?”
“Nothing happened to him.” I stroked Ambrose’s head, and he got excited, sparks flying out of his mouth. I quickly tapped my knee, where smoke began to rise from the burnt fabric. “Ambrose is perfect just the way he is.” I covered his ears. “He’s just little, that’s all.”
Killian harrumphed.
Ignoring the hovering vampire, I scratched under Ambrose’s chin—his favorite spot—before I rose and headed for the open galley kitchen behind the living room. My entire apartment could probably fit into Killian’s living room, but I was proud of it nonetheless. I had warmed the small space by bringing the colors of nature inside.
“Would you like a drink? Wine? Beer? Blood?” Vampires still ate and drank and used the bathroom, but they wouldn’t stay living without blood, and I always kept a couple of bags of blood for Gwen and Finnick.
“Beer is fine.” Killian moved into the tiny living room that only fit a chair, a small couch and a television set next to the bay window. He took the big chair in the corner surrounded by indoor plants. No one had ever made the chair look small. Killian made it seem tiny.
I nuked Ambrose’s gigantic steak in the microwave, removing all the bones since his little teeth couldn’t manage to break them apart. The moment I set his bowl down, he pounced, and the meat was gone in the blink of an eye.
Trying to wrap my head around everything that had happened today, I moved to the window and opened it, letting Ambrose fly out to see about his business on the roof where I’d planted a patch of grass for him.
I took a beer from the fridge and poured a glass of wine for myself before returning to Killian. “All right, now you can ask me your questions,” I said, giving him the beer, then taking a seat on the couch.
Killian blinked at Ambrose, who flew back through the window, jumped on the couch, and curled up on my lap. “How long have you had your dragon?” he finally asked before sipping his beer.
“I can’t remember not having him.” The dry wine tickled my cheeks as I drank. “From what I understand, my late mother”—who was once the high priestess of the Southeastern coven—“bought him as my protector when I was a child.” Before he asked, I added, “And no, from what I hear, he wasn’t always this size, he was smaller when she gifted him to me, but he stopped growing at this size.”
Killian’s eyebrow arched. “A protector?”
I stroked Ambrose’s warm scales that were soft and fuzzy, not leathery like they should have been. “He might not be big, but he’s mighty. He came to school with me every day and always kept me out of trouble. Why do you ask?”