Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
FIONA
W e fall into a pattern after that. Every morning, Connor has a gourmet breakfast waiting for me and then we walk Bones. We walk and we talk. He tells me about culinary school, which sounds like a completely normal and human experience. And then about training to be a warrior in a place called Cardinal Island, which he explains is another world, only accessible by dragons.
I tell him about the orphanage, our failed attempts at living with foster families, and my not-so-secret Taylor Swift addiction. His taste in music is eclectic. I’m not familiar with his favorite band, a group that his brother Seb just recently signed, an alternative rock band called Apples Fall. He plays a few songs for me and I dance around the living room to the album after he leaves.
And he does leave, every day after our morning walk. I see him sometimes chopping wood out back, his skin steaming. Other times he looks pale, his skin clammy. Is this the mating sickness he mentioned? The fever?
If it is, he doesn’t try to ease his symptoms with me again. A week goes by, and to my chagrin, he doesn’t try to kiss me or anything else. I guess I asked him for time and he’s giving it to me no matter how much I secretly wish he wouldn’t. And I’m too much of a coward to do anything about the growing ache within me.
Every afternoon I return to my room where Alex is already there in my imagination, her arms spread wide. She’s still wearing a maid’s uniform. You’ll never believe what happens next, Fiona. After weeks working as a maid in the Milk Cult’s headquarters, I find so many clues but I still don’t know where they’re hiding the girls.
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll figure it out. Give me a minute,” I say to no one.
I open my laptop and get to work. I write like I’ve never written before, pages and pages flowing out of me like my brain is plugged into the keyboard.
I never hear anything more from either Roman or Vivian.
Every afternoon, Zaire brings me tea and an array of fruits, cheese, and vegetables. I barely notice. Alex is sleuthing in the Milk Cult’s boarding house, then being chased by a group of thugs whose eyes glitter from the mood-altering drugs they’re on. She’s so close to the big reveal where I show the reader why the girl was murdered and why it all bothers Alex so much.
In the evenings, Zaire brings me dinner. I don’t even taste it. I’m too wrapped up in the story. Only when my head starts to bob over my keyboard do I sleep. And when I do, I dream, always about Connor.
Twenty days into my stay at Dragon Lodge as I’ve come to call it, I wake genuinely excited to see Connor. Excited for our walk. But when I enter the kitchen, Zaire tells me he had some business to attend to and will be back in the evening. A pang in my chest has me rubbing the spot. I miss him. I miss him so much it hurts.
I play Apples Fall on repeat while I wrap up the day’s work, realizing I’m only a handful of scenes from finishing The Milkmaid . Maybe three more chapters and it’s done.
Tonight though, my thoughts of Connor outweigh the demands of Alex’s voice. I crack my fingers. I’ve never written this fast in my life and I know it’s because of him, because I’m living with a dragon. I know something else too. I want him.
I’ve been here almost three weeks, and I have no idea what will happen next. I certainly no longer have any desire to marry Roman. But this situation can’t go on forever, can it?
It’s out of your control , Alex says. She’s back in her military fatigues, drinking a beer inside my head. What you can control is tonight. Having the experience you want to have. And you can control your reaction to wherever you end up.
I know Alex is me. I created her. But sometimes she gives great advice.
I shower and slip on a casual dress I find in the closet. It’s soft and stretchy in a deep green that brings out the color of my eyes. When I think about Connor picking it out for me, I wonder if he chose it because he likes the color or because he thought it would be comfortable for me. He bought me an entire wardrobe. Everything fits and everything is comfortable. I can’t help but compare it to my horror of a wedding dress, and that was made with me standing right in front of the designer. Which means Connor saw me more clearly in one day than Roman saw me over weeks and weeks.
I coil my hair up the back of my head, fastening it with a clip, then slide my feet into some leather slippers. A few turns in the mirror and I exit the room. Only I can’t find Connor or Zaire anywhere. I search the kitchen and the dining room, and then I hear someone singing near the back of the house.
The hall is dark, but I can see a light on at the end of it, a bright natural light, and as I get closer, I know it’s Zaire singing. I step into the room and instantly feel transcendent. The painting Zaire is working on takes up most of the wall—I’d estimate seven by five feet, but it’s hard to tell because it comes off as much larger. The modern piece is constructed of red, purple, and blue splatters with other colors dripped and dribbled in. It’s a rainbow of total chaos. Until you look at the negative space.
“Oh my God, it’s you,” I mumble, recognizing the pattern of white among the color. Up close, the painting is nothing but splotches, but taken as a whole, Zaire smiles from the tangle of color.
“It’s my self-portrait. My first actually,” he says, grinning proudly at me. “I’m relieved you saw it for what it is. You are the first to view the finished product.”
I place a hand on my chest. “I’m honored. It’s glorious, Zaire. Truly, this is a masterpiece. So many layers. So much dimension!” Art isn’t my forte, but any amateur could see this was an exemplary accomplishment.
He bows. “Thank you, Ms. Morrow.”
“Please call me Fiona. I should have asked you to call me by my first name a long time ago.”
“Fiona. No matter, we are all still getting to know each other.”
We stand there in companionable silence, taking in the painting for a few minutes more, until I can’t put off the inevitable. “Zaire, do you know where Connor is?”
His smile fades. “Out back, chopping wood I’d guess. The cold helps with the symptoms.”
“Symptoms of the mating sickness?”
He looks at me and gives a heavy sigh. “He’s told you about it?”
I chew my lip. “Briefly.”
“The dragons call it appetency ,” Zaire says. “For Connor, this is the worst I’ve ever seen it.”
I squint at him. “So, it’s a true physical ailment? When he told me it caused a fever, I assumed he was being metaphorical and it was more, um, psychological in nature. But I’ve noticed he hasn’t been well.”
His dark features take on a melancholy quality. “It’s very much physical, I’m afraid. Dragons suffer a fever every year during their alignment. Now that he’s nearing forty, the fever is accompanied by flu symptoms that worsen each year. It’s caused by the beast within calling for a mate. Each year older he becomes, the more effort the dragon puts into the search and the hotter they burn. If a mate isn’t found, they will eventually die of the affliction.”
“He mentioned that too.” It wasn’t something I wanted to think about at the time. “So, he just needs to get laid and he’s cured?”
Zaire shakes his head but never cracks a smile. “It’s not just sex, although he’s told me the act does ease the pain of the fever. Before he met you, there was a woman who would visit this time of year to help him with the symptoms.”
Jealousy rises within me, and I’m surprised at the sharpness of its bite. It must show on my face because Zaire raises a hand. “It was only a relationship of convenience and necessity. But of course, once he saw you, he told her not to come. A dragon can only bond with a true mate, and that mate is the only one who can stop the fever.” He begins cleaning his brushes. “I would have thought he’d have explained this to you. He seemed sure you were the one.”
The way Zaire looks at me wrenches my heart. The entire time Connor cared for me through my illness, he was suffering his own. “I… I am his mate, I think. He says so, at least. And I do feel a bond. I feel something. An affinity for him. But it’s awfully fast. I don’t know him in the way someone should know another person before they… mate with them.”
He nods. “Only you would know for sure.” He puts his cleaned brushes away and washes his hands in a sink fashioned in the corner. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I believe I’ll be preparing dinner tonight. If Connor is still outdoors, it means it’s a particularly bad day. ”
I follow him from the room and toward the kitchen, but as I’m passing by one of the guest rooms, I see him. I step into the dim room and up to a large window overlooking the backyard. Connor is shirtless, his red flannel tied around his waist, his jeans low slung on his hips, exposing an impressive vee of muscle. He positions a log on a stump, hauls an axe over his shoulder, and chops. The wood splits, the impact causing his golden skin to quiver over the hard ridges and tight valleys of his body. My stomach flips at the sight, a sigh breaking the boundary of my lips.
Not for the first time I wonder at his godlike appearance. No one would argue with the comparison. But now that I know what I know, I see the steam coming off his flesh, the way his mouth is drawn as if he’s in pain. I see the sweat at his temple. The sun is setting. It’s cold out there. Bones is running circles around him. Connor just looks miserable.
If you don’t fuck him, I will , Alex says in my head .
Go to sleep, Alex , I think. We’ll talk in the morning.