Chapter 26
TWENTY-SIX
AERO
Cassia kissed him.
Soft at first. Questioning. Her lips brushing his with a gentleness that undid him more completely than anything demanding could have.
Aero froze.
Every instinct screamed at him to retreat. Lifetimes of self-protection, of keeping everyone at arm’s length, of building walls that had never once been tested until now—
His dragon roared.
Not a demand this time. A force of nature that swept aside every wall he’d ever built and left nothing but the blazing, undeniable truth.
FINALLY.
Aero stopped thinking.
He hauled her against him, one hand fisting in her tangled curls, the other wrapping around her waist to press her body flush to his.
He kissed her back with all the hunger he’d been denying himself—kissed her like she was the only real thing in a world gone blurred, like she was the answer to a question he’d forgotten how to ask.
She tasted like mint and magic. Her body was warm against his, soft where he was hard, yielding where he was rigid. Her hands slid up his chest to grip his shoulders, pulling him closer, demanding more.
His dragon roared its triumph.
Lightning cracked overhead.
The sound barely registered. He was too lost in the taste of her—salt and ozone and something intoxicating.
The feel of her body pressed against his, all soft curves and burning heat.
The way her magic rose to meet his, tangling with his lightning, amplifying every sensation until thought became impossible.
Wind screamed around them. The sea glass chimes shattered. The porch railings creaked as if trying to escape the storm building between two supernatural forces that should have known better.
Cassia gasped against his mouth. Her nails dug into his shoulders. She was trembling—or he was—or they both were—and her magic kept surging, calling thunder, calling rain, calling everything wild and uncontrollable.
Aero’s dragon fire blazed to the surface. He felt his hands heat, felt the energy coiling in his palms, felt—
Something behind them caught fire.
He wrenched back, breaking the kiss, and spun toward the cottage.
The corner of the porch where the wind chimes had hung was smoldering, small flames licking at the weathered wood.
Inside, through the open door, he could see papers scattered across the floor.
One of the windows had cracked in a spider-web pattern.
A ceramic pot lay in shards at the base of the fireplace, and the massive stone mantle was scorched black in one corner.
The living room looked like a small tornado had swept through it. Cushions on the floor. Books fallen from shelves. A barometric instrument—one of her grandmother’s, he thought—had tumbled from its place of honor and now lay dented on the carpet.
His dragon snarled in frustration.
“Did we just—” Cassia’s voice was breathless. Wrecked. Her lips were swollen from his kiss, her robe askew, her hair wilder than before. “Did we set my house on fire?”
Aero waved his hand, and the flames died. Dragon fire responded to dragon command, at least. The rest of the damage—the cracked window, the scattered papers, the destroyed wind chimes—was less easily dismissed.
“That was…” He searched for words. His mind was still reeling, his body still burning, his dragon still demanding they continue what they’d started. “Catastrophic.”
Cassia looked at the smoldering porch. The shattered chimes. The chaos visible through her open door. Then she looked at him, and her lips curved into a grin that made his pulse stutter.
“I was going to say ‘promising.’”
His dragon purred. Despite everything—the property damage, the loss of control, the terrifying implications of what had just happened—the sound rumbled through his chest unbidden.
Cassia’s grin widened. “Did you just—”
“No.”
“You absolutely did. The ancient, terrifying dragon elder—”
“It’s a physiological response. It doesn’t mean—”
“It means your dragon is happy.” Her eyes sparkled with mischief. With understanding. With something that looked dangerously close to affection. “Which means somewhere under all that emotional constipation, you’re happy too.”
He didn’t know what to say to that. Happy wasn’t a word he used. Wasn’t a state he pursued. He’d spent so long being nothing that the concept had become foreign.
But standing here, with her hand on his chest and her magic humming against his skin and the ruins of their first kiss smoking around them—
Maybe. Maybe he was.
“We should probably figure out how to do that without destroying property,” Cassia said, echoing his thoughts with uncanny accuracy. “I don’t have insurance for ‘made out with an 800-year-old dragon and things got out of hand.’”
“That seems like a reasonable concern.”
“Also, there’s still someone trying to destroy Haven Shores.”
“Also that.”
“And we should probably talk about what just happened.”
“We should.” His throat worked. “I don’t know how to talk about it.”
“Shocking revelation.” But she was still smiling.
Still standing close. Still looking at him in a way that made his dragon want to pin her against the nearest wall and finish what they’d started.
“Here’s the thing. I don’t need you to be good at this.
I don’t need pretty words or smooth declarations.
I’ve had plenty of smooth men in my life, and they all ran the moment things got intense. ”
“They were fools.”
“They were scared.” Her smile turned wry, something exposed beneath it.
“I’m not most people.”
“No.” Something soft entered her expression. “You’re really not.”
“I won’t run.”
“I know.” Her hand slid up his chest to rest against his neck. The contact was gentle, grounding. “That’s kind of the point. You showed up at my door at dawn to deliver the most awkward confession in the history of supernatural romance, and you’re still here. That matters more than eloquence.”
His dragon hummed with satisfaction. She understands. She sees us. She’s not running either.
“I should fix your porch,” Aero said, because he needed to say something and everything else felt too enormous. “And your window. And—”
“Later.” She rose up on her toes and pressed a quick kiss to the corner of his mouth.
Soft. Safe. Nothing like the conflagration of before.
“Right now, I’m going to make coffee—terrible coffee, but that’s all I have—and you’re going to tell me everything you know about siren magic.
Because we have a villain to catch and approximately zero time to waste. ”
“Coffee first. Villain later.”
“Coffee first.” She smiled at him—wild and beautiful and completely unafraid of what they’d just unleashed. “Villain later. And at some point, we’re going to practice that kissing thing until we can do it without structural damage.”
His dragon purred again. Louder this time.
“That,” Cassia said, leading him into her damaged cottage, “is still adorable.”
“It is not—”
“Utterly adorable. The terrifying dragon elder purrs when he’s happy. I’m never letting you live this down.”
He should have been annoyed. Should have felt exposed, vulnerable, all the things he’d spent centuries avoiding.
Instead, he followed her into the cottage—stepping over scattered papers and shattered ceramics—and let the warmth spreading through his chest be exactly what it was.
Hope.
Finally—hope.
The coffee she made was terrible. Burnt and bitter and nothing at all like the precise brew he preferred. He drank it anyway, sitting at her kitchen table while she pulled charts and data printouts from the chaos of her living room, organizing their evidence against Nerissa.
His dragon was quiet. Not dormant—he didn’t think it would ever be dormant again—but settled.
Content. Watching Cassia move through her damaged home with something that felt uncomfortably like devotion.
It tracked her every movement, cataloged every gesture, memorized the way morning light caught in her tangled curls.
Finally, she’s ours.
Aero didn’t argue.
And for once, he didn’t want to.