Chapter 19
SILVER
Gold and I closed the bakery for the first week in January. She said it was for my move, but she planned to spend most of that time with a certain spider fae.
I loved cooking and baking for Hart and stroking my fingers through his growing beard whenever we crossed paths.
Every chance I got, I whispered those three words to him, unable to contain it when we passed in the hallway or when I caught him falling asleep in front of the television. I loved him so much.
I was satisfied with words, but my dragon wanted more. "Mark? Claim?" He was usually more confident, and I felt awful that I couldn't reassure him. I believed Hart would eventually claim me with a mark, but I didn't want to bring it up. What if I was wrong?
After that first week of bliss, I returned to my schedule at the bakery.
The subway rides were shorter, but the hours away from Hart stretched, making me grumpy.
My belly bulged with our eggs, hindering my ability to tend the ovens.
My head hurt from the increased hormones, and my back ached after standing on my feet all day.
Gold offered to take over baking and put a stool behind the cash register for me, but that only made me grumpier. I had no patience for our customers, and only a little more for my sweet sister.
It was even worse that night when I went home.
Nothing went right. I stepped in a puddle on the sidewalk, soaking my shoes and socks.
Then, I found a gigantic mess in the kitchen before I found my mate.
I spent forty minutes scrubbing pots and pans, loading the dishwasher, and putting things away, slamming cupboard doors as I went.
I heard Hart's bare footsteps in the hallway before I saw him and turned to give him a piece of my mind. Instead, he stood completely naked in the doorway, one hand curled around his cock, the other tossing his hair back from his forehead.
"Hey, sorry for the mess," he said, his voice thick with sleep. "I made us dinner in the slow cooker."
I hadn't even noticed the delicious smells coming from the far counter, I'd been so frustrated. Inhaling deeply, I let the pleasing aroma soothe me. "I can't wait."
"Well, I was hoping you would." The hand not wrapped around his cock dropped to his pecs and rubbed his already perky nipples. "My reindeer doesn't want to wait any longer to claim you, if that's all right with you."
My dragon charged to the surface, ready to answer him with a roar. Instead, I croaked, "Yes, please." I strode toward him, careful of his feet, since I still wore my wet and gross shoes. I glanced down at my mud-splattered pants. "I should shower first."
"Dinner will keep," he said. "Let's get you cleaned up."
Thirty minutes later, I lay in bed facing my gorgeous mate as he lazily stroked his cock and stared at me through half-lidded eyes.
"How do reindeer mark their mates?" I asked. "Bite? Hoof?"
"Bite," he said. "Dragons?"
"Depends on the size of our mate. Two dragons bite each other, but a scratch from a wing claw works for smaller shifters and humans."
Hart scoffed. "I'm no small shifter."
"Your reindeer is nowhere near the size of my dragon." I caressed his cheek, loving the way his beard rasped against my fingertips. He'd trimmed it shorter today, and I liked it.
I traced the line of his jaw, down his throat, to rest on his left pec above his heart. "Here."
He rubbed his fingers along the left side of my neck and pinched the tendon that connected it to my shoulder. "Here, after my knot locks us together."
"How do you want me?"
"I don't want to hurt the eggs."
I cupped his cheek and hauled him in for a kiss. "They'll be fine, but I'll give you a show, anyway."
Now clean and dry, my dragon wanted to show off for my mate.
I pushed him over on his back and straddled his chest. He gazed up at me with heat and utter devotion.
How had I doubted he loved me? He'd worshiped me from the first time we kissed.
I would let him revere me a little more, and then it would be my turn.
I rolled a pillow beneath his head and leaned forward, letting my cock drag over his lips and chin. He opened for me, sucking my tip into his mouth. Lifting his hands to cup my balls and guide my shaft into his mouth, he encouraged me to go deeper until he swallowed around me.
He felt so good on my cock, but we had a purpose that didn't involve me coming down his throat. With a sigh, I eased back onto my heels, leaving him with spit-slick lips and glassy eyes.
With an awkward shuffle, thanks to my hard cock, I made my way down the bed to return the favor.
He was already rigid and leaking, and a little pool of precome nestled in his wiry pubic hair.
I licked it up before sliding my mouth over his cock.
I didn't stop until his hair tickled my nose.
Then I pulled back, rolling my tongue around his length.
While I played with his cock, I slid two fingers inside my slick hole, stretching the muscle while I forced myself to relax.
I added a third finger and worked my channel open until the burn subsided, and then I collected all the slick I could. My hand glided over his cock, preparing him for me.
"You're so perfect," Hart whispered as I rose on my knees and positioned his cock at my entrance. "Look at you."
My dragon rushed to the surface, preening from the praise.
In my human form, I'd always tried to look smaller, to take up less space, and to avoid attention, but this, with my mate spread out beneath me, telling me how beautiful I was, I accepted the praise for both of us.
I was my dragon, and he was me, and our mate found us attractive.
Not only that, but he wanted to claim me with his mating mark, to solidify the bond fate had suggested. I hadn't realized how much I'd wanted to wear his mark on my neck, to show everyone that I belonged to the sexiest reindeer of all.
I sank down onto his cock, and it felt like coming home. Hart was my mate, my perfect fit in every way.
He lifted his knees, tipping me forward as he thrust into me, putting exquisite pressure on my prostate. "Not gonna last," I choked out.
"Neither can I. Wanna mark you, mate."
Both of our beasts hovered near the surface. I surrendered to the pleasure filling me with each stroke. My cock dragged along Hart's abs as he rolled his hips up to greet me, our bodies slapping together as our sweat dripped everywhere.
Hart reached between us to grab my cock. It was too much and not enough at the same time. "Need your bite," I whispered.
Hart snapped his hips up and froze. His cock pulsed inside me as he came, and he relaxed into the pillows, sated and boneless, as his knot swelled.
I partially shifted above him, my leathery wings overtaking my arms, but staying their same length, the soft scales brushing against my sides when I tucked them under me and positioned my claws over my mate's heart. I leaned down, pressing my neck against his lips.
I felt the change come over him. His snout grew longer, his wet nose brushing against my shoulder, and then he clamped down with blunt teeth. At the same time, I clawed his pec, leaving three shallow gashes. My arms replaced my wings again, and I collapsed to Hart's chest, which was already healed.
"Love you," he panted against my neck.
"Love you, too." I propped myself up on my elbows so I wouldn't crush him and relished the fullness of his knot as it built.
Though I enjoyed it, and could probably come again from the pressure, tonight was about more than pleasure.
I kissed him, slow and sweet, as the bond settled between us.
Like Hart's reindeer, our connection was fluffy soft on the outside but with a tenacious and unbreakable core.
"I'm so proud of you," I whispered.
"Me? Why?"
"You could have walked away from fate, but you chose to stay."
"You mean everything to me," he said. "What choice did I have?"
"Oh, my sweet reindeer mate, you had a choice." I kissed him again, trying to tell him without words. I felt lucky and eternally grateful he chose me instead.
On a Friday afternoon at the end of January, Gold sent me home early. "You're absolutely intolerable. Go home and hatch those little ones."
"It's not time," I whined. I couldn't help it.
"Did you call the birthing assistant?" she asked. Cuthbert had come in to check on me earlier in the week, but I'd been delivering coffee and cookies to Santa 30 while Hart ran errands.
"No."
"He said you could lay the eggs any moment now." She grabbed my wrist and tugged me off the stool. "Go home and call him, and don't come back until you have to carry your eggs outside your body!"
I couldn't believe she'd kicked me out. As I waddled to the subway station, I felt a stabbing sensation in my gut. I dropped my hand to my bulging waist, expecting it to come away with blood, but the stab had come from inside.
Gold was right. I was about to lay our eggs. The moment I sank onto the bench on the subway car, I texted Hart. "Call Cuthbert. I'm on my way home."
Our birthing assistant beat me there, since his office was only a block away. When I arrived, he had already created a hefty spell dome over our back yard.
Hart helped me out of my clothes in the den, since taking the stairs to the bedroom seemed like unnecessary torture. My belly skin felt too tight, and everything hurt, from my breastbone to my balls.
Even shifting hurt. Once I was in my dragon form, Cuthbert had me roll onto my side. He disappeared around my flank and then returned with a reassuring smile. "The eggs are coming. Roll onto your stomach."
That was easier said than done. My wing was pinned beneath me, and the other wasn't close enough to the ground to grip anything. I flailed for a moment, and then a giant griffin tugged on my free wing, giving me the counterweight I needed to roll onto my haunches.
Back on the ground, Cuthbert stood before me once more, still in his clothes. My astonishment must have shown in my gaze, or perhaps he was used to people questioning his ability to shift without destroying his attire.
"I'm a griffin," he said with a shrug. "We don't shift, so much as change places with our human forms. My body is tucked away somewhere safe, and when it returns, my clothes are still intact."
"That's so cool," Hart said. He'd gone into the house to get some rope from the basement to help me roll over, and now we didn't need it. "I shredded a perfectly good pair of jeans, the last time I attended family dinner."
"I hear that happens—"
I drowned out whatever wisdom Cuthbert was about to impart with a deafening roar. From the way it reverberated off the spell dome, the sound was trapped inside with me, while Cuthbert and Hart continued their conversation outside the barrier.
"Okay, Silver, it's time for you to push." Thankfully, I could still hear Cuthbert. "And Hart, you'll need to catch the eggs."
"Won't they crush me?"
Cuthbert shook his head and laughed. "Not at all. They are about the size of footballs. A dragon Silver's size won't have any trouble laying them, but we won't take any chances."
I resented his statement about my size. The eggs felt like giant stones in my abdomen.
"Footballs. Okay. Got it." Hart took off his coat.
Though his silky beard made him appear more ruggedly handsome than when we first met, he looked every bit the athletic jock on Santa 30's team.
He walked out of sight behind me, and my entire lower half clenched.
I roared again, though it sounded more pitiful than the first.
"That's it, Silver," Cuthbert said. "Push into the contractions. The first egg is almost here. I can see it!"
How embarrassing. I tried not to think about it as I focused on my breathing. When my lower half clenched again, I was ready. I pushed, and Hart cheered.
"Woohoo! Caught it!"
The next one took three more pushes, and then Hart cheered again. "Two perfect eggs! Come meet them, Silver!"
He didn't have to tell me twice. I shrank into my human form, still on my hands and knees in the sodden brown grass beneath the snow my dragon's body heat had melted. I'd barely felt the cold in that form, but now I shivered.
I stood and took a step, surprised how quickly my body recovered after shifting. It was almost like I hadn't carried the eggs at all. Even my stretch marks were gone.
In a wicker laundry basket lined with soft blankets at Cuthbert's feet lay our two eggs.
They were larger than footballs, but the same shape on top, with a gentler curve on the bottom.
One was a beautiful mother-of-pearl reflecting every color of the rainbow, and the other was a deep purple that reminded me of twilight. I couldn't stop touching them.
Hart returned from inside with my parka. Once I covered my nakedness, Cuthbert dropped the spell shield.
"The hard part's over." Cuthbert patted us both on our backs, and then he left out the gate with a wave.
We had four more months until the eggs would hatch. If the hard part was over, why did it seem like it was just beginning?