Chapter 2
August ledme inside and closed the door halfway, then stepped in front of me.
I sucked in a breath to prevent a more embarrassing reaction, like pressing my chest to his.
He was so tall.
And strong.
And I was still wet between my thighs.
“You live with roommates,” he said in a low voice.
That… wasn’t what I expected him to say.
I blinked.
He waited.
“Yes. Two of them. My best friends,” I finally said. “They’re sisters.”
“I can smell them on your skin. I need you to shower.”
I blinked again.
Was he allowed to ask me that?
It was a weird request, wasn’t it?
Even though he hadn’t really phrased it as a request.
“Why?” I finally asked.
“Having anyone else’s scent on your skin makes me itch to mark you with mine.”
Oh.
Great.
“And you would mark me with…”
“My tongue.”
I shivered.
My body wasn’t against the idea at all, apparently.
“A shower sounds great,” I blurted.
His lips curved upward, just slightly. It was the tiniest hint of a smile, but the fire in his eyes burned brighter with it. “The master bathroom has soap and a towel.”
With that, his hand landed on the small of my back, and he led me into one of the bedrooms. I let him guide me, remaining quiet as we walked together.
There was a mattress on the floor, with dark gray blankets, sheets, and pillows askew. I thought it was odd that all of them were the same color, but he didn’t mention it as we walked past, so I didn’t ask.
In the connected bathroom, there was a towel hanging off a hook, and one bottle of four-in-one shower gel, shampoo, and who knew what else. There was an electric razor and a toothbrush on the countertop, but nothing else.
No shower mat.
No toothbrush.
“It’s very lived-in,” I said, before I could reconsider my sarcasm.
He chuckled, low and rough.
The sound gave me goosebumps.
“I don’t live here, Fireball. Or I didn’t, at least.”
“When can I go home?” I asked, and both of our amusement faded.
“In four weeks, after the fire leaves your veins.”
That was a long time to live with a stranger, while dealing with heat.
A long, long time.
I leaned against the edge of the bathroom countertop, putting space between us. The warmth in my body immediately increased when he wasn’t touching me, turning slowly into a slight ache that reminded me of soreness after a workout.
I hadn’t worked out in months, but the feeling wasn’t entirely foreign.
And it definitely wasn’t pleasant.
“I’ll have to let my friends know I’m okay. They’ll report me missing if I don’t show up this afternoon. I should ask them to bring my clothes, too,” I said.
“Everything at your place will smell like them. It’s not an option.”
My forehead creased. “What do I wear, then?”
“My clothes.”
I scowled. “I’m not spending a month in your clothes, August.”
“Then we’ll order new things.”
“Can’t we just wash everything?”
It was his turn to blink.
I held back a snort when I realized he was surprised by the option.
A moment passed before he agreed. “That’ll probably work. I’ll have to buy a washer and dryer too.”
Oh.
“If you don’t have the money,” I began.
“Money’s not an issue. If it was, my sister and her mate would insist on paying.” He took a step back, and slipped his hands into the pockets of his jeans. It was a casual motion, one that made him seem more… human, I guess. “Take your shower. I’ll put a set of my clothes outside the bathroom door, then make sure we’ll have a washer and dryer too.”
“Alright.”
“Lock the door,” he added. “My instincts will push me back to you. When I check on you, tell me you’re fine.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll reach out to your friends to handle the clothing, too. I?—”
“Don’t do that. They need to hear this from me. They’ll need to see me, too, if you don’t want them to call the cops.”
He didn’t bat an eye at the warning. “Human police don’t challenge dragons.”
“Lovely.” I brushed a few strands of hair out of my eyes. “I’m all set. You can go.”
He dipped his head, then strode out of the room.
My gaze lingered on the bubble of his ass, and my head jerked as I forced myself to stop staring at him.
We were going to fight the heat. Not embrace it.
I locked the door behind him, then leaned up against it and let out a long, pained breath.
My mind scrambled to catch up with everything that had happened.
It was a lot.
And what did I even know about dragon shifters?
I forced myself to think about it.
They could shift between their dragon and human forms.
They were known to be secretive.
And… they guarded a huge supernatural prison somewhere in the mountain range connected to Scale Ridge.
It was the only supernatural prison in the world, as far as I knew.
So yeah, it wasn’t surprising that the dragons didn’t report to human police. They were basically the cops of the supernatural side of our society. They probably didn’t answer to anyone.
There was a harsh knock on the door against my back.
“Fireball?”
Guess he wasn’t kidding about checking on me.
“Why isn’t the water on?”
“I’m just thinking. I’m fine,” I called back.
If I didn’t answer, the bastard could’ve broken the door down, and I wasn’t about to risk that.
There was a moment’s pause.
I wondered what he was thinking about, or what he was considering saying.
He finally said, “Alright. Let me know if you need anything. Food. Water. Toiletries.”
My lips curved upward slightly. “Do you even have food or toiletries here?”
There was another beat of silence before he finally said, “I’ll get them.”
I bit my lip. “Don’t worry about it. I’m good.”
He let out a long breath, but I heard his footsteps as he walked away afterward.
Easing myself away from the door, I finally turned the shower on and stripped my clothes off. My mind continued to replay what little I knew about dragons as I scrubbed myself with August’s unscented four-in-one bodywash.
Dragons could shift forms.
They were secretive.
They guarded the supernatural prison.
And apparently, they had some kind of weird mating process called heat.
I tried to remember everything he had said about heat, too.
His fire was in my veins, and would cause me pain when I was away from him. Considering the increasing warmth and ache in my muscles, that wasn’t hard to believe.
It would last two weeks if we had sex, and four weeks if we didn’t. But if we had sex, that would seal the bond that had started between us.
So, no sex.
Four weeks of pain.
Yay.
We would go our separate ways after that, at least. I’d go back to my life, and August would go back to his.
He hadn’t told me why the heat had started, as far as I could remember. He’d said it was my fault because I interrupted their conversation and put my scent in his nose or something. But he hadn’t said why that triggered heat.
His mind would devolve with distance between us, too. That was… something.
He’d said that when it did, his priority would be making my pain go away. I didn’t understand how or why that would happen, either.
So, I had questions to ask. Questions were manageable.
What else had he said?
Hmm...
If there was more, I couldn’t remember it.
The ache in my muscles was getting seriously uncomfortable. And the heat in my veins was, too.
I turned the water temperature down a bit. It didn’t really help, so I just sighed and washed the soap off my skin.
August knocked on the door again. “Fireball?”
“My name is Elodie.”
He ignored my statement. “How are you feeling? Are you in pain yet?”
The question caught me off guard.
I didn’t want to hear that pain was inevitable.
“Fireball?” There was an edge to his voice.
“I’m not in pain. Just a little sore. And warm.”
“Alright.” There was a pause again. “Make sure you wash your hair, too. I could smell your friends in your hair.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Why were you smelling my hair?”
“It’s unavoidable,” he growled. “Just wash their scent out. Please.”
“Alright. I need my shampoo and conditioner from my place after this, though. This stuff will wreck my hair. No one soap can effectively do four things like this one claims.”
“Your friends can bring it when they come to make sure you’re alive.”
With the shower on, I didn’t hear his footsteps as he walked away. But, he didn’t say anything else.
I grabbed more of the unscented soap for my hair.
I probably shouldn’t have been going along with his requests. I probably should’ve expected the worst from him and braced myself for it, after everything that had happened with my ex.
But I didn’t want to fight with him.
And for absolutely no good reason, I didn’t think he would hurt me.
Plus, Brynn was there. She’d made it clear that she would help me if I needed her to, no questions asked.
So I would figure it out.
I’d be okay.
Somehow.
August knocked again as I shut off the water.
“I’m still fine,” I said, grabbing the single towel off its hook and wrapping it around myself. It was gigantic, so it more-than covered my average-sized self. Considering how huge August was, that wasn’t a surprise.
“I have clothes for you,” he said through the door.
“Thanks.” I crossed the bathroom and pulled it open, sucking in a breath when I found myself face-to-face with the dragon.
His eyes moved slowly down my figure. “You keep doing that. Breathing in when you see me. Why? I can’t imagine you can pick up on my scent the way a shifter would.”
“No, it’s not your smell. You’re just…” I gestured to all of him.
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.”
His eyes narrowed. “You know.”
I huffed. “You’re aware that you’re gigantic and ridiculously gorgeous. Supernaturals are always cocky assholes—you know exactly how you affect me, and why.”
With that, I plucked the messy bundle of clothes from his hand and swung the door shut.
August caught it with a massive palm just before I could close it. “What makes you believe that?”
My face flushed. “Screw off.”
I tried to shut the door again.
The bastard didn’t let it budge.
Instead, he said, “Dragons don’t associate with other supernaturals outside the prison. I’m in deep shit with my thunder for making an illegal deal with Bash and his brothers. What makes you think you know what to expect from me?”
“That’s none of your business,” I said, though I was suddenly questioning my way of thinking.
He opened the bathroom door wider. “I’ve never been in close contact with a human woman other than my sister for more than a few minutes, Fireball. I’m not in the habit of asking pointless questions. I asked because I didn’t know.”
After a long moment, August finally released the door and stepped back.
Guilt rolled through me as he shut the door behind himself, turning the lock as it closed.
I’d assumed the worst.
And maybe I shouldn’t have.
He hadn’t done anything to make me think he was cocky, after all. He didn’t seem self-conscious, but that didn’t necessarily make him full of himself. He could potentially just be confident.
And while he didn’t seem very nice, that didn’t make him an asshole. He hadn’t done anything rude or even really wrong. Our situation seemed just as shitty for him as it was for me.
So… maybe I needed to wait until I knew a little more about him to figure out what kind of guy he was.
And I probably needed to apologize.
I dried off and pulled his clothes on.
The boxers were too big, but I got them to stay up when I rolled the waistband a few times. The basketball shorts were a lost cause. No amount of rolling made them fit. His shirt hung nearly to my knees, so I tied it in an unattractive knot at my hips, where it met the boxers.
My hair felt like straw, so a grimace pulled at my lips as I started detangling it with my fingers.
Shitty hair, along with apologies.
Not to mention the uncomfortable soreness and warmth caused by heat.
And the abduction of sorts after I tried to help some girl out in front of a coffee shop.
It was a great day.