Page 21 of Dragon My Crazy

I hesitated. The nest was sacred. It was also up in my personal floor of the castle, a place I didn’t let anyone else visit. It was my sanctuary. Well, at least here in the castle. I had another nest hidden away in a cave in the mountains, my true inner sanctumwhere I kept my treasure hoard. I wasn’t kidding when I said dragons were territorial.

She saw the hesitation and understood. “It’s in your personal space. Desmon was very strict about that too. Though he eventually let me go up and tidy it.”

“Yes, it is,” I said with a grin, my tone turning playful. “Icouldlet you see it, but then I’d have to kidnap you and keep you there for the rest of the night.” I lifted my brows suggestively.

She rolled her eyes, but I didn’t miss the way her cheeks flushed. “You, sir, are a shameless flirt.”

“Only with you,” I shot back, grinning.

She huffed, shaking her head, but there was a smile tugging at her lips. “Goodnight, dragon.”

“G’night, pretty witch.”

She turned to walk away, and I couldn’t help but notice her slippers. There, on her feet, were two little mice with oversized ears, bouncing with every step. Cute. And definitely not what I’d expected from the poised and elegant woman. My little witch had layers.

I watched her go, my dragon growling in my chest.

Ours.

I clenched my jaw, forcing the thought away. That was a complication I didn’t need right now. Not with her believing thatI was only feigning interest to get her to stay. And I wasn’t even sure my dragon was right.

I ascended the final flight of stairs and pushed open the door to the uppermost floor of my home. This was my domain. The space sprawled before me, a chaotic shrine—or was that graveyard?—to every hobby I’d ever latched onto in my endless quest to stay busy.

A long life meant many years staving off boredom. A half-finished model ship sat on a workbench, its sails meticulously painted but still unattached. Beside it, a shelf groaned under the weight of unassembled drones, their sleek black frames gathering dust. A vintage record player sat in the corner, next to a collection of old jazz albums. A guitar leaned against the wall, its strings long out of tune. A stack of unread books teetered precariously on a side table. An easel stood in the corner, a half-finished painting of the valley below still gracing its frame. Then there was an oak desk buried under a pile of blueprints, sketchbooks, and scattered tools.

The massive room was so filled with abandoned projects that I was embarrassed to show anyone. Then there were the things that actually managed to keep my attention.

A high-end gaming PC hummed softly, its screen still frozen on the menu of a game I’d been playing recently. Video games were a great way to pass the time. And I’d dove into them head first, wasting hours and hours of my days in them for a little over a decade. Recently, that had also lost its appeal.

A weight bench sat nearby, its barbell still loaded with plates from my last failed attempt to start yet another fitnessroutine. I’d lost interest in that too. There were also games and challenges demons and dragons played. They kept me entertained whenever there was something interesting to bet on. But even those bored me more often than not. It was easy to lose interest in things when I’d done everything thrice already.

We’ve never had a mate.

Oh, shut it.

At the opposite end were two doors, both of which I kept open, since I was the only one allowed up here. The one on the left led to my bedroom. I headed through the one on the right and placed Melly into her nest.

A ring of smooth, fire-scorched boulders formed the outer edge, but inside, the nest was a cocoon of comfort. A circular mat, custom-made, thick, soft, and enchanted with magic, lined the bottom. The blankets, too, were spelled to be fireproof, as were the plush pillows. A few of Melly’s favorite toys were half-buried in the mess—a chewed-up rubber lizard, a singed wooden block, and a single fluffy fabric ear, the only remaining part of a plush mouse Melly had destroyed.

I laid her inside, and she stretched, waking briefly before snuggling into her bed and falling right back to sleep.

Chapter 11

Elana

WewalkeddownSolstice’sMain Street side by side, and despite my assurances that this was not a date, it was really starting to feel like one.

The town might have only been a few years old, but it had personality galore. Unlike the sterile, cookie-cutter developments popping up elsewhere, the buildings boasted a range of architecture.

Wooden storefronts with hand-carved shutters stood shoulder-to-shoulder with stone cottages sporting thatched roofs that looked like they’d been lifted straight from a medieval village. Farther down the street, sleek modern houses with floor-to-ceiling glass windows gleamed in the sunlight, their contemporary lines contrasting with the older architecture. Somehow, it all worked together, feeling both timeless and fresh, a place that had grown organically rather than being planned within an inch of its life.

I’d spent the early part of the morning in Melly’s nursery showing her how to pick up a jumbo crayon, one of the few that hadn’t melted during her last fire-filled tantrum, and draw on a sheet of paper. We made a little progress when she stopped trying to pick it up with her mouth and finally used her paws. It wasn’t her hands, but I praised her anyway to let her know she was going in the right direction. It was one step toward her actually shifting so she could discover all the fun things her human form could do.

She’d clung onto my leg when I’d tried to leave, and I’d asked again about bringing Melly along, but Emmett had been firm about it being too dangerous. And I understood. There were some shitty people out there, and I didn’t want her on their radar either. But still, I couldn’t help wishing she could see this place, where magical creatures chose to live mostly in their human forms.

Emmett was convinced no one in town would actually recognize him as the very dragon who lived in the castle overlooking the town. His aura was a lot weaker than Desmon’s, and while I could immediately peg him as a shifter or monster, and a powerful one at that, I had to admit that I wouldn’t have thought“dragon” at all. And for me, my aura and magic were being subdued by Seth’s spell, but it was still very clear that I had magic.

There was no way we’d be mistaken for plain humans by anyone with the sight. The plan, if asked, was to pretend we were visitors from Darlington looking for a quieter life.