Page 9 of Fated for his Flame
Things were about to get very interesting, indeed.
Chapter Five
Chloe
“You’re awfully calm,” he remarked, breaking the silence that had been our only companion for the past several minutes.
I looked over and up at him, glad I’d rehearsed and planned my actions and personality ahead of time. It meant I could give him a response without stumbling or panicking, thinking he’d already caught on to what I was.
If he or any of the dragons knew my mission or discovered what was so very carefully sewn into the seams of my pants and underwear, they wouldn’t bother with an elaborate setup. They would kill me on the spot.
“Should I be?” I asked, putting just enough tightness in my voice to make it appear like I was faking the calm to try to appear tough.
The big dragon-man stopped, coming to a halt faster than someone that large should be able to. I filed that away, making a note not to underestimate his speed or agility just because his arms were impressively large.
His eyes, sharp and alert, scanned me from head to toe as we faced one another in the tunnel, the only light a ball of flame he’d conjured into being as we’d left the original cavern. The flickering flames made it hard to tell the color of his irises, but I didn’t need that to see the pinching in the corners of his eyes or the slight flaring of his nostrils. Was he testing the air?
I made another mental note to see if I could find out just how sensitive their noses were. How much of their animal side was merged with their human form? We had no idea, but I suspected it was important to know. One of the think-tank nerds back home would figure out something helpful.
“Let’s see,” he mused, his eyes still running me over from head to toe like some sort of automated machine.
Was it just me, or did his pupils dilate as he did? Again the lack of light made it impossible to see. But it made my heart beat a little bit faster. I frowned internally at that. Why would I care? I shouldn’t …
He lifted a finger into the air. “One, you just discovered we can shift into human form. Two”—a second finger went up—“you were plucked from a lineup by a random man, whose name you don’t even know, and now you’re expected to be my mate for life. Maybe I’ve misunderstood how humans normally do these things, but yes, I would say you should be a bit nervous.”
I grinned at him, deciding to stick with my current personality of choice. Backing down now would probably make him more suspicious. Better to double down and make him think this was just me.
“Dragons wanting human women as mates made no sense,” I pointed out to him. “Unless you had a way to use us. Which meant either you had captive human males somewhere. Or you weren’t purely dragons. I didn’t know the answer, but I knew there had to be one. This is the more surprising of the answers, but it’s not a complete shock. To me, at least.”
He leaned back, eyes never straying from my face as I spoke. The intensity of his attention was wearing on me … but not in an uncomfortable way. My cheeks grew warm instead. A reaction I didn’t need but could no longer control. His sharp, chiseled jaw, perfect cheekbones and strong, straight nose were all fixed on me, and I was staring back.
“Two,” I made myself continue speaking, glad I’d planned for this conversation because there was no way my brain would work right now, “I volunteered for this, yes?”
“Supposedly,” he agreed.
“I didn’t come in blindly. I know what I signed up for,” I said. “You dragons wanted us here. That means you had a reason for your ceasefire terms. I refuse to believe that reason is as simple as ‘We’re hungry’ or some such nonsense. If that were the truth, well, I would have expected the cavern back there to serve as the hunting arena. But you didn’t do that. You still haven’t done that or anything else. And even if you do, what am I going to do to stop it?”
“So pragmatic,” he rumbled.
“Would you prefer I try to act like a meek, scared little girl?” I asked. “I could try if that will help.”
The dragon let his head fall back, laughing slowly, the deep rumble echoing off the cavern walls.
“Exactly,” I said, stepping forward suddenly, hand extended. “So, we can just accept this is how it’s going to be and go from there. By the way, my name is Chloe.”
He stiffened as I moved toward him but quickly calmed as he realized what I was doing. His eyes lingered on my hand for a moment before he reached up and took it.
I think he gave me his name. I couldn’t remember. A buzzing intensified as his hand neared mine, drowning out the sound coming from his lips. My eyes were drawn sharply down as a tingle zipped up my arm the instant his palm touched mine. The buzzing became an outright roar like the pounding of the surf on steroids. I blinked rapidly, trying to push it down without shaking my head. I didn’t want to give away that something was wrong. What the hell was going on with me?
The tingle reached my shoulder, where it exploded into pieces. Some lingered in my arm. Others reached up through my spine and into my brain, driving their fingers deep into unidentified parts. Still more flooded my upper body, moving straight to my nipples like homing missiles, immediately turning the skin there stiff and erected, while more bursts ricocheted through my crotch, leaving my clit throbbing and my underwear forced to absorb a rapid dampness.
Muscles constricted around my lungs, tightening down, leaving me short of air, even as my leg muscles weakened and threatened to lose control.
An echo tickled my ears. An echo of a sound cutting through the buzzing.
“Chloe?”
That was my name—I’d chosen to use my real first name on the assignment to make it easier if I truly was stuck for the rest of my life. But who was calling me? Who was saying it?