Their Runaway Mate (6 page)

Giant gray wings beat at the air above her. The dull thump vibrated through her. Jasmine ran away from the beast and its urine-colored eyes. She'd never imagined a dragon would be so massive… or so scary.

Twigs and stones bit into her bare feet.

Hide. Get away. Run.

"Help…"

She flailed against the strong grip on her shoulders. He'd found her. He'd
—

"Jasmine."

He'd never spoken before. How did he know her name?

"Wake up."

She twisted in the tight embrace that trapped her. Caged her.

"Help me," she screamed.

"Wake up, Jasmine," Kylan said. "You are safe."

She blinked. Sunlight streamed over her, as did the realization that she was fighting her nightmare in the arms of a dragon. She froze, but her fear was already subsiding. This dragon didn't frighten her. Panting breaths shuddered out of her.

Kylan held her tightly. Like a parent soothing a child, he stroked her matted hair and sweaty back as he rocked her back and forth.

"Is she okay?"

Oh, God, who else was there? Jasmine tensed. Another dragon was in her room. She turned her face into Kylan's naked chest, hiding from the intruder. Instinctively, she knew the dragon holding her would not put her at risk. He would protect her.

"Shh…" Kylan murmured against the top of her head. "Don't worry about him, that's just Dillon. He won't hurt you."

He loosened his embrace and leaned back to peer into her eyes. His forehead was furrowed in worry. He brushed away the tears she'd shed at the height of her nightmare. He was so close to her. So intimate and tender.

His hair was ruffled, as if he'd just woken from sleep himself. And his earthy scent flowed over her. Damn, he was sexy.

She leaned toward him before she realized what her body was doing. No. She jerked away. Then everything came back to her. His seductive whispers in the night were so fresh and real. The same hand gripping her now had stroked his length last night while he called her name. Heat swam over her. All the latent arousal she'd tried to banish earlier sprang to life again. Her gaze dropped to his mouth. What would he taste like?

"What happened, sweetheart?" he asked softly. His gaze locked on her face. She'd always believed she was good at hiding her emotions, but the way he looked at her made her question that.

"Can you read my mind?"

Laughter broke over them, but neither she nor Kylan was smiling. Damn, she'd forgotten about the other man. He must have opened the drapes when they'd come in to check on her. He stood by the window with light cascading over him like a halo. It was the man from her house… the man who’d stepped in front of the dragon.

"You…" Jasmine's mouth gaped open.

The man, Dillon, winked at her and bent at the waist in a mock bow. "Hello again."

Kylan cleared his throat and Jasmine looked back to him. "No, we can't read minds. If I could read your mind, I wouldn't have had to ask what had happened, right?"

"I… He…" Jasmine pointed at Dillon with her thumb. "He was at my house."

Kylan nodded. He brushed his finger over her cheek again, but this time she knew there weren't any tears. It just seemed he was doing it because he liked touching her. The light touch sent ripples of awareness fluttering over her.

"If you are okay…" He paused until she nodded. "Why don't you dress and then we can talk?"

She swallowed. "Um, okay."

Kylan swept his lips over her forehead as he rose from the bed. She closed her eyes, savoring the feeling of his mouth against her skin. When she opened them again, he was looking at her. A bright blue glow flashed over his eyes, just as it had last night. The look on his face was intense. It made her want to tug him back onto the bed.

What the hell was the matter with her?

She averted her eyes downward… Oh lord, he was naked. She snapped her gaze away from the bountiful, enticing sight of his wonderland of a body. Want for him struck her like a pick-up truck.

Oh, God, was that the sound of both of them smelling the air? Smelling her arousal?

Could this moment be any more embarrassing?

They didn't say anything, but simply left the room in silence and shut the door behind them.

Chapter 7

D
illon sat in the leather chair by the potbellied stove and tapped his foot. That was the only indication of the restlessness eating at him. He had questions, but he could wait until she was ready. They were at the precipice of something important. As much as he wanted to, he wouldn't force it. Jasmine was every bit as wonderful in his brief glimpse of her this morning as she had been yesterday morning.

They needed to approach this conversation carefully.

Kylan dressed in silence, then went to stand by the window. Dillon had never seen his chief so tender with anyone before. It was an obvious sign that his dragon senses were opening to the woman in the next room.

He silently outlined the risks. That was his job. But the benefits of exploring the opportunity to mate her far outweighed the challenges.

Which probably meant he was too close to the situation already.

When the bedroom door swung open, both he and Kylan stilled and waited.

Jasmine licked her plump bottom lip as she entered the room. Her gaze darted over him and then Kylan. She'd pulled her red hair back into a ponytail, revealing an enticing expanse of creamy white skin from her jaw line to her collarbone. He always liked kissing a woman's neck, feeling her pulse jump under his lips.

He leaned toward her. He wanted to get closer still, but it wasn't time yet.

Kylan stepped forward and motioned Jasmine to the couch. "Why don't you sit?"

She nodded and moved slowly toward them. She winced as she stepped. Kylan and Dillon lunged toward her. She froze. Her eyes were wide with surprise.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

She relaxed at his question and waved them away. "I'm fine. The blisters on my heels are stretching out, that's all."

Dillon scowled at his chief as he settled in the chair again. Kylan could have made Jasmine's cuts disappear with a drop of his blood. "You didn't—"

"No," Kylan said, cutting off Dillon's words.

Dillon reined in his annoyance. Of course Kylan was right. If Jasmine had dragon blood mixed with hers, she wouldn't be able to mate another dragon pair. He should have thought of that.

Shit, if he was already thinking with his emotions, they were doomed. Dillon gripped the edge of the chair. Kylan shot him a sharp look, and Dillon tried to school his face. The last thing he wanted to do was scare her. Hell, his eyes were probably glowing already. That was hardly a human characteristic.

After she had perched herself on the sofa, Kylan sat at the other end, leaving a lot of space between them. Jasmine let out a deep breath.

"Are you a dragon too?" Her green eyes narrowed as she studied Dillon.

She liked to cut to the chase. He liked that. "Yes, I am. Just like Kylan. He is our clan's chief and I am his primary."

Jasmine frowned. "Why were you at my house yesterday?"

He frowned. "Kylan asked me to make sure proper protocols were followed. I was too late to keep things on track."

She tilted her head to the side as she evaluated his answer. "What protocols?"

Kylan met her gaze. "Before I entered isolation, I was involved in the negotiations with the human delegation. We had agreed that the only women to be considered would be volunteers by their own choice, and that they would live with the clan of their choosing."

"Why should I believe that? I had a letter announcing my nomination ages ago." She shook her head at Kylan. "I certainly didn't put my own name forward. And there was at least one dragon, but I think there were more, who didn't seem to want to give me a choice."

"I know." Dillon nodded. Kylan had told Dillon about Jasmine's version of the events. Her assessment matched what he'd seen and heard. "Maryk's clan has been without a woman the longest. He almost went rogue when he saw you."

"What's so special about having a female human, anyway?"

"If you bonded with us," Kylan said quietly.

He paused and let his gaze link with hers. Dillon knew he wanted to make sure she'd caught the
you
and the
us
. The darkening flush on her cheeks suggested she had.

"Our entire lives," he continued, "would be devoted to making sure you are safe and have everything you want and need."

"And what do you get out of it? Sex? A dragon baby?" She shrugged. "I realize I should have taken the time to learn more about dragon culture when I was first short-listed, but we were convinced it would never happen. So humor me."

Her gaze flitted from one to the other of them, waiting for their answer. Her interest had to be a good thing. At least she wasn't saying no at the moment.

"Females are critical for the health of any clan. Even the dragons who aren't mated to you will benefit from your presence," Kylan said. "Your feminine energy balances ours."

She flinched. "You would share me sexually with your whole clan?"

Dillon jolted at the image she painted. "God, no. You are ours. Ours alone. We would never share our mate like that."

"As mates," his chief said, "we would bond to you with our blood as well as our bodies."

"Blood?" Jasmine squirmed.

"It is mutually beneficial," Kylan said. "Our mingled blood keeps Dillon and me healthy, and your life span will be lengthened to match ours. But as a clan female, there would be an expectation that you would assist with healing other dragons if needed. That is done through blood transfusions."

She nodded, but Dillon wasn't sure what the nod meant. They had laid it all out for her and she hadn't run screaming from the room. That had to be a good sign.

Still, it had to be overwhelming for her.

They waited.

Both he and Kylan already considered her a potential mate. The best way to confirm that was to get closer. A lot closer. Everything that he'd learned about her suggested she wasn't someone who jumped into bed with strangers, which to most humans was what they were suggesting. But dragons sensed their mates quickly. They didn't need to go through a courtship to be certain. What he wasn't clear about was if a mate would sense the same thing.

A shift in the energy teased him. Her strength was already reaching for his. That would only happen if there was hope for a mating. He inhaled. The intoxicating fragrance of her flourishing sexual interest permeated the air.

Kylan must have sensed it too.

She rose and walked to the minuscule kitchen.

"What are you doing?" Kylan asked, as he shot a confused look in Dillon's direction.

"I'm not done with this conversation. I just need to do something while we talk."

"Bake?" Dillon said hopefully.

"How did you know—" She stopped her question before she finished it. She sighed. "Right. I guess you probably know a lot about me. Yes, I want to bake. What ingredients do you have?" Her tone suggested her expectations were pretty low.

"I bought some groceries."

Her face relaxed into a tentative smile and a little dimple creased her cheek. "Did you?"

Dillon nodded toward the bags on the counter. "I wasn't sure what you'd need, so I just bought one of everything in the bakery section at Deford's."

Jasmine eyed the three bags. "That is one of everything?"

Dillon smiled and shrugged. "It's a corner store."

"Well, thank you," she said. "That was very thoughtful of you."

When she touched his hand lightly, he felt something tug in his chest. He'd had women in his bed plenty of times, but he'd never obsessed about seeing a woman's smile the way he did with her. After witnessing the pure fear in her eyes just twenty-four hours earlier, he'd been determined to give her a little happiness. Kylan would probably tease him, saying that he was just impressed by her pyrotechnic display at her bakery. Or maybe not. He glanced at his chief. Kylan looked as taken with their guest as he was.

Jasmine unloaded the supplies. Then she explored the contents of the cupboards and the small refrigerator. She waved them to the wobbly bar stools at the rustic kitchen island. "Okay, you two sit there. We have a lot more to talk about."

She pulled out a bowl and a spoon, then looked at them. She waited until they were seated. Not many people could get away with telling Kylan what to do, but Jasmine didn't even seem to realize the novelty of her request.

As she measured out the first of a series of ingredients, she twisted her mouth this way and that, as if considering what questions she should ask.

"What happened this morning?" Kylan asked.

Her hand trembled. She set the spoon on the counter and looked at him. "I had a nightmare." She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "I've had the same one since I was a little girl. I dream that I'm being chased by a dragon through the woods." She opened her eyes and shrugged. "My doctor gave me some medication to deal with my fears and to help me sleep, but lately the pills haven't worked."

Kylan grew very still beside him.

"You are afraid of dragons," Dillon said.

Jasmine laughed as she fiddled with the controls on the oven. "Kind of crazy that I'm the first one whose name gets selected, hey?"

"Do you fear us?" Kylan's question hung in the air for a minute and Dillon hated that she couldn't answer immediately.

"No."

The word came like an elixir to his nerves.

"I suppose I should be. But I'm not." She picked up a box of another ingredient and measured it out. She stared at them over the heaping spoonful of white powder. "Wait, should I be?"

"Not of us," Kylan said carefully. "But I'm not going to lie. Some dragons don't have the control…"

"Is that what
going rogue
means? A lack of control?"

Dillon shifted in his seat. "Something like that."

She dumped the powder in the bowl and reached for something else. Then she paused. A pink blush stole over her cheeks. "Control over what?"

Dillon smiled. "A lot of things… Including showing our interest in you."