Do not let her put walls around herself. She needs us. She needs to trust.
“That is so much easier said than done.” Jasper stuffed his hands in his pockets, even though his palms burned where his fingernails had sliced the skin and stared up at the night sky.
He had half a mind to go to Cal, the monster hounding Cora, and ask him what she was running from. If Cal wouldn’t tell him, he’d beat it out of the man.
This war was tiring, but Jasper would never give up on her.
Cora was the answer to everything.
Chapter Seven
She cursed and flinched, dropping the pan. It skittered across the floor and spilled its burnt contents everywhere. In the bright light of the early morning sun, her burnt oatmeal gleamed like plastic. It was perhaps the most unattractive thing she’d ever laid eyes on.
Even worse was the smoking pan that held what should have been fried eggs. Cora lunged for the frying pan and chucked it into the sink. Smoke still billowed off it. She tried turning on the faucet to cool it with cold water, but steam erupted and filled the air.
She choked from the acrid smell. Not even a hand over her nose could save her from the disaster she’d wrought. Hell, she would be a terrible dragon wife. Jasper was in for a rude awakening.
Defeated, she threw open every window and door she could find. The evidence of her failure slowly slipped out the openings. Cora was left with just a mess. A very clearly inedible mess.
Her stomach pinched and grumbled. The beast beneath her skin squirmed. Hunger was making her anxious. The beast clawed her from the inside out. She needed to shift. She needed to eat. She needed a lot of things. Tears of frustration stung her eyes and she gritted her teeth against the beast’s demands.
No, she told the creature inside her. We can’t risk shifting. We can’t let anyone know.
No matter where Cora went, she would have to hide. Truth be told, she didn’t know when she would ever be able to shift again. If Jasper found out what she hid, he would never let her out of his sight again. The demon inside him claimed indifference, but she knew better. Cora knew that she would be hoarded like a piece of treasure.
The smoke had just about cleared when she moved to close the nearest window. It looked out at the front door of the main house, where Jasper was now standing. It was early enough that he should have held a mug of coffee, but he toted a glass of whiskey instead. He raised it in salute when he noticed her. She wanted to smack the dumb smirk off his face.
She was half tempted to march over to him and lay out every reason she would be the worst dragon wife ever. Mate bond or not, maybe then he would fixate on someone else. Someone who could give a king what he deserved.
Because she certainly wouldn’t.
Cora had been told all her life that she needed to be a certain person. Even before Cal tried to force her to be his dragon wife, her mother and aunts and cousins were telling her everything she would be expected to do. Her mother attempted to teach her to cook. Her aunts warned her that she would never be able to speak to him and be heard, that she would have to wait for him to speak to her, and even then, she would just have to smile and nod.
Everything they said felt like something out of a royal mistress’s handbook. It was for the women living in the fifteenth century. Not for this modern day and age.
But she was bound to Jasper. As a king, he would have a certain set of expectations.
Or, that was what she thought. Cora hadn’t expected him to bring her a burger the night before. Least of all one that he’d cooked himself. The gesture was strange and not at all what she’d thought would happen. The idea that Jasper could even cook rocked her world.
At least one of them could cook.
She slammed the window shut and turned back to the plasticky oatmeal mess on the floor with a heavy sigh. Not even a dog would eat that. A glance in the sink told her the same thing about the eggs.
Her stomach didn’t growl. Not with the pathetic attempts at cooking in front of her.
She would have snuck out again and found some place to eat in Grove, but Jasper was nearby. He would follow her. He would insert himself into her life. Right where she didn’t want him.
All Cora could do was finish cleaning her failed breakfast. Her only option left was the box of increasingly stale puff cereal. She groaned but committed herself to this bachelor lifestyle. It truly was her only hope.
The box of puff cereal sat untouched for the better part of an hour. A daytime talk show where all the guests were clearly bad actors had distracted her, but she could no longer ignore the rumbling in the pit of her stomach. She sat up and put her feet on the floor right when there was a knock at the front door.
Sniffing the air, she caught the familiar hint of whiskey that warned of Jasper’s presence. Cora sat on the edge of the futon for a while, as if he would go away if she remained perfectly still. Unfortunately, her heart had other ideas, beating wildly at the thought of being in the same room as him.
Cora hadn’t wanted to admit it, but being near him had been almost revelatory.
Almost.
She still wasn’t convinced that the universe had made the right decision. There was no way she could love Jasper. After what she’d lived through, love couldn’t be in her future. It was a thing that existed for others, but not for her.
Because of the beast inside her. Because of its scales.
There was no other knock, so Cora ventured forward. Just like last time, there was no sign of Jasper outside. Instead, there was a pizza box atop a stack of bags. She bit back a laugh, but still found herself smiling.
The air smelled of crispy pepperoni and charred cheese. Her beast was celebrating, and she hadn’t even opened the box yet. Dragging it all inside, she found more supplies. Things she couldn’t have while hiding in the mountains, things she’d left behind when she escaped Cal.
There were fleece lined blankets, a large pillow that was furry on one side, a bottle of prosecco, and an insulated wine glass with a lid. She cackled at the grown-up version of a sippy cup. Once she sobered, she wondered why Jasper was being so nice. It wasn’t like he was getting anything in return.
She looked to the nearest window, as if she would catch a glimpse of the golden king, but he was nowhere to be seen. Cora pushed the bags aside. If they were bribes or early payment for her duties, she didn’t want them. She didn’t want to know what Jasper would ask of her if she let herself enjoy his gifts.
Her stomach churned. Cora had already used some of his gifts, including the giant television he’d previously left. It left her in a predicament. She didn’t want to be beholden to anyone, and yet she was already in debt to Jasper. Not just for the gifts, but for the war he fought on her behalf.
She could reason all she wanted that the war was Jasper’s choice, but he never would have fought it if she hadn’t come running to him. Cora could have hidden in the Nevada mountains, maybe lived in an abandoned gold mine for a while instead of the Colorado wilderness. Not that it sounded all that inviting, but she could have avoided Jasper and the bond between them.
Instead, she’d come running right to him. Even if she didn’t immediately go to Jasper, she found safety under the umbrella of his reign. Which meant a small part of her must have already trusted him. It was an instinct, probably driven by the bond, but there nonetheless.
Grumbling to herself while she lifted the lid of the pizza box, she was greeted with an actual New York style pizza. It was enough pizza to feed her for a week. Her earlier reservations about accepting gifts disappeared at the sight of it and she eagerly grabbed the first slice.
Jasper hadn’t had enough to drink. The beast prowled at the edges of his consciousness, looking for ways to take over. He sighed and set down his glass before tearing off his jacket.
Watching Cora receive her gifts had been nice. It pleased the monster living inside him. He lived to make her happy, to make sure she was safe and taken care of. He wished he could tell her that but doubted she
would believe him. All because someone else had hurt her.
His beast growled. He stepped into the woods and let the creature surge forth. His hands were replaced by scaled toes and long claws. His tail lashed and slapped the nearby trees, leaving ruts in the wood. Tucked against his back, his wings itched to spread out and catch air. Ahead was a clearing.
He ran for it. As he broke free of the woods, his wings snapped open and he lifted from the ground. It was amazing to think that a creature the size of a house could fly. He would have reveled in the fact had his beast not been driven by a single thought.
Drive Cal out.
The war needed to end. There was no way Jasper could become the king he was meant to be until he finished this war. Each day that passed proved to him that his father had only been partially right.
Jasper was exhausted. Snow was slowly falling outside, painting a winter wonderland that he could not enjoy. The house was empty. There were no howls of rage or hoots of excitement. His cousins were home with their mates, spread out across the mountains instead of here, keeping Jasper distracted from the one thing he could not have.
Across the court yard, Cora was still hiding in the guest house. He hadn’t seen her since the breakfast debacle. It’d been a sight to behold. He’d been convinced every woman was birthed with the innate ability to cook. Seeing her utter failure had been both comedic and alarming. To keep Cora from burning herself or the house around her, he ordered a pizza and used the food as an excuse to give her more things.
He liked giving. It made him feel competent when he knew he was missing the mark in other ways. Cora was no closer to trusting him than she was when she arrived. He couldn’t find Cal earlier, either. The enemy dragon’s disappearance irked him. Especially when he knew the man was up to something.
If he could, Jasper would have destroyed the man and taken his clan. Before he could do something so ambitious, Jasper needed to make sure the clan he was running was safe. He knew that his father’s lack of involvement with some of the shifters had led to the creation of some imbalanced social structures. He needed to disassemble them but didn’t know where to begin.
He didn’t want to assert his power over them, though he knew he could if it came to it. Control was only a momentary solution. It was impermanent in the long run. He needed to convince them to follow him. But who would want to follow a mess of a king like him?
They must all know that he was endangering them. Not only was he starting fights all over the mountains, but he’d been a reckless fool for so long they couldn’t possibly think of him any other way.
He snarled at himself, at slipping so deep into thought when he could do nothing about his problems right then and there. There was no use dwelling on what he should have been doing when he knew what needed to be done first. On the stove was a roast that needed to be shared with someone.
If she wouldn’t leave the guest house, he would camp outside her door in the snow before she let him inside. He was determined to make progress tonight. Cora was already his, he just needed her to trust him.
That meant getting her to talk. Food always made people talk. There was something inevitable about conversation over meals even though mouths were full of food. It was strange and undeniable magic. His mother had taught him that, one lesson from a parent that had actually paid off.
He stood and marched himself across the courtyard, leaving footprints in the snow. It would have been a magical moment had Cora not slammed the door in his face the second she saw him on the other side. His beast clawed at him. It pushed him forward, but he would not break down the door.
Not everyone had the control of his silver dragon, the idiot who’d systematically dismantled Jasper’s Jaguar. The mechanic was still putting it back together and the new hood was lost in transit somewhere. Of all the things this war had cost him, the Jaguar was probably the most insignificant yet most irritating.
“Cora!” He called out. “I just wanted to invite you to dinner. It’s just me. There’s no one else in the house.”
If this was a movie, he’d be standing outside with some romantic proclamation. The snow had already set the stage. Unfortunately, all Jasper had was a roast that was getting cold and a half-finished bottle of whiskey.
Real life wasn’t anything like the movies, but when Cora opened the door and scowled at him, he realized it could be so much better. Even more so when she approached him and brushed the snow from his hair. There was a ghost of a smile on her lips, even if it was a little wry and uncertain.
“I can’t forgive you for thinking I needed an adult sippy cup.”
He was thrown for a second. “Oh, you mean the insulated wine glass. I mean, don’t most women need a lid on their cup after the third or fourth glass? I figured you might want to drink away some of your problems…or boredom since you refused to leave.”
“I’m a shifter, remember? A single bottle of prosecco isn’t going to make me drunk.”
“Ah, that is a thing I forgot since I haven’t seen you shift since you arrived here. Or as long as you’ve been in my mountains.” He wasn’t trying to goad her, but when her smile fell, Jasper knew his banter had missed its mark.
Miserably so.
“If you want to grab the bottle,” he said instead, “we could share it over dinner. I made a roast and I don’t want to eat it alone.”
The confession was stark, but it was the truth. Jasper couldn’t ignore the loneliness he felt anymore. His life had been filled with people, with Griffin’s presence. Yet, Jasper had always felt on the edge. His beast sat between him any connections he might have made. The only time he felt a part of something was when his court was together, when he could see what his problems had forged.
Even then, he didn’t feel complete.
Cora turned without another word and disappeared into the guest house. A long while passed, leaving him in the snow. He thought she’d abandoned him to hide once more when she returned with the bottle of prosecco and what she called an adult sippy cup.
“About that roast,” she said.
***
It was her second time inside Jasper’s house, but somehow this time felt like the first. Without the presence of the other shifters, the rooms felt more…intimate.
When she went to retrieve the bottle of wine, she’d almost stayed inside. Logically, this felt like a bad idea. She shouldn’t hang out with Jasper if she wanted to keep him at a distance, but the part of her that craved being near him made her compromise.
This wasn’t a date. It was a chance to show Jasper that she would be the worst dragon wife ever.
He gestured to the living room before going into the kitchen. The smell of roast beef and caramelized onions filled the air. She didn’t know if prosecco was the right kind of wine to pair with such a rich meal, but she didn’t think it actually mattered.
Across from the couch was an unlit fireplace. A cool draft blew from its mouth, reminding her of the snow falling outside. She was tired of the snow, but she couldn’t deny the beauty of it now that she was inside. The delicate flakes fluttered in even the smallest breeze.
Jasper returned with two plates loaded with food and a corkscrew. They ignored the wine for the time being. Having something to eat other than pizza was exhilarating. Cora hadn’t realized she could overdose on pizza so quickly.
“Who taught you how to cook?” she asked around a mouthful of rich beef. Embarrassed, she covered her mouth with her hand, but Jasper just smiled.
He laughed before telling her that his mother taught him. “It was a kind of magic. She was human and so watching her make magic intrigued me. Dad didn’t want me in the kitchen with her, but she told him I would have to attract a mate someday and I wasn’t going to do it with my charm.”
Cora laughed so hard she snorted.
“Mom knew that I would have trouble far before anyone else did. She made sure I was prepared.”
Grief flashed across his features. While it was brief, she saw the depth of it. His
parents were nowhere to be found. She assumed he must have been their only child, born late in their lives. If his mother was still human and his father died, the magic keeping her alive would have faded and taken her with it.
Jasper hadn’t lost just one parent, but two.
Cora knew how that felt, though she couldn’t bring herself to say it. Not yet. The wounds were still too fresh.
“Seems a little redundant, though,” Cora noted, moving past her pain. “Your mother had to know that you would take a dragon wife someday. You wouldn’t need to cook for yourself again.”
Jasper raised a brow, obviously unconvinced and probably a little confused. There was no way he didn’t know what she was talking about. Every male dragon shifter had a dragon wife.
Then again, only one of the human mates in this court had been changed and, as far as Cora understood, that had been an unfortunate accident. Neither Ashton or Wyatt seemed to care that their mates were human. And, if Jasper’s mother was still human when she passed, then maybe this clan did not have the same traditions hers had.
“Obviously, I’d never ask you to cook,” Jasper said.
Cora’s head snapped up. The statement was so simple, yet it shook her entire world. She’d thought that was a non-negotiable part of her life, a facet she would never escape. Jasper just stated that he didn’t expect it of her.
“Are you serious? You’d cook every meal yourself?”
“After what I saw you do earlier, I would gladly make every meal…or order out if it came to that. I can’t have you getting hurt for a steak.”
She leaned back, surprised. “You would forgo hot meals for the sake of my safety?”
“What kind of mate would I be if I made you risk your neck every night when I’m perfectly capable of cooking. Like I said, my mother made sure I was prepared.”
Jasper Drake Page 5
