by Selena Scott
He didn’t move a muscle as she lifted a hand, moving slowly, but curiously, toward his face. Gently, as she thought she would startle him otherwise, she traced a finger over the scales on his snout. Donovan would have thought that he wouldn’t be able to feel a touch through the thick armor of his scales, but the heat of her finger seared him.
Apparently it did her too because she instantly whipped her hand back, holding her finger. “Ouch. Sharp.”
She looked down at her hand and Donovan followed her gaze. She was bleeding. From touching him.
Donovan had always been a particularly fierce dragon. He’d had vicious encounters with dragons who’d infringed on the Prodigo family territory. But at the sight of her blood, something new rose up in Donovan. A feeling so intense, so fierce, so protective, that Donovan could barely identify it. All his dragon heart knew was that his true mate was injured. In a field. Completely vulnerable and exposed.
“No,” Donovan growled. No to the whole situation.
“What?” she looked up from her wound.
“No,” he said again. “You. Home.”
“How?” she asked incredulously peering back up at the sky where she’d fallen from.
“NO,” Donovan growled even louder, furious that the idea of returning to her realm had even crossed her mind. “MY home.”
“Oh. Uh. OK.” She shrugged, and Donovan didn’t understand the bemused look on her face, but he didn’t care. She was coming back to his home now.
She stood and looked around, like she expected his home to be somewhere that she could walk to. Donovan stood, stretched and flexed his wings, making sure everything was in working order. He shook his mighty body, flinging dirt off of him in a great cloud.
He reached out for her with one claw and was surprised when she batted him away with her good hand.
“No way!” she said, something strong passing across her face.
He tried again with the claw. And again she slapped it away.
“Stop that!” she yelped.
“You stop,” he growled.
“No.” She stamped her foot on the ground. “You’re too sharp! Even the tiny little cute scales on your face cut me up.” She held her bleeding finger up and Donovan felt an agitation like he’d never known build in his chest.
He couldn’t touch his mate without hurting her. For the first time in his life, Donovan wanted to shift into his human form. But not out here, in the field. Not where they were still vulnerable. He needed to be able to protect her from anything.
Considering, Donovan walked over to one of the trees that lined the field, each of his tremendous steps making the ground shake. He yanked the tree up by the root. He couldn’t interpret the woman’s gasp that he heard come from behind him, but he hoped it wasn’t fear.
He brought the tree back over to her, laying it down flat on the ground. “Get on.”
Again, she shrugged her shoulders and crawled onto the tree. She hugged it around the middle with her arms and legs laced in with the branches. Reasonably sure that she was safe, Donovan gripped the tree on either side of her body with his claws. And with a great, heaving beat of his wings, he lifted her from the ground, flying her home.
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