His Devoted Dragon (Divine Dragons Book 4)

by Jill Haven

  “Hey,” Beau broke in, tapping my arm to get my attention. “You okay?”

  I didn’t answer that because I didn’t think he would have appreciated my listing of my failures. I would have to do better going forward.

  “They got me after I came back from doing Devin’s chores,” Beau said, turning back and tilting his head so I could have access to the cut. It was shallow, still bleeding sluggishly because it was a head wound and they always bled.

  Being a mercenary for a while had taught me more than my fair share of first aid, and I was silent as I took care of him. “How did they get you?” I wanted to pat myself on the back for the evenness of my tone. I sounded almost neutral.

  I was not.

  “They hit me over the head from behind,” Beau said with a grimace I could feel. “It didn’t knock me out, but they tried to gag me and one of them ran inside the house.”

  “That’s when you started yelling?” I finished dabbing the blood off his face best I could. He needed a shower, now that the bleeding was starting to slow.

  “Yeah.” He let out a shaky breath. “They’re not very good at gags.”

  Feeling oddly off-kilter, I went to the freezer and grabbed the first frozen thing I saw, which was peas. Humans and peas. I didn’t get it. I wrapped it in a kitchen towel and crouched down in front of him, a hand on the top of his thigh. “Can you hold this to your head?” I asked, my voice lower than I meant it to be.

  “Yeah.” Beau blushed, his hand immediately seeking mine as I held the towel-wrapped bag of frozen peas to the cut.

  I stayed crouched low in front of him, my gaze flickering between those gorgeous amber eyes of his and the wound to make sure it was done bleeding. The flush was high on Beau’s cheeks and he was biting his bottom lip like he was nervous, which just made him more irresistible. “I’m glad you’re okay,” I said quietly, unable to look away. He was all I saw.

  I saw his throat bob out of the corner of my peripheral vision as he swallowed, something heavy hanging in the air between us. There was an itch under my skin, something telling me to lean forward and claim him, kiss him, plunder his mouth with my tongue until he cried my name.

  My breath caught in my throat, my body moving forward on instinct when he bolted to his feet, nearly knocking me over.

  Instead of landing on my ass, I stood, looking at him with some concern. His cheeks were even darker red now. “I need to take a shower,” he said, the words spilling out quickly. “I’ll get you clothes first.”

  “Okay.” What in the hell was going on?

  “You can stay down here,” he said, “since you’re keeping an eye on me anyway.” He was already taking steps back toward his bedroom, his eyes very determinedly focused on my face.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, worry pushing me forward. He was acting weird, and after a head injury, that was problematic.

  “No!” Beau said loudly, taking a large step backwards when I moved toward him. “Uh. Yes. I’m fine.”

  Hurt flashed through me but I fought to keep it from my face. “We’ll go get our stuff, then,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant.

  Something in Beau’s face told me I misunderstood him, but I wasn’t sure what it was. “It’s not that,” Beau muttered, biting his bottom lip again. His eyes raked over my body. “I can’t focus when you’re naked.”

  With that, he fled upstairs and into his bedroom, shutting the door behind him.

  I looked down at myself, having forgotten the whole nudity thing. He’d called me distracting. I was going to take that as a good thing.

  A smile took over my face, warmth replacing the hurt. He was interested in me, and that was proof.

  7

  Beau

  I remembered enough about dragon hearing that I didn’t speak out loud. Instead, I berated myself in my head. What in the hell had I been thinking, inviting them to stay? Sleeping was difficult enough, and now I had Mr. Six-foot-two-Adonis sleeping somewhere nearby. Like I needed another distraction. Him naked in my living room, crouched in front of me, was bad enough. Only the remnants of pain from the head wound kept me from getting hard with him right there.

  Pacing back in forth in my bedroom, I made myself go over to the closet. At the very least, they would need clothes to go get whatever they needed from wherever they’d been staying. As apprehensive as I was, I knew it was the best choice. I would be safest with them around.

  At least, I’d be safe from the shifters. Ace was his own danger.

  I scowled at the mahogany of my dresser as if it would have answers. It didn’t. Grabbing sweatpants and shirts for both of them, because they were probably the only things I had that would fit them, I opened my bedroom door and headed downstairs.

  To my dismay, both men were standing naked, talking, completely unashamed of their nudity.

  “These should probably fit you,” I said in a rush, shoving the clothes at them. “No underwear, though.” That had felt a bit too weird, giving Ace a pair of my underwear, even though they were clean. Given that I’d just almost been shoved into a van and then rescued by a dragon, my tolerance for weird was pretty high. But still.

  “Thanks,” Ace said with one of his ridiculously gorgeous smiles. Ten nodded, quickly pulling the clothes on. My cheeks flushed and I looked away, not entirely certain why I hadn’t retreated upstairs yet.

  “I’ll go to the hotel,” Ten said to Ace, giving him a quick nod. Then Ten grinned at me. “Better get used to nudity if you’ll be staying around shifters.”

  Ace and I watched him go, the lock of the door echoing loudly in the nearly silent house. “Want some company in that shower?” Ace asked with a wink. “I’m already naked.”

  I didn’t squeak, I really didn’t. I just may have turned red and ran upstairs. His chuckling followed me until I closed my door behind me, leaning against it and struggling to breathe normally. Whatever it was about him, it turned me from a steady man of twenty-five to a teenager who’d just gotten his first crush. Even worse, he didn’t seem to be bothered by me the way I was by him.

  “This is not how I expected today to go,” I muttered as I got out clean clothes for myself. Ace had done a good job of cleaning the blood out of my hair, but I wanted to get the dust and dirt of working on a farm out from underneath my skin. Grabbing towels, I headed into the bathroom and didn’t relax until I stepped under the spray.

  The hot water ran down my back and I sighed in pleasure. I hadn’t realized how tense I was until that moment. As I started to wash myself, my attention wandered. The last time I had seen a dragon was probably twenty years ago, and the memory was fuzzy. I wasn’t even sure whose dragon it was.

  An image of Ace’s dragon flashed in my mind as I gingerly washed my hair. I hadn’t even thought dragons could be beautiful, but his had been. His scales were a mix of sea-green and ocean-blue, his body thick and powerful but oddly comforting. A small part of my brain had screamed to run, but the rest of me had wanted to go near him, touch him, see what those scales of his felt like. He wasn’t just any dragon. He was Ace.

  Warmth pooled low in my stomach at the thought of him and I tried to will away my erection. At least I’d waited to get hard until I wasn’t in the room with him. I didn’t want to want him. He was sexy as hell, I would give him that much. Especially now that I had seen him naked and knew what he looked like under those clothes. His muscles were well-defined, his skin the light tan of sand. Everything about him was big.

  Everything.

  I shivered and clenched my asshole at the thought, sparking the nerves that lined the rim and sending more heat pulsing into my cock. I wasn’t a virgin, but I hadn’t done a ton, either, and I could tell Ace was generously endowed. Would it hurt? Would it feel good? While I was new to it, Ace certainly wasn’t.

  The thought soured my stomach and I rinsed my hair out, trying not to grit my teeth. Ace had crouched in front of me, those ocean-blue eyes focused intently on me, those gorgeous lips inches from mine before my brain kicked in
and got me the hell out of there. As it was, I still wanted to go downstairs and grab him and kiss the daylights out of him. I wanted to feel his body against mine, slide my tongue into the heat of his mouth.

  “Fuck,” I muttered, my body tingling all over. I was close to coming without even doing anything. It wasn’t worth it, I reminded myself. If I had sex with him, I would be one in a line of many. I didn’t want to be another notch in his bedpost.

  Finishing up the shower with a cursory wash and leaving myself unsatisfied, I toweled off as quickly as I could and then dressed in comfortable clothes. The more my mind wandered, the softer my cock got. I wanted Ace, that much was self-explanatory, but it was just physical. Maybe it had something to do with being an omega.

  But if that was the case, why wasn’t I responding to Ten in the same way?

  Dragging my attention back to the present—and away from the hot dragon—I headed to my grandpa’s office, two doors down the hallway and often where I ended up when I needed to clear my mind. I opened the door slowly, inhaling deeply. It smelled normal now, after a year, but if I tried, in the air was a hint of the tobacco Grandpa would always smoke. It was more like an echo of a smell than an actual one, but it comforted me anyway.

  I stood there, looking at the impeccably clean office with warm eyes. I cleaned it every week, made sure dust didn’t touch the photographs or mementos. Walking across the small room, I opened the closet, the scent of Grandpa hitting me and mingling with hints of Grandma’s floral perfume. She’d always liked the lily scent, although I didn’t remember what it was called. Even now, on the rare occasion I came across flowers, they reminded me of her.

  Sadness flickered at the edges of my consciousness. The scents were fading, if they weren’t already just in my mind. Soon, all that would be left were memories, the little bits of them I held and loved in my mind, forever.

  Reaching into the closet, I grabbed Grandpa’s favorite jacket, an old denim one he’d covered in various patches for one reason or another. One of his favorite things about being old was being able to do whatever he wanted, just to be labeled ‘eccentric’. Just thinking about him made me smile.

  I smoothed my hand down the front of the jacket, adjusting a couple of the patches that were starting to fray, even staying safe and away from the elements in the closet. Then I sighed and put it back in, the movement fluid. Adjusting it on the hanger, I stopped and stared when a small, folded, white piece of paper fluttered out of the slanted pocket and toward the floor.

  My throat was dry and I struggled to swallow. It got worse when I saw my name on the front of it, like it was something Grandpa had been carrying around to give to me at some point but hadn’t. My hands shaking, I picked up the letter and slowly unfolded it.

  A few lines in, I made myself go sit down before I collapsed. There was no way Ace would have missed hearing me faint, even from downstairs.

  I read the words over and over, physical confirmation of what Ace had said. Dragon blood went way back in my family, all the way to my great-great-grandfather on my mother’s side who was a dragon himself, and that blood had trickled down to my mother, then to me. I tried not to clench the paper too tightly, but it was difficult with how fast my mind was moving. What had that meant for my grandparents? If I could sense Ace, could they sense other things? Or were they just human?

  Why was I different?

  The letter went into a bit more detail about my background, about how my great-great-grandfather had ended up leaving his clan for my great-great-grandmother. There wasn’t a lot about my paternal lineage, but I was pretty sure Dad was a full shifter, so that took care of that side of the family.

  I leaned back in the chair, my body sagging into it and my eyes still wide. I’d been such a jerk to Ace, denying that it was even a possibility. But why had my grandparents lied? Were they protecting me?

  Fingering the note, I turned it over, looking at my name written on the front. Maybe he’d been carrying it around to give to me. Maybe he’d just been waiting for the right time. Either way, I would never know now.

  I scrubbed a hand across my face and was surprised to find it wet with tears. I hadn’t even realized I was crying, but once I did, my chest hitched, grief hitting me like a freight train. I had loved my grandparents, and I still did. They’d saved me when no one else wanted me. I was an adult, but there was so much of my life that they would miss.

  I moved back toward my bedroom and grabbed a towel, scrubbing it over my face in an attempt to erase the tear tracks. It sort of worked. There wasn’t much I could do about the bloodshot eyes, or the faint puffiness. I wasn’t one of those people who could cry and come out looking gorgeous.

  Deciding to pretend that everything in the last twenty minutes had never happened was the right way to go, I headed downstairs, stopping halfway when I could smell something cooking. The aroma was mouthwatering, whatever it was.

  “Dinner’s almost ready,” Ace said, his voice loud enough that I could hear easily. I wasn’t far from the kitchen, so I walked forward, trying to brace myself for seeing him again.

  It didn’t work, because standing in front of the stove, a wooden spoon in his hand, was Ace, dressed in sweatpants and a tight shirt, with an apron tied over his front. I hadn’t even known I had an apron.

  Apparently, Ace noticed me the moment I entered because he looked over his shoulder at me and held my gaze for a long moment. “Sit,” he said, nodding to the small table. “I’ll get a bowl for you.”

  Too tired to argue, I sank into my usual seat, watching Ace move around my kitchen like he belonged there. He didn’t even seem to struggle trying to find things, opening the correct cupboards on the first try without even looking stressed.

  Hell, after the day we’d had, I figured even I would struggle to find the right stuff in my cupboards.

  “Here.” Ace placed a steaming bowl in front of me, then sat by my side, just close enough for our feet to tangle under the table. “Beef stew.”

  My first instinct was to tease him, to ask where he’d gotten the recipe, but my eyes were still too dry and my heart a bit too fragile. “Thanks,” I said instead, my words quiet. As I started to eat, I could feel his eyes on me, like he was trying to figure out what had happened.

  Ace’s eyes narrowed to slits. “What happened? Are you okay?” He didn’t come out and say he’d heard me cry, but that had to be what it was. Stupid dragons and their stupid hearing.

  I stared at him and then let out a choked laugh. He cared, he really did, and he seemed two seconds from racing out to beat someone up if they hurt me. “I found this in one of my Grandpa’s jackets,” I said, pulling the paper out of my pocket and passing it to him. “You were right.”

  Ace’s eyes skimmed the note while I took a bite of the stew, groaning in happiness at the warmth that slid down to my stomach. “How do you feel?” His face was serious, although I could see hints of pleasure at the bottom of his eyes, like watching me eat what he made was the highlight of his day.

  “It bothers me less than I thought,” I admitted. Absently, I rubbed at the residue of the tears I could still feel on my face. “I’m just glad to know the full truth.”

  Ace looked skeptical, his gaze assessing me like I was hiding something.

  “It’s been a year, but I still miss them,” I added, because it was the truth. I took another bite of the stew, debating what to say next. Then I took a leap. “Do you miss your family?”

  Pain flashed across Ace’s face, but this time he didn’t hide it behind his usual veneer. There was still a smile there, although it was a small one. It felt genuine in a way his others didn’t, like he was sharing that moment just with me. “Ten and I were born into a Water Dragon clan and didn’t know our parents,” he said, his eyes locked on mine. “Because of the dragon war, my clan was wiped out. As far as I know, we’re the only two Water Dragons still alive.”

  I stared at him, the spoon halfway to my mouth, and my jaw hanging open. That definitely wasn’t wh
at I had expected him to say. “Is that why you’re so close to Ten?”

  Ace nodded. “He’s my brother.”

  My eyes held his, a warmth flooding between us that melded well with the stew I was eating. “I’m glad you two survived,” I said, my voice smaller than I would have liked.

  Ace gave me another one of those small, genuine smiles. “Me too.” His face darkened. “Although we didn’t escape without scars.”

  I thought of the marks on Ten’s face and winced, my heart breaking for him. What a reminder to carry for the rest of your life. How long was that life, anyway? It hit me, with a laugh, that I didn’t even know how old Ace actually was. Certainly older than his human form indicated.

  “Don’t be sad.” Ace reached out and took my hand, then twined our fingers together. “It was a long time ago, and Ten hates sympathy.”

  “I won’t say anything,” I promised, and I meant it, too. My gaze lingered on him, on his perfect, unblemished face. Ten bore physical scars, but I didn’t think Ace would have escaped completely unaffected. Maybe that was where his bravado and cocky face came from, something he was underneath but also a tactic used to avoid anything he didn’t want to talk about.

  I went back to eating the stew with my right hand, not missing that Ace still had a hold of my left. I didn’t pull away either, drawing comfort from that reassurance. No matter how scared I was, his skin against mine reminded me that he was there, that I would be safe.

  By the time I was scraping the dregs of the stew, Ace had finally let go of me to check his phone. “Ten should be here soon,” he said, his attention flickering to the front door like he could see through it. Maybe he could.

  “I’ll show you the guest rooms.” I stood, waiting for him to stand next to me before heading up the stairs. “There are a couple. These two have bathrooms attached, and—”

  “I’ll take this one,” Ace said immediately. There was no surprise in my heart when he walked into the bedroom closest to mine, looking at it like he wanted to mark it somehow, but he wasn’t certain how to when he didn’t have any belongings.