Her Dragon King (Her Dragon King Duet 2)

“I know you are,” I answer with a jut of my chin, mouse standing up to the rude fucking lion.

“And what would make you think that?” he asks folding his arms across his chest.

“Because…Damianos rub your stomach and pat your head.”

He freezes and stares at me.

And I stare back at him.

There’s several seconds of frozen silence between us, but then his cold expression gives way to one much more stricken.

As he unfolds his arms to pat his head and rub his stomach.

“Yeah,” I say for the second time that night. “That’s what I thought.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

So that happened.

A few moments later I find out that Damianos has a whole living room inside his suite. A couch and two armchairs made out of the same black velvet as his thrones, but with regular gold framing, no dragons. There’s also a chandelier hanging overhead and a low coffee table. And two Greek statues, standing against the closest wall, like attendants waiting to serve us.

I have a lot of time to check out all the finer details of the place because Damianos doesn’t say anything for a very long while.

And when he does, it’s only three words. “He told you.”

“No,” I answer. “He talked. A lot—especially compared to you, but he didn’t tell me any of that.

“Then how did you know?”

I think about it and decide to tell him the truth. “My sister had this weird story about Xenon. It never quite added up. He got really, really mad at her and refused to have sex with her for like a year. And get this, he stayed in his dragon form the whole time. I thought that was strange because for the few days he was living stateside with us, he never said no to her. Even when she asked if I could come visit them in their top-secret hideaway, he didn’t say no. But the thing is I could tell he wanted to.

“And then there was the first time we had sex. And the second. Both times I told you to do something, and you just did it. Also, you said I was your prisoner one moment and unspoke Agda the next. And when I asked you to go against how you were raised and allow me to co-parent, you just let me. No questions asked. Like you were mine to command. I chalked it up to progress in the beginning, but then that night on the beach when you stopped throwing Bazzi into the ocean just because I told you to, it hit me.”

He nods, as if remembering right along with me. “Your head flame burned bright all of a sudden, but not with your idea to help Basileios feel his dragon as I assumed.”

“No, that’s a totally old trick,” I admitted. “But that night I did stop to wonder why sometimes it felt like you hated me and sometimes it felt like you’d do anything I asked. Reverence…”

I dip my head and consider the full meaning of that word, how I always linked it to worship of a deity before Other Damianos came along. “I once read this thing that all humans are wired for religion. It’s like we were designed to believe in a higher power. I’m not sure if it’s like that for you or if it’s just cultural. But after I told you to calm down and you did that, too, I began wondering if there wasn’t something inside of you that makes it hard to impossible for you to deny me. Like, you’re not advertising it, but that’s what Reverence really is. At least for male dragons. Am I right?”

Instead of answering in the affirmative, he cuts his eyes away. “So you have been toying with me since our return,” he says. “Now that you’ve revealed what you know, how will you use your newfound power upon me?”

“I’m not.” I shake my head at him. “You only owed your father reverence for thousands of years, then I came along and messed everything up because once you mated me your natural instinct was to pay me reverence too. I can’t imagine how hard that was for you. But that’s why I came up here. You think I want to tell you what to do? I don’t. I mean, at least not outside of bed—real facts 100, reversing that domination was kinda fun.”

His expression softens, but only a little. “You are not going to command me to not seek revenge against your fathers? Or to pay you total Reverence like the alternative timeline version of me did?”

I shrug. “If I was going to pull that card, I would have done it downstairs—you know, before I called off the wedding. Baby, I’m not in this because I want to command you. I’m in this because I want to be with you. And because your throne room is bad fucking ass. But mostly because I want to be with you.”