Romance: Bought by the Dragon: BBW Dragon Shifter Romance Standalone (Paranormal Romance) (Studly Shifters Book 2) by Ashley Hunter Read Free Book Online Page A

out on the way here!”
    She mock-pouted. “Don’t tease me, I had a rough day.”
    “Humph.” His eyes twinkled faintly as he went to stow the jug. “All right, all right. But at any rate, I suppose I can show you. At night. I mostly swam on my way down the coast; my scale color stands out too much during the day.”
    “All right,” she said with a tiny smile. “Just um, let me know when.”

6: Warmth
     
    They did not fly that night, or the next, or the next. They seemed to both need that time just to get used to each other. It was as if the King, by forcing them together, had driven a wedge between them instead, and one which had to be slowly pried loose, the breach mended. Trust built, and assumptions discarded. But at least, despite the discomfort underlying it all, Taran seemed as willing to keep trying as she.
    They kept having small conversations, short and mostly non-committal, until the awkwardness slowly trickled away, and eventually they could joke and laugh together freely. She learned about dragon society, which used modern technology but preferred certain Medieval trappings still, such as dungeons, stonework, and trading in precious metals instead of paper money.
    He asked her questions about her past, her parents, the life she had led before the car accident and Aunt Margaret. Once, half joking, he asked her what she would have done if she had seen a dragon as a child.
    “Probably squeal and cling to you like a burr, and have to be dragged away. I was one of those kind of kids. Unicorn folders, a gryphon stuffie. I wanted Dracula to guard me as my sleep, I wanted Frankenstein to be my best friend, I thought King Kong got a raw deal and I’d probably hug a dragon.”
    He laughed incredulously at that. “My father would not have known what to do with a squeeing, dragon-hugging little girl. I think it might have driven him back sane again. But I would have thought it was quite charming.”
    “Good,” she commented, and he gave her a startled look.
    On her sixth day in the cave, a storm blew in off the sea, and dropped the temperature as it drenched the cliffs and sent winds skirling past the cave mouth. Jenna stood near the entrance for a while, watching the storm while hugging the furs close around her. It was going to be a cold night. Taran usually kept a fire going until they went to bed, but tonight she wished there was a way to keep it going while they slept.
    They talked for a while, quietly. The subject of the Plague, of how Lyme Disease was more subtly ravaging humanity, came up, and she told him about the experiments on Plum Island and how the news had come out that the military researchers there had either accidentally released the virus, or had done it on purpose.
    She asked if he thought that his father might recover in part from his misanthropy once he learned of the specific humans responsible for the Plague-- possibly along with addresses. “That might actually get his attention,” Taran admitted thoughtfully. “I suspect he got it twisted in his head somehow, and views the whole mess as a war on dragon-kind.”
    “It isn’t. Humans were always the first target. I know people who had it for years. One of them has brain damage. It’s meant to cripple armies, whole populations--of humans. I don’t think a single one of its creators thought outside of our species, but that doesn’t change a thing. It affects other creatures too. Dogs can get it.”
    “This illness...who would devise such a thing? It is like burning down an entire forest to catch one deer.”
    “That’s the military for you. Germ warfare isn’t even legal, but that has never stopped them. Their leaders don’t think any more of the rights of others than...well….”
    “My father,” he finished for her, regret in his voice.
    They moved on to kinder subjects after that, not wanting to drag the mood down too much. She spoke of her life in her aunt’s strange, stilted world of gilt-edged tea sets, whispered