The Dragon's Mail Order Mate: A Paranormal Menage Romance by Jade White Read Free Book Online Page B

She was standing there, before a city and all she could think about was the fact that she hadn’t seen any part of it. As she watched the lights, she wished she’d taken a cab or something to go see the city. Instead, she was going to have to wait for all of it.
    There was a noise downstairs and Oksana turned, looking at the closed door and wondered what had made the noise. She was in her underwear and a tank top, in no position to deal with a burglar, but she wasn’t as helpless and defenseless as so many people would think. In fact, she knew enough to protect herself and then some. As she took a step toward the door, she could hear something else downstairs, movement and commotion. All she could think was that the worst thing that could happen would be someone breaking into the house and robbing them on her first day there. She opened the door and looked toward the stairs where she could see light climbing and resting on each of the steps and painting the wall in soft, orange light as she stared at the stairs. She could hear footsteps downstairs and she knew someone was down there.
    She grabbed some sort of vase Will had purchased and set on a table that hugged the corner between Mike’s room and her room. Gripping it in her fingers, she was right to judge it was heavy and that it would do some significant damage. As she headed to the stairs, she could see the lights were on downstairs and that there were shadows moving in the burning light. As she slowly crept down the stairs, she could smell something burning on the stove and she wondered what these people were doing. Mike had to be asleep and Will was still gone at his work. Who could that be?
    When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she was hunched over and heading into the kitchen when she caught sight of the intruder. He walked over to the stove and was doing something with his back turned to her and that was when she let out a heavy sigh and lowered her weapon. The sound of her sigh startled the intruder and he turned around, wearing an apron and holding a knife he was using to cut herbs.
    “Christ, Oksana!” Will cried, his eyes wide in horror as he held the knife all wrong if he were going to try and defend himself.
    She smiled and shook her head at the sight of him as he quickly blinked and his mind darted back to what he was doing. She suddenly realized how incredible the kitchen smelled and she looked at everything Will was doing. The man was cooking up a storm, everything from browning Italian sausage and ground beef to sautéing vegetables for the sauce that he was making. He turned back to his work of adding the herbs and spices to the sauce before he turned and took a swig out of the wine bottle he’d been using in the sauce and turned to look at her.
    “You scared me to death,” he said, his eyes landing on the ornament in her hand and he shook his head. “Were you going to bludgeon me to death, Oksana?”
    “I thought you were a thief,” she said, shaking her head.
    “Well, thanks for watching our back,” Will said, chuckling as he went to work. He looked up and stole a glance at her and she felt flattered by it before he nervously went back to work. “I’m sorry if I woke you. Mike went out with a couple of friends and I thought it would be a good chance to make some dinner before going to bed. He always gets angry when I wake him up cooking.”
    “Does the smell make his stomach growl?” she teased, walking into the kitchen and taking a perch on one of the stools on the island.
    “Fun fact,” he said as he stirred the sauce. “You don’t actually smell when you sleep. But no, it’s the banging and all the noise I make while I’m cooking. Thankfully, he needed a beer and a good laugh with some friends. Mind if I asked how badly he blew it with you?”
    She looked at him and tilted her head, not sure what it was that he meant by that. There was nothing she could think of with him blowing it. “What do you mean?”
    “When things