“Uhhh … where exactly is here? And why are we stuck here?” Emmy finally took a few seconds to take a peek at her surroundings. Beautiful stalactites hung high above her head. While the cave may have been a natural formation, it had definitely had some man-made, or dragon-made, items inside.
“This is the lair for the King of the Pacific Dragos Clan.”
“Oh no! What if the king shows up while we’re here? Will he be upset that we crashed his lair?” she asked, not knowing the proper protocol for dragons or any shifter for that matter.
“Relax. It’s fine. He won’t be upset,” Kingston said.
“How do you know? I may be safe with you, but I don’t want to become dragon kibble …” That was the last thing she needed. What if she decided she did want to be with Kingston and the king of the dragons hated her all because they broke into his cave or something stupid like that? Would they punish a human? Jesus! There were so many questions.
“I promise the king will not be upset by our presence.” Kingston tried to reassure her, but she was having none of it.
“How do you know?” She wasn't letting this one go.
“Because I'm the king. Or I will be, once I claim my mate and make her my queen.”
“Are you shitting me?” She could just imagine the look on her face right now.
“I promise, I am not shitting you. Nor will I ever.”
“This is all too much right now. I could handle you turning into a dragon because I already had my suspicions that you were some sort of a shifter. Somehow, my mind didn't break when we did the plane crash thing. I steeled my spine when you told me I was your mate, but the king? Queen? I just can't even.”
Emmy sucked in a few deep breaths, hoping like fuck it would help. It didn't. Not at all. The cave … er, lair, started to spin. She felt deprived of oxygen and like she would pass out at any second.
“Easy does it, babe.” Kingston scooped her up and carried her down a series of corridors.
She had no idea how far back into the mountain they were when they came upon what appeared to be a large bedroom, complete with the most enormous four-poster bed she had ever seen. Seriously, the thing could easily fit ten people and still have room for more.
He laid her gently on the bed and kissed her forehead. “Get some rest. I'll check back with you in a little bit,” he whispered.
All she could do was nod and breathe. The shock of everything that had happened in such a short amount of time was finally catching up with her. She needed some time to herself to figure things out.
Her life was at a crossroads, and she didn’t know which path to take. One would lead her back to her normal life, where she lived alone in her apartment and she kept writing her books. The other path led her to a man she barely knew. A life filled with the unknown. If she were writing this story, her heroine would choose the life of adventure and unknown. She would blindly accept the hero, and they would live happily ever after. But this wasn’t just another romance novel. This was her life, her heart, her everything.
Emmy wondered for the first time if she could blindly jump into the unknown like she had forced countless of her female leads to do. Was she as strong and as brave as the women she had written?
Those were all questions only she could answer, but before she figured out those answers, she needed more information.
She had jumped into her relationship with Luke, and look where that had left her. With a serious lack of self-esteem and almost crippling anxiety, she thought about her future and her love life.
CHAPTERFIFTEEN
Kingston yanked his phone from the ground where he had dropped it before shifting back to his human form. Fortunately, he had been logical enough to grab it from his pants pocket before jumping from the plane and shifting into his dragon. He couldn’t say that for his car keys, though. It’d be the fourth new set he’d lost.
His fingers flew across the phone’s screen, explaining all that went down and asking his brother to meet him at his lair. He needed Jace’s help to figure out what the hell was going on. Someone had it out for Emmy and him. There was no way that any of the near misses that had happened over the last couple of days were a coincidence.
“No fucking way,”he said to himself.
Especially when it came to the plane. He knew it was in top working order. Had always been. He paid one of the top mechanics on the island to make sure it was perfectly maintained and replaced parts well before their scheduled end of life. There was no way something justhappenedto the engine.
“Unless someone tampered with it.”
The thought entered his mind a couple of times, and he had pushed it back, not wanting to think that someone was capable of that sort of behavior, but he knew better. He had enemies.
Hell, he had more enemies than he knew, thanks to his father. As heir, he had inherited those same enemies … especially now that he had found his queen and intended to mate her and claim the throne if she would have him.
As his father’s heir, it was his right. His duty. His destiny. The time had come for him to take his rightful place in the clan. The Pacific Dragos had been left to their own devices, without a leader, for far too long. The people of the island had suffered because of it.
Their father had run a tight ship when it came to what he had expected of his clan. He had set rules and regulations that were to be followed by all. And when those rules were broken, there was hell to pay. Everyone knew it. Those who refused his rule had paid the ultimate price. Those who were allowed to live were driven off to faraway lands.