Page 3 of Dragon Prince of New York

Jess wraps me in a hug as if we didn’t just see each other afew hours ago. “The party’s already started. What took you so long?”

I shrug. “I fell asleep.”

Jet lag will do that to you. I got in late last night, was wide awake at the butt crack of dawn, but by mid-afternoon I was exhausted and crashed hard, even though I’d intended to stay awake to help Jess get ready for the party. So much for that.

“I want you to meet some people.” My sister wraps her arm around me, leading me deeper into the crowd.

When Jeslyn married Midas, her social life changed completely. She never had much of one before, but now she’s turned into Miss Social Butterfly. It makes me realize how much she gave up when she was raising me. Her social calendar wasn’t empty because she wanted it that way, like I always assumed. It was empty because she didn’t have time for friends when she was working multiple jobs and trying to keep me on the straight and narrow. Now that I’m older, I can see how just paying the bills was exhausting for her back then.

I’m really glad that she doesn’t have to worry about all that now. She has a community she loves and a husband who adores her. It's good to see her so well cared for. But after leaving my entire life behind in Prague, it’s also kind of irritating. Like rubbing at a scab. It gives me an itchy, out-of-placefeeling. Which only gets worse when Jess draws me straight toward the enigmatic man staring daggers at me.

He dips his head as we approach. “Ra’a.”

“Cyrus, I’d like you to meet my sister, Finley.”

A muscle in his jaw twitches. I hold out my hand to shake his, but rather than accept it, he clenches his fists. “We’ve met.”

“Sharing an elevator doesn’t exactly count as meeting,” I snap back at him with a little too much venom. That brief encounter has plagued me for years. But there’s no way in hell I’ll let him know how much I’ve thought about the few minutes we spent together.

I knew he was older, probably by seven or eight years, but there was a spark there. And at seventeen, naïve and thinking too highly of myself, I thought he was going to ask me out or kiss me or something. Instead, he cussed in my face.

“Wait, when was this?” Jess swings her head from me to Cyrus.

“When you and Midas went off and eloped.” I give her a pointed glare. She knows how I feel about the beginning of her relationship with Midas. She’d never done anything reckless or irresponsible in her life and then, my senior year of high school, she up and tells me she’s going on a vacation with a man she’d known for a week and when she comes back,she’s fucking married to him.

It all turned out alright, but I’m still bitter about not being included in her wedding or even told about it until after the fact.

Midas loops his arm around his wife’s waist and narrows his eyes at me. “Let it go, Fin.”

“Eh, you’ve got another month of penance. The baby’s going a long way toward helping me consider forgiving you.” He doesn’t miss the teasing note in my voice, and a rare smirk makes his lips twitch. I may not like how they started, but Midas has grown on me. He’s a good guy, and he’s taken good care of my sister.

“Why didn’t you tell us you met Cyrus?” Jess asks.

“It didn’t matter.”

“It mattered,” he says, voice rough and gravely. It shoots a shiver of heat right down my spine. Okay, maybe he wasn’t as immune to that spark as I thought.

He clears his throat and his voice softens. “How are you, Finley?”

I hate that question. No one wants a real answer. They want me to say I’m fine, good, great, couldn’t be better. They don’t want the sob story that’s been my life over the last year. But forsome inexplicable reason, I can’t bring myself to lie to him and give the pat answer he expects. I want to tell him everything, but I know I can’t do that either, so I just stand there, staring.

His eyes bore into mine, penetrating, digging for secrets. He doesn’t look any older than he did last time I saw him, but there’s a depth in his gaze, a steadiness, maybe even sadness, that wasn’t there before. For a moment, he looks… conflicted.

Jess nudges me, and I suddenly remember we aren’t alone. “Oh, um, yeah, I’m… I just moved back to New York, so I’m still settling in, I guess.”

“I just returned as well.”

“Cyrus is going to fill in for Midas while we take our babymoon,” Jess says, beaming at her husband.

I still don’t know exactly what Midas does. Something about investments or other financial bullshit that goes way over my head. I guess Cyrus must be involved in the business, since he’s going to help while Midas is gone.

Jess leans into me. “I still wish we weren’t leaving so soon. You only just got back.”

“You could cancel.”

“No. We can’t,” Midas answers.

I’ve known the man for six years, and I’ve only seen himupend his plans twice. Once, when he met my sister and fell head over heels in a matter of days. The second time, when I called her sobbing a year ago because Tim broke up with me. The two of them were on the next flight to Prague and spent two whole weeks trying to cheer me up. I think that’s when Midas really started to feel like family, like the big brother I never had. Even if the man is difficult and demanding as hell.

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