Page 23 of Lachlan

The four-poster bed she was lying in was much larger than anything she had ever slept in before. The mattress was so comfortable, it felt as if she was lying on a cloud. The duvet covering her was so thick, she felt toasty warm.

But it was still a bedroom Belle knew she had never been in before now.

A glance toward the window showed the heavy blue velvet curtains weren’t drawn and that it was already dark outside. Still dark? She had no idea how long she’d been asleep. Nor did she have any idea where she was or how she came to?—

Dragon!

Belle bolted upright as that word screamed in her brain. Her fists were clenched on top of the duvet. Her eyes were wide, but also wary as she frantically searched the room for a sign, anything, that might tell her where Lachlan Drake was now?—

“I’m lying right here beside you, lass. On the duvet rather than under it because I don’t want you to think I’d ever take liberties. But I’m right here, Belle.”

Belle had frozen in place upon hearing the first word Lachlan spoke.

She literally felt as if she had turned into a block of ice, despite her previous warmth. She was so cold, in fact, she wasn’t even sure her heart was still capable of beating. Her mouth had also gone dry, preventing her from speaking even if she wanted to. Which she wasn’t sure she did.

What could she possibly say?

Maybe if she ignored the elephant—no,dragon—in the room, it would disappear.

“Can you look at me, Belle?” that familiar voice rumbled.

No, not gone yet.

Was she capable of turning to check if Lachlan was actually there or, as she suspected, just another figment of her imagination?

No, probably not.

Because what if she turned and Lachlan’s handsome face morphed into that of a dragon again?

Only in her mind, of course, because it couldn’t have been real. No, it had to have been a hallucination brought on by the hours of stress she’d suffered through when she believed she was going to freeze to death alone on a Scottish mountain.

A hallucination that had begun the moment she’d thought Lachlan had somehow appeared through an opening in the back of the cave. An opening that hadn’t been there when she’d searched the cave the previous day after taking shelter there. Which meant that Lachlan didn’t really exist either.

No, the logical answer to this situation was that she was still on that mountain, huddled in the cave, and about to die. That the savagely beautiful Lachlan was no more than an illusion as she died.

Why she would be fantasizing about lying in bed next to such a savagely gorgeous man, and self-consciously aware she only wore her panties below the waist, was a question she needed to ask her obviously overactive imagination!

“I would rather cut off my own arm than ever hurt you,” Lachlan assured her gently.

Her throat moved as a rush of saliva suddenly flooded her mouth and forced her to swallow.

“Look at me, Belle.”

“I don’t want to.”

She needed this hallucination to stop.

Now.

It might be too late to save her life, but she’d like to hold on to her sanity?—

“I’m not going anywhere, and I’m pretty sure you’re going to need to go to the bathroom soon after all the water you drank with your dinner earlier.”

She turned to glare at the owner of that annoying and persistent voice.

Then immediately wished she hadn’t when she found herself looking at a sleep-tousled Lachlan Drake as he sat up against the ornately carved headboard.

He was just as big and powerful-looking as she had previously imagined him to be.

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