Page 8 of Dragon's Honor

Olivia nodded. “I’m sorry, Fin.”

“Don’t be sorry for me. Be sorry for her.”

Ash’s fingers dug into her skin. He’d been so concerned about her safety, he hadn’t even glanced down at the tourmaline around her wrist. The light was subtle, but it was there. The stones were glowing. He wanted to be pissed off. He wanted to not want her in his lap while he held her and comforted her.

Olivia checked out her hands. “We should get you to the emergency room and have these burns checked out.”

“They don’t hurt.”

“Maybe not right now, but you could be going into shock.” Olivia was obviously concerned.

“I’m not going into…” Finley’s head jerked around until her gaze met Ash’s. “Oh my god, I have to be crushing you.” She moved to get off his lap, but his grip tightened.

“You’re not crushing me,” he growled. “Stay put.”

She stilled on him. “Why are you…holding me?”

Olivia cut in, “Leave him alone, Fin. He’s clearly quite capable of manhandling you.”

With the music off and the chatter down to a dull roar, the incoming sirens were loud. Uniformed police officers were the first on the scene, and then paramedics were filing in with their gurneys.

Ash knew there wouldn’t be much use for the paramedics. They could tend to the people like the beautiful Finley, who tried to help. But the bodies on the floor weren’t heading anywhere but the morgue.

There was chaos for a while with police officers wrangling everyone into groups, trying to take statements, block off the areas with corpses, and making sure no one left. Ash eventually relented and let Finley out of his arms, but not out of his sight. He never strayed far from her.

“I assume you saw it,” Henrik said quietly.

Ash grunted. “Yes, I saw it. It’s my fucking heartstone.”

“What is your plan?”

“To take it off her and leave.”

Henrik sighed. “Why? Why not find out more about her?”

“She’s human. That’s all I need to know.”

“Ash, you’re a fucking dick. You already lost one of your friends because he found a human mate. There has been plenty of talk among the clans what was going to happen when there were no unmated females left. If all the unmated males succumb to the craze, what will be left of dragons?”

“Why are you so eager for finding mates in humans? Have you found yours?”

Henrik rolled his eyes. “No. I’m not that lucky. You are. You found your mate.”

“She’s not my mate. She’s….” He couldn’t finish his sentence.

Henrik clapped his hand onto his brother’s shoulder. “Fate is a nasty bugger. I dread the day it shows up on my doorstep. You always believed in fate, until our clan fell apart. Somehow, you’re taking all the responsibility for that, but our parents were the rulers and in charge, and just hitting their prime.”

“Rik, look around. You’re worried about mates and destiny when we’re standing in a club that has seven smoking corpses in it. They all started on fire at the same time. This isn’t some weird human case of spontaneous combustion. This is the work of magic. A witch did this. Or something else. Tristian just killed seven more people. How many more people are we going to watch him kill?”

“I see humans matter when it’s more sins you can stamp on Tristian’s punishment.”

Ash turned to face his brother. “What would you have me do? Go up to her and tell her that she’s my mate, that I’m a dragon shifter, and that I want to bite her and claim her?”

Henrik pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a frustrated sigh. “You could go out with her a few times first. Not everything has to be all or nothing.”

“Yes. It does.”

“You’re hopeless, brother.”

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