Page 21 of Love Bites Extra Hard

He went back to his food.

“Should I… throw them out?” It was difficult to say the words.

Apparently, I was attached to them.

Like a collector. A toenail collector.

Yikes.

“No.” He growled, that time.

“So I should just keep them for you?”

He grunted.

Guess that was a yes.

At least I could tell myself I was collecting the trophies for him. He could be the creep, while I stared at my pretties.

His pretties.

Even though some part of me kept insisting they were mine. I was totally losing it.

I slipped into the bathroom to brush my teeth while he finished eating. When I came back out, he was gone again.

I stared at the door.

Okay, then. Guess I was on my own.

I was pretty sure I was supposed to meet Stella down in the jail, so I headed out alone. I wasn’t a fantastic navigator, but I could probably find my way down there. And I could ask for instructions if I needed them.

Halfway down the hall, I stopped.

Abruptly.

I’d forgotten what I was. A siren.

We were desirable.

There could still be dragons who might try to force me to mate with them.

I should probably go back to my room.

“What are you doing?” Talon’s voice sounded kind of amused when he stepped up next to me in the hallway. There was a pair of thick socks in one of his hands, and a hoodie in the other.

I really, really hoped they were for me.

“I was going to walk down to the jail on my own,” I explained, eyeing the socks.

He handed them over, and I pulled the pair apart before he could ask for them back. Leaning against him for balance, I pulled them over my thin pair and tugged them into place.

When he didn’t comment on me taking the socks, or what I’d said, I kept talking.

“I made it over here before I remembered that it’s not safe for me to walk around alone. People could try to take me. Clementine was stolen away to the fae realm a few months back, and Zora was imprinted on by that monster asshole.”

“You’re safe in Dragon Manor. The worst our people will do is proposition you.”

His words relaxed me more than they probably should’ve.

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