Page 29 of Love Bites Extra Hard

Good.

Maybe over time, I could actually make him lose control and shift.

seven

AVERY

Talon rejoinedus a few hours later with two massive plates of food. He must’ve already eaten, because after he gave me one, he handed the second one to his sister without a word.

Then, he took the empty chair next to mine.

He didn’t mention my magic. Or anything else.

If he did, I probably wouldn’t have heard him. Between our audiobook and the meal I was devouring, I didn’t have the energy to pay attention to the big, grumpy dragon.

He finished off my food when I couldn’t eat another bite, and after Stella was done, he took our plates and wordlessly left again. I kind of wanted to ask what he was doing and whether he’d be coming back, but decided against it.

At dinner time, he was back with more food, and a set of three guards. Two were male, one was female.

Stella paused the book, and we both ate. Stella chatted with the guards about some sort of race. Surprisingly enough, Talonjoined the conversation every now and then. It sounded like he’d done whatever race they were talking about.

The dynamics between him and the guards were so much different than those of the other kings. Some of those guys tried to pretend they weren’t as much of leaders as they actually were, but everyone knew they were full of it.

Without a king, the vampires would wreak havoc. The werewolves would run wild. The fae wouldn’t have anyone to keep things running smoothly in both realms. The monsters would rampage.

But the dragons didn’t seem like that.

They seemed steady.

Laid-back.

Strong.

Their strength meant I was even more at risk, but I didn’tfeellike I was in danger.

When we were done eating, all three of us left the guards to the camping chairs and headed back upstairs. Stella offered to take the plates back to the dining hall, and Talon handed them over.

“See you tomorrow,” she called out. “Don’t forget to feed, Avery!”

I scowled at her, and she winked at me.

“You’ll need to feed every day while you’re working on our prisoner,” Talon said, leading me down a hallway that I vaguely recognized. We were getting closer to my room.

“Probably. I might be able to get away with every other, now that I’m using a smaller amount of magic.”

“There’s no reason to go hungry when I’m willing to feed you,” he said bluntly.

“No, but?—”

“No buts.”

I huffed, but stopped arguing with him. It was pretty much pointless.

We reached my room, and Talon followed me inside after opening the door for me. I didn’t bother protesting when he shut the door behind us.

I went back to the bed and sat down on the edge of my mattress, watching him closely as he went over to the scales on a shelf.

That weirdly possessive part of me tightened when he picked one up. I wanted to ask what he was doing, but didn’t let myself.

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