Page 73 of Her Dragon Daddy Disaster
“That is not true.”
“Oh, please! I know all about your history with Lydia. Your mom told me everything, Levi. Don’t lie to me!” I bit my lip as the words came out louder than intended.
He worked his jaw. “Of course she would tell you about that. She loves humiliating me. Reliving that time.”
“Clearly, you do, too.”
“Explain yourself.”
“You wouldn’t keep her around if you didn’t want her, Levi. You would have severed that friendship after she chose him instead of you. Anybody would. ‘Mate’ or not, that hurts.”
He shook his head. “I can’t get mad because her dragon chose someone else.”
“Uh-huh. And just coincidentally, you get to have her come by on the regular dressed in barely there lingerie.”
“I didn’t ask her to do that,” he said, baring his teeth. “You know me better than that. You’re just latching on to this because you want your anti-dragon prejudice to be proven correct. So you don’t have to admit you’re wrong about some of us.”
“OrI saw the man who says I am his mate up against the wall with a scantily clad woman pressed up against him kissing him in the dark,” I fired back.
“On the cheek,” he stressed. “And fine, what do you want me to say, Sarah? Yes, I wanted her. I thought she was my mate. I didn’t handle it well after. There. Fine. Does that help? Does it make you feel better about yourself to make me relive that pain? Does it?”
“I’d say youstillaren’t handling it well.” I refused to acknowledge his points.
“You’d be wrong.”
“Really? And why is that? What changed in you, Levi? Please tell me. This should be good.”
“You!” he exploded, flinging his arms out wide. “You changed me, Sarah. You changedeverything. Can’t you see that? You showed me I was wrong about her. That she wasn’t my mate.”
I looked away, embarrassed at myself by the emotion in his voice. Emotion that couldn’t be faked. He was hurting, bad, though he’d been trying to hide it. Not just because of me, though. It felt … deeper, in some way.
“All we did was fuck,” I muttered.
“Right. If that’s all you think it was now, then you’re the best damn liar I’ve ever seen. We both know it was more. That it was somethingelse. I was too hurt at the time to recognize what it meant, but I’m not anymore, Sarah. I know what it means. I know whatyoumean to me.”
He was right. Again. In hindsight, it was easy to see that the connection between us, as filled with sex as it was, had been the gateway to something else. Something more.
“I’m serious,” he continued when I didn’t say anything. “Why do you think I acted so rashly when I saw you at the White House? My focus wasn’t on consequences. It was onyouand the sudden realization that not only could I have you again, but that I wanted you. I wanted youbadlywith every part of me. I’m not just talking about your body, as sexy as it is. I’m talking about all of you, Sarah. Your brain, your heart, everything that makes youyouis what I wanted. What I needed and couldn’t live without. That’s why I demanded you come here. Because I didn’t want to lose you. Again.”
Biting down on my lip hard, I paced across the room to buy myself some time to come up with a proper response.
His words had come dangerously close to a word neither of us had yet used. Whether on purpose or simply because we weren’t ready, I didn’t know, but what Ididknow was that he’d been treading on the edge of it just then. I could see it, those four letters, just on the horizon.
What would have happened if he’d said it? I didn’t know. Wasn’t sure I wanted to know. It was all too much. Too fast.
“You can’t expect me to just believe that,” I said, stopping and facing his desk.
“Whynot?” he cried. “I believe it!”
I lost my cool. “Because you were just letting yourself get felt up by another woman in lingerie while I was twenty feet awaywith your son. If you cared that much, you wouldn’t let that happen!”
“It wasn’t like that!”
“Yes, it was!” I slammed a hand down on his desk, knowing I should be keeping quiet and yet somehow not able to. “I saw it. You were against the wall. She was pressed right up against you, touching you, one knee on the wall. She could probably feel your damn dick getting hard!”
Levi came closer, trapping me against his desk. I pushed him back. He took a half step back but didn’t go any further.
“That’s not what it was. She came on to me, yes, I admit that. Butnotbecause I wanted her to,” he hissed. “Think about it. She’s my best friend’s mate. Why would I want that? Do you really think I’m that shitty of a person? Of a friend? That I would do this behind his back, let alone yours? Can you honestly say, with true conviction and heart, that I come across like that?”
