“It’s yours.”
I can’t watch his expression, so I glance at Ben whose mouth drops open in shock.
There’s no shock from the dragon. He laughs. It’s not the warm laugh he’d given against my skin that night, this is cruel and sharp. “Your boldness truly knows no bounds.”
He doesn’t believe me.
I shrug momentarily at a loss for what to say. I’d anticipated disbelief, but not this confident cruelty.
“It’s true—”
“You return to the scene of your crime and proclaim the impossible. Perhaps you do want me to call the Council to report you.”
I blink, and terror flashes through me. If the Council takes me into custody, I’m not going to last long.
My heart starts to race, and it’s harder to breathe. It’s been difficult to keep calm, but when I get stressed, I lose more body heat. Body heat I can’t afford to lose. It’s already hard to keep my eyes open. My fingers are past numb, and I’d put on lipstick to hide the blue tint to my lips from passersby before coming here.
It hadn’t taken long after discovering the pregnancy to recognize that the little terror in my belly is doing something to throw my temperature off. It’s not just my temperature. It sucks heat away from everything. Hot baths only stay that way for a moment. The hand warmers in my pocket lasted an hour instead of the twelve they proclaim.
My shivering keeps me awake at night. I throw up anything I try to eat that isn’t above room temperature.
And it’s only getting more severe.
“You don’t understand,” I say, trying to keep calm. “I need help—”
“Perhaps go to the actual person who got you with child then and leave me alone,” he ends on a growl. The laugh is gone. His posture is casual, but his eyes show a banked rage I can’t even begin to understand.
My vision goes blurry at the edges.
“Do you think I want it to be yours?” I whisper. There’s the flicker of something in Kalos’s gaze, but I’m trembling with anger that I wish would give me warmth. “I haven’t slept with anyone else for the last year. If there were any other candidates, I’d go there first. I know exactly what you think of me because you told me so.”
“It’s impossible—”
“I don’t care!” I cut him off. The edges of my vision are getting darker, and it only makes my fear worse. “It doesn’t matter how it happened, I only know it did and that something is wrong.”
Kalos’s posture changes. He almost looks worried. The room shifts back and forth, and I blink to dispel the sway. Fuck. He’s finally taking me seriously, and now it’s too late.
“Let’s have you sit down, and Ben can get you something. Maybe some water or something to eat,” Kalos starts, but his voice starts to dampen, and I hear him curse as the darkness at the edge of my vision claims me.
7
KALOS
I CATCH her before she falls to the floor.
My thief.
My little liar.
I swallow, worried. Or not actually a liar.
Impossible.
Her body lacks any of the warmth that it should have, and she’s shivering. I place my hand on her face and curse. Her skin is like ice. I scoop her into my arms and sit us on the couch. I pull off her jacket and check under the sweater to make sure she has another layer before removing that as well.
“What does she need? A healer?” Ben asks.
“Grab me a blanket,” I say. She’s too cold for a human. I remove my own suit jacket and bring her to my chest. I press our bodies together and will my heat into her. Because of what I am, I run hot. Fire is my element, and I can burn down cities or do something as small as heating the woman on my lap.
Ben returns and pauses for a moment. Probably at the sight of me cradling the thief in my lap. He shakes the blanket out and wraps it around the side of her body not pressed against me.
“Do you want me to call someone to test the paternity?” Ben asks carefully.
“There’s no need.” My throat feels tight, raw. “I can sense it.”
I should have just extended my senses instead of antagonizing her. The dragon part of me has been a horror to deal with since that night. Snarling and moody and distracting me at every turn with the memory of our thief. And when Ben had said she was here, my frustration had boiled over.
I shouldn’t have taken out the beast’s reaction on her. Especially since she’s telling the truth.
It is impossible, but she’s pregnant and the spawn is mine. I can hardly breathe through the pain of it.
They’d made themselves known as soon as I’d stoked her anger. A prodding, hungry curiosity poking at my senses that had almost derailed me entirely. I’d blocked that mental channel of communication to keep myself focused.
“So we had a thief…” Ben starts, waiting for me to fill in the rest.
“Last week, during my heat.”
Ben’s brows shoot up. I send him and Maggie away during my yearly heats. They usually last a couple of days, and it’s hellish. This last one had been shorter. Apparently because it had been successful.
“What do you want to do?” Ben asks. “If anyone finds out, she’s going to be a target.”
That’s inevitable. The thief in my arms may already be entangled with unsavory individuals, but with this, she’s been forced into a world of different players. I have many enemies lying in wait. All it takes is for one to find out, and our whole world will know of my new weakness.
Acting as if I want nothing to do with the child or their mother won’t work either. Enough people are aware of my history. They know I’d never abandon my blood.
They will assume this woman’s place in my life based on the fact that dragons can only breed with their mate. I narrow my eyes at the white scar I’d left from my bite. The mark would pass for a mating mark if anyone else were to look for it.
But there is no bond tickling my senses.
“She’ll need to move in here,” I say, thinking quickly. It’s easier to think about specifics than to think about what she’s carrying. “There are side effects that only my presence will help with.”
The circles under her eyes are dark with exhaustion. The effect of the spawn draining her heat energy may be only one of many issues to deal with. I won’t know more until she wakes.
“I’ll tell Maggie to prepare a room for…” Ben trails off, waiting for me to name the woman in my arms.
I press my lips together before confessing. “I don’t know her name.”
Ben whistles. “I’ll start on that then.”
He picks up her jacket and pulls her wallet from the pocket. “If this ID is correct, her name is Katarina Smith.”
Katarina. It’s a nice name.
“Of course it’s Smith,” Ben mutters, and my lips twitch.
“Find out what you can.” I straighten as a memory surfaces. “But first, can you get an order from Maria’s? She’ll need food when she wakes up.”
Ben raises a brow. “Sure thing, boss. Are you sure you don’t want me for anything else?”
I press my lips together. “I should be able to handle one woman, pregnant or not.”
“She seemed a little angry with you.”