Maggie frowns. “Where’s Ben? These potatoes are going to get overcooked.”
“He went to take Stella home.”
“Oh, she should have stayed for dinner!”
I arch a brow. “Apparently, she’s not brave enough to try Ben’s cooking.”
Maggie nods knowingly. “The two of them are quite entertaining.”
“I’ll admit, I haven’t seen the show except for today.” I did wonder why Ben’s face closes off whenever she is mentioned.
“You haven’t seen the show because you’ve been avoiding a certain lady in residence.”
“Yes.” I don’t deny the charge. “I started out avoiding her anyway. Not that it was possible with the required contact.”
Maggie hums, flicking off the burner for the potatoes and grabbing a strainer.
“I accepted Jensen’s offer because I wanted to,” she says, looping our conversation back. “It’s been a long time since I lost my mate.”
Maggie’s mate had been a radical in the fae realm. He didn’t want to wait for their slow courts to abolish the more heinous laws or punish the nobles committing the most atrocious acts. The list of enemies he made had eventually caught up with him, leaving Maggie in a dangerous position on the other side of the gates.
She may age here and be less powerful overall, but she can remain free of contacts who would try to drag her back into the conflict and to do what she wants without judgment. A noble fae, even one separated from those who hold court by many bloodlines, keeping house for a dragon? The ridicule would do nothing for her peace of mind. She enjoys what she enjoys, and I happily provide protection and a home.
Maggie drains the potatoes. “I’d been thinking since Katarina showed up that you should accept the good thing in front of you and let yourself love again, and I realized I was being a hypocrite.”
My throat swells at her words, because I may have thought the same thing about her and Jensen. “And now you’ll allow yourself your impudent words because you’re no longer a hypocrite?”
She doesn’t respond immediately, and I wait for the words that I know will sting.
“It doesn’t betray those we’ve loved to keep on living after they’re gone,” Maggie says softly. “It’s something I’ve thought for years, and I finally let myself believe it. That’s why I went out with Jensen.”
She clears her throat. “You are ages older than I am, Kalos. Wiser too. I’d never think to lecture you about how you live your life.”
I shake my head on a chuckle as she’s done exactly that. “Of course you wouldn’t.”
Her face softens. “You smile more. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you as relaxed as you were this morning.”
My cheeks heat, and my grin turns rueful.
Maggie continues, “You deserve more than you’ve let yourself have.”
“I’d make a mess of it,” I say, voicing concerns that I try to repeatedly bury. “There’s part of my heart that isn’t there anymore. I don’t know if I could love again, even if I tried.”
“Have you tried?”
“I haven’t wanted to.” To love without a bond would feel… temporary. I can admit to myself and others that I like Katarina, that she brings me peace, but to dwell on my feelings past that when a permanent relationship would only have me experiencing her eventual death to old age is a pain I’ll rail against.
“Then you’ll never know.” Maggie shrugs. “You have a miraculous child on the way, falling in love isn’t nearly as impressive a feat.”
I don’t respond to that. The child isn’t as miraculous now that I know that my dragon has mated Katarina. Unlikely and rare, yes, but not miraculous. There’s an emptiness in my heart where the bonds of a mate should be, a silence.
My dragon healed whatever part of himself had the same damage, and not for the first time have I wondered—how?
Did he snuff the memory of the mate we lost from his mind? Our son?
I don’t think so. Dragons hoard what they find most precious. They don’t allow it to fade or disappear.
Perhaps that is why he holds so mindlessly tight to Katarina and the future she offers. He is instinct, while I am only bitter logic and the memory of pain.
25
KATARINA
I FROWN at the painting in front of me. It’ll be the last project I do for a while, and the dirt is being stubborn. Or I need to alter my mix of solvent to remove this type of varnish. I have a new restorer starting at the beginning of next week. An excited young witch who loves this work and learned the basics from the internet. I’ll slowly train her on the more specialized parts of restoration until she can take over for me completely. The business side of getting an employee set up is just the distraction I need to forget how ridiculous I’ve been the last couple of days.
It feels like my body isn’t my own.
Everything makes me cry. Half the time I don’t even know if the tears are from being sad, mad, or scared. The freakout over the pregnancy books put the uncontrollable mood swings on display.
It will be a relief to let restoration go. It truly is a much more frustrating job than I’ve let myself realize. The years I’ve spent punishing myself with my profession are over. Now it’s time to figure out what I really want to do in life.
Tears well, and I roll my eyes at myself.
At least Kalos has given me a list of things to avoid that he and Maggie agree on for pregnancy safety. The list is tiny and makes me feel silly all over again for being so overwhelmed before even asking Maggie what was relevant to gestating a dragon.
I’m smart. I could reason that the rule against baths over a certain temperature definitely didn’t apply, but everything else I had no idea about. Maggie had gently explained that most of the food restrictions were to avoid getting sick, and with the temperature the baby is running, getting a fever isn’t going to affect anything.
So my rules are: avoid stress, extreme workouts, and sleeping on my back. Even that last one is debatable.
Right now, stress is the only thing I’m unsure how to avoid. Especially with the mood swings, but I’m doing my best.
My phone lights up with a text, and I ignore it. Avoiding stress isn’t the only reason that I’m not going to respond to the texts Nemo has been sending me, but it’s a good one.
It started slowly. He sent a text last week asking how I was, which I’d ignored with a pang of guilt. I wanted to respond. I wanted to believe that he was going to be worried about me, but my actions were validated when the next text was about the perfect job for me and to call him if I was interested.
Nemo doesn’t care about me. He probably never did.
Am I really so unlovable?
I sniff and wipe away the tears angrily. Stop this. Stop this right now.
Since those texts, Nemo’s been sending more, acting like because I broke into Kalos’s place, I’m back in the business. He gossips about mutual contacts we have, who has taken which job, what items are in demand this week, or a sly inside joke we used to share.
He was never so chatty when I responded before, so I can only imagine that each detail he drops is a ploy to suck me back in. And I’m done.