Last Immortal Dragon (Gray Back Bears #6)(24)

“Hell if I know. It makes no sense. I’m the only immortal dragon left. I think she was just in so much pain, she didn’t know what she was saying.” He was quiet for a long time as the water ran down their bodies in rivers. He seemed content to cradle Clara—to just be—but at last, he murmured, “The eggs were mine.”

“How do you know?”

“They were blue like my scales, not the black color of Marcus’s dragon. He left them there for me to see.” Damon frowned emotionally. “They were so small. He’d broken them all. When you told me about your pregnancy taking but not keeping, I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to hear how it hurt you. I don’t want you to feel pain like that. I don’t want you to feel that emptiness.”

“You’ve lived for a long time, Damon. I could feel it in my dream. The earth was still wild. Did you find more mates?”

“Wives, not mates. Humans. My first three, I buried when they were old and gray, but my fourth took her own life early. She couldn’t stand aging while I stayed the same. I didn’t look for companionship after that. The other women I found to bear offspring when my dragon craved family were nothing more than business transactions. I couldn’t risk getting attached to anyone again. Everyone I’ve ever known has died, and eventually, it was easier to be alone than to attach to people who disappear in the blink of an eye.”

She pressed her lips against the uneven skin on his chest. “That sounds like a shit deal.”

Damon snorted. “Thank you. I’m pretty sick of everyone thinking I’ve lucked into living forever. It’s not lucky. Immortality is a curse.” He plucked at a strand of her damp hair with his lips. “I would give anything to grow old and gray beside you.”

“We’d make a f*cking hot pair of elderly people.”

He laughed a relieved sound, but she needed to know the rest. She needed to know what happened after Feyadine’s death before he shut down on her again.

“What happened to Marcus’s people? What happened to the Blackwings?”

Damon’s lip twitched, and his eyes went cold and dead. “It turns out he had his sites on being the last immortal dragon. He killed all of his own people.”

“Oh, my gosh. How could he do such a thing?”

“He fancied himself a god. He wanted to rule the earth without opposition.”

“And your scars?”

“Dragon’s fire is the only thing that can kill another dragon. I went to war with Marcus to avenge Feyadine and all of our people. I burned him up and left his carcass for the vultures to roost on. I buried my people in these mountains eons ago, and from that day on, this land was mine. These mountains are my treasure. I failed to protect my people, but I’ve protected their final resting place and will continue to do so until the end of time.”

Heart aching, Clara snuggled her cheek against the burn marks on his chest and wrapped her arms around his neck. Damon wasn’t some cold, emotionless dragon. He was a man, and a shifter just like her who’d had to find a way to survive something horrific. Something he could never escape. He’d felt everything so deeply for so long, he’d shut down out of self-preservation. Loyal, fearsome, protective dragon. Feyadine had done a number on his heart with her betrayal, and what had happened afterward would’ve brought other men to their knees. But he’d risen up and gone to war to avenge the people he’d loved.

And now here he was, fighting to protect the land that his people had died on all those centuries ago.

Damon was right that something bigger than both of them was happening, but she wasn’t afraid anymore. If he could be so brave for all this time, she could stand strong beside him until they figured out what had caused them to cross paths like this.

She’d respected other men in her life. She’d been lucky to have time with Charles and Daniel, but what she had with Damon was turning out to be so much different. So much more. For the first time in her life, she knew what it was to love a man.

She wouldn’t admit it to him out loud for fear of him shutting down again, but she gave a private smile at what she’d found here in Damon’s mountains.

For the first time in a long time, she felt like she belonged.





Chapter Nine




Clara shimmied her hips to the sound of the song she had stuck in her head, did a little spin, and plopped a thick slice of provolone cheese onto the sandwich she was making.

Damon had to work today, but he’d told her at breakfast this morning he’d let his chef have some time off so he could cook for her. It still blew her mind that he enjoyed taking care of her so much. She’d been the caregiver in her crew, nurturing Charles and Daniel any time they had a week off of the rig, so the dynamic was so different here. She was repaying Damon’s sweet affection and the delicious food he’d been cooking for her by making them lunch—a pair of sandwiches stacked high with meats, cheeses, and vegetables, just like she’d seen on television. Even the bread was fancy and had to be sliced directly from the fragrant loaf.

There had been so many happy, eye-opening moments since their break-down in the shower yesterday, and one of those was that she hadn’t had a single headache in an entire day. Not one. And she couldn’t get over the giddy sensation that everything was going to be okay. The visions, dreams, coincidences…all of it. Damon was still wary, but she couldn’t shake the growing feeling that perhaps the point of all of this was that she and Damon met, and some cosmic unbalance was reset by them finding each other.