Darkblood Prison - G.K. DeRosa Page 0,30

rushed my insides. Jumping up and down, a tiny smile cracked his lips as I tugged him along for the ride with my legs clinging around his torso. When the thrill had passed and I finally stopped, I slid down his bare chest. When I hit the floor, I made the mistake of glancing up, and my mouth nearly brushed his lips.

He cleared his throat and took a step back, unraveling my arms from his neck. “That’s probably not a good idea,” he murmured.

My brain agreed with him, but my body had other plans. Apparently, so did my mouth. “You keep promising me a talk about this”—I pointed back and forth between us—“but somehow, we keep getting interrupted.”

“Convenient, right?” He ran his palm over the back of his neck and shifted from foot to foot.

I shot him my best glare, planting my hands on my hips. “Or we could talk about our weird mental connection or maybe even Vander. You owe me lots of explanations actually…”

He grunted and slid down to the floor, a shock of dark hair tumbling over his forehead. I clasped my hands together to keep from reaching out and tucking it behind his ear. “You’re right, I do.”

I folded down across from him, keeping some much-needed space between us. With all the training lately, our connection was only getting stronger. I’d heard his thoughts more than once in this session alone. Sure, it was fun overhearing his naughty contemplations about me, but it wasn’t fun when we couldn’t act on them. “So?”

He raked his hand through his wild locks and huffed out a breath as if talking about this was causing him physical pain. “The mental communication thing only happens with mates,” he spat out. “So I don’t understand how that could be possible. The blood exchange bonded us, but we haven’t consummated the relationship.”

My breath hitched at the word relationship. Stupid, because I knew he didn’t mean anything by it. My cheeks heated and I flipped my hair forward, hoping to hide behind the dark curtain.

“Anyway, the closer we get, the stronger the bond becomes. And I mean that by both physical proximity and emotional closeness. There’s not much we can do about the former given our bunking situation and the latter…” His words fell away as his mouth twisted into a pout.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. The idea of getting close to me is too abhorrent for you to even consider.”

I blinked, and his face was only an inch away from mine. Whoa, when did that happen?

“Stop saying that,” he growled, his breath ghosting over my lips. “There’s nothing abhorrent about you, Azara. What you did—or rather what you were somehow forced to do is what I couldn’t stand. But now that we know there’s more to the story and Vander’s alive, things are different.”

My heart soared at his words regardless of how much I tried to tamp down on the excitement. I didn’t want to care about this dragon douche, and I hated how helpless I was to stop myself. “And because of the blood bond…” I murmured.

“Yes, that too.”

Silence stretched between us, and I fiddled with a hangnail on my thumb. Talon hadn’t moved, he still sat only a few inches awat. It would be so easy to reach out and pull his lips to mine. From the lusty vibes seeping through the bond, I knew he wouldn’t resist. Every day it was becoming harder and harder to fight.

I glanced up, and Talon’s face loomed ever closer. His eyes captured mine, and I was swept up in the bottomless blazing silver. His hand slowly moved to my cheek, and the rough pad of his thumb caressed my skin. My heart flip-flopped in my chest at the gentle touch.

“I’m tired of fighting this,” he muttered, the gruff edge to his tone making my insides quiver.

His words, coupled with his smoldering irises, were a second away from melting me into an incoherent puddle. I leaned into his palm, relishing the feel of his flesh against mine. I was so tired of fighting this too. As infuriating as the dragon was, he was all I could think about. His face was the first thing I saw in the morning and the last before I drifted off to sleep. His blood thrummed through my veins, a constant link to the mercurial man. But that was it, it was only because he gave me his blood a few weeks ago to save my life. Prior to that, he