Page 16 of Kidnapped By The Messy Dragon

“What the hell is going on?” She twists against my arm to face me. “What are you doing with me?”

“Calm down, sister,” Malachi says, easing the SUV to a stop.

She is furious in my arms, and I’m fighting the stupidest smile of my life. It’s the wrong moment for it, and my body doesn’t care. My mate is awake and yelling at me from a foot away, and the heat in my chest takes it as good news.

“Don’t tell me to calm down.” She shoves at my arm. “Why am I not at a police station? Or a hospital?”

“Because it’s not safe.” I ease my arm off her waist. “You’re in a lot of danger, Zuri, and I don’t know why yet.”

She turns to the window as Malachi noses the SUV into the mountain itself. A carved tunnel takes us down, smooth walls, warm lights coming on ahead of us.

“Why are we going into a cave?” she asks.

“You know the stigma that dragons dwell in caves?” I flash her a grin. “Well, we do.”

She frowns at me.

“It gets better once you see your new home,” I say.

“New home?” She pulls all the way back to stare at me. “I’m not staying here.”

Malachi snorts from the front seat.

She’s not leaving. Both dragons in this car know it, and neither of us is fool enough to say it to her face yet.

The tunnel opens into the garage.

Malachi parks the SUV and cuts the engine, and he’s out of his door while the echo still runs the walls. Zuri pops her own door and jumps down. She takes in the garage corner to corner, counting the doors.

I grab her tote off the seat and follow her out.

“Take me back to Millbrook,” she says, backing a step toward the tunnel.

“I can’t do that.” I keep her tote against my side.

“You can’t keep me here.” She puts the SUV between us.

“Do you know why those men were chasing you?” Malachi asks over the hood.

She snaps her mouth shut.

I can’t help smiling. My mate has a secret. Malachi eyes me over the hood, and I look right back.

Then he stuffs his hands in his pockets and frowns at her. My brother doesn’t take being told no well. As far as he’s concerned, she came home with us as clan, and that means his word covers her now.

He comes around the hood toward her. The air near him has gone warm.

Everything in me sits up. If he makes my mate cry in this garage, there’s no version of me that handles it well.

I step between them before he clears the bumper.

“Hey, hey.” I plant myself in front of her. “Mal. Breakfast first. Interrogations after.” I glance back at her over my shoulder. “You hungry? Dorian cooks.”

“Who’s Dorian?” she asks.

“Our brother,” Malachi says.

His hands come out of his pockets. Then he gentles his whole bearing and gives her a different face than the one he brought around the hood. “This morning went wrong in every direction, and I’m sorry for our part in it. But you’re part of this family now.”