Page 114 of Dragon Tempted

“What?” Tessa demanded.

Eric’s eyes danced. “You called me every nasty word in the book and threatened me with bodily harm.”

“Well, yeah. That was when I thought you were a player who ghosted Megan instead of a dragon with amnesia.”

Megan rolled her eyes. “Lily is a better matchmaker than you. She introduced Evelyn and her new partner, Walter. She also drew pictures of you and Adam together before she even met you.”

Tessa stuck her lip out. “True. But she also drew John and I together in front of his cabin holding hands.”

Lily giggled from her spot on Ryan’s lap.

“What’s so funny?” Tessa asked.

Lily flipped through her book and pulled out a drawing. John could see that it was the drawing that had become legend around there. It was a picture of him standing in front of a cabin with a blond woman holding hands. This was the drawing that spurred Adam to tell Tessa he loved her. “Mommy. That’s not you.”

Tessa took the paper from her. “What?” She held it up close to her face. “I’ll be.”

“What is it?” Adam asked.

“When you saw this drawing, did you not notice that the blond in this picture has brown eyes.”

“Megan saw it first and then showed it to me,” Adam said as if that was going to get him out of trouble.

“It’s Aunt Sienna.” Lily giggled harder, which got Bella laughing.

John’s heart thumped at the announcement. He squeezed Sienna’s shoulders.

Sienna looked up at John with huge eyes. “Lily has known all along we were going to end up together.”

Bella held up her hands to John. “Hold me, Unka Gumpy!”

“And apparently, so has Bella,” Megan gasped.

“Holy shi-oot,” Ryan and Tessa blurted at the same time.

John scooped up Bella and looked at all the shocked adults around the table before bursting into laughter. Which had them looking even more surprised. The grump had a funny bone! Which made him laugh even harder.

He had been alone for so long that he never dared to hope he would find a family, let alone someone to share his heart with.

But this once-cursed dragon had been blessed at last. And he would never ever take it for granted.

Epilogue

Sienna couldn’t wipe the smile off her face if she tried. Her cheeks were actually aching from the grin, but she wouldn’t have it any other way. She stood in front of the building that had been her mother’s dream, next to Ryan as they both cut the ribbon officially opening The Bright Spot Center. The building had been refurbished into a facility for children of all ages, offering day care, arts and crafts classes, a safe and inclusive after-school hang out spot, tutoring, and numerous other opportunities for babies through teens, including counseling and resources to link families with social workers and shelters if the need arose.

She stood back and let the visitors head into the center to check out the building as well as talk to the team that would be running it. Sienna glanced over where her family gathered. They stood next to the plaque dedicating the center to her mother, Nora Simonson. Her brothers, Megan and Tessa, and the girls had come. As had Marcus and Jonas, who was giving Ryan a big hug. And of course, John stood there grinning from ear to ear as well. It still took her breath away when she saw joy on his face.

They converged on her, congratulating and hugging her before heading inside. John wrapped his arm around her, kissing the top of her head. “Have I told you how proud I am of you?”

She nodded. “Every day.”

John had settled into the family and clan. They still spent nights in the cabin when he needed a respite from the chaos, but that didn’t mean he was reverting back to his hermit status. And John liked working with Marcus and the guards, teaching them about all he learned over the centuries for hiding out and protecting himself.

He had slowly become friends with Marcus and her brothers. John and Tessa butted heads occasionally, but when he’d found some gray hairs a month ago and Tessa threw him a party, declaring that it would be the only party in the history of the world celebrating gray hair, he rolled with the punches. And a weight lifted off his shoulders now that it looked like he would grow old with the rest of them.

But what shocked Sienna the most was John’s super-close friendship with the girls. They adored him and told him things about their powers that they didn’t share with their parents as easily. Sienna believed that the girls sensed a kindred spirit in John and knew he wouldn’t freak out about their growing abilities. And John had assured Megan, Tessa, and her brothers that their safety was his number one concern, and he would come to them if anything they told him jeopardized that. So John was often in the know well before the rest of them. Which irritated Tessa to no end.

After the Templar attack, the evidence Mia had gathered on the Templars had been the olive branch needed to get the witches and dragons talking again now that they had a common enemy that they would never underestimate again. And it was amusing that since the other clans had also gotten their dragons back, they took her and Clan Simonson very seriously.