Chapter 31 Dante
“You.”
Her breath hitched — barely — but enough.
She turned her head toward me, eyes narrowing like she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to challenge me or run from me.
I welcomed either.
“What does that even mean?” she asked.
“It means,” I said, voice low, “that some things don’t become important. They simply are.”
She shook her head like she was trying to dislodge whatever that sentence did to her.
Smart.
It did plenty to me too.
Before she could respond, Amara called from behind us:
“HEY. You two done making googly eyes, or should we leave you alone?”
Lucian snorted.
Seraphine flushed.
And I…
did not take my eyes off her.
Not even for a second.
We moved deeper into the penthouse. I showed them the private library, the sunken lounge, the guest wing that would now be theirs. Seraphine listened, but she kept stealing glances at me — quick ones, cautious, questioning.
Each look tightened something in my chest.
Lucian and Amara wandered ahead into the open kitchen, arguing over whether the chefs used too much basil in the sample platters set out. Their bickering faded behind us.
I let Seraphine walk beside me through the last stretch of the hallway — the one lined with warm lights and framed maps of old empires.
She reached out to run a finger along the gilded border of one.
“Is this real gold?” she asked.
“22-karat,” I said. “But that isn’t what makes it valuable.”
She glanced up at me. “Then what does?”
“It survived thousands of years,” I said, watching her reaction. “Pressure. War. Fire.”
“Fire?” she repeated, raising a brow.
“Fire,” I echoed.
“But it never broke.”
I didn’t mean the frame.
She knew I didn’t mean the frame.
Her cheeks warmed — a soft pink dusting across her freckles — and her gaze flicked away, almost shy.
It was the most dangerous thing I had seen all week.
We reached the final room — the one with floor-to-ceiling windows spanning the entire eastern side of the penthouse.
Dawn would hit here first.
Light would touch her here first.
That thought shouldn’t have mattered, but it lodged itself in my chest anyway.
Seraphine stepped inside and inhaled sharply.
“Oh my god,” she whispered. “This view…”
She walked straight to the glass, palms hovering just above it as if she was afraid to smudge something sacred.
Her voice came softer.
More honest.
“…this is insane.”
I moved behind her — not touching her, not crowding, just there.
Close enough that I could feel the faint warmth of her body through the space between us.
Close enough that my dragon stirred.
“Beautiful,” I murmured.
She smiled without looking back. “Yeah. The city looks different from this high up.”
“It does,” I said.
“And so do you.”
She froze.
And then, very quietly:
“I don’t know what that means either.”
“You will,” I said.
“When you’re ready.”
Her breath trembled.
And I felt it all the way to my bones.
Slowly — deliberately — I lifted my hand.
She didn’t pull away.
Not even a flinch.
My fingers brushed the side of her arm… feather-light, barely a touch at all, but the effect was immediate.
Seraphine shivered.
Not from fear.
From recognition.
And gods help me — so did I.
Her pulse kicked beneath her skin.
Her lips parted.
And when her eyes met mine in the reflection of the glass…
I saw it.
A spark.
Small.
Brief.
But unmistakable.
Fire.
Not human fire.
Not metaphorical fire.
Dragon fire.
The same molten flicker that lived behind my own eyes when my dragon stirred.
The same elemental spark Lucian carried — water shimmering darkly in his irises.
The same shadow-flash that marked Kael’s gaze.
The same storm-spark that ignited Thane’s.
But hers…
Hers was newborn.
Drowsy.
Distant.
A dragon still asleep inside her bones.
Waiting.
Waiting for a catalyst.
A touch.
A bond.
Waiting for someone like me.
I stepped closer until my chest brushed her back — a whisper of contact, nothing more.
But she leaned into it.
Just slightly.
Just enough.
And I knew.
She felt it too.
“Seraphine,” I said quietly — too quietly. “Look at me.”
She turned her head, eyes lifting to mine.
The spark danced again.
My breath caught.
Dragons could scent truth.
Could sense destiny.
Could taste the bond forming before it was spoken aloud.
And everything in me — every buried instinct, every shard of fire in my blood — roared one word:
Mate.
Her dragon was dormant.
Unawakened.
Unclaimed.
But the spark meant she was close.
So close.
And with dragonborn…
the one who awakens their sleeping dragon becomes their mate.
Their equal.
Their counterpart.
Their fire-tether.
If another dragon discovered what she was before I awakened her?
They would claim her.
Take her.
Bind her.
Or kill her to keep her power sealed.
I couldn’t allow that.
She blinked, unaware of any of this, still flushed from the light touch of my fingers.
“What?” she whispered.
I should have stepped back.
I didn’t.
Instead, I traced a slow line down her arm — so soft it barely existed, but she trembled again, deeper this time.
Her dragon stirred.
My control snapped taut.
“You don’t see yourself clearly yet,” I murmured. “But you will.”
She swallowed hard. “You keep saying things like that.”
“Because they’re true.”
“What truth?” she whispered.
I leaned in, lips beside her ear, heat rolling off me in waves I didn’t bother to contain.
“That you’re more than you think you are.”
She sucked in a breath.
“And one day soon,” I added, voice dipping low, “you’re going to feel it.”
Another spark. Brighter.
Her dragon pushed against its cage.
I exhaled slowly, forcing myself to step back — just an inch, just enough to keep from touching her again.
If I stayed too close…
I would claim her right here against the glass.
Not with a kiss.
Not with a touch.
With fire.
With power.
With the bond.
She wasn’t ready for that.
Not yet.
But soon.
Very soon.
I watched her steady herself, unaware of the war raging beneath her skin.
Unaware of how close she was to awakening.
Unaware of how mine she already felt without even realizing it.
Lucian called from the hallway, his voice laced with amusement.
“You lovebirds ready? Amara is trying to bribe the chef into making ‘Goth Girl French Toast’ and we need an adult in the room.”
Seraphine startled and stepped away, flustered.
I let her go.
For now.