Wordlessness momentarily settles between us. Sips of the booze are shared back and forth and back and forth as the new information swims around my senses, doing its best to sink in.
Basically, this is my husband, or he lives the rest of his life in inconsolable misery?
I wanna say worst marriage proposal ever, but sadly, I feel like I might be wrong.
After one significantly larger guzzle, I offer the bottle back to him on a shake of the head. “I think you’ve got the wrong woman.”
He relocates the bottle to the ground near his feet.
“I think The Goddess of Fate or whatever made a huge fucking mistake.”
“She doesn’t make mistakes.”
“Uh, clearly she fucking does, because she completely fucked this up.”
His perplexed expression pushes me to continue to spiral.
“I am so not the woman you wanna be mated to! I can’t keep a fucking job because as the new hire, I’m always first to go during budget cuts. I have to haggle over the price of my shoes at the fucking thrift store. I have the diet plan of a nine-year-old that just learned how to use the can opener and who only gets decent chow when she crashes her siblings’ family meals or when the stars align ever so nicely for a random dude to ask her out on a date he agrees to pay for.”
Disapproval growls over the last comment are easy to ignore in spite of how special they make me feel.
“Dude, I’ve got the luck of an ugly fairy tale princess who killed a black cat in her carriage, on Friday the 13th, after breaking the cursed vanity mirror in her wicked stepmother’s bathroom because she tried to fucking summon Candyman in between stepping on cracks to break said stepmother’s back and forgetting to pick up a penny so she would have good karma for just one. Fucking. Day.”
A.D. does something my instincts are screaming he would probably do often if I let him. He attempts to make me smile. “That’s a lot to fucking unpack, Tiny Toes.”
I mindlessly release a huffed laugh. “What I’m saying is, I’m the unluckiest person on the entire face of this earth. We’re talking, I probably hold the highest track record for most fucked up things happening to an individual in a single day. There’s no way the Goddess of Fate would pair someone who obviously has their shit together – seriously, have you seen your fucking life – to someone like me.” A slow, exhausted head shake appears. “It would be – admittedly – kinda badass to be mated to a fucking dragon, but I’m afraid I’m not the one for you, peanut butter.”
“But what if I’m the one for you?”
Shock sends me flying backwards against the couch seat.
“What if it’s our mating that changes your luck?”
Completely befuddled by his rebuttal, my mouth bobs in speechlessness.
“What if having a life with me…on this side of The Fog is the exact opposite of the hell you’re living in now?” A.D.’s body gravitates a little closer hitching my breath. “Don’t you owe it to yourself to at least give the shit a shot?” His tongue steals a quick taste of his lips, and I immediately wish they were mine. “Me a shot?”
Answering is interrupted by a knock on his bedroom door.
“Yeah?”
“Is everyone decent?” Z’s voice inquires from the other side.
His question causes me to shoot A.D. a curious stare. “And exactly how often do you end up naked with women you just kidnapped?”
“Come in!” the blond-haired hottie calls out rather than acknowledging my teasing question.
Z opens the door revealing himself as well as his wife.
Or mate.
She said mate.
I distinctly remember that term because I thought that shit was really fucking strange but then shrugged it off as what the fuck ever, to each their own.
Except now it makes sense.
And those questions she thought I might have?
Yup.
Absolutely fucking have them.
“Griff wants us,” Z announces. “He has news.”
Concern crosses A.D.’s face fleetingly, something he hides with a polite smile to me. “I need to attend a family meeting for a few. Do you mind?”
“Did you really just ask another being if they minded you doing something?” Z taunts from the doorway. “The creature who once covered the stairs in bubble wrap so everyone in the house would know where he was at four in the morning?”
Childish chuckles pour out of the man – um creature – I am evidently supposed to be with for the rest of my life.
“The same creature who once had the ‘Shaft’ theme song play every time he entered the kitchen for two weeks straight is asking someone else do they mind his actions?”
“What is with you and theme music?” Dae enthusiastically ponders.
“He’s an attention dore, Little Tails. It’s in his nature.”
“Little Tails?” I ask the pair. “Did you just call her…Little Tails?”
“Yes.”
“Because of my braids,” she educates while twisting the loose edge of one around her finger. “Dragons give their Fated Mates nicknames that only they can use. It’s like a verbal Fated Mate marking. It’s meant to tell everyone who can hear that this being is theirs. Dragons – as a species – are equally driven to care for their mate and to let the world know that they’re off the market with additional nonaudible clues like smells and changes in appearance.” The giddy giggle she gives as a pause prompts me to smile wider. “They really are the most fascinating creatures on this side of The Fog. Hands down.”
“Why don’t you come tell me more about them while they have their family meeting?”
Excitement pops into her stare. “Really?”
“Yeah. Let’s have a drink while you try to help me make more sense of what it is I’m getting myself into.”
“You’re not supposed to drink when you’re pregnant,” Dae quickly declines, “no matter what type of being you are.”
Again.
Weird sentence.
“I’ve got M&M’s too.”
“Oooo!” She squeaks prior to pecking a goodbye kiss on her other half’s cheek.
All of a sudden, A.D.’s foot gently nudges mine to summon my stare. In a low, soft, almost unbelievably vulnerable tone, he firmly promises, “You won’t regret giving me a shot.”
“I wish you could say the same.”