Vampires. Some sort of fae? A werewolf? Or maybe⁠—

  “I’m a dragon shifter.” Ranulf’s announcement put an end to her wild imaginings.

  Except his answer was even more magical than her thoughts had been.

  A dragon!

  Ranulf could shift into a dragon!

  Sephie couldn’t seem to wipe the grin off her face. Which was probably causing Ranulf to question her sanity. “You’re a silver dragon, right?” she prompted excitedly.

  Ranulf eyed her quizzically. “How do you know that?”

  She shrugged. “Every now and then it’s as if you have silver flames in the depths of your eyes. It’s really fascinating to see!”

  “Ah.” He smiled ruefully. “I’m a snow dragon, and my dragon is silver. I also have enhanced hearing and sight.”

  “Are your brothers dragon shifters too, with the same superpowers?”

  He huffed. “Those ‘powers’ seem pretty normal to us.”

  “But it’s the reason they both seemed to know what we were talking about earlier, even though they were all the way across the kitchen from us?”

  “Yes.”

  “Explain more about the shifter part, please,” she encouraged.

  Ranulf moved up the bed until he was leaning back against the carved headboard. “Most people who speculate about or search for dragon shifters⁠—”

  “You know there are people who do that?” Sephie prompted guardedly.

  He nodded. “Edgar Wallis is one. But I believe he is also under the misapprehension that I’m a man first and can shift into a dragon at will. It’s actually the other way around. I was born a dragon but can shift into and now spend most of my time as a man.”

  “Why, when you can be a dragon?” Mind-boggling as this was, Sephie couldn’t deny she was also thrilled by what Ranulf was confiding in her.

  Ranulf shrugged. “We learned very quickly that humans become alarmed and start shouting ‘dragon’ if they see one of us. That tends to bring out the pitchforks and wanting to burn our home to the ground.”

  “Has that happened to you?”

  “Centuries ago,” he dismissed.

  “This really is a castle, though?”

  “Yes.”

  “How do you make everyone else see it as a manse?”

  “Two ways. We can put a shield on the castle so that humans only see a house. We can also mentally influence what they see and the memories they retain.”

  She frowned. “I hope you never intend to try to do that to me.”

  He smiled. “The shield obviously doesn’t work on you if you can see the castle.”

  “Which I can.”

  “Then I doubt I could influence the memories you retain either.”

  “I advise that you never try,” she warned. “I will not be amused if you do.”

  He chuckled. “I already know that.” He sobered. “The advent of the internet and people being able to take photographs on their cell phones and instantly put them up on social media has changed things for us somewhat.”

  Sephie was still assimilating the I was born a dragon part of his statements.

  A dragon!

  How cool was that? She couldn’t wait to tell— “You said Lachlan and Hunter are dragon shifters too,” she said slowly.

  Ranulf nodded. “We were born from the same clutch.”

  Her eyes widened. “Birds, reptiles, and insects have clutches of eggs.”

  “So do dragons.”

  “The three of you emerged from eggs?”

  “Yes.”

  Sephie searched for any indication in Ranulf’s expression that he was messing with her. Although the seriousness of his nature up till now didn’t indicate that that was at all likely.

  Nope, those beautiful green eyes continued to meet hers, unflinchingly honest in their intensity.

  But hadn’t she already sensed that there was something feral lurking inside Ranulf and his two brothers beneath that veneer of civility they presented to the world? A surface civility that occasionally grew very thin, most noticeably when Ranulf appeared to growl over something he didn’t like. In her company, that was usually in connection with someone—Wallis—hurting or touching her.

  From the moment she first saw Ranulf, he had been unlike any other man Sephie had ever met—probably because she now knew he was actually a dragon!—and last night had been amazing, magical.

  It was fast, and incredible, but Sephie knew she had already fallen in love with him.

  “Do Belle and Zoey know all this too?” she asked.

  Ranulf smiled slightly. “Oh yes, they are well aware of the nature of their mate.”

  “Mate,” Sephie echoed, not as a question but more as a way of her trying to assimilate the whole concept of dragon shifters and their mates. “I’m guessing being a dragon’s mate is something even deeper than the commitment of a husband and wife.”

  “Yes.”

  She nodded, grateful when Ranulf didn’t try to fill the silence that followed. It had already been a fantastical twenty-four hours, including having a deranged man holding her family prisoner at gunpoint before placing bombs in their inn. She wanted time to absorb all that she was hearing right now. Not because she didn’t believe him, because she did. She just needed a little time to come to terms with it all.

  She finally managed to speak again. “So, Belle and Zoey are Lachlan’s and Hunter’s mates?”

  “Their fated mates, yes.”

  “Fated?” Sephie was sure she sounded like a damned parrot, as she kept repeating certain words Ranulf said. But she needed to know all of it, not just some of it.

  Ranulf nodded. “Dragons only have one true mate.”

  Her eyes widened. “Just one, in the whole world?”

  “Yes.”

  “But the odds of them meeting that one person who is their mate must be astronomical.”

  “They are,” he dismissed. “And yet that’s exactly what’s happened for Lachlan with Belle and Hunter with Zoey.”

  “Will that happen to you too?” Knowing she was in love with Ranulf, she couldn’t quite manage to keep the disappointment or jealousy from her voice. The woman who became Ranulf’s mate would be the luckiest one in the world.

  “Yes.”

  Sephie felt a painful tightening of her chest at the thought of Ranulf with his own mate. “Belle and Zoey are happy with all these changes in their lives?”

  Ranulf chuckled. “They now have the same enhanced hearing and sight that we do, and the absolute wonder on Belle’s face the first time she shifted and flew beside Lachlan was priceless.”

  “Belle can fly as a dragon?”

  He nodded. “Once she became Lachlan’s mate, yes.”

  “Zoey too?”

  “Yes,” he confirmed.

  Oh my God! That sounded so amazing. So much so, it still seemed unreal to Sephie.

  “Their lifespans will also match their mates’,” Ranulf added.

  Her eyebrows rose. “How long do dragon shifters live?”

  “Our parents were several thousands of years old when they died.”

  “Together?”

  “Mated dragon shifters always share the same lifespan.”

  “So, if Belle dies…”

  “So does Lachlan, and vice versa.”

  “The same with Hunter and Zoey?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long will they live if nothing untoward happens to either of them?”

  “As I said, our parents were thousands of years old when they died.”

  “Together,” she repeated.

  Ranulf shrugged. “Neither of them would have wished to carry on without the other anyway.”

  “That’s…”

  “Unbelievable?”

  “Romantic,” she corrected. “No… It’s more than that. So much more. My mother and father have always shared a love and closeness I’ve always dreamed of having with my own partner one day. They are utterly devoted to each other.” She eyed him quizzically. “Are dragons faithful to their mate?”

  “Always and completely.”

  She nodded. “Then to be mated and love each other for so long, to be totally in tune with each other, and to then die together, sounds like heaven to me.”

  “My brothers and their mates also have an emotional link that allows them to speak to each other with only their thoughts.”

  This was all so much more than romantic. What Ranulf was explaining to her sounded magical, a closeness that existed on another level completely than that shared by any married human couple. Even her parents.

  Sephie felt an ache of envy, wanting that for herself. But only if it could be with Ranulf. And it couldn’t when she obviously wasn’t his mate.

  “I follow a different mental path to link with my brothers.” He seemed to be choosing his words carefully, seeming aware of her inner turmoil, if not the reason for it, and not wanting to alarm her.

  A little late considering all that he had already told her!

  Sephie sat up, the duvet held against her bare breasts as she turned to look at him. “Have you met your fated mate?” She could barely breathe, terrified of what his answer was going to be.

  “Yes.”

  “Your one and only?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh.” Sephie could no longer look at the man she had fallen in love with, feeling as if a heavy weight was pressing down on her chest. “Is it because you have a mate that you stopped us from making love completely last night?”

  “Partly,” he acknowledged.

  “Which part?” she bit out, her disappointment almost too much to bear.

  How could she be expected to just walk away from this man and the magic that surrounded him?

  The man she had fallen in love with, possibly before she even met him, if her obsession with Ranulf’s carvings was an indication?

  “The part where it would not be safe for us to have penetrative sex until you know about and have accepted that you are my fate mate⁠—”

  Sephie gasped. “I’m your fated mate?”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “Sephie, you are only my fated mate, if you choose to be.” Ranulf took one of her hands in both of his.

  She was Ranulf’s fated mate!

  Not some other faceless, nameless woman she already hated with a vengeance, but her, Sephie Malcolm.

  The heavy weight eased from her chest, her emotional pain of a few minutes ago evaporating completely.

  She was the mate of a dragon shifter!

  She wanted to shout it from the rooftops, from the castle rooftop!

  Instead, she reined back her euphoria. There were still things she needed to know. “I can make that choice?”

  “Yes.”

  Why the hell would any woman in her right mind choose not to become the fated mate of this gorgeous, sexy, and protective man? Or any woman in her wrong mind, come to that!

  Even so… “Would you have told me that if I hadn’t asked?”

  “Of course.”

  “When?”

  “When I believed you to be over the shock of the past twenty-four hours. The last thing I would ever want to do is take advantage of you when you are still recovering from being scared for your own life and that of your parents.”

  Sephie studied him again, still sensing he wasn’t being completely honest with her. “Something isn’t sounding quite right here. What happens to you if I refuse the mating?”

  “I would sicken and eventually die— I could have lied to you, my Sephie, but I will never do that either,” he explained when she gasped again, in horror this time. “If you do not consent to becoming my mate, then I will not want to go on living anyway.”

  The thought of Ranulf dying was— No. Just no. “But if we’d had penetrative sex last night, the decision would already have been made for me?”

  Ranulf winced. “I would have tried to give that to you, but once I was inside you, I know I would find it very difficult not to bite, mount, and mate you.”

  Sephie surged up from beneath the bedcover to grab a hoodie, presumably Ranulf’s, from the bedroom chair. She quickly pulled it on over her nakedness. Which, when the garment reached down to her knees and the sleeves hung off the end of her arms, confirmed it definitely belonged to Ranulf.

  There had just been something so—so visceral in hearing Ranulf say bite, mount and mate you. Even hearing those words caused a melting heat between Sephie’s thighs, her breasts suddenly feeling hypersensitive.

  She turned to stare across the room at her lover. Ranulf’s muscular chest was bare above the duvet, his hair tousled, those green eyes—that really did occasionally have silver flames dancing in their depths—fixed on her intently. His expression was once again guarded.

  As if he were preparing himself for a blow?

  As if her need for distance from him was because he was expecting Sephie to refuse him.

  Right mind or wrong mind, Sephie was never going to do that. She loved this strong and resourceful man. Loved him deeply. She had a feeling she had started to fall in love with him the first time she saw one of his carvings.

  “How can you be so certain I’m your mate?” she pressed, needing to know he felt the same way about her.

  “The moment I first saw you, colors, which over the long years I’ve been alive had started to fade for me, once again took on a fresh vibrancy. Your scent of strawberries⁠—”

  “I told you I don’t wear perfume.” She shook her head. “Or use any other products that smell of strawberries.”

  “It’s your natural scent that only my dragon can detect. Belle’s is honeysuckle, and Zoey’s is Lily of the Valley.”

  “You can smell their scent too?” A surge of jealousy told Sephie she found that possibility unacceptable. Ranulf was her lover.

  Her dragon!

  No matter how many times she said that in the future, she knew it would never get old.

  Ranulf smiled slightly, as if aware of her conflicting emotions.

  Which, if he really was her dragon mate, maybe he was?

  He shook his head. “Lachlan and Hunter told me about the unique scents of their mates. I believe so that I might know to seek out my own mate’s scent.”

  “Which you did?” Sephie prompted, still needing that affirmation.

  “I smelled strawberries before I even met you. A scent that became even stronger once I was in your presence at Ben’s funeral. I know without a doubt that you’re my mate, Sephie,” he assured gently.

  The sincerity in his expression was indisputable. “Where are your brothers and their…mates now?”

  “Inside caves in the mountain behind the castle. It’s where we keep our hoards of dragon treasure.”

  Sephie’s brows rose to her hairline. “Edgar Wallis was right that it exists?”

  Ranulf’s jaw tightened at her mention of the other man. “Yes.”

  “About everything else too?”

  “Yes.”

  “But why—how could he know any of this when no one else seems to know you really do exist?” Her eyes widened even more when Ranulf threw back the duvet and calmly got out of bed.

  She had seen him naked when they made love; of course she had. But seeing the sheer magnificence of his muscular body now made her mouth dry.

  His chest was so broad, with what looked like tribal—dragon kin?—tattoos covering most of his shoulders and torso. His abdomen was clearly a ten rather than an eight pack, his thick cock aroused, his thighs strong, as were his long legs.

  Because he needed that strength when he was a dragon?

  That thought alone was enough to renew the heated awareness she now had of Ranulf.

  “Are you going to shift into a dragon now?” Her tone was a mixture of excitement and disbelief.

  “The rooms in the castle are big, but not big enough for that,” he dismissed. “The church could have accommodated my dragon, if needed, but not the rooms here.”

  She gasped. “How tall are you?”

  “We are all thirty feet high, with an even wider wingspan.”

  Sephie gave a breathless laugh. “I’m still trying to get used to the idea of wings!” She sobered. “You didn’t answer my question of how Edgar Wallis found out about you and your treasure.”

  Ranulf appeared completely unconcerned with his own nakedness as he bent to pick up his discarded jeans before pulling them on, but leaving them unfastened as he turned to face her. “You’ve heard us speak of a journal that Belle bought by accident when the contents of a house were auctioned?”

  Sephie was having difficulty getting her dry tongue to move so she could answer him after staring at the tautest backside she had ever seen. Or imagine. Ranulf really was a work of art in his own right.

  She finally gave up trying and nodded instead of answering.

  “The contents of that journal were written by a girl who lived in this village eight hundred years ago,” he answered, seemingly unaware of her inner arousal.

  At least Sephie hoped he was.

  “It was a much more primitive time then,” Ranulf continued. “She was offered up by the villagers to the dragon gods as a sacrifice to bring forth a good harvest and hunting,” he explained, his top lip curled back as indication of what he thought of such nonsense. “Instead of eating her, as the villagers had intended we should, we flew her to a convent far away in England. Whilst living there, she took holy orders and became Sister Agnes. She later became abbess of the convent. She learned to read and write during her years there. The journal that Belle bought, which was later stolen from her, was written by this nun.”

  “I’m guessing it’s the same one in which she wrote of having met three men who had turned into dragons and flown her away from danger,” Sephie said dryly before her eyes widened. “Didn’t Belle initially come to the village as a guest and flatmate of Ben McGregor? The boy who died in a mountaineering accident over the New Year?”

  Respect for her intelligence flared in Ranulf’s eyes. “It was no accident, and Ben didn’t fall down the mountain. He stole the journal from Belle to give to Edgar Wallis in exchange for money.”

  “Then I’m guessing Wallis had something to do with his death?”

  Ranulf released a heavy breath. “He did, yes. He’s also responsible for the death of Zoey’s parents in a plane crash ten years ago. Wallis was already obsessed with searching for the existence of dragons and their treasure, and after Zoey’s parents died, as their lawyer and Zoey’s guardian, he then had access to the money left in trust for her. He used that to send Zoey to boarding school and to buy a mansion on the Cornish coast, which he claimed was Zoey’s main home. No longer having to work left Wallis free to continue his quest for dragon treasure.”