Dragon Knight (The Collegium Book 3) Read Online Free Page A

protested.
    “Watch me.”
    “Fine. I promise.” She was not having Morag extract the promise from her.
    Lewis set a fast pace, and she was grateful for the ballroom dancing lessons her parents had insisted on her taking throughout her childhood. It meant she could keep up with him, even balancing on five inch heels.
    It was a crack in the sidewalk that was her downfall—almost literally.
    He caught her as she tripped and fell forward, swinging her around and up, into the security of his body, redirecting and absorbing her momentum.
    “Thanks.” Her voice was dry. Her mouth drier. She was plastered against him on a busy New York street and couldn’t make herself move. He felt so good, all hard muscle and solid bones.
    He stepped back. “The next building along is mine. My apartment is there. I’d like to stop in and change. It’s been a long day starting with a breakfast meeting. I’d like to have a shower and pick up an overnight bag, too.”
    “Okay.” It made sense. Or it would if her brain hadn’t stalled at the vision of Lewis showering. “I can wait in the lobby.”
    He glanced at her as the door to the apartment building opened. “A girlfriend wouldn’t.”
    A girlfriend would be in the shower with him.
    No, no, no. She stamped on the thought and ground it underfoot as the elevator in his apartment building carried them up. Floor fourteen of twenty one.
    His apartment was so appalling it knocked all thoughts of sex out her head. Her house witchery instincts were outraged. The place was clean, sterile actually, but boring to the point of impersonality. The walls were a soul-crushing beige, the other furnishings an odd shade of charcoal, almost with a hint of brown in. Living here would be torture.
    “Pardon?” Lewis stared at her.
    “Did I say something?”
    More staring, as if she baffled him. “You made a noise.”
    “Ah.” How he lived—where he lived—was none of her business.
    She couldn’t help herself. “How long have you lived here?”
    “I don’t know. Three years.”
    “Three years!”
    He looked around. “It came furnished.” So at least he was aware, to some extent, that the apartment needed excusing.
    “Good grief. Surely in that time a girlfriend could have tried to cheer this place up, if you couldn’t.”
    “It’s a place to sleep.”
    “Good golly.” She collapsed onto the sofa in the open plan, if small, living area. “Go, shower, get dressed. I’ll sit here and shut my eyes against the horror.” She really did shut her eyes—too much beige—but she didn’t hear him moving away. She cracked one eye open.
    He studied her musingly. “If fixing this place is something a girlfriend would do…”
    “Don’t even think about it, buster.”
    He grinned.
    Her heart stuttered. She hadn’t thought the president of the Collegium could smile like that. It reminded her that for all his experience and responsibilities, he was only thirty four.
    “Make yourself a coffee or something. I won’t be long.” He disappeared into the next room.
    A couple of minutes later, she heard the shower run.
    She exhaled a long, shaky breath. “Oh Morag, the things I do for you.”
     
     
    Lewis left the shower water cold and let it blast away some of the tiredness in him and the unwanted rightness of seeing Gina in his home. She mightn’t like his apartment, but her vivid personality had shattered its usual quiet in a very satisfying way.
    He was so accustomed to loneliness.
    He tipped his face to the stinging cold of the spray. Once, with a thought, his magic could have warmed the water instantly. He had lost so much to serving the Collegium. It—his life—had disappeared unnoticed. Now, the needs of the Collegium were his needs. Its problems, his to solve. Its complexities, his maze to tread. Thinking of trying for anything more was futile.
    If I get the Group of Five that will be enough.
    It would be vengeance and justice. If he did nothing else, it would be enough.
    He