Page 186 of The Discount Damsel

The three raced down the pier, raindrops as fat as frogs pelting after their heels, and were promptly shouted at by the marines for lollygagging.

“Those are pirates, you fools,” the captain said. “Stop gawking and get inside or be mistaken for one if they land.”

It was a short run to The Dreary Pelican, made long by the ferocity of the wind and rain. It had begun to hail, and Millie cried out as marble-sized balls pelted her exposed arms. The same moment Bradley pulled her close, trying to shield her with his body, Dirk shoved himself into the air.

He spun a look over his shoulder and found only a wall of gray, the white-and-blue uniforms of the marines smudges of color bleeding away. No one would see him.

His scales shimmered bright beneath his illusion, and Dirk swept his paws and body in an acrobatic aerial display that created a tunnel free of hail and rain.

Millie smeared the wet from her eyes. “Simply marvelous, Master Dirk!”

Heart light despite his weariness, he flew above his friends as they ran on wet planks, no longer hunched to protect their ears, all the way to the hotel’s front door.

Which Mr. Jameson had already locked and boarded, and no amount of hollering would convince him to open it again. The man either had wax in his ears or was just that spiteful, or both.

With no small amount of difficulty, he launched Millie into the air. She had the good sense to choke off her scream before the whipping wind could carry it to the ears of the marines. She had the even better sense to snatch hold of the sill of their third-story window and angle herself inside. The Mini Red performed the same trick on Bradley and barely had the strength to fly up after him.

It’s all the flying from searching for Millie this morning, he assured himself. And all the spells. And the general stress. You’re just burning the candle at both ends, Dirk my lad. You just need a nice nap and everything’ll be easy peasy, fresh and breezy.

The three scrambled to close the shutters to block out the storm, but they were so warped that the rain, much like an infestation of cockroaches, found its way inside anyway. Bradley and Millie yanked the bed to the far wall, effectively barricading the door, and Dirk whisked the candle away before the wick got soaked. Millie got it lit and set it on the dresser as far away from the rain as possible.

When there was nothing more to be done, the three finally caught their breaths. Dirk flowed over to the window by the nightstand, perched, and pressed his eye into one of the gaps.

“Can’t see a blasted thing,” he reported. “Not even the magefire.” Then he squeaked when lightning flashed and thunder ripped overhead.

“Why don’t you get dry?” Bradley suggested to Millie, turning around to give her some privacy.

He stripped out of his sodden clothes and changed into the dry ones she’d packed in his knapsack. He hung them on the jagged bits of plank that stuck out from the walls like nails, then slipped a cautious look over his shoulder. A nightgown was slipping past a lacy pair of unmentionables and down over strong tan legs. Bradley whipped his gaze back to the wall.

“I can hang your clothes when you’re done,” he said loudly.

“Alright, thank you.”

When he turned, he discovered the princess with a towel wrapped around her head and a fluffy pink robe bundled about her body. Thick socks covered her feet.

The corner of his mouth quirked up. “So that’s why your suitcase was so heavy.”

“You have your essentials, I have mine.” She’d said it haughtily, but it was all for show.

He hung up her clothes and the towel after she finished rubbing the water from her hair. Shivering, she reached for the comforter. Bradley took his knapsack and retreated for the floor.

“Mr. Donmarin, don’t be ridiculous. Get up here.” She whipped back the bedsheets.

He couldn’t deny how much he wanted warmth, so he didn’t protest. The princess had the pillow propped upright against the headboard in preparation to watch the storm from the windows, so he sat and wiggled his legs under the sheets. There wasn’t any room to sit shoulder to shoulder in the narrow bed, so he looped his arm across the headboard.

“Is this acceptable?” he asked, strangely fearful of what she would say.

She was wedged in tight against him, and he could feel the tension in her body undermining her bold, “Perfectly acceptable.” She was cold, or nervous—probably both. They had never shared a bed as affable companions before. The physicality was the same, but the protocol and intention was vastly different. Hells of the deep, he should just move to the floor. It wasn’t like he’d never been cold and wet before. The luxuries at the College had made him soft.

Then the princess did something he did not expect. And thank Caelus’s stars she was shivering or else good sense never would’ve let them get away with it. With small tentative movements, she shifted onto her side. Her head slid from that awkward position against the top of the headboard onto his shoulder. Bradley felt his own body softening in response, accepting her. With this soundless permission, her hand rested against his ribs and her knee came high enough to drape over the edge of his thigh.

“Is this acceptable?” she asked back through chattering teeth.

His arm left the headboard and curled around her. To pull the comforter up over them, he told himself, but when the task was done, his arm remained molded to her. He knew, deep down, that it would kill him to move it away from her.

An involuntary groan escaped him as she snuggled in tighter. When she relaxed fully against him, head lolling into the cradle of his neck, he swore his heart stopped for a beat. Not for the reason he thought, that momentary spark of lust, but because she trusted him to be vulnerable with him.

It was a gift he didn’t deserve, yet the armor he had built to protect his heart cracked wide open.