Hidden Flame 28

**Avery**
After my non-date with Clint, I slept fairly well. I dreamed but I don’t remember them. I start my morning routine of
showering and getting dressed. I opt for a casual knit dress and my comfortable sneakers. I make my way to the kitchen
and the Trio is standing there waiting.
“We waited for you,” Clint says.
I am not surprised after yesterday. These guys might be gods on the football field but they are rabble in the kitchen. I
decided to teach them how to make omelets. They are fairly simple and the guys can stuff them with whatever
ingredients they want. While I am doing the eggs, I have them chopping their fixings. I grab spinach for mine and toss it
to Clint to wash and chop. I have them crowd around me so that I can show them how to add the egg and when it is
ready for the ingredients and to be flipped. They watch me as if I were an expert surgeon.
Their positive attention was nice even if I felt a bit uncomfortable under their gazes. Cooking is one of my escapes and I
am very good at it. Maybe I will study culinary science when I go to college. After breakfast, we left for school. I started
walking until a black Jaguar pulled up beside me.
“Get in,” Cassius ordered as he pushed open the passenger door.
I roll my eyes because I doubt that the Hags will try something again. They showed me their claws and I lived. What are
they going to do now, call me names? It is not like I have not been called vile things before. I just hope that none of them
are the Trio’s mates because I would demand that I be relieved of my service. I would die before I serve them!
“If you do not get in, I will come and put you in,” Cassius says as I catch the red flakes in his tepid blue eyes.
“Asher, is that how you ask a lady?”
Cassius shakes his head as his eyes twinkle a mix of red and blue. They almost turn purple. I have never noticed that
before. Maybe it was because I always tried to keep my head down, but facing death changes a lot. “Avery, will you
please get in,” he says.
I giggle inside at my small victory. Once I was inside, he fastened my seatbelt and started to drive. I look over at him,
“Friendship 101, never command your friends. Offer suggestions instead, trust me on this.”
He chuckles as he asks, “Friendship 101, huh? Just how many are in this class?”
I blush, “It was just Trisha and now I guess you and your brothers.”
He looks over at me, “I have never seen her with you. Why?”
“The Hoity Hags targeted her back when I was mentoring her, so we have kept our friendship a secret since. She’s the one
that lent me a change of clothes last week.”
“Then invite her to the palace next week for dinner. You do eat with your friends, don’t you?” he jokes.
I slapped his arm only to jerk my hand back and place it in my lap, “You are almost as much of an ass as Asher.”
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Cassius chuckles, “It is why he chose me I guess. But he’s not that bad, Avery. The death of our parents changed us all
plus he is very irritable without his mate. It is hard to explain.”
I sigh. “Okay, but you said that he chose you. Aren’t you born with your dragon like other shifters are?”
He pulls over. “Some of us are born with our dragon and must share a singular body. Think of it like a molecule. Some
bonds are easily broken whereas others cannot be. But for royal dragons it is different. A human is born and a dragon
hatches from an egg. They must choose and bond with each other and then they are like my brothers and me where we
can exist separate from our dragon for a decent length of time, but eventually, we must come back together. It is why you
rarely see a lone dragon as they usually die without a suitable human.”
I never knew this, but now it does make some sense. He started driving again after I nodded to his explanation. But then I
noticed that we weren’t driving towards school. “This isn’t the way to school.”
He grins, “You are right. It is not.”
“Take me to school.”
“No. I got us excused for the day. I asked if you wanted to hang out and that’s what we are going to do,” he says.
“I can’t miss class.”
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“Nerd alert,” he teases.
“Takes one to know one considering you just used a chemistry reference.”
We both laughed as he continued to drive. I fiddled with his radio until I found a pop music station. I get lost in the
happy beats.
**Cassius**
This might have been the best idea that I have ever had. Clint was right. This Avery is different and I like it. As long as she
doesn’t undermine me in public, I can let her get her digs in in private. As we near the beach, I watch her face light up.
She looks like an angel. I can’t believe that I once tried to strip her of her wings.
“The beach? I don’t have a swimsuit and I barely know how to swim,” she says in a panic.
“Relax, I have it covered.” I parked in front of a beach supply store. In the human world, they have a store for everything. I
once discovered a store that only sold items suitable for left-handed people. Once we were inside of the store, I told her
to go find her a swimsuit, coverup, change of clothes, and anything else that she could think of. She stared at me for a
few moments before she did as instructed.
Wearing my new swim trunks, I waited for her outside of the women’s dressing rooms. She emerged wearing a blue
tankini with boy shorts. Part of me hoped that she would choose a bikini, but she isn’t like other girls. Avery has scars and
lots of them that even Enya’s magic couldn’t heal, but it did fade them all but those claw marks on her back. I walked up
to her and yanked the price tags off, “Good, let me go pay, and then we can have our beach day.” I picked up the other
stuff that she had stacked outside of the dressing room and paid for it all. It didn’t cost as much as I expected and then I
looked at a beach towel and knew why. She selected things only from the clearance rack. I inwardly chuckle because
when she finds her person they will have fun breaking her of that habit