Hatchling

Lucien-
I was taken when I was just a boy-ripped from the skies and dragged into darkness with the rest of my class. They didn't want our powers... they wanted to understand how to break us. I made a deal to spare the others. I became their only experiment.
Years passed. Bones broke. Scales were stripped. Fire dimmed.
But I survived. And when I escaped, I carried hell in my lungs and vengeance in my heart.
Then I met her.
A killer with feline grace and merciless eyes. She's working for the very people I swore to destroy, and I should've ended her the moment we crossed paths. But something in her calls to me. And I can't decide if I want to kill her... or kiss her.
She's my enemy.
So why the fuck does she feel like the only thing keeping me from turning into the monster they tried to make me?

Selena-
I don't choose who I kill. I do what I'm told, or the people I love die.
That's the deal I made with the devil I work for.
When I'm sent to track a rogue dragon shifter-one the bosses say is unstable and dangerous-I don't ask questions. I find him. I stalk him. I wait for the moment to strike.
But Lucien is not the monster I expected. He's fury wrapped in scars, but there's a broken, burning thing behind his eyes that sees too much of me.
And I hate that I see him, too.
Every time he looks at me, I forget who the enemy is. Every time he breathes my name like a prayer or a curse, I want to run-or stay forever.
I shouldn't feel this. I can't feel this.
So why does it hurt to imagine a world where we walk away?

We were never supposed to find each other. Not like this.
We're weapons forged by opposing hands, trained to draw blood from one another. And yet... in the silence between the chaos, we start to question the orders we were given.
Love wasn't part of the plan.
But neither was survival.
And if we can't figure out how to stop the war between us... we'll destroy each other long before the world gets the chance