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“I will. I can’t promise that I’ll never again give in to the instinct to leap to your defense when you don’t really need it—but I’ll be doing my best. And if I slip up and you ask me to back off, I’ll listen. So don’t be shy about telling meoff.”
A giggle slipped out of me. I swiped away the tears. The wrenching feeling had faded, but an ache remained. An ache for Nate and the years he’d spent alone when he could have had that bond of lovealready.
I raised my head and touched his cheek. Nate smiled, with so much affection shining in his dark brown eyes that I couldn’t doubt for a second he felt he’d made the right choice. I bobbed up on my toes to press a kiss to hismouth.
He kissed me back, softly and then more hungrily. His hand slid down the skin the dress left bare on my back and over the satiny fabric clinging to my hips. A sharper ache settled between my legs. I wouldn’t have believed it was possible to want one man this much, let alone four, but I did. God help me, Idid.
The murmur of the opening door interrupted those thoughts. The heron shifter I’d seen earlier stepped out onto the terrace, clearing his throat. I stepped back from Nate, not even flushing. After the near-orgy I’d seen in the courtyard yesterday night, it was hard to think a little kissing was going to raise anyeyebrows.
“Your presence is requested in the dining hall, Dragon Shifter, Alpha,” the young man said with a respectful dip of hishead.
“We’re on our way,” Nate replied. He wrapped his hand around mine and pushed away from the railing. We walked hand-in-hand to the door, not with him leading, but in stridetogether.
I’d have thought it was a perfect moment if not for the dinner ahead of us, which I knew was going to be anything butfun.
Chapter 17
Ren
When I walkedinto the dining hall, at first I couldn’t do anything but blink in awe. The room was so big I’d bet you could have fit a football field in there. Long teak tables set for twenty each stood in rows across the hardwood floor. Another of those tables, this one covered with a red silk tablecloth, stood on a dais at one end of the room. Five of the chairs on the far side of that table were carved in an ornate style, with the one in the middle the tallest and most elaboratelysculpted.
I didn’t need anyone to tell me that was the dragon shifter’schair.
My heart started thudding twice as hard. Other shifters were already moving around the room, talking with each other and greeting newcomers. I felt all those eyes move to me as Nate and I approached the high table. I must have talked to a lot of them last night at the welcome celebration, but somehow this felt different. Then everyone had been partying. Now we were down to more seriousbusiness.
Aaron appeared by the high table to meet us. Like Nate, he’d put on a suit for the occasion—a royal blue number that made his eyes look even more brilliant. Damn, I really had lucked out in the mates department, hadn’tI?
A woman who looked a few years younger than Aaron, with the same golden-blond hair and bright blue eyes, stood by his side. She studied me with an expression that wasn’t exactly unfriendly, but wasn’t all that welcoming either. Her dress was a simple Grecian style gown in gray silk, and I could tell from the way she held herself that it wasn’t her usual get-up.
Her arms, crossed over her slim chest, were solid muscle. Right. Aaron had said I’d be meeting his sister—the one who’d appointed herself as a sort of bodyguard. She definitely looked thepart.
“Serenity,” Aaron said, motioning me over. “This is my sister, Alice. Alice, meet Serenity, mymate.”
“Hmm,” Alice said. She held out her hand for me to shake and squeezed mine tightly as she pumped my arm. “So you’re the one who’s had my big brother running around all over the country. Glad you finally made it backhere.”
Her voice was so deadpan I’d have thought she was being snarky, but her lips curled into a playful but warm smile. I relaxed a littleinside.
“It was a long trip getting here,” I said. “But I did make sure he returned in one piece, as much as certain rogues might have preferredotherwise.”
Her smile grew into a grin. “I’ll give you that. And it’s probably a good thing he’s got someone dragging him out of that library every now andthen.”
Aaron gave her a baleful look. “The more time I spend outside the library, the more you complain about all the potential danger I’m putting myselfin.”
“Only when you don’t bring me along.” She gave him an affectionate pat on the arm and shot me another smile. Okay, I liked thischick.
Aaron escorted me the rest of the way to my special chair, as if I needed help finding it. I guess the formality looked nice for our spectators. And it wasn’t like I minded the reassuring squeeze of my shoulder as he took his seat besideme.
I was particularly glad that he and Nate had been the first ones here, because I had them sitting directly next to me on either side. I still wasn’t sure what to say to Marco or West. They’d both avoided me allday.
Marco showed up first, sauntering to the chair beside Nate with his usual carefree expression. When our eyes met for a second, his were wary. I dragged my gaze away, my throat tightening. I didn’t want to think about our earlier conversation or the revelations it had brought rightnow.
West arrived a few minutes later. He stalked to his chair without a word or a glance at me and sank into itabruptly.
Alice, who was sitting at his other side, leaned forward to catch my eye and raised her eyebrow. Okay, so that chill wasn’t just in my imagination. Was he pissed off because he hadn’t meant to make out with me last night? Or was something else going on in that inscrutable wolf shifter head ofhis?
The chairs across from us began to fill. Aaron introduced me to each figure as they sat down. The Cumberlands, Hubert and Isla. The Porters, Frankford and Tracy. And so on. I caught whiffs of their scent, my instincts and their forms helping me determine their animal side. Hubert and Isla were swans. Frankford and Tracy falcons. The couples around them included hawks, pelicans, and even a couple of geese. I had to bite back my amusement imagining their rounded bellies and long necks in birdform.
“Well,” Hubert said to Aaron after a passing nod to me, “I hope the arrival of the dragon shifter means the community can move forward in a more orderly fashion from hereon.”
