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She’s also stunningly beautiful, and I feel a completely irrational rush of jealousy until I hear Aiden joke, “Your boyfriend doesn’t mind that I stole you away for the day?”
She laughs and says, “No, he’s too busy trying to break the Land Rover you gave him.”
He laughs and says, “Tell him if he breaks it, the repair cost is on him.”
She laughs again and turns to me, extending her hand. “I’m Courtney. I’m the groundskeeper’s daughter, but you’ll meet Dad eventually. It’s wonderful to meet you!”
I take her hand and smile. “Thank you. It’s lovely to meet you as well.”
She grins and says, “I can already tell we’re going to be great friends.”
I would find that sentiment silly if I hadn’t spent most of the past twenty-four hours with either my mouth or my pussy wrapped around the cock of a man I’ve known only for twenty-four hours.
She leads me to a very luxurious—you know what? You can just assume everything’s very luxurious—SUV, a Range Rover, and drives me toward one of the estates.
“It’s so exciting to have a Westin here again,” she says. “Did you know your great-grandfather used to be the Vipera family lawyer?”
My eyes widen. “I didn’t,” I say. “Is that why they reached out to me?”
She nods. “Mmhmm. You’re the first lawyer in your family since your great-grandfather. From what I’m told, he did an outstanding job. They were probably just waiting for one of his descendants to become a lawyer to hire you.”
“Wow,” I say, “it’s almost like it really was fated.”
She laughs, and I blush when I realize what I say. Fortunately, we pull into the parking lot of the massive mansion that will be my home for the next several years, and she has to introduce me to the rest of the staff. I’ll have a housekeeper, a cook and a maid.
“Wow,” I say when she leads me inside and I find the interior as grand and opulent as the exterior. “This place is huge!”
“Would you believe that it’s actually the smallest mansion on the grounds?” she says with a smile. “Mr. Vipera didn’t want to overwhelm you.”
I think about the past two days and decide that he’s already overwhelmed me and more than.
* * *
Aiden
The calling is almost overpowering. The desire to possess this girl is all but impossible to ignore. There are legends among the dragons of certain human women with whom the calling represents far more than the typical biological possibility for reproduction. There are legends aboutfated wyrms. That’s just an old way of saying fated dragons.
The legends speak of certain pairings between dragons and humans that are destined for purposes that go beyond the furtherance of the race. The humans feel something similar to the calling, just in the other direction. According to our legends the first dragon shifters came about because of a fated dragon who fell in love with a human princess and through sheer force of will transformed himself into a man.
I don’t know if I believe that is the origin of dragon shifters. I suspect there is no such thing as a pure dragon, that we have always been able to shift into human form. There are stories of dragons once shifting to other creatures as well. I’m not sure if I believe that either. I can’t think of any benefit in shifting to a non-sentient creature. Perhaps for sport, but dragons don’t view sport in the same way as humans.
I will tell you, though, that it’s impossible not to believe that my longing for Brooke has great significance. I have felt the calling before. No dragon my age has lived without feeling it. In my father’s home in Dalmatia, there are many human women there, essentially breeding stock available to dragon nobility.
God, that’s a horrible way to put it. Please understand those women are there voluntarily. They’re surrogate mothers very well compensated for their service. They aren’t kept there against their will and any dragon who hurt a human without cause would be shunned by the rest of us.
The point, though, is that any woman capable of having a dragon child produces the calling for male dragons. There is no avoiding that. I know how it feels, and I know the immediate desire it produces. The way I feel about Brooke goes well beyond that. Furthermore, her reactions toward me suggest far more than simple sexual excitement or even, for that matter, romantic attachment.
I need to understand why that is.
I press the intercom on my desk, and when my valet answers, I say, “Petyr, I need to speak with Valentia. Do you know if he is here?”
“He is, Your Majesty,” Petyr replies, “in the caves.”
“I go to the caves then,” I reply.
It isn’t surprising that Valentia is in the caves. He spends almost all of his time as a dragon. He’s almost seven hundred years old, and dragons that old can sleep for decades deep in the earth. Valentia was advisor to the first Vipera king more than seven hundred years ago when the various dragon factions came together to unite under a single monarch. If there lives a dragon who can offer insight about my situation with Brooke, it is Valentia.
I rise from my desk and find my scepter and crown. Valentia’s eyesight isn’t all that great anymore. Nonetheless, the sight of the crown and scepter will allow him to recognize me instantly, will fill in the gaps on my face his sight might create. Petyr meets me at the elevator with a collection of gifts. Gift giving is very important in dragon culture. Typically, gifts are given to those of equal or higher social status. The importance of Valentia is such that no dragon would dare to approach him without bringing a gift, even the crown prince or, for that matter, the king.
