“She won’t make your life hell. Not if she wants to keep her job, and I guarantee you that she does. And don’t worry about the pack life. I can handle Valerie,” Callin said.
“Then I would love to,” Brianne said.
Callin’s dragon was practically purring at the thought of spending the night with Brianne.
“Fantastic,” Callin said. “I assume filming will be done around ten tonight, so if you want to hang around, we can go straight from here.”
9
Brianne nodded her head as Callin asked her if she wanted to take her wine to the living room. She was stuffed full—Callin had cooked them a lovely dinner of chicken in a creamy sauce with sautéed potatoes and green beans, and then they had had some ice cream. She was glad of the chance to move to the comfortable-looking leather couch.
They had talked nonstop throughout their dinner. Callin had told her all about his career, including plenty of funny stories of his mishaps along the way. In turn, she had told him about her time as Valerie’s assistant, and as it turned out, she had plenty of funny stories of her own. They had spent the whole meal laughing and joking and sharing parts of themselves, and Brianne had found herself feeling closer and closer to Callin by the moment.
The air in the room had been completely charged the whole time, and Brianne knew that when they had sex later on, it was going to be mind-blowing. Her clit was already tingling and teasing her. Brianne’s body was primed for this. She wanted Callin so badly, but she knew that they still had some things to talk about before they got that far.
When they had first arrived at Callin’s apartment, he had asked her how she felt about him being a dragon, and she had answered honestly, telling him she hadn’t thought too much about it. He had accepted that and told her that they should talk about what it meant for them after dinner. She had agreed, happy to put it off and talk about normal things that normal people talked about on dates, but she knew that now they had to face the truth of his immortality and what that meant for their relationship.
She thought about it as Callin sat down on the couch beside her. The thought of him being a dragon didn’t scare her, and that, she thought, was the main thing. At first, she had been put off the idea of dating him because he was a dragon, but that had been because she had prejudged him based on Valerie’s behavior. He was so different from Valerie.
“So,” Callin said. “The dragon thing.”
“The dragon thing,” Brianne repeated with a smile.
“How much do you know about it?” he asked.
“Enough, I think. I know that you can turn into a dragon at will. I know your senses are enhanced and that your instincts are always spot on. And I now know that not all dragons are assholes,” she finished with a smile.
Callin gave her a questioning look.
“I thought Valerie was the norm for dragons, that her being the way she is was somehow linked to her being a dragon,” Brianne explained.
“Oh, right. Well, I guess that makes sense when she was the only dragon you knew. For the most part, shifters are like humans. Most of them are good, decent people, but there’s a few that give them a bad name.”
“Shifters? Does that mean there are more than just dragons out there?” Brianne asked.
“Sure,” Callin said. “Bears, wolves, witches—they’re all real.”
“Wow,” Brianne breathed.
“You’ve likely encountered a few shifters over the course of your life, but because most of them are just normal people on the surface, you never would have known it,” Callin said with a smile. His smile faded as he made his next point. “Brianne, I don’t want to scare you away from being with me, because I want you more than I think you know. But I also don’t want to lie to you.”
Brianne felt herself starting to get a little bit nervous as Callin spoke, but she resisted the urge to interrupt and let him go on. The last thing she wanted was for him to start lying to her, and if they were going to be together, then she wanted to go into the relationship with her eyes wide open.
“Like I said, most shifters are normal, nice people. A few are like Valerie—mostly harmless, but selfish, and they see themselves as above humans. Unfortunately, there is another kind of shifter. The kind who sees humans as a commodity. And while I promise you right now I will never let anyone hurt you and I will always be there to protect you, I must warn you that as a human dating a dragon, you might draw some attention of the unwanted kind from some of these undesirable types.”
“What kind of attention?” Brianne asked with a frown.
Callin explained to Brianne about his parents dying when he was young, and how he was meant to take over the pack.
“So, even though I didn’t end up taking control of the pack, I’m pretty well known, and shifters know I’m powerful and influential in the supernatural world. Some of these undesirable types won’t be above using you to get to me,” Callin said.
Even though Callin’s words carried quite a chilling message, Brianne felt herself relaxing a bit.
“I appreciate your honesty,” she said. “But I don’t think I have a lot to worry about right now. I’m on set for the majority of my time and I’m at home in bed for the rest of it. It’s not like I’m going out all of the time where I could be grabbed or something,” she said.
Callin nodded his head thoughtfully.
“Yes, true. And while you’re on set, you’re safe because I’m never far away. And maybe once filming wraps up, we can
