Li moved to kiss Wei on the cheek, then tiptoed down the stairs to do the same to Bruno, who barely seemed to notice as he started telling Li about their new plant in excruciating detail.
Wei stood and clapped his hands, drawing everyone’s attention. “I go to prepare. Ready yourself, Misha Novak and Rory O’Malley. I will not be kept waiting for you.”
He disappeared, and Li smiled at us. “He’s really quite sweet.”
Bruno realized he’d lost Li’s attention and forced himself into Misha’s space instead to continue to share his excitement about the plant.
“I’m sure,” I responded diplomatically. “Forgive me, but… the three of you are… together?”
Li’s eyes crinkled into thin little crescents as he laughed. “It’s a bit of a surprise for most people. But yes. Wei and I found each other very young, and he tried to resist Bruno for the longest time, for my sake.” He rolled his eyes. “Alphas.”
“Wait… please forgive me if I’m being too nosy, but… is Bruno just with Wei, then?”
Li shook his head and clapped his hands. “There’s nothing to forgive. I feel like I’m the one who ought to apologize. I have a bad habit of confusing people on purpose, but seeing as you’re soon to be a member of the Novak family, I’ll hold myself back. We are all three equal partners. Though Bruno came into our lives later, and though he’s a different kind of dragon than Wei and I, it was meant to be.”
“Different kind of dragon?”
“Oops!” Li covered his mouth with his hand. “Dragon secrets. But let me tell you my favorite part, omega to omega. They both took my family name.”
“Huh. I have a hard time imagining Wei giving up anything of his.”
“Like I told you, he’s really quite sweet. And such a romantic.”
This definitely had to be one of those love is blind things. Or rose-colored glasses. But it was clearly working for Li, so I wasn’t going to try and convince him his mate was a pompous dick.
“And it’s an even bigger statement in our culture. Normally, we each keep our family names, but both Bruno and Wei wanted to make it absolutely clear that we were all together, and that we weren’t just members of Wei’s harem.”
I blinked at that. Was it normal for dragons to have harems? “That… sounds incredible.”
Li nodded happily. “I know it’s too much to ask of a lower shifter to display such true and deep love, but I hope your alpha is half as willing to sacrifice something for you.”
It was impossible to take offense at Li, even though he’d referred to us as “lower shifters.” But he did make me think about everything Misha had done for me today. He’d used his contacts and time to search for my da’s last known whereabouts. He’d convinced his family to sacrifice the dragon’s favor for me. And he’d kept his mouth shut even though I knew it was killing him to not snap smart-ass comments during this whole audience.
I was starting to look forward to getting to know this mate of mine once everything had calmed down.
We found ourselves at the Indiana Dunes National Park, though night had fallen a few hours ago. We were able to follow our earlier scent trails, however, right up to the point where the dragon scent had disappeared at the top of the dune. Now that I was familiar with dragon scent, I caught a hint of the original trail the twin jaguars had followed.
Wei took a knee, his hands pressing into the sand as he lowered his face to less than an inch from the sand. He took in a deep breath that stretched way beyond a normal person’s ability—human or shifter. His chest billowed out and I worried he might rip the seams of his clearly ridiculously expensive white suit. Or explode. I really didn’t want to have to explain that to his mates.
But he let the breath out in a windy roar and stood. The sand fell from his knee and hands like magic, glittering in the light from Misha’s phone, which we were using as a flashlight.
“I recognize their scent,” Wei growled.
“Is it another clan?” I asked. “Are you going to get in trouble for helping us?”
Wei gave me a dismissive frown. “Dragons do not get in trouble. We challenge or receive challenges. But no. This is not anyone my family need fear. The dragon who took your father, no matter which of the two I suspect actually did the task, is nothing more than hired muscle, and not very good at that. I am going to follow his trail through the air. Once I shift, we will be unable to speak. You must climb on my neck, just in front of the leg joints. Do not attempt to grab any individual scales if you value your fingers.”
Before I could ask him more questions about the dragon who’d taken my father, Wei shifted. He didn’t strip, as I or any other shifter I knew would have done. He seemed to absorb his clothes until a long, snake-like red dragon with a gold stripe down his back suddenly loomed over us.
His size, his power, his presence was overwhelming, and Misha’s flashlight only illuminated about twenty feet of the dragon, from somewhere on its neck to halfway down its back. At least, I hoped that was only halfway. My knees shook with the prey’s instinctive urge to run, to hide, to protect myself from a creature who was designed to destroy me. I gulped, and nearly jumped when Misha took my hand and squeezed it.
“So I guess we’re doing this?” His voice was muted, with a rough catch in it. It was not comforting to know I wasn’t alone in my intimidation.
Suddenly, the large, scaled head of the dragon snaked back to us. His nostrils were big enough for me to put my fists in them. His eyes were about the size of my head. His horns looked sharp enough to run straight through my body, but they were pointed backward, which was fine until I realized if I fell forward on his neck, those horns might be the things that caught me.
The dragon snorted at us, and a spray of embers, like a kid’s sparkler, snapped at us. Misha and I leaped back, smacking into his scaly leg. The dragon jerked his chin in an upward motion.
Up. We were supposed to go up. We were supposed to ride this monster.
“Let me climb up, and then I’ll be able to pull you after me.”
I stared, half in shock, as Misha did just that. My hand nearly slipped from his when he took it to help me, and I had to wipe the sweat off on my pants before he could get a strong enough grip. He settled me in front of him. The dragon’s neck was bonier than I’d expected, and I sat in a dip. What was it? Maybe the space between his vertebrae?
“I wonder how he flies,” Misha muttered. “How does he fly without wings?”
I was too focused on getting settled to wonder that far ahead. Don’t grab the scales. Right. But how was I supposed to hold on to the dragon for security? I clenched my legs tightly and looked for any kind of handhold. “I guess we’re reaaa—”
Wei leaped into the air without waiting for me to finish. My hands fell flat against his neck and I simply braced myself.
Riding a dragon was… nothing like I’d expected. The initial terror, that was understandable. But once it faded and I was able to focus on the actual experience?
It was warm. Wei’s body pulsed with enough heat that it seemed to surround us in a shield and protect us from the expected whip of the late autumn night air.