Page 17 of Bred By the Dragon

“Right. It was to protect us.” She rubs her arm. “And maybe we still need protection.”

I give her a baffled look. “From what?” Does she think I’ll injure her?

“From each other.” She sighs. “It’s easy to get too close when you’re having sex with someone, you know? But that’s not what either of us is looking for. What we want is to get you a hatchling, so dragons will continue after you.”

I’m not entirely sure what distinction she’s trying to make. “Are you speaking of romantic involvement?” I ask, just to be clear.

“That’s what was brilliant about DreamTogether, right?” she says brightly, almost unnaturally so. “They connected us, but once our roles were played, that was the end of it. No complications.”

So that’s what she wants—for us to go our separate ways once the mission is achieved, without any further attachment. I try to ignore the way my heart plummets.

“Why do you smile that way from time to time?” I ask her, tilting my head. “It doesn’t seem like you.”

Her lip twitches, and the smile falls from her eyes. “What do you mean?”

“The way you looked at me as if...” I scratch my chin with one claw. “As if you didn’t know me.”

She shoots me a surprised look. “Oh.” Her mouth tilts down into a frown. “It’s... professionalism, you know? At my old job, we had to be professional, no matter what. And that’s how I’m going to approach this, too.”

So this is still just a part of the job for her.

But I believe I understand why she doesn’t have romantic interest in me. Likely she would prefer to marry another human, spend her life with someone who would live a normal life at her side. I would live long beyond her, anyway.

We are not compatible. So, instead of letting that disappointment in, I nod and wall it off.

“I understand,” I say.

“Friends?” Sammy asks, holding out her hand toward me.

I take it in mine, my big claws dwarfing her small palm, and we shake as best we can.

“Friends,” I agree. And it tastes like ash on my tongue.

SAMMY

Way easier said than done, of course. Interacting with Zakarion out here, in the real world, he’s even more... I don’t know. Wonderful. Funny. A little out of his element.

Which, of course he is. He’s a three-hundred-year-old dragon standing in my backyard. And now we’ve just shaken on our deal.

“Does that mean that I should, erm...” Zakarion’s hand curls at his side, and the tip of his tail is twitching.

“Fuck me?” I ask. “Probably.”

He looks up at the sun and spreads his wings, as if soaking all of it in. Then he approaches me, those wings still unfurled, and dwarfs me in their shadow.

“Are you certain?” His voice is lower, more full of gravel. “There is no steel table here to protect you.”

Little does he know that’s part of the fun.

“I have you here,” I say. “You won’t hurt me.”

He doesn’t look quite as certain as I feel, though. But he rises up on his back legs anyway, and he slips a claw under my shirt.

“Take this off,” he says, in a way that’s surprisingly commanding. This part of him is back, then. I peel up the shirt, not that it’s necessary to the business of procreating, but I can’t stand the way we did it last time. Mechanical. Businesslike. Zakarion needs intimacy to get turned on, and I don’t mind the skin-on-skin with him, either.

I toss the shirt aside along with my bra, and then Zakarion nudges again with his claw at my pants. I can see that slit at his groin opening, revealing two hidden treasures inside. The moment I ditch my jeans, I stoop down in front of him.

“Sammy?” Zakarion asks, uncertain.

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