Page 11 of Unhaunt Me

Someone younger.

Teddy.

Fuck!

Why couldn’t it have been Sunny? He’d have kept it to himself at least.

I punched the dragon again. He blocked with his forearm and both of our flesh pushed up more scales to defend us.

“It was a joke, buddy,” he laughed, and I punched him again.

Something hit my side hard, knocking me off the laughing, pink-haired dragon and pinning me to the ground. I grunted Teddy’s name, but it wasn’t Teddy. The person pinning me down with their knee was Tritus. I grunted at him to get off me, but he didn’t budge up. He waved away the pink-haired, whistling asshole. He trotted up the stairs, laughing as he joined his friends. He’d be sore in the morning, but it wasn’t a draconic party unless someone got punched.

“Is he okay, Tritus?” Teddy’s voice rang out above the chaos.

Someone else was shooing the other partygoers inside. Sunny’s scent joined the fray, and I bucked up gently against my mate. He moved his knee and flipped me onto my back.

“Guides are taught how to handle cave-dragons. He’s young. He’s dumb. He was having fun. He only did it a second time to get under your skin. It’s a familiar game: prod the alpha who just met his omega.”

“I’ll pro—” I stopped, thinking better of what I was about to say.

“No mounting for dominance, dumbass,” Sunny said, standing above us akimbo.

“Did you two just respond?” Teddy asked, nudging Sunny back and stepping in front of him.

“Not just now,” Tritus said, straddled over me.

He moved my hands to his thighs as if that might keep them busy. I missed the next few things Teddy and Sunny said. Under his pitch-black half-robe his thighs were muscular, and those muscles flexed under my hands.

“Is that true?” Sunny asked me.

When I didn’t answer, he squatted down as if I couldn’t hear him and asked me again.

“Is what true, Sunny?” I sighed.

Tritus’s hands found mine and my dragon swallowed down the fireball he had been considering shooting out.

“Did you respond to Tritus earlier in the day?” Teddy asked.

“Yeah. Had some stuff to do. To get ready,” I shrugged. “Some—”

“Don’t worry about my honor,” Tritus flashed them his well-practiced guide smile. “We’re together now and as long as the hatchlings don’t play their silly, little games it’ll be alright.”

“We’ll let the captain know,” Teddy said before Sunny could speak and pulled the other dragon away before I could ask where their masks were.

The line of partygoers moved at its own pace, but Tritus didn’t budge, and I didn’t try to make him either. I drew circles on his thighs with my thumbs, ignoring how hard I was from touching so much of him.

“I didn’t mean to embarrass you,” I said when I couldn’t stand the silence buzzing in my ears any longer.

“You didn’t,” Tritus shook his head. “I’m a hard dragon to embarrass. Perhaps it was a bigger deal back on Earthside but here that’s not really much. It’s more common on 2 butit happens here too. You didn’t go for the kill. That’s all that matters in the broader scheme of things. At least to the flight.”

“Punching him felt good,” I shrugged.

“I’m sure he felt the same about you,” Tritus chuckled as the line dwindled down to nothing and the last of the partygoers slipped inside Starlight Hall. “Is that why you’re a closed book? You like to fight?”

“Never much liked it. Just because something feels good doesn’t mean I like it.”

“That’s not contrarian at all,” Tritus said, furrowing his brows together. “Not one little bit.”

---