Page 34 of The Dragon's Mate

“Why?”

“Because I want my family with me.”

Bren snorted. “More like you want thepress to see you with your family.”

“It’s for a good cause, Bren. Just onceyou could think of someone other than yourself.”

Bren glanced at Tyler. The teenager rolledhis eyes and then twisted his body so his father couldn’t see and made awanking off motion.

Bren hid his grin. “What’s the charity?”

His father paused. “It’s raising funds forHAPI.”

“No,” Bren said. “I’m not going.”

Humans Against Paranormal Influence, orHAPI for short, was an anti-paranormal group that he’d had more than a fewrun-ins with over his career as a detective. The group had been investigated afew times for brutality toward shifters. He’d never been assigned directly toa case, but he’d seen what happened with the cases that actually made it tocourt. They were almost always thrown out. Bren wasn’t so naïve to think itwas because the group was innocent rather than because of corruption in their legalsystem.

“Bren -”

“I’m not going, I said.” He made his voiceice cold. “I don’t feel the same way about the paranormal as you do. Stop pretendingthat I do.”

His father grunted angrily. Tyler glancedat Bren before saying, “I’m not going to it either.”

“Like hell you’re not,” his father said.

“If Bren doesn’t have to go, I don’teither,” Tyler said.

“You’re living under my roof and you’ll doexactly what I tell you,” his father replied. “You’re going to the charity luncheon,Tyler.”

“Whatever,” Tyler muttered. “Can we go,Bren?”

“Yes.” Bren clapped his hand on his brother’sshoulder, massaging the tension from it as they walked out of the kitchen.

* * *

“This is gonna be great, Corey,” Ty said.

“Right.” The fox shifter stared out thewindow and Bren watched him in the rear-view mirror.

“If you don’t want to do this, Corey, youdon’t have to.”

“He wants to,” Tyler said.

“It can be intimidating to learn how tofight, Ty,” Bren said. “Not everyone wants to learn.”

Tyler twisted in his seat to study Corey. “You’renot nervous, are you?”

“No,” Corey said.

Bren had heard more convincing denials fromguys he’d busted for breaking and entering while they were literally in themiddle of breaking and entering.

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,”he repeated to Corey.

The fox shifter smiled faintly at him. “Yeah,I know.”

“You’re all healed up though, right?”Tyler said. “Nothing hurts anymore?”

“No, I’m good.”

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