Page 18 of The Dragon's Stormwoven Bond

“Finally, Valen, you’re here.” Eryx grinned broadly, a mischievous glint in his eye. “This is Samuel.”

I shook the omega’s hand, and he held it a second too long, his eyes raking me.

A set-up.

There was no denying it now.

I was being set up.

This omega was my date for the evening.

Fuck.

Of all the things for Eryx to do, this had been unexpected. I’d known him for centuries and not once had he attempted something like this. If anything, he’d tried to dissuade me from hooking up with omegas. He was a wait until fate hooked you up kind of guy. Of course, he didn’t think fate was planning to make his youngest son my fated at the time.

I grimaced as I sat down, keeping as far away from the omega as I could without being obviously rude. I didn’t smell like my mate right now. To everyone in this place, I was an unmated dragon. I was up for the taking—at least for the hitting on.

Had this been three weeks ago, I probably would have loved to be set up, but not now. I had Pep, and there was no one else for me. I needed to find an excuse to leave as soon as possible, and we needed to fess up to Eryx. I couldn’t allow this to happen again.

I managed to make small talk throughout most of the dinner. Eryx did his damnedest to get Samuel and me to hit it off, but there was no spark. And there never would be. How could there be when I had the perfect omega at home waiting for me.

When Samuel excused himself to go to the bathroom, Eryx gave me a stern look. He was not pleased. It wasn’t as if I’d asked to have a double date with them. Had I known that was what this was, I’d have made it clear from the get-go.

“Come on, man, I know you don’t want to settle down, but you’ve never been opposed to dating before. Give the guy a chance! You’ve been treating him like a piranha for the whole night,” Eryx said.

I bristled. “I’m not interested,” I said. “And I don’t appreciate the ambush.”

“Well, yeah, we’ve all gathered that.” Katrina put a hand on her mate’s shoulder.

I didn’t wish to be rude, but it wasn’t as if I had asked to be set up on this date.

“I told him you didn’t want to be set up,” she said to me, “but you know how he is.”

I did, and it wasn’t playing matchmaker. What had gotten into my friend and when did he stop listening to his mate? At least I knew he was going to get an earful when he got home. There was some joy in that.

“I’m seeing someone,” I said.

Both of them went still, their eyes wide with shock.

“What? Why haven’t we met them?” Eryx asked.

Oh, they had met him, all right. That wasn’t a conversation for now. Not in public. Not with a date who was as much a victim as I was about to be back at the table. Not without my mate present.

“It’s new,” I said, “and I’ll bring them by soon.”

“Valen, if you had told me that, I never would have done any of this.” Eryx was far happier than he was going to be when he discovered the truth. That was for sure. “Next time you start dating, let me know so I plan dinner better.”

“Or you can stop meddling,” Katrina said.

We managed to make it the rest of the way through dinner without any big argument, and I tried as much as I could not to treat the poor omega poorly without inadvertently leading him on. He wasn’t part of this plan any more than I was. Why should he suffer?

I went home at a decent hour, a meal in hand with not one, but two desserts. My mate was likely still up, and feeding him was the least I could do.

He tended to come home from work, unwind a bit, and then start back up working again with his laptop wherever he felt comfortable in the house—some days at the table, some days in the recliner, some days he even worked outside. No one could ever accuse him of slacking off, that was for sure. If anything, I feared he was working too hard.

Pep was at the dining room table when I walked in. He smiled when he saw me, but as I stepped closer, his nose wrinkled, a look of shock in his eyes.

“Valen,” he said, his face contorted—hurt, disgust, pain.

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