Page 2 of Princess Seeks Dragon

“It’s not all bad. I’m in a legal business.” I mean... I’m muscle. I’m a repo man for someone quite shady, but it’s legal. The people who don’t pay their car loans get their vehicles taken back. It's simple. Legal.

I don’t let myself think about the fact that my boss is an Incubus and that if he doesn’t get paid in cash, he’ll eventually take souls. That’s not my department. I would never...

I stop my train of thought. There’s a lot I said I would never do that I’ve done since I started working here. They say the longer you work in the CrossRealms, the more evil you become. It’s just a myth. I tell myself it’s just a myth.

“There’s legal work here, too!”

“There aren’t as many of our kind,” I snap. When Ian and I moved to Pine Ridge four years ago, it was because we’d heard tales of so many “monsters” finding their mates in Pine Ridge. After a year of running a business together, Ian was smitten with a human and hearing wedding bells. I was furious and felt betrayed. I didn’t stick around long after they tied the knot.

“You mean dragons? There must be nice dragonesses there, I’m sure, but I heard,” Ian drops his voice, “that a lot of them work for crime families or have been corrupted by the dark energy coming from the CrossRealms.”

“So? Dragons are fierce. We’re meant to protect and fight, not to work in garden centers.” The second I say it, I regret it. Our mother is a fierce dragon, but she was a ranger with the National Trust. It’s from her that Ian got his love for nature. It’s from our father that I got my stubborn streak. I always wanted to be out finding trouble or creating it, the way he would constantly agitate members of other clans, the way he was always on about the Kanes’ position in the High King’s council, or always on about our land and how our we should have more, how it was our birthright.

“Aye, well, we’re not supposed to be so fierce we get ourselves a bad name with every other clan in all of the British Isles, Graham. Wee Murdo will be a fresh start for the Kanes, and you’re bloody well going to help. If you don’t... Well. This is Pine Ridge. The people here don’t fight between clans. I’ll ask everyone in town to take a shift if I have to, but Iwillget Murdo his amulet, and Iwillhave Vanessa and our baby blessed by the High King.”

Ian’s fire sparks my own. I can feel the human skin I normally wear shifting to scales, feel talons emerging as my skin turns dark violet. In seconds, I’m in my halfling form (a humanoid dragon for those not in the know), and there’s only a shred of calm keeping me from turning into a dragon proper—the kind with a wingspan and lashing tail that would destroy my little apartment.

“I’ll see if I can get away, but don’t count on me. You’re the older brother, not my clan elder, not the High King.” I throw the phone onto the bed as I stalk past and grab my long leather trench coat from the heap of clothes where it lives.

Scaring the shite out of someone when I go to claim their car might put me in a better mood.

And maybe I’ll even figure out why I’m so angry in the first place.

Chapter Two: Angela

“Princess, help me decide. The gold or the silver?”

I stand in my mother’s closet, which has a raised circular platform surrounded by three full-length mirrors. It looks like the inside of a couture fashion house. Then again, that's my mother's new life: Clothes. Trying on clothes. Spending money on clothes. Spending money, period. Buying things with her new husband's money is her passion, her hobby, and her career.

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy for my mother to be spoiled. My dad was the definition of a lousy, no-good, rotten deadbeat. The hell he put my mother through meant I was more than happy for her when she found someone who would treat her right, especially since I want to live my own life without worrying about her rattling around in New Jersey all on her own while I'm going to... well, I don't know what I'm going to do exactly.

“I’d go with silver. What's the occasion?” I ask my mother.

Ronnie has some big business meeting tonight, and I have to go with him. He really wanted you to come along, sweetie. He said, ‘Angela should come. She’d love Joey’s family. Lots of good-looking boys.’”

The way my stepfather talks about his business associates reminds me of some cheesy ‘80s mobster movie. Not the mainstream ones. The ones that were on television as reruns on Saturday afternoons. If I didn't know better, I'd think he was in the mob.

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