Page 5 of Cowboy Dragon's Rose

Maybe I’ll swim.

Maybe I’ll have a drink.

Maybe I’ll dance barefoot in the grass under fairy lights with strangers who don't know a damn thing about me.

Hell, maybe I’ll finally breathe.

That’s the plan, anyway.

And I’m holding onto it like it’s the only thing keeping me from unraveling.

CHAPTER TWO-ZEKE

“Are you serious right now?” I snarl, glaring at Dante like he’s just asked me to donate a kidney. Or worse—go into town during tourist season.

“Look, I’d go,” he says, already distracted, eyes glued to the tree line, “but Avery’s got that morning sickness bad, and Rosie Posie won’t change out of her fur. Come on, man. Do me a solid?”

Sure enough, his cub—currently in full fuzzy-wuzzy Grizzly mode—is sauntering toward the woods like she owns the damn forest.

Which, to be fair, she kinda does.

I grit my teeth.

“This couldn’t have been, I don’t know, planned better?”

Dante ignores that, starts stripping down, boots off and shirt flung on the porch like we don’t have rules about public Shifting. Though, in his defense, this is the ranch. Everyone here is in the know.

“Her name’s Casey. She was at the wedding,” he says like I don’t fucking know who he means. “You’re picking her up from Av’s old place. Don’t make it weird.”

“Why? She your cousin or something?” I ask, just to fuck with him. “Look, Yogi, if this is a setup?—”

“It’s not some fucking set up, asshole. And just for the record, I wouldn’t attempt to set your ornery ass up with my worst fucking enemy, you grouchy bastard. Casey is just a friend. Avery’s friend. So be nice.”

I grunt. Like being nice has ever worked out for me.

Besides, I know exactly who Casey is. In fact, I’ve been beating the shit out of myself just to stay away.

I’m no good for her.

She’s human. Soft. Fragile.

I’m a goddamn monster. Literally.

How can I take a chance my Dragon won’t hurt her if I try to pursue a human woman?

No. It’s not worth the risk, which is why I put the female firmly out of my mind right after that night.

“Emmet or Kian couldn’t go?” I try one last time, clinging to the hope that someone else could be sacrificed to the traffic gods.

Dante shoots me a look. “If they could, I wouldn’t be asking you, Zeke. Shit—Rosie! Hold on, Princess, Daddy’s coming!”

He’s already halfway through Shifting as he lunges toward the woods, pants around his ankles and the faintest snap of magic in the air.

Fur explodes across his skin, muscles popping, bones reshaping with brutal crunches.

It’d be impressive if it weren’t so damn disturbing.

Because now I’ve got the image of Dante’s massive Grizzly ass wedged into a pair of tighty-whities stuck in my brain like a trauma memory.

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