Her Dragon Temptation (Alpha Protectors Book 7) Read online

  Her Dragon Temptation

  Olivia Arran

  Arran Publishing

  Copyright © 2018, Olivia Arran.

  All rights reserved worldwide.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locals or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Please note that this work is intended only for adults over the age of 18 and all characters represented as 18 or over.

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  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peak: Her Dragon Protector

  About Olivia Arran

  Chapter One

  Bastian

  I rolled my head back, fighting off the headache that clung behind my eyes and forced my shoulders down, leaning back in my chair. Papers covered my desk, the dark, cherry wood completely obscured by financial demands and calls for help from clan members, each equally important and deserving of my attention, and each weighing in my stomach like a lead brick. Sparks spluttered in the hearth, the fire leaping as another log met its demise, but the heat offered no comfort from the cold. High ceilings, cold, wooden floors, and sash windows that had seen better times, this was a house that had once stood proud through many a winter, shored up with the love and attention of a family.

  My family.

  Scattered now.

  Mother and father; dead. Sister, gone to London with her new mate.

  Leaving me to carry on.

  My clan depended on me. There were expectations to be met. The Shifter Council had made their position very clear. I either rose from the ashes like the mythical phoenix, or lose everything.

  A pop from the fire shattered the silence, along with my suspiciously sounding huff of despair.

  Shrugging off the self pity that threatened to overwhelm me, I picked up my glass, swirling the stout crystal until the amber liquid coated the sides in an even swirl. There was only one thing for it. Only one reasonable thing, anyway. I was the alpha of the Jewelcrest Clan, and I had no heir.

  I needed a mate.

  A suitable one, of course. One who understood what was expected. Who wouldn’t cling to absurd notions of love and forever. A woman who could give me what I really longed for. A child.

  Fire burned a path down my throat, the brandy searching out the ever present chill and failing miserably. Slamming the glass back down, I lurched to my feet, grabbing at the table as the room spun in hazy circles. Four and a half bottles. I noted the amount absentmindedly, re-counting the bottles littered on the floor to make sure. So that’s what it took to get a dragon shifter drunk.

  Tapping my chin, I blinked as the room continued to spin, my stomach lurching back and forth with an intensity that had me gritting my teeth.

  Time for bed.

  Wiping my hands on my jeans, I carefully placed one foot in front of the other, edging my way around the desk.

  I stumbled to a halt, dragging a hand through my hair. “I didn’t write the letter!” My bellow echoed around the silent room, cutting through what had now settled into a pleasant buzz.

  What letter? my dragon piped up, sounding a little too sober for my liking.

  I poked him inside my head while scowling around the room. Wishing, not for the first time, that we could have a conversation face to face. Or a drinking match. Or a brawl. To find a mate.

  With a letter? He sent me an image of his snout curled up in disgust, his displeasure at my idea clear. But at least he was talking to me. Maybe the alcohol did affect him, the self-righteous asshole.

  “Why not?” This time, I answered out loud, adding an indignant snort to break the heavy silence. “It’s how they used to do things, and there’s plenty of online—” Ding! Light bulb moment. My hand hit my face a little harder than I’d intended, dislodging my buzz. Of course … the internet!

  What are you thinking of—

  I cut my dragon off with an unsteady swipe of my hand through the air, and strode back around my desk. Misjudging, I banged into the sharp corner, cursing the air blue and hobbled the last couple of steps. Yanking my chair back, I sank down and jabbed at the keyboard, rubbing my hands together with barely restrained glee when the dark screen lit up with the familiar blue haze. Several attempts at a password later, some careful one-fingered typing, and I had the website open. A dating site for shifters. Who would have thought it?

  I don’t think this is a good idea. For once my dragon didn’t sound like his usual confident and cocky self, more quiet and reserved, almost anxious.

  Scrolling through the page, I searched for the join button, but the words were jumping all over, my eyes watering with the effort to focus. “Psssht, you want a mate, don’t you?”

  Silence met my question.

  Success. A new screen popped open. Name. Address. Age. At least I didn’t have to lie about my age, I was young for a shifter—only just nearing thirty. The next question had my finger hovering over the mouse, my mouth twisting as I flitted back and forth.

  Are you open to interspecies matches?

  Translation: would you mate with a human?

  Not that this dating site was promising a mating, or anything quiet so … permanent. Maybe an ad in the paper would be a better idea?

  A muffled snort inside my head, then, interspecies doesn’t just mean human.

  Oh. Oh! My eyes widened as his meaning filtered through the fog of alcohol. Different shifters. I tried to imagine it. A dragon with a bear. Or a wolf. Stranger things had happened. Or, at least, I was guessing they had. My finger tapped softly on the mouse. I was open to new things. After all, I was trying this, wasn’t I? Anyway, the dominant gene always won with interspecies mating, so any child of mine would be a dragon.

  Another couple of clicks, a little creative stretching of the truth, and the screen blinked at me, the success message plastered across the monitor in big, bold letters.

  Doubt chose that exact moment to worm its way in, sneaking past my reckless defenses and setting up camp in my head. With a fucking foghorn. I was looking for a mate; would the kind of woman on one of these sites really be what I was looking for?

  At least I’d know she wasn’t looking for love.

  Sex? Yeah. But she wouldn’t be expecting a mating proposal.

  Hitting the shutdown button, I resolutely poured myself a celebratory glass of brandy. I’d have to convince whomever I decided on that she wanted to stick around. I wasn’t physically repellant, or violently ugly—unless I’d been lied to my whole life. I sipped at the liquid, musing it over. I could probably be classed as attractive enough. I was a shifter, so I was strong and healthy. Nothing unusual. No genetic flaws or abnormalities to discover. Unless she was human, then the whole turning into a dragon thing… Yeah, that might come as a shock.

  The last log crumbled into ash, the flames swallowing it whole as I gazed into the flickering depths. Women were confusing creatures. Emotional. You’d think having a sister would have deepened my understanding, but Astrid wasn’t exactly what you’d call … normal. She was a Seer. The Seer, and th
erefore a whole other level of confusing. She’d also been absent for most of my adult life, having run away at the age of sixteen. It was only recently that we’d been reunited, and that hadn’t gone … quite so well. I missed her, though I’d rather cut off my arm than tell her that.

  She called me stubborn. Pig headed. Determined. Always wanting my own way. And she was right. When I really wanted something, nothing could stop me.

  I would just apply the same logic to this as I did to everything else in my life.

  And look where that got you….

  I winced, taking another swallow to bolster my ego. Even my dragon judged me, and found me lacking. The cold crept back in, circling in my stomach like a lazy cat settling into it’s favorite place to nap. I’d messed up, made a few mistakes, and no one was going to let me forget it. Astrid had forgiven me, but she didn’t look at me the same way anymore. I’d burned a lot of bridges in my short time as Alpha. “I’m trying to make amends,” I whispered into the flames.

  Are you?

  His words rang true. Maybe I didn’t fucking want to.

  Faye

  Fixing my other arm by my side, I rang the doorbell, craning my head back to get another look at the huge house looming above me. It was definitely the right place. I’d double checked my directions, and the villagers down the way had confirmed that this was the home of the Alpha of the Jewelcrest Clan.

  The wrinkled noses accompanying the confirmation hadn’t gone unnoticed. The Alpha wasn’t very well thought of by his people. Not really a surprise, and exactly why I was here.

  Squaring my shoulders as the bell sounded long and loud behind the thick, wooden door, I pasted on a pleasant smile. I’d make my own decisions about this Bastian Jewelcrest.

  A crash sounded behind the door, a muffled thud, followed by a loud curse.

  My eyebrows crept up toward my hairline.

  The door swung open, a tall, large body filling the opening and casting me in shadow. “What?”

  I blinked, speech escaping me for the first time in my life.

  The man faced me, his gaze zigzagging over my face and down my body in determined strokes that had his head moving with the effort. Skin tanned a deep bronze gleamed in the soft light filtering through from the house, dark hair curling over his brow and shading his eyes. Over six feet tall, thick muscles filled every possible inch of clothing, straining the seams as well as the doorway.

  Fact: I’d known he was a shifter. Therefore, I’d assumed he’d be attractive. Fit. Muscly, even.

  But they’d failed to mention he’d look like a fallen angel.

  A devastatingly, dangerous, fallen angel.

  A hand shot out, and before I knew it, I’d been hauled inside, the door shutting behind me. My back hit the wall.

  “You were fast,” he murmured, leaning into me and bracing an arm above my head.

  I cleared my throat, trying to swallow the lump that was stuck. “Fast?”

  “Very,” he confirmed, not answering my question one little bit. Blue glinted through the curtain of black hair, watching me.

  My fingers itched to trace a path across his jaw; to scrape my nails down the dark shadow clinging to his neck. Heart thudding in my chest, I took a deep breath, centering myself. “I’m Faye—”

  “Bastian. But you already knew that.” His lips quirked up in what could only be described as a grimace turned smirk. A sexy smirk.

  “Yes. Bastian Jewelcrest.”

  The man in question took a deep breath, then his mouth tightened, stretching his lips into thin lines. “Human,” he muttered under his breath, the word so quiet, I almost missed it.

  What of it? I bristled at what felt like a racial slur, his tone of disappointment affecting me more than it should.

  “Drunk,” I muttered back at him, the near overpowering smell of brandy finally hitting home.

  He shrugged. “So what if I am? Doesn’t affect me.”

  I pushed away from the wall. “You might think it doesn’t—”

  His other arm came down around me, blocking my planned exit. “Sweetheart … alcohol doesn’t affect me at all.” His hips swayed against mine, defining his meaning to perfection.

  “Let me see your eyes,” I blurted out, buying time. How the hell was I meant to talk to the guy, when I couldn’t see his face. His whole face.

  He stilled before me, his chest rising and falling and stretching his shirt tight. Forearms corded with muscle and dusted with short, dark hairs, surrounded me, the tension radiating from him almost as intense as the heat that rolled off him.

  Hot. Steaming hot. That answered one question, at least. Dragon shifters lived up to their name.

  A flick of his head and the curtain of hair fell back. Sapphire blue eyes glittered, narrowed against my perusal, lines creeping out at the corner of each eye and digging into his tan. “Do I pass muster?” he murmured, almost squinting at me.

  “Pass?” It came out on a breathy sigh, all reasonable and sane thought having vanished under his weighted stare. He was dazzling. Arresting. Dangerous and dark, with his little sexy, brooding scowl.

  “I shouldn’t…” his voice trailed off, his gaze dipping to my mouth and lingering.

  “Pass muster?” I offered, filling the silence. This wasn’t like me. I didn’t do soft and unsure; I was always in control. Ever since my life had been turned upside down, anyway.

  “That as well.” He was talking in riddles, his deep, gravelly voice sinking into me and persuading me not to give a damn. “You’re the first one here though.”

  His low mutter cut through the haze of desire that had somehow wound its way around me, ensnaring me with some sort of witchcraft I didn’t recognize. “You were expecting me?” That was not something I had considered, the Shifter Council having assured me that I’d at least have the element of surprise on my side.

  He frowned at me, his eyes almost crossing with the effort to stay focused. “Sweetheart, why else would you be knocking on my door?” He leaned in, crowding me against the wall, the scent of man and brandy twining together to fill all available airspace with a sweet, musky smell.

  Heat flooded me, pooling low in my stomach and settling in at a slow swirl. My heart thudded in my chest, air puffing out of my lips as I grappled with my last few remaining brain cells, forcing them back into line. I had a job to do, and it didn’t involve fucking the client or interviewee, or whatever the hell you wanted to call him.

  “Last chance to run away,” he offered with a predatory smirk. Like he already knew my answer, had read it in the lines of my treacherous body. In my scent.

  Shit! He could smell me. Heat flooded my cheeks at the thought of what he must be getting a good ole lung full of right now. No wonder he was surveying me like potential prey, his body poised to strike. Fast. Hard. And with exquisite, single-minded purpose. A moan escaped and I coughed, turning it into an undignified splutter. “Why don’t we get to know each other first?” Then I can figure out what the hell you’re up to…

  “Sounds perfect.” His head lowered, a small smile playing on his unfairly gorgeous lips.

  Lips that, under any other circumstance, I’d have no qualms nibbling and sucking, but not now. Not him. My hand shot up, bracing against his chest.

  He stilled, an eyebrow shooting up in silent question.

  Resisting the urge to curl my fingers into his shirt and drag him closer, I shook my head. “Get to know each other when you’re sober.” Thankfully, my voice sounded steady and firm.

  He blinked, and I watched as it dawned on him that I was deadly serious, a look of disbelief sliding over his face, then disappearing under a mask of indifference. “Of course.” He straightened at once, turning away from me and shoving a hand through his hair.

  “I’m going to need a room,” I suggested, affecting a light, airy voice. As if I didn’t have a care in the world. As if the man in front of me hadn’t knocked me sideways, realigning everything I thought to be true.

  He regarded me with
a watchful eye. “How long are you planning on staying?”

  Pushing away from the wall, I yanked my inner diva up by her bra straps and strolled over to him. Casting my eyes down his body, I catalogued his strong legs, trim waist, and—with a twist of my neck—his firm ass. “As long as I want to.” At no point had my instructions ever said I wasn’t allowed to have a little fun, and after everything I’d been through this last year, I was overdue a karma booty call.

  And Bastian Jewelcrest was shaping up to be the perfect candidate. Confident, easy on the eye, and wouldn’t know commitment if it reached up and smacked him between the eyes, or so I’d heard from the few people I’d grilled before accepting this case.

  Putting a little swing into my hips, I walked past him, heading to the large, sweeping staircase. When his eyes dropped, gluing themselves to my rounded derriere, I allowed myself a small smile. First, to get the work out of the way, then a little fun. And God knows, I needed some fun in my life.

  Chapter Two

  Bastian

  I cracked open an eye, squinting against the bright light that was busy burning holes into my retinas. The bed beneath me was hard—lumpy—my cheek smashed up against rough wood, a trail of drool having tracked down my cheek and dried in an itchy trail. A crick in my neck had me rolling over onto my back. My hand hit the floor, eyes staring at the ceiling.

  Wait. Floor? A quick survey and it was confirmed. I’d passed out just feet from the comfort of my bed, choosing—for some bizarre reason—to bed down on the floor for the night. My mouth drier than a dragon’s scales at high noon, I swallowed, wincing at the bitter taste of day old brandy while scrubbing a hand over my forehead as though it might jog my lackluster memory.