The next day, Adrien was in bed, lazily curled around his mate, watching her sleep quietly, wondering at how lucky he was, when he heard a loud knock on the door.

“Dammit,” he said sharply when Kelsey stirred and looked up, green eyes sleepy but worried. “I’ll get that. You stay in bed.” He kissed her on the forehead. “You deserve a break.”

He got up and got dressed, pulling on his clothing and cursing whoever had taken him away from his mate so soon after their first time together, but hurried to the door when the knocking continued, getting louder.

He yanked open the door to see Citrine there, looking furious and holding a letter. His dark hair was mussed as if he’d been running, and his yellow eyes were angry rather than warm. His tanned skin was slightly flushed.

“What is this?” Citrine asked, holding the letter up and shoving it in Adrien’s face. “What do you know about it?”

“What?” Adrien asked, taking the letter tiredly and holding it up to read it. It was from Robbie.

“Dear Citrine,

I’m so grateful for the chance I’ve had to work at your club as a manager. I feel confident that you won’t need me any longer, and this was never supposed to be permanent. Given the damage I caused yesterday, I’m sure you won’t disagree with my decision to resign. I don’t think I belong there, and I have trained Kelsey so that with a little bit of work, she will be able to replace me. I will miss all of you, and I’m so grateful for the chance to meet you all. Give my best wishes to Adrien and Sever, and tell Kelsey I loved being her friend.

Sincerely,

Your friend, Robbie”

“So?” Citrine asked, arms tightly folded, veins throbbing at his temples as though his brain were threatening to pop. “Am I the only one totally shocked by this? How could she just leave?”

“You know she’s right, though,” Adrien said, handing the paper back. This was always supposed to be a temporary thing.”

“I know,” Citrine said. “I mean, I know that’s why Ella sent her. But how is she just supposed to leave like this? Run away and imply we would think an incident with a door is more important than her?”

“Most employees would be fired for throwing a person through a door,” Adrien said, trying to hide his slight amusement at Citrine’s predicament.

Would the citrine dragon really be able to hide his feelings for Robbie now? Even from himself?

Citrine paced angrily in Adrien’s apartment. “I’m going to find her. Can you and Sever manage the club for an hour or so?”

“Wow, you never leave,” Adrien said, his tone teasing. “She must be special.”

“We take care of our own,” Citrine said. “We don’t let them just leave, thinking they aren’t wanted. She needs to give us more info.”

“And then you would let her leave?”

“I don’t know!” Citrine yelled, sounding completely un-Citrine-ly.

Adrien just raised a brow, glaring at him.

Citrine lowered his voice in defeat. “I know. I need to figure out what this is, why I’m angry.” He looked to the side wistfully. “What is going on between us. But I can’t do that if she just leaves. How could she just leave?”

Adrien folded his arms. “I guess you better go look for her. You should have her address from her resume. With any luck, she’ll be at home.”

“I know,” Citrine said. “I just had to know it was okay with you guys. I know I’m not supposed to leave two collared dragons alone.”

“We’re fine,” Adrien said. “It’s only an hour, and if that weird human woman shows up again, I think we can hold her off until you get back. Go after your woman.”

“Shut up,” Citrine said. “This isn’t about that.” But as he rushed out of the room, slamming the door behind him, Adrien kind of thought it was.

He walked back to the bedroom where Kelsey was changing and watched in amusement as she turned, nearly tripping on her pants in surprise.

He was there in a second, catching her, and she looked up gratefully into his eyes. He was so glad he got to look at that beautiful, vivid green for the rest of his life.

It was always going to be his favorite color for sure.

She steadied herself, a deep blush on her cheeks. “Thanks again for last night,” she said softly.

He nodded. “Thank you.”

She giggled. “Okay, you. So what just happened with Citrine?”

“He left for a bit. He went to find Robbie.”

“She left?”

“Yeah,” Adrien said. “Seems she felt bad about the door thing.”

“I don’t know,” Kelsey said. “I… I think it might be about something that happened at the mall the other day.”

Adrien looked at her softly, understanding her position. “Well, Citrine went to see her. I’m sure they will work it out.”

“I guess so,” she said. She went to the fridge and pulled out a pastry. “But with Robbie gone, I better go have a look at the software.”

“Okay,” Adrien said reluctantly. He wanted to stay glued to her side all day, but there was really no need. “I guess I should go tell Sever what’s going on. He and I can go set up the club, get it ready for any appointments we might have.”

“Hey, look at us,” Kelsey said. “Already such a good team.”

He walked over, wrapped his arms around her, and placed a kiss on her forehead. “Yes. Yes, we are.”

Then he released her so they could both get to work.

* * *

Kelsey was shuffling through papers on Robbie’s desk, seeing if she left any instructions, when she felt an odd prickling on her neck.

She looked up at the empty office, the chairs on the other side of the room, the closed door, and let out a sigh. She was alone, safe at Date-A-Dragon, and there was no reason to be nervous, even if Robbie wasn’t here.

She was in charge, at least for now, while Citrine figured out what was going on, and she would do a good job trying to make sure there weren’t any problems.

She opened the scheduling program and was relieved there weren’t any appointments. That was the last thing they needed today. She looked affectionately at the camera in the club room, where Adrien and Sever were cleaning and setting up just in case.

They’d brought a camera in from one of the private rooms to replace the one that had broken.

It was fun watching Adrien’s big body work. His hands were so beautiful, his movements so sharp, no efforts wasted.

She liked Sever as a person, too. He was very straightforward, though kind of stoic. She would be fine working with him and Citrine, too.

She pulled her eyes away from the screen and back to her computer and then jumped slightly as she caught something in the corner of her vision.

She jerked her head up to see someone sitting in one of the chairs by the still-closed door. It was the woman from before, staring at her with an evil smile, sitting rigidly still.

She had just… appeared there.

Kelsey’s heart was threatening to lurch out of her chest as she slowly closed the laptop and faced the woman. Had she somehow not heard the door because she was watching the camera?

The woman stood, walking forward, and there was something unearthly in her eyes that Kelsey couldn’t ignore this time. Everything about this felt very, very wrong, and though the woman’s movements were slow and deliberate, Kelsey had the feeling that if she made any quick moves to call Adrien, this woman would move quickly as well.

And the threat in the air, feeling as if it could choke her, was very, very real.

The woman leaned over the desk, planting her hands on it. As Kelsey looked up into her eyes, frozen with fear, the woman’s eyes changed from blue to gray, a deep, swirling silver like molten metal. Like no eyes should be.

Nothing like Adrien’s at all.

She was about to scream, but the woman’s hand shot out to cover her mouth as she came around the desk, pinning Kelsey against the wall, still gagged by her hand.

“Shh,” the woman said, putting a finger up to her lips, which still had a hint of that gut-wrenching smile. “We don’t want to alert anyone, do we?”

Was it just Kelsey’s imagination, or was the woman’s voice lower?

The woman let out a deep laugh and threw her head back and then, before Kelsey’s eyes, changed.

Kelsey’s eyes widened as the woman in front of her morphed into a man, a tall man, with the same kind of beauty as the men of Date-A-Dragon but eyes that were much, much crueler. There were lines around his eyes and mouth that the other guys didn’t have, as though he’d lived a very different life.

A mean one.

He grinned at her, fully transformed, wearing an odd, gray metallic tunic that was belted at the waist with some kind of chain. He was tall, like the others, but a little bit lean, though still muscled.

“I’m Mercury,” he said. “Nice to meet you. At least, it’s nice because now I can make sure Adrien never gets a chance to mate you and never gets his powers back. If I can keep even one of the noble metals from achieving happiness for what they did to me, then I can rest.”

She eyed him fearfully, having no idea what he was talking about. But as she’d just seen a woman literally melt into a giant man, she was beginning to accept the world wasn’t exactly as simple as she’d thought it was.

His eyes blinked and his lips turned up as he cocked his head in realization. “Oh. I see. He hasn’t told you. How droll. After the way you fought for him yesterday, I assumed you two had gone back to have a conversation. I was worried it would be too late, but I couldn’t move in until Citrine was out of the picture. He isn’t collared like the other two are.”

Collared?

“Yes, collared,” he said. “As dragons have to be when awakened in the modern world. Otherwise, the oracle worries they will use their powers to wreak destruction carelessly.” He reached out to stroke her hair, though she tried to jerk back unsuccessfully. “The only way to undo the bonds on their powers is to find a human mate.”

For a second, her heart dropped, wondering if that was why Adrien wanted her. Why this was all too good to be true. But her heart went back to those moments last night when Adrien was staring into her eyes, telling her he loved her. No, that couldn’t be wrong. His feelings were real, even if the situation was hard to comprehend.

She’d just have to wait for his explanation.

“Oh, isn’t that sweet?” he said. “So faithful. So tragic that he won’t ever get to see just how good you are.” His eyes glared at her. “And yes, I can read your mind. I assume Adrien hasn’t, as his kind thinks it’s some kind of violation of privacy. Too bad.”

She stared at him helplessly, wondering how to fight back.

“Don’t bother,” he said. “I could crush you with one hand. The only reason I wasn’t more violent when I came here disguised was that I wasn’t ready to make anyone more suspicious than they had to be. I swear I could have gotten Adrien to react if you hadn’t shown up. He was getting more and more impatient, and I knew the oracle would give up on him and lock him up if he lost it on a human woman.” He shook his head. “It would have worked if not for you coming to the rescue.”

She hated him more than she’d ever thought possible.

“Don’t bother,” he said. “I neither care about your hate nor enjoy it. Anyway, I found another option through Robbie. See, someone just had to tip off her old pack that she was in this city, and I was able to do that anonymously. I was even able to wait outside and watch you take a cab to the shopping center and give them an idea of where to go.”

She stared at him mutely.

“Robbie is a wolf, you see. A powerful one. Of course, she uses masking agents, due to female alpha wolves being high in demand and because she didn’t want to be tracked. But now I’m sure she knows it’s time to go home, now that she probably revealed herself to Citrine and the others. Plus, she doesn’t want her pack to come here and hurt her friends. So she left, and I knew do-gooder Citrine would go chasing after her, leaving his friends defenseless.”

This damn bastard.

He threw back his head and laughed. “It’s so rich. Other shifters don’t know about dragons, and most dragons don’t know about alpha wolves using masking. So they’ve been sitting here keeping secrets from each other the whole time, and now I’m benefitting from it.”

Date-A-Dragon. They were actually dragons. Images of him saving her that night in the alley and then beating up Bernard all came together in her mind, solving a puzzle she hadn’t even known existed.

He was a dragon. But that didn’t change that he was hers. If she could believe a man like him could change her whole life and make amazing love to her, capturing her careful heart in only a few days, then believing in dragons wasn’t that hard.

He stroked her cheek again, and she cringed, trying to pull away. “I like the way you think. So faithful. So willing to believe something outside your normal human world. Maybe I should keep you for myself instead of killing you. Which do you think would hurt Adrien more?”

But before she could answer, the door to the office burst open and Adrien came in followed by Sever.

“Get your hands off her,” he said, eyes burning with anger.

Mercury just laughed and then pinned them with a sharp glare. “Oh, good. Two collared dragons.” He let go of Kelsey, and she fell back with a gasp. “This is going to be fun.”