As he perched on a stool with one hip, wearing his tightest clothing, Titus wondered if being the subject of a painting was always this uncomfortable.

Truthfully, all human clothing was tight, but he wasn’t sure it was the kind of tight where she could see his muscles well enough.

She was sitting on a stool of her own, the top of her head visible over the top of her easel when she was focused on the canvas, her eyes and nose visible when she looked up at him.

He felt his entire body heat up as those hot, turquoise eyes studied him, and he was glad for his position and his tight jeans that would keep him from giving away any reaction.

He had been admired before, by many maidens in many villages, especially because of his hair, which he’d always been fairly vain about. But this was different.

He’d underestimated the power of his mate’s eyes. There was a heat there, slowly building, stoked by the trust between them, calling out to him, making it hard not to answer.

Hard. Literally.

He adjusted his position slightly, and she tsked, glaring at him over the canvas.

“How long will this session be, do you think?” he asked, trying to stay still.

“Shut up,” she said. “I’m really on a roll here.” Her eyes came up to devour him for a moment before she focused back on the canvas, her hands moving rapidly.

He sighed. “My butt is tiring.”

“You said you wanted a portrait,” she said. “You’re doing such a great job on the house, so I’m trying to give you an equally good job on the work I’m doing for you.”

He was flattered by the compliment, but he hoped she really didn’t consider this hard work. He didn’t really require anything from her but being happy.

He’d just suggested this as a trade so she didn’t think he was a creep who wanted something else.

Except he kind of was a creep who wanted something else. He did have a different motive than he’d spoken. But he’d learned enough about her to know he wouldn’t want to tell her that. Not until things were stronger between them.

Still, it was almost impossible to stay still with his curvy mate watching him. Her gaze was hotter than dragon fire.

“Talk to me,” he croaked out, his throat feeling tight. “Give me something to focus on.”

“Is the chair really that uncomfortable?” she asked, moving her hand gracefully over the canvas.

No, his erection was really that uncomfortable. Trying to stop himself from flying across the room to make love to her was uncomfortable. Wondering if she could ever feel about him the way he already felt about her was uncomfortable.

“Tell me about the house,” he said. “Where you came from, why you bought it.”

She glared. “I will if you stop moving.”

“I promise,” he said sharply. Anything to take his mind off his predicament. And getting to know his mate was a bonus on top of that. They’d already talked somewhat while working, but more about general stuff—how she’d become an artist, her inspiration, things like that.

“I just knew it was the right place when I saw it,” she said. “So much wide-open space. I mean, I loved the house, too, though I didn’t really understand what rough shape it was in. I actually paid cash, so I was able to skip the inspection. Which was stupid, but I was in a hurry to be out on my own. In my own place, where no one could bother me without my permission.”

“Why?” he asked. “Who was bothering you?”

“Who said someone was bothering me?”

“Well, you said you wanted to go somewhere no one would bother you, which sounds like a change, so someone was bothering you.”

She paused her painting and looked up at him, blue-green eyes wide as she thought. “You’re perceptive, you know that?”

“Yes, I am,” he replied. Perceptive enough to know he was getting close to something she didn’t want to tell him. Something he definitely wanted to know.

“I guess I can trust you. So I started painting in college, after moving away from my controlling father. And after I graduated, I was recruited by this gallery to work for them. The guy running it really liked my work.”

Titus didn’t like where this was going.

“Anyway, I got an apartment in the same building as the gallery. It was owned by the gallery owner, and he let me rent it so I could be there to check on the art. He also liked my art, and after a while, he let me display my own stuff for sale there.”

“Nice,” Titus said, lips tight. He hoped she would mistake his taut jealousy for simply trying not to move too much.

“Well, anyway… I became really successful, and he became really controlling.” She began painting again, her shoulders moving as she made smooth strokes. Her eyes were on him, then on the canvas, and he felt burned every time.

“And?”

“And I don’t know if he was jealous of my success, or maybe it had always been too good to be true, him helping me right out of college and taking me under his wing, but he got pretty dark on me.”

“Dark?”

“He didn’t want to let me leave. Other galleries were interested in my work, but he flew off the handle, claiming I’d signed contracts I hadn’t signed, claiming he would ruin me in the art world if I didn’t…”

“Didn’t what?”

“Be his exclusively.”

Titus felt like he’d swallowed a bunch of lead. “Exclusively his how?”

“Maybe just for painting, maybe for something else,” she said. “I ran. As long as I was living in his rental, I didn’t have control. I’d already had enough from my dad, and it hurt to think I thought I’d found a safe place only to be a trapped bird once again.”

“I can’t ever see you as a trapped bird,” Titus said. “You’re too much of a free spirit.”

She looked at him over the painting, a few stray wisps of hair dancing in the breeze from one of the open windows. “I want to be. I really want to be, Titus. I don’t want to ever be tied down again. It always goes wrong.”

Uh-oh.

He hoped his sheer panic didn’t show on his face. He’d gone into this thinking she’d met some real jerks, but as soon as she realized he wasn’t one, she’d be open to him.

He hadn’t realized it was much more complex than that, because at least one of the jerks hadn’t started as a jerk.

And had only become a jerk when he wanted her all to himself.

Like Titus did.

“Wow,” Titus said. “What an ass. So why are you still scared of him?”

“What do you mean?”

“You get nervous just talking about him. I can… tell.” He could actually scent her fear in the air. Just something he could do as a dragon.

“Because he found out where I live, and when he saw the house, he threatened to get me evicted. Get it inspected and condemned. He has to know I sank everything I have into it, and he thinks I would have to come back to him if I didn’t have it.”

“But you wouldn’t,” Titus said, feeling cold at the thought.

“No,” she said. “But I have to be honest and say I don’t know what I’d do.” She smiled at him ruefully. “So I guess you’ll just have to do a good job fixing the house.”

He nodded. “Can I be done? Getting sore.”

“Sure,” she said, taking off her apron.

He came around to look at her painting and grinned at how well she had translated him onto the canvas. He was kind of touched by it. So many little things with her just hit him deeper than anything else ever had.

Looking at her art, at her beloved little curvy figure in front of him, he vowed he would fix up her house. Buy her or build her ten more houses if she wanted.

She was going to be his, but she could still be free.

* * *

After dinner, she settled in on the couch for a movie, having invited Titus to join her if he wanted to.

Dinner had been a quiet affair, with Titus seeming oddly thoughtful since their portrait session.

She got the feeling he wasn’t often taken off guard, and he wasn’t that great at dealing with it.

Had posing for her been that uncomfortable, or was it just that he didn’t like hearing what he had about her mentor, Geoff?

She wasn’t sure. He had eaten and only answered her questions as she asked them, looking as if he were deep in thought about something most of the time.

Maybe he just felt more urgency about working now that he knew what was at stake.

But she just had the feeling that as long as he was in her life, she’d be safe.

On her end, she was just stunned by how painting him had made her feel. It was the first time in a long time she’d wanted to just get lost in her painting and her subject, and it had stunned her once she thought about it.

After the hard, complicated, but good day both of them had, a movie was just what they needed.

Titus was in front of her movie shelves, pulling different DVDs out to look at the back of them, shaking his head and replacing each one. “I’ve seen a lot of these,” he said.

“Really?” she asked. “I didn’t take you for the type to watch a lot of TV.”

“I’ve been kind of… housebound. Since we hadn’t had a customer in a while and I hadn’t taken a job. It’s hard to explain.” He finally picked one out and held it up. “How about this? I haven’t seen it.”

“You like romance?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Who doesn’t?”

She laughed. “A lot of manly men wouldn’t want to admit it.”

“Screw them,” he muttered, putting in the DVD and sitting on the couch across from the sofa she was on.

He had a distinct scent, and she wasn’t sure if it was because he wore cologne or not. It was fresh, spicy, like a mountain spring with plants growing around it. And something masculine layered over it.

And she really shouldn’t be thinking about it while he had his long body sprawled on her couch.

Biff loped into the room and looked around at his options. An incorrigible cuddler, he seemed keenly aware there was more than one human body to use as a cushion.

She was surprised when the huge, grayish-silver dog trotted over to Titus and stood on his hind legs to jump onto him. Ever more surprised when Titus allowed him to stay, rubbing the dog’s grateful head.

It was funny, but next to Titus, Biff’s huge size didn’t seem so ungainly. Just sort of… right.

Titus looked over at her, blue eyes amused, handsome face relaxed, and for a second, she didn’t see him as only a contractor. Instead, he was just a guy in her living room, sharing a movie with her, cuddling her dog with his huge, muscular body.

A body she couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to cuddle with.

He seemed to sense her attention was on him rather than the movie and turned to look at her, Biff following suit.

“Something wrong?” he asked.

“Nope,” she said tightly. “Nothing’s wrong.” Except the fact that she was fighting hard not to fall for her contractor, despite only working one day with him.

If something didn’t change, she was going to end up in bed with him. She just knew it. There was something so hot about a man who could handle a hammer, throw out your neighbor, and cuddle your dog while watching a chick flick all in the same day.

And she really didn’t need to fall right now, not when she was just getting to be independent.

“I think I’m headed to bed,” she said, pretending to stretch so she could look more tired than she really was. All she wanted to do was escape to bed and immerse herself in a book until sleep. Anything to distract her from the hottie in the living room.

“Did I do something wrong?” he asked as she got up and checked the lights and the locks on the doors so when he was done watching TV, he just had to turn off the living room light and head to bed.

“Nothing,” she said, giving him a wistful look as he sat up on the couch, forcing Biff to get off his lap and sit next to him. His braid was falling over his shoulder, a few sexy strands loose and hanging around his face, only emphasizing his beautiful masculinity. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

As she waved and then made a hasty exit toward her bedroom on the other side of the ground floor, she knew it was the exact opposite.

What made him truly dangerous was he was doing everything right.

* * *

Titus got to work on the roof the next morning with the odd feeling something was wrong between him and Bree, but he couldn’t put a finger on it.

When she’d gone to bed the previous night, had she just been jealous that he’d been the one to sit with Biff?

He wasn’t sure. He just knew something was off, and the way she’d rushed out of there hadn’t boded well for how he was doing in winning over his mate.

Oh well, today was a new day, and with luck, he could finish the roof and start on the disaster that was the wood on the outside of the entire house.

He wanted to fix everything well enough that she’d never have reason to worry, even though he’d be the one worrying about house issues from now on.

He heard someone ring the doorbell and wanted to set everything down and go down, but with how she was acting around him, he figured it was best to slow things down. Not interfere as much, unless she asked him.

She couldn’t think he was being too pushy if she was the one who asked for help, right?

He heard the door open and voices talking, fairly calmly.

Nothing to worry about, yet… that voice was awfully familiar.

His heart twisted painfully. Screw being patient; screw waiting for her to call him down. He set down his tools and ran to the trapdoor, jumping heavily onto the floor with her easels and then running for the stairs.

They shook as he traipsed down them, but he didn’t care. As he rounded the corner to see her standing at the door, and saw who she was talking to, his fears were totally confirmed.

His mate was talking to a dragon. Not one of his friends, either.

He locked eyes with Platinum and saw a smirk in his dark-gray eyes, like angry storm clouds or dull steel. He was the most similar-looking dragon to Titus, with long, dark-gray hair streaked with silver, shaved on the sides but long on the top and back, pulled into a long, warrior-like braid.

His grin spread as Titus walked toward them, standing behind Bree protectively and then pulling her behind him.

“Titus,” Platinum said, a sneer curling his lips. “Good to see you.”

What the fuck kind of game was he playing? The three noble metal dragons had interfered with Liam’s mate, but after being roundly defeated in battle, had retreated, and Titus and his crew had later found that the mercury dragon was somehow involved in that as well.

Now they were back. Well, one was. The one Titus had the most history with. He and Platinum, or Sever as he was also called, went way back.

“What do you want?” he asked, glaring at him as Bree pushed her way around him, looking up at him curiously.

“He said he’s here as your boss. A supervisor to look over your work,” Bree said.

Titus’s lips twisted as he resisted the urge to shout and throw the other dragon off his mate’s porch. Supervisor, my ass.

You could just tell her, Platinum responded, able to speak to his mind as they were both metal dragons. And then, you know, I could tell her you’re a dragon and you’re only here to mate her, and you’ve been lying to her from the moment you met.

Platinum had him there. Titus folded his arms. Why are you here? What do you want?

Same thing you want, a mate, Platinum responded.

This one’s mine. Back off.

Didn’t stop you with my mate.

Titus didn’t know what he was talking about. I don’t know what your problem is, but we used to be friends. Just because we went to different crews doesn’t mean you have to pull crap like this.

Don’t try to pretend that’s all you did, Platinum responded bitterly.

Titus wanted to argue further, but now wasn’t the time, with his mate watching avidly, growing more and more concerned. He didn’t need her to get paranoid and throw him off the job.

Fine, you can stay, Titus told him. But keep your hands off of her.

You should know better than to think I would force a woman. But if she prefers me to you… Platinum’s thoughts trailed off, the smirk on his face growing ever more irritating.

Shut up, Titus responded. She won’t.

We’ll see.

“Okay, Sever, you want to look over my work, come on up with me,” Titus said.

Bree looked surprised. Her strawberry-blond hair was back in a low ponytail today, and she was looking especially pretty. “That easy?”

“That easy,” he said, trying not to grit his teeth so much that it showed. If Platinum wanted to stay, he would be coming upstairs with him, doing manual labor, and staying away from Titus’s mate as much as possible.

Titus would guarantee it.