Despite her claim, he still gave her a stiff-lipped stare. She didn't look like a dragon now. Even her eyes were normal and human looking. He suspected her pupils only slitted green fire when her beast pushed.

"You're a fucking dragon." He couldn't help but repeat himself.

"I don't know why you're acting so surprised. I told you from the start what I was. You were the one who kept insisting I lied." She shrugged, the movement sending a ripple through the hair forming a silvery curtain around her body. Her nude body. Parts of it flashed as her hair shimmered over her skin. Hide and seek. A game he wanted to play with his lips and hands through the silk skeins of her tresses.

Want her. He most certainly did. Wanted her for himself. The pretty-shiny precious moonbeam who'd suddenly appeared in his life.

A woman who was a dragon.

"Dragons aren't fucking real." A denial that no longer worked. He'd seen Aimi in all her gleaming beauty. Such a majestic creature. Few things awed him. She did, though; a strange new feeling for him.

And he'd thought to touch her? Kiss her? He wasn't worthy of her. Not by a long shot.

"Let us recap so you can stop repeating yourself. I am a dragon. Dragons are real. Want to touch me again to be sure?" A teasing smile lifted the corners of her lips, and her hip jutted to the left, loosing the silken hair covering it. Even with the murky shadows, he could see her exposed skin.

How he wanted to touch her and do dirty, wicked things to her body. Have her scream my name as she comes for me. A wickedly appealing fantasy, but one he couldn't have. "Fuck me."

"I'm ready now if you are." She took a step forward.

The temptation almost dropped him to his knees. On my knees, I could worship her as she deserves. A true moon goddess who entranced him. "I can't."

"You mean you won't because we both know you can." Her gaze dropped to a spot below his belt.

"Don't you look at me like that. I was more than willing earlier, and then you drugged me."

"My sister drugged you. For your own safety."

"How is making me helpless safe?"

"Because then you don't do stupid things like try and leave." She glared and pouted at the same time. A powerful combo.

Not going to kiss her. Nope, not him. He was still pissed. With good reason. He'd woken from a drugged sleep to find himself locked in a room. The result proved to be a litany of curses-goddamn piss fucking son of a bastard-that did nothing to get him out.

However, he'd learned a thing or two about electronic door locks while working at Bittech. There was always a way to shut it down and open the door manually-unlike the movies.

"I left because you had no right to keep me prisoner."

"You're my mate."

"Well, you sure didn't act like it."

"Did you not wake in my bed with me?"

"Do you lock in all your lovers?"

She smiled. "Only the one I'm keeping. Congrats, you're the first."

The words shouldn't have warmed him. Why didn't he fight their allure? Shut the fuck up and enjoy it.

Nothing wrong with enjoying the fact that a woman appreciated him. He'd had to wash that appreciation off his hand so it wouldn't give him away when he made his escape.

A male should never share the scent of his woman's passion. It's mine and mine alone. Sharing was for saps.

"You know, if a guy does the same thing, it's considered a felony."

"Sucks to have a penis."

He winced. "You shouldn't use that word."

"What word? Penis?" Cringe. She laughed. "I don't believe it. He cowers at the word penis."

"I don't cower," he said, lips twisted in annoyance.

"Penis."

Flinch. Glare.

"Peeeee-nnnnnissss." She sang it.

"I don't care if you're a dragon. Say it one more time, and I'll put you over my knee and spank you."

"Promise?" She batted her lashes, which were dark, unlike her hair. "What word should I use instead? Penis is the proper word."

"Cock." The word burst from him, reasserting some manhood to his manbits. "Dick. Giant lizard."

"Lizard? You think lizard is a sexier option to penis?" She stared at him, mouth agape.

"Snake also works, as does love shaft, boner, and dong. They're okay, too, depending on how you use them."

"There is another term mother approves of-baby maker."

Funny how that didn't make him flinch. "There will be no baby making."

"Don't let my mother hear you say that."

He blinked at her. "Your mother wants me to fuck you?"

"That's the preferred method of getting pregnant. By the way, I feel like I should mention, she hates the f-word."

"Your mother can kiss my ass."

"She just might if it turns out you're really a gold."

Ah, yes, the insane belief that he was a dragon. As if. He could never aspire to the beauty he'd seen. A gator or a freak with wings was his lot in life. At this point, he wasn't even sure he still had the ability to change. The only thing certain was that the cold voice within still spoke to him and, even more worrisome, appeared to be blending in.

"What if you're wrong? What if I'm not gold? What then?" He already knew the answer. They'd cast him out faster than a drunk at a bar at closing time.

"If you're not, then, as a consolation prize, you can kiss my butt instead." She smiled. "Or bite it. I'm open either way."

Why did she make it so hard? And he meant hard. Any chance she didn't know the effect she had on him? Judging by her coy smile...no, she knew. "You're trying to distract me again."

"Is it working?"

It worked all too well. As Aimi stepped off the massive rock, her hair wisped around her body, teasing and revealing only snippets of her perfection.

"You're naked." The observation from before spilled past his lips.

"Your grasp of the obvious is startling."

"I didn't mean it that way. I mean you have no clothes, even though you changed back. From watching movies and stuff, I thought dragons weren't like shifters. I thought you were supposed to be more magic. Shouldn't that mean you keep your clothes when you morph?"

"It would certainly make things easier if we could. Alas, we are perhaps more like Cryptos than we like to believe."

"Cryptos?"

"Short for Cryptozoids. It is what we call those who are not dragon or human."

The line dividing him from her got thicker. He was but a shifter whose entire belief system had gotten turned upside down. "Your culture is completely different from mine, isn't it?"

"Yes. We have a unique way of living, much of it very structured, but many of our laws came about out of a need for survival after the purge."

"The purge being...?"

"When humans tried to hunt us to extinction. Much like what might happen now that the Cryptozoids have revealed themselves to humanity."

"You think they'll kill us all?"

"I should hope not because it would mean we would never have a hope of revealing ourselves."

"And do dragons want to reveal themselves?" he asked.

"I think most of us just want to be able to fly free in the sun and blue skies once again."

"You did just now." A setting sun, but still, it was far from dark outside.

"And for that, I will probably be punished. Even though I did it in a safe spot, I broke a cardinal rule."

"The rebel of the family, are you?"

She appeared startled by his statements. "Me? No. That's usually my sister, Adi."

"And yet, your sister isn't the one here on this mountain with me."

"Of course, she isn't. I claimed you."

The nonchalance with which she threw that at him didn't detract from the words themselves. "Should I be flattered?"

"Are you looking for compliments?" Her lips curved. "I claimed you because you intrigue me. It is hard enough to find an unmated male, but to find one who is handsome and strong and not a mama's boy..." She reached out a hand to trace his lower lip. "That was not a prize I could ignore."

"I won't be owned." His uncle and Andrew and Bittech had thought to own him once upon a time. He wouldn't let that happen again.

"But I take ever such good care of my things. Wait until you see my hoard."

"Hold on a second, did you just say-"

"You talk too much. Come here." She grabbed his chin and pulled him down, and he let her, mostly because staring into those shockingly beautiful violet eyes, he couldn't stop himself.

"You're dangerous, moonbeam." His words dusted her lips; her hands cradled his cheeks.

The reply hit him warmly. "Thank you. Remember that if you ever decide to cross me. Apparently, my family still has yet to learn how to give me my space."

Whirling from him, she planted her hands on her hips and yelled at the approaching drone. "Yes, I know I'm in trouble. But could you give me fifteen minutes with my mate?"

Fifteen? He could probably shave that down to five for both of them.

Zap. The streak of heat hit the ground at her bare feet, and Aimi scowled. "You pussy-blocking, womb-hogging, ass-kissing traitor. I will get you back for this."

Zap. Aimi easily dodged the laser's streak. "We'll have to continue this conversation later."

"Or I could grab that drone and make it into scrap." It occurred to him that chivalry demanded he destroy the toy robot.

"She'll just send another. Besides, we should get back. We have a mission."

"A mission? To do what?" Finish what they started?

"You still want to save your sister?"

"Yes." The mention of Sue-Ellen had him forgetting any thoughts of seduction. Sue-Ellen was the reason he'd left the house in the first place. "Do you have a clue as to her whereabouts?"

"Not quite but I'm sure it won't be long before we've pinpointed it for sure."

"What my so-in-trouble twin means to say," said a tinny voice issuing from the drone, "is that she has an invitation to the gala one Sue-Ellen Mercer is attending tonight in Beverly Hills. And guess who gets to be Aimi's plus one?"

"I'm going to see my sister?" The very concept stunned.

"Apparently. So let's go."

And by go, Aimi meant now, as with a shimmer, she went from seductress to dragoness-silver-scaled majesty.

Stunningly beautiful.

Don't touch.

Fuck it, he touched, the scales warm against his skin and of the strangest texture.

"Mom is going to kill you," sang Aimi's twin, to which Aimi replied by swatting the drone out of the sky.

He, on the other hand, was emasculated as once again she grabbed him in her claws and carried him, with ease he might add.