by TJ Cross
Contents
Dedication
Copyright
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Omega For The Dragon Alpha: 3 Book Bundle
Omega For The Dragon Doctor
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Epilogue
Omega For The Dragon Professor
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Epilogue
Omega For The Dragon Playboy
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Excerpt: THE DRAGON'S OMEGA
About The Author: TJ Cross
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Copyright © 2016 TJ Cross
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Written by TJ Cross
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OMEGA FOR THE
DRAGON...
DOCTOR
PLAYBOY
PROFESSOR
TJ Cross
OMEGA FOR THE
DRAGON DOCTOR
TJ Cross
CHAPTER ONE
Gurney
The doctor was in. The whole hospital seemed to buzz with activity, often requiring Gurney Keller's attention. There was something special about that one particular surgeon -- everyone who encountered him seemed to pulse with a sense of relief after meeting him.
Bedside manner, perhaps, but it felt like something exceptionally natural -- a sense of composure that, if trained, would have taken decades to develop.
He was tall, standing at 6'3" and thus towering over all the nurses and interning doctors, which went on to cement his dominant position in the hospital. Although he wasn't operating right now, he was dressed for the occasion. The emergency room at the Seattle Tranquility Hospital was undeniably busy this Sunday night, but that was exactly the sort of setting that Gurney thrived in.
When he was around, everything just seemed to work better.
"Doctor Keller," a woman said, stopping behind the doctor.
He turned around, nodding in greeting to the nurse.
"Doctor Herrera's asking for you. She's in room 304 right now, it didn't seem urgent, but she did ask me to find you all the way here," the nurse said.
"Thanks, Karen," Gurney said. "I'll head there now."
The doctor had a reputation for being a workaholic -- he just didn't ever seem to need rest. He was a man driven when he was in his element, here in the hospital. Gurney began walking quickly towards the elevator, keeping a solid smile as he passed coworkers. There he goes, he knew other people were thinking: the surgeon who works all week.
Few people at the Seattle Tranquility knew the true reason he managed to do so well despite his torturous hours. That he was hiding a secret -- although even he had to admit it was not especially secret, especially if you were industrious enough to search newspaper archives back in the early '90s -- which explained his incredible work rate.
Gurney preferred it that way.
"Beats having people freak out knowing you're a shifter," he murmured to himself in the elevator, alone, as he punched out the button for the third floor.
But not just any shifter, he reflexively thought. A dragon. "And that's the dragon pride, right there," he said under his breath. The beast inside him found the idea of ignoring his true self entirely repulsive, far preferring the idea of becoming famous for his deeds, having the world bow down to this dragon, the master of medicine...
Gurney could only shake his head as he repressed those feelings. He channeled his inner dragon frequently, knowing it was the key to his success in the world of humans and shifters alike... but even so, he was a particularly unique case. Dragons were destructive, dangerous beasts. Even other shifters frequently found them to be anathema to the rest of the wider community.
It was always a good idea to shut up about it.
And so Gurney had. He kept his background known only the a very select few, feeling safe in knowing it was need-to-know only.
Dr Jessica Herrera was one of those few people who knew. He walked up to room 304, standing outside the open doors as he watched her finish up with a patient. He didn't have to wait long; she seemed to have an almost supernatural sense for his presence.
"Dr Keller," she said, smiling. "Thanks for meeting me. Want to grab a snack in the break room? I could so go for a KitKat."
Gurney returned the smile, letting her lead the way as they walked the short distance to the doctors' break room on that wing of the hospital. "You're doing something special this evening, I take it?" he asked, the deep, almost musical tone of his voice instantly becoming apparent.
"Jake Hosnia," Jessica nodded. "Delivering my first shifter baby tonight. I'm excited. This is what, the first time I've been booked to do this and not been cancelled on in favor of the great Gurney Keller?"
"Shifters like shifters, what can I say?" Gurney shrugged, grinning. "If it makes any difference, I'm really glad you're available now to relieve me of my duties. I'm not exactly an obstetrician. That's always been your line, Jessica."
Jessica stood in front of the vending machine, tapping out her order. Without facing Gurney, she answered quickly, "I think it's more... well, you know. Politics. I'm the first human doctor with a specialization in shifter physiology, you're the first shifter doctor of any sort, so..."
"Only shifter doctor," Gurney cockily answered. He didn't need his inner dragon to prompt him to boost his ego there -- this was simple fact.
"I've heard of a up-and-coming medical hotshot in India who's a tiger, actually," Jessica said, challenging him with a grin.
Then he can come meet me first before I start acknowledging my healer peers, Gurney bit back. "Is that so? Interesting..."
"Anyway, back to Jake Hosnia. Male pregnancy is still... well, not something there's a body of medical wisdom on. So I need your help on this."
Gurney's eyes flashed. "Why, because I'm gay?"
"You're too much," Jessica said, shaking her head. "No, because you're the only person in the world who's qualified to give me help on this."
"Shifters doing hospital births is a new thing in my culture, but a welcome one. You can't have midwives and doulas and shifter shamans always hogging the scene, not in the 21st century. I like it this way,
actually," Gurney replied. "But given the aforementioned midwives and doulas and shamans, I'm really not the only person in the world qualified to help you, there are lots of others out there, Jessica."
He knew he was just playing hard to get, but that was the core of their working relationship -- they were both outsiders coming into a line of work not ever previously breached by another. Shifters still distrusted human medical care, so he rarely treated them... hence the hospital never creating a department for shifter medicine that he could be in charge of.
It rankled against his pride, sometimes, but that was just the way things were. Most days, shifter patients were either needing emergency or critical treatment, an area of expertise not handled well by most shifter healers who relied on traditional medicine, or other shifter patients who had been raised practically human and preferred the comforts of human care.
Then, of course, there were the mates to these shifters... not all of whom were human. Pairings between humans and shifters were increasingly common.
"I could be with a human, I suppose," Gurney murmured, musing aloud.
Jessica raised an eyebrow, looking at him. "Want me to hook you up? Blind dates your sort of thing, Gurney?"
"Never been on one," the dragon replied.
"Not a single blind date in, what, the two hundred years you've been alive? You must be lonely as hell," Jessica taunted.
It was just banter between the two of them but somehow, for some reason, it struck home for Gurney tonight. He had been feeling lonely, which was the reason he kept pouring in so much of his time into work, but he hadn't been expecting this sort of a dissection from someone who knew him well enough to be able to make that sort of an assessment.
"I'm going to need a second opinion on that," Gurney joked drily.
Jessica placed a hand on her hip, her free hand reaching for the packet of chocolates she had gotten from the vending machine. "You can get a second opinion. Ask yourself the next time you're in front of a mirror."
"Now you're just being obnoxious, Jess," Gurney said, his voice reaching a gravelly darkness.
"I'm looking out for you. Most humans would die if they were this lonely for years, let alone decades. And for you, we're talking about centuries here, Doctor Dragon," Jessica pointed out.
Gurney felt a heat rise to his ears. He glanced around the break room suspiciously. "Do you have to shout it to the whole world? Not everybody is supposed to know how old I am, you know."
This got her, at least. "I'm sorry," she apologized quickly. "But what I said still stands. I won't budge until you admit that."
"That I'm lonely?" Gurney asked, hiding his irritation.
"That you've been building this giant wall, letting nobody in... even though you probably want that. Of all the doctors I've ever had the pleasure of working with or watching, you're undeniably the one who gets least stressed. You've got an incredibly cool head under pressure. Your experience is tremendous. Stress just doesn't get to you. But sometimes I wonder if it's just naturally the way you are... or if there's a threshold out there, Gurney, and one day if you're not careful you might just hit it."
Gurney inhaled sharply. He had been listening to Jessica intently, even though her words struck him hard; he had to pace his breathing before he could get a word back in.
"Dr Herrera, I truly appreciate your concern. You're right, I should probably spend a day or so just looking out for myself. But I've got it handled right now. Got it all wrapped up nice and neat, that I'm not going to let anything bother me -- not when I have lives hanging in the balance." He looked at the short, long-haired Spanish woman. "You didn't call me to see you all the way down here on the third floor because you needed to tell me I need to go on a date, did you?"
"Not go on a date," Jessica said, suppressing a giggle. "I'm telling you you need to get laid."
He felt his dragon rise, interested in the new direction of the conversation. "Maybe I do," he conceded, biting his lip. "Maybe I do..."
"If I ever come by any particularly hot new guys who, for some reason or another, I am unable to start pursuing romantically myself... I'll send them over to you, okay?" Jessica offered. "You have a type?"
"Gosh, I don't know. Fun. Vibrant. Young," Gurney said, thinking about what he wanted in a partner... a mate, his inner dragon thought. "Damn, I don't have a clue. Not someone who's vapid. Someone passionate about something. Creative, maybe, even. I wish I had more time invested into more creative avenues, you know? Like photography or something."
"Slow down there," Jessica grinned. "I'm not your matchmaking service just yet. I only offered... if there's someone. I'm sure you'll find someone eventually."
"And is this the reason you had me come down to see you?"
Jessica giggled again now, remembering. "Oh, crap, no! I wanted to ask you if you were free to supervise -- well, observe, really -- during me delivering the baby tonight."
"And before you asked that, you decided to start with bringing me down about how I'm getting too stressed and overworked because I haven't fucked a guy in ages?" Gurney said, shaking his head in disbelief. "Bedside manner, Jessica: you need to work on it."
"So you'll do it?"
Gurney laughed, moving towards the exit. "Okay, I'll be there."
This graveyard shift was only beginning.
CHAPTER TWO
Brandon
"This spot is perfect!" Zara called out. Brandon was just behind her, slowing his bicycle down as he trailed his enthusiastic friend in the light crowd of cars along a traffic bridge. "Come on, Brandon!"
He lugged two cameras by his side, with lenses packed in the messenger bag in the bike's basket behind him. "Where?" he said, dismounting and chasing after his best friend.
It was cold this time of the night, but this was when he and Zara worked best together. He was the junior photographer hoping to one day have his photos go viral online -- she was the alt model who was his number one cheerleader. All the best photos of her lavish canvas of tattoos and piercings were done by Brandon.
She wanted photos to slap onto the cover of a punk girl zine tonight, and Brandon was always up for a late night adventure.
"Here, right by the railing," Zara said, as Brandon caught up with her, his Canon camera in heavy, full glory already out in his hands. The spare camera, a point-and-shoot he used mainly to frame shots before switching to his main DSLR, hung by his left hip.
"That's just right," Brandon said, grinning as he fired off shot after shot in quick succession. Zara's short pink hair looked almost greenish in the hue of the bridge's overhead lighting, positioned in such a way that the shadows she immersed herself in also had the effect of making her seem slimmer.
The young photographer raised his hand, his open palm guiding his friend's posture. They had a lot of creative chemistry together, with Zara knowing to tilt her body following the shape of Brandon's outstretched hand, so he could fix the exposure just right.
"Nice," Brandon said, staring down at his camera. Zara hopped back over to join him, glancing at the screen to review the shots. "I think these turned out okay."
Zara laughed. "Brandon, these are more than just okay. They're amazing. I can't wait to see them on your computer."
He didn't tell her that he was keen to continue their outing in as many impromptu photoshoot locations as possible. Brandon disliked being home alone, his everyday reality given his depressingly tiny apartment out in the city. Once upon a time he had enjoyed the idea of living away from his family, or having his own space instead of rooming up with friends.
These nights, he just felt too lonely at the idea.
"You know what would be crazy? If we cycled all the way across and tried to find a path down to the beachside where we can shoot with the bridge looking imposing in the background," Brandon offered, panting to catch his breath.
"What, you mean under the bridge?" Zara asked, thinking as she glanced around. "Seems a little dangerous."