Date with a Dragon (Date Monsters Shifter Agency)

by Lisa Daniels

  “I could come,” Oskar said, suddenly eager. “I could help, even. That would work, right?”

  “Um…” Lena fidgeted with her hands. “I think you would disappoint… my mother.”

  Katie nodded, but Oskar didn’t understand why. “Explain.”

  Lena did so, in a quiet voice, so no one else overheard. “If she sees you, and thinks you’re my partner, she’ll get so excited. She’ll start showing you my baby pictures and talking about all the embarrassing things I’ve done, and really hint at you what a wonderful wife I’d make. But since this is all fake… I’m not sure I want to disappoint her afterwards by saying we broke up or this was never real.”

  Oskar stared into Lena’s flecked brown eyes for a moment, seeing nothing but sincerity there. “I understand. Yes… I wouldn’t want to disappoint her. Tomorrow, then?”

  “Tomorrow,” Lena said. “I have a morning shift. So I’ll be out early afternoon.”

  “Okay. It’s a date. Now… hey, you’ve got something in your…” He made a vague gesture at her hair, as if he was going to pluck something out, and she leaned forward.

  Instead, he quickly kissed her on the lips, then drew back, grinning at her wide-eyed astonishment. “Got it.”

  It wasn’t enough of a kiss to really feel anything, to pay attention to the texture and taste of each other, but it seemed to have stunned her all the same.

  “We should go,” Katie said, tugging at his sleeve. “Got a call from your father, a message from your brother, and those need to be dealt with.”

  “I’ll see you later, Lena,” Oskar said, bowing elaborately and blowing a kiss her way. He walked smoothly away, glancing over his shoulder once to see that she was once more touching her lips, mouth parted, a slightly dazed expression on her face.

  He grinned triumphantly to himself. Seducing Lena was going to be fun.

  Chapter Five – Lena

  Lena’s mother, naturally, knew about the gossip in town. It took skillful deflection on Lena’s part, along with a vague “We’re not that serious, we just want to take it easy, see how it goes,” for her mother to finally lay off her relentless questions. Conversation remained steady and safe then, and Lena returned home some time later, firing off a quick message to Oskar that she’d survived, and hoped he wasn’t rotting away due to the four-star service of the hotel.

  Oskar: It’s not so bad. I think you’d like the food. Not tomorrow, though. I have a plan for you once you finish work. Advice: take warm clothes.

  Mystified, Lena stared at the message, wondering what on earth he wanted to do. Warm clothes in early afternoon? No snow for miles around? Wasn’t snow season in Geevor, after all. She’d packed a duffle bag with warm clothes, stuck with her neat “librarian” sweater and pants doing her morning shift, where only three people came in. The library survived by church donations and book sales mostly, to pay the threadbare staff members who worked it. Sometimes money was allocated from Democrat and Republican funds to preserve heritage sites, since Geevor technically was one of those rustic, backwoods places with a wealth of local folklore and Cornish/Irish origins.

  Excitement brewed in her as time neared the finish line for work.

  Even though it was just a pretend date in a pretend relationship, Lena couldn’t help but wonder—maybe it was real.

  Because Oskar didn’t have to do anything other than turn up. Yet he was messaging, visiting local places at her recommendation, trying foods, and, well, dating her.

  Katie: I’m outside.

  Lena practically skipped to clock herself out, handing the keys to Debra Haynes, mistress of bake sales, before grabbing her duffel and meeting Katie outside, wondering why Katie had messaged, and not Oskar.

  “Hop in,” Katie said, patting the passenger seat next to her when Lena approached the car. “We’re going just outside of town to meet Oskar. You’ll see why shortly.” She stopped Lena when registering what she was wearing. “Actually, go in the back. You better change now.”

  Flushing, Lena did as ordered, since Katie had a very no-nonsense tone to her demeanor. She hoped no one spotted her changing into her fluffy blue turtleneck and fleece top, which were probably better seen on grannies.

  “Something else for you as well,” Katie said as she glanced into the mirror, before taking goggles out of her glove compartment and tossing them to Lena. “You’re gonna need these. Good choice on that turtleneck.”

  “What on earth are we doing?” Lena asked, mystified. “Skydiving or something?”

  “Only if you can’t hold on,” Katie said, “but I don’t recommend that.”

  “What—” Lena stopped talking. She had her answer when Katie took the next turn, and, partially concealed in a copse of trees, was a huge, red dragon.

  Light scintillated off the scales, which were small and layered like fish. Great, yellow-red wings, webbed like a bat’s, with veiny membrane between the bony joints, flared out at an eye-watering span. A long, whip-like tail twitched, and a stocky, four-legged body with ridges along the middle supported a horse-like neck, with frilled ears and curved black horns tapering like backward tusks from the dragon’s head.

  “I take it this is Oskar,” Lena said faintly, having stepped out of the car and drawing in the sight of the great beast.

  She’d seen dragons before. Just… not up close. He could practically swallow her up in a couple of bites.

  “You’d be right,” Oskar said from that toothy mouth, and Lena jumped, startled.

  “Wait, you can talk in dragon form?”

  “The wonders of speech therapy,” Oskar said. His voice sounded like a smile, but his dragonish snout didn’t indicate one. “Better put on those goggles. And Katie, you got the harness?”

  “Yep,” Katie said, fishing something out of the trunk of the rental car. Lena placed the goggles on, mouth dry, wondering if she should refuse to ride a dragon, because this wasn’t the way she’d been expecting to ride one, exactly.

  “Are we… going far?” Lena squeaked, unable to hide all her trepidation. She imagined losing her grip on Oskar’s back, sliding off and plummeting and becoming a splash of tomato on the ground. “Do we get parachutes?”

  “No,” Katie said, holding up two obscenely pink harnesses. “These. If you’re wondering about the color, they were the only ones left in the shop.” Without a backward glance, she strolled to Oskar and vaulted up over his bent back leg onto his spine, pacing along until she found a spot and began attaching the carabiners to what appeared to be a thick, hollowed-out spike.

  “It doesn’t hurt,” Oskar said, perhaps misinterpreting Lena’s expression. “Those of us who fly with guests on our backs get our pinion spike hollowed out so humans can stay on safely. Maximum holding capacity, five hundred pounds,” he added with a smirk, which Lena suspected meant he wasn’t being entirely serious.

  “That’s, um… nice.”

  “Are you scared of heights, Lena?” Katie asked, now beckoning Lena on. “You didn’t have it documented on your medical files under phobias or traumas, though I did catch the one about centipedes.”

  Lena paled slightly. “No, it’s just… I’ve never actually flown.”

  Katie face-palmed herself, while Oskar chuckled. “Right. Shoulda figured if you never left town.”

  “It’ll be fine, I’m sure,” Lena said, suddenly desperate to prove she wasn’t a coward or backing out because some of her brunch wanted to expel itself from her stomach at the thought of being thousands of feet above the ground on the back of a dragon. Before she had time to second-guess herself, she clambered up onto Oskar’s back the way Katie had done so, and was awkwardly placed into a pink harness, watching as Katie tightened it so that her crotch seemed almost puffed out from the fabric.

  “Try sliding off now to test the strength,” Katie advised. “I’ll pull you up and then I should do the same.”

  Lena slid off Oskar, until she dangled stupidly to his left side, just under his wing joint, letting Katie haul her back up.
Katie did the same, appearing far more graceful, and showed Lena how to hold onto Oskar when they flew, burrowing her fingers under the larger scales and into surprising warmth.

  The flight terrified Lena for the first ten minutes. She clung on with a death grip to Oskar’s scales, the breath ripped from her as they lurched through the air with every flap—seemed dragons had to claw through the air with their wings to get anywhere.

  Katie tried talking to her, but it was hard to hear with the wind rushing around them, and the scenery below shifting from dusty, narrow lanes to fields full of cows, woods… they must have made it to about five thousand feet above ground at one point, and she alternated between mild terror and sheer exhilaration. By the time they descended about an hour later in Metopalis, one of the designated shifter cities in the region, Lena felt quite giddy and faint. Being back on the ground came as a relief, and being guided through a bustling, shifter-dominated city left her speechless, as most shifters opted to stroll around in their animal forms.

  She saw werewolves, tigers, lions, dragons, and bears pacing along wide sidewalks. The shifters didn’t seem to like cars; only a few were trundling up and down the designated roadways, and most were taxis. Oskar, back in his human form, took Lena’s hand casually, and she gulped at the gesture, warmth flooding up her arm from the touch.

  Oskar wore warm clothes as well, though Lena didn’t think he needed them in his dragon form, or now. The black suede jacket with wool inner lining puffed out his stature, and he was already muscled as it was.

  “Don’t worry, Lena. They won’t bite. There’s just somewhere I’d like to show you,” Oskar said with a charming smile, and she swooned slightly at the gesture, before catching herself furiously.

  No. She wasn’t going to act like some lovesick teen to her fake date. Not at all. Even though her heart kept doing annoying little beats that hit harder than the others, and a smile kept tugging up her lips whenever she looked at him next to her.

  Because damn. If this wasn’t fake, she’d be so blessed with the knowledge of walking next to someone like this. She tried to walk proud and straight, noticing faint attention on them, but Oskar acted as if he didn’t care about it.

  For the next few hours, he proceeded to show her some absurdly expensive places that made her eyes almost pop out at just how extravagant they were. A fine dining restaurant racked up a bill of eight thousand dollars between them, including wine, and Lena kept muttering she’d be fine going somewhere cheaper, but Oskar seemed to take delight in offering her something she clearly wasn’t used to.

  “About time someone treated you to luxuries,” he’d declared with a grin. From the fine dining, they went to an expensive spa session, where she spent an hour having her back massaged, and went skinny-dipping in a private heated and scented pool, with only slight disappointment that Oskar didn’t join her in the same pool. Probably for the best. She wasn’t sure if she’d be able to control herself if he came too near her looking like he did, except… more naked.

  Following this was indoor ice skating, where she fell over an embarrassing number of times, until Oskar offered to support and guide her, so she managed to achieve some sort of grace near the end of the session, and a theater showing of A Midsummer Night’s Dream adapted to slightly more modern times.

  It was all ludicrously high-end. A relentless barrage of different things that made it feel like Oskar was trying very, very hard to impress her.

  By the time they had to leave the city, and Lena had spent another hour clinging like a limpet to Oskar’s scaly back, she felt thoroughly swept off her feet as she wobbled back onto ground.

  To be fair, she literally had been.

  “Again, I’m glad you enjoyed all of this, Lena,” Oskar said, back in his human form, as Katie tucked away the harnesses in the trunk. “I’d take you all over the world if I could, but I don’t fly that fast.” He stepped towards her in the darkness, a half moon glinting over them, his eyes crinkled as he smiled. Lena’s breath hitched in her throat when his gaze dipped to her lips, and her brain erupted into a frenzy.

  Oh god he’s going to kiss me what do I do—

  A frozen smile reached her lips, and her heart hammered loudly, probably loud enough for him to hear.

  Instead, his lips pressed against her forehead, then nose, and his thumb lightly brushed her bottom lip, before he pulled away with an almost devilish smile. “Thank you as well for being a wonderful date. You made it quite… magical.”

  He’s only saying his lines, Lena thought, even as her cheeks flushed, and the ghost of his thumb lingered on her mouth afterwards, leaving a tingling sensation there.

  A part of her was tempted to pull Oskar close and capture his lips with hers—but if he was planning to get her into his bed by charming her senseless…

  Well, it might work, but she had more integrity than that. So when he offered with a seductive whisper for her to come into his hotel room, she’d smiled sweetly in response, before telling him not tonight…

  But all bets were on for tomorrow, since she planned to take him somewhere afterward.

  Only fair, after all.

  Oskar had definitely pouted at this, and she suppressed a laugh, because there was a strange power in refusing someone, in not playing their game to the script they’d made.

  He accepted graciously, though, which surprised her. She was used to pushy males and females. Oskar, however, pushed, and when she said no, he backed off immediately.

  That was nice.

  He did, however, leave her with another searing kiss on her cheek before watching her walk into her home, his eyes fixed on her until she closed the door.

  * * *

  Day four, after work, was her taking him to the local, old-school, drive-in cinema which showed indie films. The fourth of five attractions Katie had noted down. Lena always wanted to go on a stereotypical movie date straight out of the 50s/60s and had always found the idea of drive-in movies romantic as hell.

  What made it sweeter was that Chloe Galer seemed to have had the same idea with her husband. Galer and her husband sported an expensive, navy blue Jaguar model that opened up like bird wings upon the sides, while Oskar and Lena sat on the hood of their car, comfortably entangled in one another, munching popcorn sold from the little trailer by the side, watching a 1956 sci-fi movie called Forbidden Planet. She wasn’t really into sci-fi, but Oskar seemed to find it fascinating… and it was long, and she ended up drifting to sleep in his arms.

  When she woke up, it was to him stroking her hair, the movie minutes from ending, and him wearing such a soft, tender expression on his face, that she couldn’t stop herself. Her hand traveled to his jawline, running over his cheek, before, gathering courage, she closed her eyes and moved to press a light, chaste kiss on his lips. He inhaled sharply from the gesture, before his arms wrapped around her tighter, and his return kiss came back considerably more heated than before. Her fingers roamed through his scalp, ruffling his dark hair, and she gasped against his lips as he nipped lightly at hers.

  Heat roared through her, and it took all her self-control to peel herself away so that she didn’t get too carried away with the petting or start attempting to grind against him in full view of everyone else.

  “Let’s… break,” she whispered with difficulty, and his eyes slid open, slightly glazed.

  “Maybe we can take this elsewhere?” he whispered back, as the credits rolled for the movie.

  She wanted to. God, she wanted to. Her courage, however, failed just before words left her mouth, and she’d said to him she’d rather go home.

  Wasn’t hard to catch the disappointment in his eyes there—but again, he respected her wishes.

  She was beginning to think that a woman would be exceedingly lucky to ever secure Oskar Wainwright in any capacity outside of a one-night stand.

  Though even then, they might be lucky to experience him at all.

  * * *

  Day five started with a confrontation by Chloe Galer in the
library, while Lena wistfully daydreamed about the kisses shared between her and Oskar. Twice at the drive-in, and once during a heavy session just outside her house before he left her, and she had to clamp down on her jaw to avoid calling after him to come back. Or to grab at his arm and give into the budding feelings.

  “Hey, Lena! I saw you at the movie last night. It was really good, wasn’t it?” Chloe said, smiling in a friendly manner to Lena. Chloe was without her usual gaggle of sycophants, and she rested her hands upon the reception desk after delivering back the borrowed books from before.

  “Oh, yeah. Amazing movie. I got a little distracted, though,” Lena said, in a most un-Lena-like giggle. Solely to piss of Chloe. It worked somewhat, because the blonde’s jaw tightened.

  “Yes, it looked so romantic between you two. I’m happy for you both.” Chloe brushed Lena’s arm, and she flinched back from the uninvited touch.

  “Yeah, me too for you. You two seemed like you were into the movie,” Lena bullshitted, having absolutely no idea if they did. She sought to be nice, knowing if she snapped at Chloe, the woman would find a way to guilt-trip Lena for her reaction.

  If she was anything like the person she was ten years ago, Lena knew perception was Chloe’s deadliest weapon. Chloe, however, continued smiling.

  “You seemed really in love with him. It’s beautiful.”

  Lena’s heart did a small, ugly leap. Love? It was just an act.

  But hell, she’d be lying if she said some small part of her didn’t want circumstances to be vastly different. For Oskar to like her beyond his contract, for her to be able to date someone who charmed the socks off her. And maybe other things, too.

  It just reminded her more and more of what she didn’t have. What she’d been missing her entire life.

  “How did you two first meet, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “Online,” Lena blurted immediately, flushing. “Don’t we all, nowadays?”

  “Online,” Chloe repeated, her smile turning crystalline, with the barest hint of danger. “Yes, of course. Well, I just wanted to return the books. Thanks a lot. And I’ll see you at the reunion tomorrow. It wouldn’t be the same without you.” She waved and stalked off, taking long, elegant strides. Lena watched her go, blood rushing in her ears, hands balled, throat dry, wondering if she’d somehow fucked up.