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and shift at a moment’s notice.
    He left his dwelling and headed for the main hall. His flight had eased some of his tension and calmed his dragon, but as soon as he was within range of Melanie’s scent, the battle would start all over again.
    Spending all day with her tomorrow was going to be hell. At this rate, he’d be trying to take her at midnight tomorrow.
    As he neared the dragon-shifters’ former castle with its towering stone keep, crumbling walls, and massive four-story brick building that served as the dragon-shifters’ main hall, he could hear conversations in a mixture of English and Mersae, the dragon-language. Nearly everyone, including the children, would attend tonight’s gathering. Bram liked to say it was to give everyone a chance to meet the new sacrifice, but Tristan believed it was to show off the new possible threat.
    He passed a few of his fellow trainers and nodded a greeting. No one offered any sort of congratulatory remarks, which was to be expected considering the near meltdown of the last female sacrifice eight months ago. Unfortunately, Caitriona Belmont had conceived. And she was still with them. As much as Tristan hated humans, he almost felt pity for her. Neil, her assigned male, had broken the sacrifice contract and disgraced the clan.
    Tristan had far too much respect for Bram to do the same.
    He pressed through the throngs of people and headed inside to the main raised dais in the front of the room. Bram was already there, but there was no sign of Melanie or Samira, the human female in charge of getting her ready. They were late.
    When he was close enough, Bram caught his eye and signaled for him to come up onto the dais. Tristan approached his leader and said, “Did you send someone to check on the human females?”
    Bram glanced at him. “Anxious to have your First Kiss?”
    “No. I just want to get this over with as quickly as possible.”
    “You do know that you’ll be seeing her again tomorrow. And probably the day after that. While it’s my job to scare her a bit into behaving, you need to stop pushing her away if you ever hope to get your cock anywhere near her.”
    He looked at his friend. “How do you know I’m pushing her away?” Bram raised an eyebrow. “Hey, I’m following my contract to the letter. I won’t physically harm her or force her. That’s all I care about.”
    “Harm comes in more than just physical injuries, Tristan. Look at what Neil did to Cait. Words and actions can be just as harmful as punches.”
    “Neil was a right bastard. I sure hope you’re not comparing him to me.”
    Bram was quiet for a second before he said, “If you keep focusing your hatred of humans on Melanie, then you could end up being worse. I had put my hope into Neil changing because of the clan depending on him. I failed and will always have to live with that, but I’m not about to watch one of my dragon-shifters sentence another human female into a life of misery.”
    Tristan was thinking of how to respond to that when he noticed Samira’s entrance at the far door. Since Melanie was a few inches shorter, he couldn’t see her brown hair with all of the tall dragon-shifters in the way. His dragon urged him to go find her, but as he battled the beast for control, the crowd parted to reveal Melanie.
    He almost didn’t recognize her. Her long hair was swept up atop her head, with strategic tendrils dangling near her ears. The light green material of the dress set off her eyes and made her creamy, bared skin glow. His gaze moved from her face and bare shoulders to the way the material hugged her breasts and ribcage before flaring out around her belly and hips. The dress was in the traditional style and tied on one side, in case a dragonwoman needed to shift, and the image of him untying the dress with his teeth and exposing her creamy, warm skin flashed into his mind.
    He felt Bram’s hand on his shoulder and he nearly jumped. Bram squeezed his shoulder and said, “You