Once standing, I looked at my feet pointedly before putting out my hands. “Where’s my red carpet, Mr. Tom? All this hullabaloo and no red carpet?”

“Nice word choice.” Ulric laughed.

Mr. Tom sniffed. “I sure hope you liven up your jokes for tonight.” He led me out and then peeled away.

My chest tightened up, and I forgot to breathe for a moment.

Damarion stood just inside the door holding a bouquet of long-stemmed roses. A navy blazer showed off his broad shoulders and perfectly followed the contours of his body to his trim hips. A cream dress shirt peeked out, the first few buttons undone, hinting at the defined chest underneath it. Dark, distressed jeans hugged his legs, ending at his shiny black dress shoes. His tamed hair shone with product, perfectly framing his handsome face.

Upon seeing me, he took a hand from his pocket and offered a slight bow, his face tilting up to me as he straightened, his forehead lined and eyes a little squinted, and holy crap this guy was really, really attractive.

I blew out a low breath. Who needed a red carpet when you had this waiting for you? I’d take a pile of loose dirt or an obstacle course if this guy waited at the end, no problem.

“Hi,” I said, closing the distance.

He pushed forward the flowers, the gruffness of his—our—kind showing in the gesture. His wings draped down his back on the outside of the blazer, and I realized he’d had his jacket custom-made to work around his wings rather than wearing clothes over them. That was why it fit so perfectly, and probably the shirt beneath it as well.

How did he get them off, though?

Heat pooled in my core as I imagined it.

Down, girl, I thought.

“Thank you.” I took the flowers and did the customary smell and smile, pleased down to my toes to receive them. It had been a long time.

Except…what did I do with them? I couldn’t very well just lay them down on a table, could I? He certainly wouldn’t want to wait for me to put them in a vase—it was arduous work, especially with stems this long. I’d have to measure them against the vase and then cut them down…

Mr. Tom saved me, as usual.

“Absolutely gorgeous, miss.” He stepped up next to me and put out his hands. “Allow me to put them in a beautiful crystal vase so that you may best show them off.”

“Oh, thank you.” Delighted, I handed them over. “They really are beautiful, Damarion. Thank you.”

He nodded and the door opened, Ivy House butting in. She really wanted me to get laid. If he was startled, he didn’t show it.

“Shall we?” He gestured me out.

“Yes, of course.” I took my clutch from the little table by the door and led the way, Damarion falling in beside me on the walkway.

Waiting by the curb was a silver Lexus, a sporty sedan model that I’d never seen before. The lights flashed, Damarion unlocking it while crossing to the driver’s side.

“Is this your car?” I noticed the sticker in the window, indicating it was brand new.

“Yes. With so many non-magical people around, I decided a car would be necessary for transportation.”

“Right.” I sat into the cream leather interior, doing a quick check to make sure everything was still safely tucked into my dress before he got in. “So you just…went and bought a car, huh?”

He closed his door. “Yes, of course. The non-magical police frown on stealing.”

I smiled, about to laugh, but then realized he wasn’t joking. Which then made me laugh harder. “Too true. Pesky non-magical police.”

He revved the engine, and then we were on our way. Closed in the car together, I caught a hint of his cologne: subtle and sweet, somewhat floral.

“Where do you live?” I asked as we headed toward the highway. “Oh. We’re not having dinner in town?”

“No. There’s a nice restaurant in Franklin I think you’ll like.”

“Oh, great. I haven’t really explored the area.”

Once on a highway, trees and signs zipped past, his speed way over the limit.

“So…where’d you come from?” I asked, having to unclench my jaw to do so. “What’s your hometown?”

“A small town in Pennsylvania, about four times the size of this one. Only magical people reside there.”

“Oh, really? That’s interesting. And…” I tightened my hand as he swerved around a car, our speed still climbing. I gritted my teeth. I didn’t want to be that woman, the one who bosses or nags or tells a man on the first date that he is doing something wrong, but I also didn’t want to be dead. It was a very fine line at that moment. I tried to ignore it, knowing he also flew at a jaw-dropping speed. His reaction time probably wouldn’t be that much different on the ground, would it? “How do you keep magical people from— Watch out, deer!”

He glanced over when he really should’ve had his eyes facing forward.

“What is wrong?” The car swerved around the frozen animal at the last moment, the right tires rolling off the shoulder and into the dirt before he maneuvered us back into the lane.

“Not a thing.” I sucked in a lungful of air, adrenaline firing. “I’m just calmly watching my life flash before my eyes. It reminds me of when we went flying earlier. Remember when you suddenly dropped me, let me fall, and then scooped me up at the last minute? This is kind of like that.”

“Yes. I’ve seldom heard a woman scream so loudly. I hope to get that volume out of you again, but in the bedroom next time.”

I widened my eyes, not sure what to say to that. I went with the eloquence of “Yeah.”

“You screamed through the whole lesson.”

“Well, yes, mostly because I thought I was going to die. For a while there, I thought you might make me have an ‘accident’ for magically knocking you around earlier. I made it, though, so that’s good news.”

“I do not have accidents in the sky.” His tone was haughty. “My purpose is to protect you, Jacinta. I would die to do so.”

Warmth flooded me. For the second time, I didn’t know what to say.

“Why do you flap your arms when you’re in the air, though?” He turned abruptly off the highway, not slowing nearly enough before he did so. The tires screamed around the corner and the back end of the car whipped out.

“Oh God.” I squeezed my eyes shut. “Please slow down a little. I’m just starting to really like my life. I don’t want to lose it.”

“I am in complete control.” He took another corner too fast, very nearly hitting a tree with the back end of the car as the whole vehicle slid off the road through the dirt. “I’d expected the car to handle a little better, however. Must be the roads.”

He slowed just enough to get traction, then we were on our way again, speed limits be damned.

I cracked an eye open. “I flap my arms because I’m dropping through the air without wings.”

“You shouldn’t think of arms as wings.”

“Yes, thank you. That hadn’t dawned on me.”

“Didn’t it?” He looked my way as we approached a glowing establishment with a large wagon wheel affixed to the outside. Steakhouse, I’d bet.

“You’re not one for sarcasm, huh?” I asked.

“No.”

I took a deep breath when he parked, his car easily the most sporty and upscale vehicle in the lot.

“Oh, I forgot to mention…” I climbed out of the car and steadied myself. “After dinner, we need to stop by the bar.”

He waited for me at the back of the car. “The one the bear owns?”

My heel caught a divot and I wobbled, clutching his arm, my fingers not able to wrap around his forearm, not even close. He stopped and let me regain my footing. “Sorry, heels and gravel do not mix. Austin’s bar. He’s the polar bear, yes.”

I wasn’t great at reading grunts, but he didn’t seem pleased.

“He found someone who escaped the attack yesterday,” I said.

He opened the door for me and waited for me to go in. A little hallway led to a scuffed-up wooden podium, currently unoccupied.

“Escaped?”

“Yeah. Apparently there was one more attacker that your guys didn’t grab.”

“Impossible. We’re very thorough.”

“He tracked down the guy.”

“I don’t know who he found, but it couldn’t have been from that battle. My people assured me the threat had been extinguished.”

“Well…I mean…they weren’t lying. The guy took off, so the threat had been extinguished. It’s just that not all the attackers had been extinguished with it.”

The host, who would have given Sasquatch a run for his money with his thick beard and shoulder-length hair, showed up at the podium in a black vest with a white shirt layered underneath. He lifted his eyebrows at us.

“Stavish,” Damarion said, his arm encircling my shoulders possessively.

The awkward feeling of a stranger being too close crept through me, but I ignored it as the silent host led us to our table. We sat in the back, the table built for two, our menus laid sideways because of their size and the little wagon holding the condiments between us. The host nodded once and walked away.

“Real chatty, that guy. I kept waiting for him to shut up.” I opened the enormous menu, the words big and spaced far apart just to fill it all up. “This is a man-sized menu, huh?”

Silence greeted me. A quick peek told me Damarion was still there, his fingers gripping the edge of the menu and the rest of him hidden behind it. He wasn’t much of a joker, clearly. Pity. Hot guys were so much hotter when they had a sense of humor.

“So…” I hunted for small talk as a strange feeling washed over me. I couldn’t place it, but it persisted. “Do all the guys you came with live in the same town as you?”

“No. None of them. I arrived with them, but I did not come with them.”