“You know, it has got potential,” Hayley said. “But I’ve no idea how we’d get him to agree to it.”
“Much as I’m delighted by the thought of our rugged leader forced to oil up and sell off his virtue, I concur,” Chase said. “How about—”
“No,” Griff, Hayley, and Connie said together.
Chase looked wounded. “I was only going to suggest that we arrange for them to get trapped together in Rose’s beer cellar.”
Rose looked down at the still untouched drinks on the bar. “Are my prices too high? Did you all get drunk on cheap spirits before coming here?”
“Ash can burn his way out of anything like that,” Hayley said, as though Rose hadn’t even spoken. “I know! We set Rose up with a fake boyfriend, so that Ash will be driven mad with jealousy!”
/> “Sounds dangerous for the fake boyfriend,” Griff said, one eyebrow quirking. “Not sure we’ll persuade anyone to risk their life like that. But what if Ash is the fake boyfriend? Say we invent a crazy stalker—”
“And persuade Ash that the only way to keep Rose safe is for him to pretend to date her so that the stalker will be scared off,” Hayley finished eagerly. “And then of course the fake relationship will turn real!”
“Right, you are all being completely ridiculous,” Rose announced.
Gathering up the tray of drinks, she swept past the whole silly lot of them. With her head held high, she marched across the room.
“About time,” Hugh said, as she reached Alpha Team’s corner booth. The white-haired paramedic passed a beer to his mate Ivy and took a whiskey for himself. “I was starting to wonder if you were having to distill the alcohol from scratch, Rose.”
“You can blame your colleagues for the delay,” Rose said, scowling over her shoulder at the group still whispering together back at the bar. “I don’t know what’s gotten into them, spouting such nonsense.”
Red dragon shifter Dai cocked an auburn eyebrow at her as she passed him a beer. “Surely you should be used to gibberish from Chase by now.”
“But not from Griff,” his mate Virginia said, taking a white wine. “What was that about setting fire to something?”
“Just a joke,” Rose said quickly, her face heating. “Here, John, Neridia. I brought non-alcoholic for you both.”
Neridia smiled as she accepted the mixed juice cocktail. Her huge belly barely fit behind the table. “Thank you, Rose. Though John’s not the one who’s pregnant, you know.”
“But I am on duty guarding the most precious treasures in the Pearl Empire,” John said in his melodious sea-dragon accent. He saluted Rose with his own mocktail. “Honor demands that I maintain a clear head.”
That left only one.
Rose cleared her throat, forcing her hand and voice to stay level as she set down a glass of water. “Ash.”
“Rose,” he said, in precisely the same neutral tone.
That had gone well.
Holding the tray like a shield, Rose swung round to flee back to safety—and ran smack into Chase’s muscular chest.
“Gentlemen!” the pegasus shifter declared, draping an arm around Rose’s shoulders before she could escape. “And beautiful ladies, of course. We were just having a very interesting discussion at the bar.”
A desperate smile frozen on her face, Rose stomped hard on his foot.
Chase didn’t bat an eyelid. “On a topic that I’m sure will be of great interest to all of you. I refer, of course, to romance.”
Dai’s forehead wrinkled. “But we’re all already mated.”
Virginia nudged him in the ribs, her eyes cutting across to Ash.
“Oh. Right.” The tips of Dai’s ears flushed faintly pink. “Sorry. No offense intended.”
“None taken,” Ash murmured.
“One word, Chase,” Rose hissed as quietly as she could. If she’d been a mythic shifter, and able to communicate telepathically with the pegasus, she would have been screaming in his mind right now. “One word, and you will never drink in this pub again.”