The length of the death spiral was unique to each dragon. Some waned over years, some over weeks. One thing was certain—without the completion of his mating bond with Mei, he would lose his dragon form forever. Sweat broke out on his brow. More than from simple exertion, this was the sweat of pain. He pushed through, making his muscles strain, trying to strengthen that which he knew was dying.
His next breath dislodged sweat from his face, which he ignored. It really pissed him off how indecisive she made him. He was never indecisive, always choosing action over inaction, so that his father had frequently chastised him, calling him a bull in a china shop.
He’d rather be a bull than a steer any day. But she’d held his balls in her hands since the first time they had touched each other in Paris. The barbell hit his chest hard, and he grunted at the contact and pushed it away.
Mei.
The door of the weight room sighed open and closed.
He knew it was her without turning his head. His dragon uncoiled and snarled inside him, and the sudden rush made him bobble the bar. The unbalanced weight dove toward his right side before he straightened it.
He didn’t want to discuss his waning dragon with her and see her oh-so-sorry face. Fresh adrenaline surged through his body, and his gut clenched. Laying his spine flat against the bench, he pressed the barbell, and it surged upward, almost leaving his grip with the force of the propulsion.
“Hey,” Mei said from the open doorway, seeming hesitant to cross the threshold.
He leveraged the bar up and down, faster and faster.
“I opened your gifts.”
Fuck. Even though it was what he wanted, it made him feel even more quarrelsome, like she’d finally gotten around to throwing him a few scraps of her precious attention, and he was supposed to pant like a street mutt. With an extra loud grunt, he lowered the bar to the cradle and sat up, wiping sweat away with a rag from his bare chest and face.
Mei’s steps were tentative as she crossed to him, her high heels sinking in the matted floor precariously. She stopped more than an arm’s length away.
Smart woman.
Her scent surrounded him in a cloud of seemingly super-oxygenated air. It was the smell after a rainstorm, with the hint of salty ocean breeze at its core. She frowned, her red-painted bottom lip caught under her white teeth. He saw pity on her face, knew she was feeling sorry for him.
His surliness boiled over to major pissed-offness. “I want my tie back.”
Her hesitant lip chewing stopped in a millisecond and changed to narrow-eyed annoyance. He liked it a whole lot better than false concern.
Rising, he turned his back on her and went to the pull-up bar between the weights and the gymnastics equipment. He jumped to grab the metal rod, his weary muscles renewed to Superman-level strength with her eyes watching him.
Mei followed him to the bar, the only indication of her shifting mood the loud, top of the palate sigh that he heard as he yanked himself above the bar in strict military pull-ups.
Below him, the top of her shining black hair was twisted into a tight bun, holding his latest gift: handmade gold and onyx chopsticks he’d ordered from a collector in his bid to soften his approach and win her over. His patience for all that fucking gentility evaporated with each pitying look she cast his way.
He lowered his torso below the bar, letting his gaze sweep over her as he rose. Admiring her red-painted toes peeking through the front of her shoes, and her narrow ankles, to the swell of her hips under her work skirt, to her touchable breasts and down again. He’d always considered himself a leg and ass man until he met Mei. But he loved everything about her delicate stature. It made him want to cherish her, hold her, and protect her.
His cock stirred to attention despite his continued effort to leverage himself over the bar. Fuck. How could so much trouble be contained in such a tiny package?
If someone had told him when he was leaving Moscow to follow Alec and bring peace to the dragon kingdom, that one small woman would tie him up in knots, he would have laughed. Literally. Laughed for days, and he would have bet good Stoli vodka they were wrong.
“I just wanted to say thank you for the gifts.” She gestured a hand at her head.
“You’re welcome.” He huffed the words over the bar.
“We didn’t get to finish talking last night.”
She hadn’t been waiting for him when he’d returned to his office—no surprise there. Darius dismounted and padded to the trapeze to finish up on the rings. Mei’s gaze followed him, and by the slight tapping of her fingers against her thigh, he could tell she didn’t like being ignored. Good. Let her see how it feels for once.
She put her hands on her hips as if she were getting ready for a presentation. He didn’t want a lecture, so he untied a rope and lowered one of the trapeze swings to her sitting height.
“Come on.” He swung the bar seat in her direction. “Sit while I finish up, then I’ll listen to whatever is on your mind.” He walked to the rings and chalked his hands, leaving her to make up her own damn mind.
He focused on the rings above him and ran through the routine in his mind. When he was ready, he jumped and grabbed the ivory rings in his hands. His overtaxed muscles stretched out, and he let himself swing back and forth. “Did you know that my family was in the Russian Circus?”
“No.” Her voice held an edge of curiosity, and she came to sit on the swing below him. She kicked off her black high heel shoes and rocked gently on her bare toes.
“You’ve never seen a more beautiful trapeze performance than my parents’. They were effortless, always knowing where the other one was in the air. It was magical.”
“Because they were bonded.” Her voice was tight again.
He swung his lower body in a controlled arc and pushed himself into a straight-armed position. “That, and they were good.” Holding her gaze, he lowered his body into an iron cross.
“Are you showing off?” Her tone was teasing, and her speculative gaze up and down his body sent tiny tingles of awareness shooting through him that had nothing to do with exertion.
“Are you impressed?”
“No.” But she continued watching him, her lips parted in admiration. “Why do you push yourself like this?”
“You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”
She frowned and dropped her eyes to her floor, seeming fascinated by her left foot anchoring her movements. The weight of his body pulled at his shoulders, and his chest and arms burned with fire. His controlled breathing broke the quiet of the room.
Now was when the effort mattered, he reminded himself. The whole workout before had led to this. Could he mentally prevail when his body was ready to quit? Tremors started at his core and vibrated up his arms, threatening to dislodge him. Sweat pooled on him, ran off the tip of his nose, and splattered to the mat below.
“I saw you fall in the casino,” Mei said, breaking his concentration.
Now is what matters. Darius forced her words away and lowered himself even more until his whole body shook, right down to his curled toes. This move had gained him a spot with his parents’ circus, a move no normal human could do. That was before he had discovered he liked the challenge of technological gymnastics better.
Mei twirled to face him on the swing. “Why didn’t you tell me before that you were sick?”
“I don’t want your pity,” he grunted out.
“So it’s true, then.” She resumed rocking with her face in profile to him. “I wasn’t sure.”
Now is what matters. Darius forced his body to stillness, and his mind to equanimity.
“I’d really like for you to go away for the weekend and return after the gala.”
This again. Her continued insistence on him leaving puzzled him. He closed his eyes against the distracting conundrum, but in the dark void of his mind, he replayed her words, seeing the importance of them in the upturned tilt of her chin and her straightforward stare. Even without looking at her,
he knew she waited nervously for him to respond.
“Not without you,” he grunted out.
“Okay.” Her voice was cheerful, upbeat. “I’ll go with you.”
His eyes snapped open to see her smiling extra wide as if she’d agreed to something she’d long wanted to do.
Liar, liar.
Darius nearly broke his posture, and he quickly refocused. Taking one last breath, he pulled his knees to his chest, held them there, and reverse flipped in the air, executing three perfect backward somersaults before dropping to the floor with hardly a sound.
“Wow.” Mei’s mouth hung open, and she stared at him, stunned to stillness.
Every muscle fiber, from his forearms to his chest, screamed with pain, but his entire focus was on her. Why was she lying to him?
He eyed her on the swing with what must have been a predatory look, because she glanced at the door. “When do you want to leave?” he said with forced nonchalance. He toweled himself off, picked up his water bottle, and drank deeply.
“How about tonight?” she said too quickly, and then resumed her swaying.
“Tonight?” He set down the water bottle on a ledge. Her face said why not, but her tense grip on the swing ropes said it was a ploy. He reached toward her with his dragon senses, but unlike other mated pairs, he’d never been able to separate her truths from her lies. All her words felt equally veiled to him, as if nothing she said were true.
“Why not?” Her cheerful reply mimicked her facial expression and would have tipped him off that something else was off, even if her quick agreement hadn’t.
“It seems rather quick.” He walked to her and grabbed the ropes above her hands before she could react, effectively caging her between his arms. Her forced smile fled, and her flighty gaze avoided his. “I’m ready to go,” she said. False cheer stretched her brow into a Kewpie doll approximation of the Mei he knew. When he said nothing, she frowned at his scrutiny and backed away from him with her heels to the limit of the swing arc.
“Okay,” he smiled pretending he hadn’t noticed her retreat.
She stared at him from the tethered distance of three feet way, her face a melee of concern and false bravado.
“Let me guess.” he asked. “What romantic weekend destination would please you?” He tilted his head sideways as if trying to come up with the answer, and then shook his head. “I’ve no fucking clue, because I don’t know a damn thing about you and why you keep lying to me.”
“I am not lying,” she said with too much force and not enough contractions. “You’re the security analyst extraordinaire. I’m sure you already know everything important about me.”
This was familiar territory, Mei winding up for the offensive attack.
“There are tens of thousands of Mei Chen’s in China,” he said. “I’ve looked at all of them. None of them are you.”
“It’s a common name.” She lifted her heart-shaped face, staring defiantly at him.
“Yes. Too common.” Darius yanked the ropes toward him.
She bobbled and rebalanced herself by dropping her hands from the ropes. She didn’t seem to know what to do with them, and she twisted her thumbs over each other in front of her. “The king has no problem with my name.”
If she thought bringing up the king would deter him, she was mistaken. He wasn’t backing off for anything or anyone in the world.
Not this time.
He wanted to know what was really going on with her. Why she evaded and lied to him. Why she wanted to get him away from the casino so badly she was willing to—pretend at least—that she would go with him.
She must have seen the resolve in his eyes. She pushed hard against his chest, and then pulled back sharply when he didn’t budge. “This is ridiculous.”
The brand of her touch blazed through his still aching muscles and tunneled straight to his groin. “On the contrary.” Satisfaction at cornering his quarry filled him with anticipation. “I think we’re just getting somewhere.”
Chapter Six
Alarm shot through her, and Mei did what all cornered creatures do— she fought back. “Don’t be such an asshole.”
Darius smiled, a wide-mouthed, toothy smile that said her insult didn’t bother him in the least. He had her trapped between his wide bare chest and the swing seat. She could duck under his arm and run, but she wanted him to leave with her tonight. Not tomorrow when everyone would be arriving for the gala.
She crossed her arms over her chest and stood her ground. “You know I hate it when you act like a bully.” She gave him her best haughty expression. Darius’s pale blue eyes stared holes through her as if he knew all the secrets she was hiding.
He moved forward. His lower body rested flush against hers so that her bare knees splayed to either side of him. It was useless to run. Heat seeped in the seams between their bodies, and sensation coiled, hot and needy, through her lower body.
“It has been a long time since we have touched like this.” His eyes dilated so that his pale irises were only thin blue rings around his pupils. “What if we run off for the weekend and find we don’t suit?”
“Don’t suit?” Her skin felt hot and her mind muddled, and she knew her words were breathier than she wanted.
“Sexually.” He stretched the word into a caress that raised the hair on her arms.
Her need sharpened, and her ankles curled of their own accord around his calves, bringing her even closer to him. The space between his bare shoulders and neck begged for her hand to stroke it, kiss it. He was sensitive there, she remembered.
She curled her hand into a ball to keep it from wandering. “I’m sure nothing has changed on that front.”
“How do you know?” He leaned closer, so less than an inch separated their mouths. The brush of his breath touched her lips. She licked a nervous tongue over them, only to hear a growl low in his chest. His lips met hers with the softest touch, and her eyes shut to counterbalance the spinning sensation.
Then he was gone.
She opened her eyes to see him watching her, the muscles of his chest as tense as they’d been on the rings. Words escaped her.
“I want you,” he whispered. “Not tonight, or tomorrow, or after the gala. Now.”
The word echoed with her need, and her right hand reached to trace the ridges of his chest muscles, feeling them quiver in the wake of her fingers. This was wrong. It might get them killed. He needed to know the whole truth before.
She should just tell him.
All of it.
But, her left hand joined her right, and under her fingers, his skin slid smooth and hard and warm. How had she gone so long without touching him? It was like touching the other half of her, the part that had been missing. The gaping hole in her life.
Darius released the ropes to lift her wandering hands to his lips. He kissed her frantic pulse at her wrist and trailed upward, branding up her bare arm. “Say you want this.” He nuzzled the side of her neck, making her feel as if she spun in circles under the ocean.
“I can’t think,” she said as delicious sensations shot through her body, and the lies and secrets burdening her mind slipped away on a fog of bliss and urgent need.
“Say you want this,” he repeated directly into her ear.
They could do this. They’d already done it before. The damage was done. She had his mate mark and though she tried to hide it, everyone in the kingdom knew.
Why not?
She couldn’t think of a single reason, and felt instead the hot press of their lower bodies fused together, the throb of his need against her belly, and she lifted her mouth and brushed the soft contour of his lips. “Now.”
She’d thought he’d slam her to him, take, take, take, but instead, he eased a gentle hand down her back as if he was afraid she might break.
“Lyubov moya,” he said in Russian, words she didn’t understand.
The gentle stroke was her undoing, and she felt the exact moment when her remaining mental barriers fell,
and her body took over. She slid the hem of her skirt up, pulled down her panties, and dropped them to the mat.
Darius watched the scrap of white lace fall with a hooded gaze.
“Now,” she whispered.
This time, he crushed his lips over hers and sucked her tongue into his mouth, sending excited shivers up her back. Her desire shook her, and every cell turned outward to him. Wanting more of him.
Darius moved between her legs, pushing forward so that her inner core throbbed against him. He tugged her silk shirt free of her waistband and pulled it over her head.
Inside Mei, her dragon uncoiled and gave a stretch of feline grace. Her already sensitive human skin shivered with otherworldly awareness. Every surface throbbed in anticipation of joining with him again.
She leaned up to kiss him. The jolt of passion flexed her toes and spread like an inferno between them. She pulled him closer, wanting more of the feel of skin on skin.
He kissed down her neck to the lace of her bra and suckled her nipples through the material. Her achy nipples tightened and felt heavy. He moved his hands away from her to the swing ropes, as if to restrain himself.
“Touch me,” he said.
Excitement ran through her, and Mei ran her hands over his skin, sliding the loose black shorts he wore off his hips and admiring the muscled vee of his lower abs. He wore nothing else, and no further barrier separated her from him. She ran her hands over his long member, stroking the ridge, feeling it jerk, responsive in her hand.
Darius tilted his head back and moaned.
She loved having him in her hands, in her power.
He reached for the back of her head. The heavy weight of her hair cascaded down her back as the chopsticks rattled to the mat. Her head felt weightless, unburdened, moored to the cynosure that was him.
“I’m going to fuck you right here.”
His crude words inflamed her with spiraling need, and she grabbed hold of his hips and wrapped her legs around him. She angled him into her moist center, but he only barely entered and stopped. She tilted her body over the offered tip, rubbing her sensitive nub, making herself crazy with want.
Dragon Her Back Page 4
