“Are the men mad, then?” he queried.
She cleared her throat—better that than start laughing at him again. “Not in that sense. It’s a TV show.” She pointed to the screen on the wall, something that always showed the news. “That’s a TV. Remember?” When he nodded, she sighed. “Anyway, yes, I always have a woman’s joy.” The woman’s joy? Or a? She settled on a. “But it’s never all that fulfilling.”
“What else have you noticed?” he asked, sounding curious now. His eyes had narrowed with intent.
She watched him reach for his coffee cup and decided to answer after he’d taken a sip.
His reaction to the concoction was worth the wait. She burst out laughing, yet again, as he pulled the best. Face. Ever.
His nose wrinkled. His mouth turned down at the corners, and his eyes screwed up. It was like he’d just plopped a dog turd in his mouth.
She knew it was only good manners that had him swallowing.
“Want to spit it out?” she teased, eyeing him with eyes bright with laughter.
He gulped. “That’s vile.”
“Why did you order it?”
“The woman before me did.” He shrugged. “I’ve decided that I like trying new things. This realm has plenty to offer.”
She snorted—who knew Dragons had a sweet tooth?—then caught Jenna’s eye. When the server appeared, she asked, “Jenna, can I have the same order but with full fat milk, please?”
“Sure. Do you want me to take that away?” She pointed to the soy milk disaster.
“Please.” She smiled at the server then, as the daywalker took off, told Georgios, “You’ll like this one. I know you like coffee bitter, but you have a sweet tooth.”
“How do you know?”
“I can smell croissants on you sometimes,” she admitted sheepishly. “As well as Danish pastries.”
He blinked at her then grinned. “Smell me a lot, do you?”
She huffed. “Well, a girl’s got to get some kind of action from time to time.”
The sparkle in his eyes dimmed a little, but he nodded gratefully at Jenna when she reappeared. When the server went away again, he asked, “Tell me. You were talking of the stirring.”
“The what?” Lara asked, brow puckering.
“The stirring.” He grimaced. “It’s what you’re going through. It’s why I awoke. I think the Dragon scale Remy gave you helped move things along somehow, but I sensed your stirring in my sleep.”
“What is it though?” she asked then took another sip of tea. The bitterness was tart on her tongue, but it grounded her too. She figured she’d need grounding after this conversation.
Her life had been one whole heap of weird since Remy had come into her world. If it was all leading to this one moment, then she figured she’d best keep her feet planted on the floor lest she flutter away in shock.
His voice was gruff. “It’s what lets a Dragon know his mate is ready for him. You probably have mood changes and need more blood, too. Are you hungry?”
She nodded, slowly. “Yes.”
His eyes flared. “Who feeds you? Is it a male?”
The possessiveness should have pissed her off, but it didn’t. If anything, it made her fucking melt. Jesus, could she get any hotter for this man?
She just knew tonight’s dream was going to be epic.
“No. I have two daywalker females who feed me.”
“Two? That’s unusual, no?”
“My hunger has always been higher than most.”
“Why?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know.” That was no word of a lie.
“From now on, you will feed from me.”
Her eyes widened. “I can’t do that.”
“Why can’t you?”
The regal arrogance in his tone spoke of a man well accustomed to being obeyed. Well, not with this chick. It didn’t matter she’d been around back in the day when women were chattel, they weren’t any more.
Hallelujah.
“I have duties to my daywalkers. I have to uphold that.”
He bit back a word, and irritation had him lowering his head, hiding his face from her. Through gritted teeth, he admitted, “I did not know about the dreams. I only knew of the loss in self-control and the issues with feeding.” The exasperation bled away and was replaced with an interesting hoarseness. “The dreams are new to me.”
“You’re kidding, right? Like they’re old school for me. The first time it happened, I came so hard, I disturbed my guards.” She let out a remembered hiss of annoyance. “The entire coven probably knows I get off in my sleep now.”
His eyes flared, and not for the first time, she saw the nictitating membrane that spoke loudly and clearly of his otherness.
All Shifters blended with ease into human society. Dragons were no different. Save for that thin layer of flesh that covered his eyes from time to time.
It was kind of gross, but she noticed it only appeared in moments of high stress. Or emotion.
It actually reassured her when it ‘waved hello.’ Its presence helped her monitor his reactions, which considering his poker face, was very helpful. It was a discomforting sensation to feel like she was the only one experiencing this bond with him. He was so cool and fucking calm that she didn’t know whether she was coming or going.
Of course, that changed through the day.
She definitely came when sleep hit.
“I think it’s time we spoke about why you won’t claim me.” There was no hurt in her voice, mostly because she didn’t feel it.
He wasn’t rejecting her. How could he be? He wouldn’t be here if that were the case.
She knew he felt compelled to come here. To be with her and to visit her.
For whatever reason, that stopped him from taking things to the next level.
She wouldn’t have brought it up, but the conversation had taken a decidedly unusual turn.
“It’s difficult for me to speak of.”
“Well, I have all night,” she said bluntly, and she meant it. She wasn’t budging until he told her what was going on. The dreams were getting too intense to ignore now. She needed to know that resolution was in sight.
He grimaced but fell silent. As he reached for his cup, she watched him take a sip.
“Better?” she asked, amused at the pleasure on his face as he took a deeper sip.
“It’s like tiramisu.”
“Kinda.” She wiggled her head. “I can get why you’d think that.”
He smiled at her. She smiled back.
Then, letting him know she meant business, she stayed silent and began to scan the coffee shop for signs she missed behind the counter.
It was a busy café, and truth was once she was in the zone, all that mattered were the orders. Not getting them wrong, keeping the customers happy.
Until Georgios, she’d never taken a seat in her coffee shop.
How crazy was that?
This one was her favorite. And not just because Meeting (Coffee) Grounds was where Georgios came.
It always had been the one she favored most. It reminded her of the old and original coffee shops back in Holland, when she’d lived there in the seventeen-eighties.
Coffee shops, back then, had been a meeting ground for intellectuals who discussed the craziest and brightest notions and philosophies around.
This store was so close to the university, students were always here. They brought with them a youthful vibe, as well as that air of knowledge.
They knew their shit.
Or they sold it well, at any rate.
Armchairs like her grandmother would sit in were dotted around the store beside low tables. They sat in clusters of two or three. A few leather couches held more customers. The mismatch hodge podge was bizarrely stylish, and with the creamy walls with block brown stripes here and there, with the picture frames holding pictures of, unbeknownst to the public, coven members, it was like someone’s living room.
She liked that vibe. And i
t was holding up well.
A couple of the armchairs would need reupholstering soon, and a few tables needed their legs looked at—she hated when a table wobbled…
“My father killed my mother.”
And like that, all thoughts of interior decoration and maintenance flew out the damn window.
Three
The look on his leman’s face was one he’d have preferred to have never seen.
But how could he avoid it?
His very reason for not claiming her was behind this harsh truth, and she would suffer for that reasoning.
A fact that pained him.
Greatly.
“I wasn’t always so serious,” he told his leman, watching as she frowned at him but settled back into the armchair, like she was preparing herself for a long story. “I used to laugh and joke, be the life and soul of any party. I was a source of great pride to my father and to the House. Our family has always been close to that of the Dreconis line. We have been friends for more millennia than you could imagine.” He sucked in a sharp breath. “Remy would be the first to tell you I was a nuisance, but I used to be his advisor. His right hand man.”
When his words drifted to a halt, the memories having the power to grind him into dust, she gently prompted, “Then your father killed your mother?”
He nodded. “I resigned, of course. Took myself away. The shame was more than I could stand, and I saw no reason to impose my presence on a friend as loyal as Remy, who stood by me.”
“What happened?”
That she hadn’t run away screaming buoyed him a little, he wouldn’t lie. He’d expected her to.
Such an admission wasn’t exactly like confessing to being unable to manage an overdraft or an inability to put dirty clothes in the hamper—he’d seen human shows on the marvel that was the miracle she’d mentioned earlier, TV. He’d watched the petty arguments that occurred between lovers in this plane, and had learned that such trivialities could make or break a relationship here. A fact that beggared belief.
With a sigh, he propped his head against the wing of his armchair. He closed his eyes, preferring not to look at her scorn and shame at being his mate. At being a part of his line.
“A Dragon and his leman are this plane’s equivalent of a Prince Charming and his Cinderella.”
“Without the ingrained sexism, I’d hope?”
He blinked his eyes open at that. “Ingrained sexism?”
She wafted a hand. “You know, the notion that a woman can only save herself if a man comes riding to her rescue.”
His mouth worked at that. How to respond?
She laughed. “I see that there’s plenty of ingrained sexism at play.” For a strange reason, she sounded more amused than irritated.
Mother, she was a bizarre female.
“I suppose so. Lemans are always strong. We only mate with Sanguennas or Sanguen. We must breed with only the strongest of nightwalkers. Only they are capable of sustaining the bond, of carrying offspring.”
“Really? How come I haven’t heard more about it?”
“Because the last leman to be discovered before Remy found his, was over half a millennium ago.”
Her eyes flared wide and her shoulders dropped in surprise. “Why?”
“Because that’s when my father killed my mother.”
“Why, Georgios? What made him do that?”
“A leman and their Dragon mate are bound in so many intrinsic ways it’s impossible to describe. A soulmate is a small comparison to the essence behind the bond. There is no need for jealousy, no room for it.
“A leman wants only her mate. The mate wants only his leman.”
She tilted her head to the side. “But your father felt jealousy?”
Surprised that she’d picked up on that, he murmured, “Yea.”
“How come?”
“I don’t know. In every generation, there’s an aberration.”
“But, your mother was a Sanguenna, right?”
He nodded. “Of course. As I said, we can mate with no other. The Mother made it so millennia afore, and it has not changed since.”
She pursed her lips. “What did he do? Take her out into the sun?”
He closed his eyes. Nodded.
Silence fell, and he waited, expecting to hear footsteps as she walked away from him. Instead, he heard the leather of the armchair creak as she moved, and then, placed her hand on his knee. “I’m so sorry, Georgios. I can’t imagine how hard and painful that is for you.”
He gulped, prepared himself for the worst, then opened his eyes. “You do not hate me?”
She scowled at him. “Why should I?”
“My blood is tainted,” he told her earnestly, not willing to lie to her. “I have no right to claim you. No right to bring you into the twisted lineage that saw fit to destroy the most purest forms of love.” He swallowed heavily. “I can’t do it. Can’t expose you to that. It would be cruel of me to make you mate with a man in whose bloodline insanity flows.”
For endless seconds, she was quiet. She was studying him, he knew. She wasn’t just looking at his face blindly, absorbed in thought. Her eyes were scanning his features, reading them, searching for answers to questions he didn’t know she’d asked.
After what felt like a lifetime, she murmured, “How much do you know of my bloodline?”
“Nothing. Like with mine, it’s difficult to discern more unless you ask the people closest to me.”
“And you haven’t done that? Haven’t asked around?”
He shook his head. “No. Rumor or gossip is of no interest to me. If I want to know something, I will ask you.”
“There’s only one way to kill a Vampire. To expose them to the sun. But there’s a way to punish them for an eternity.”
“To freeze them,” Georgios answered, already knowing this and wondering where she was going with the rather gruesome topic.
It always horrified him to think that a Vampire could be frozen and subsist in an endless stasis. Fully aware that they were being frozen, aware that they were being punished. Unable to do anything but endure.
He wondered how long it took to go mad. To be driven to the brink of insanity before toppling over the edge and falling into the chaotic chasm below.
“My mother was frozen. For close to twenty years.”
Her statement had him jerking upright. “I beg your pardon?”
“You heard me correctly,” she assured him.
“She was being punished? By whom?”
“Her stepfather.”
His eyes widened. “She had one?”
“Yes. It’s an unusual tale. My grandfather perished during one of the many ridiculous Crusades. My grandparents weren’t mates but were a political match—arranged from birth. You know how it was back then.”
He nodded. He knew those times far better than he did these bizarre ones. Where a woman’s chastity meant nothing. Where men wasted time behind screens, watching ball games, instead of claiming and protecting their territory.
It was, to him at any rate, beyond peculiar.
“Well, my grandfather died, and my grandmother, who was crazy beautiful, was pushed into another political match. This time with a human. He was a cruel man. Quick to temper. Even quicker to punish. My mother told me once that she had never been frightened of anything in all her life until she met the Butcher of Belaise.”
His eyes widened. “The Butcher of Belaise?”
“You know of him?”
“Aye,” he whispered hoarsely, and would never wish any female on the bastard. “He was a monster. There were never any enemies left to take as prisoner after a battle with him. He enjoyed the destruction. Loved the glory of war.”
“There is no glory in war,” she retorted, her lip curling into a sneer. “It was a strange match. I’m sure you know as well as I do that Vampires never marry humans, but at the time, my grandmother’s family held territory that Belaise wanted, and the Butcher of Belaise knew their secret.
“To keep the coven safe, my grandmother was sacrificed.”
“What happened to your mother?”
“He tried to rape her several times, and she always managed to fight him off. My grandmother tried to protect her by attempting to poison him. He killed her, then punished my mother by having her shipped off to what is now Siberia. He had land up there, and allies who saw to her punishment on his behalf. They felt no compunction because she was the ‘evil undead.’ She remained there until the bastard died, and our family could come and rescue her.”
“They couldn’t rescue her before?”
“No.” She swallowed heavily, the story evidently as difficult for her to recount as his had been for him. And who could blame her? Her mother had been tortured. His had suffered a quick but brutal death. In this, they both knew what it felt like to suffer on their parent’s behalf. “He would have butchered the whole coven. They had to protect the many rather than the few.” She closed her eyes, and it was obvious the thought made her feel sick to her stomach. “It has taken me a long time to forgive my mother’s coven, but I did. My mother did many years before I was born.”
“Did she…” How to word it? “Was your mother crazed by the punishment?”
“Sometimes. It came like a wave. It would draw her in, and she was unable to fight the tide. It would drown her, and then, she’d be free of it. She might be free for three decades and, out of nowhere, be recaptured for a handful of weeks.”
“Lady Mother, what a torment for you.”
“The reason I’m telling you this, Georgios, is because we all have nasty, dirty little secrets in our pasts.” She eyed him, not letting him drop eye contact. “Our histories are loaded with worse, I’m sure.”
He shook his head. “That’s different. You’re speaking of an atrocious act that took place against your mother, one that wasn’t perpetrated by your father. It was a taint outside of your bloodline. I can find no such comfort in my heritage.”
Lara pinched the bridge of her nose. “My mother, during those moments when she wasn’t lucid, would do horrible things, Georgios. To me. To my father. To the coven. She was wicked. Evil at those times. So much so the Sanguen would often discuss ending her life.”
Leman Page 4
