by Anya Nowlan
“I didn’t need to run from anything,” Julie scoffed, feeling anger heating her from the inside out now. “And I didn’t hide from Antonio. The night we shared, he made it clear that I knew it could only be that one night, and that was fine. It was all I wanted.
“I had no intention of getting pregnant, but the condom must have broken. I did not come after him because I assumed he would not want to be a part of Tony’s life, because there could be no more than one night between us.”
The look on Amira’s face told her that the woman didn’t believe a word she was saying.
Then again, she didn’t need to explain herself to Amira either. So why did she want to, regardless?
“I do not think you understand the danger you’ve put your child in, girl,” Amira said then, turning away from the crib.
Unlike her son, the matriarch of the Capirelli family didn’t seem to have an ounce of interest in her grandchild, other than for the trouble his existence was causing her.
“Are you threatening me?”
“I am simply telling you what is the truth. My son will marry Rossella. They together will have his heir. And it will be his firstborn son.”
Amira’s expression didn’t change as she uttered the words, quirking a brow at Julie as if to prompt a response of understanding from her.
“For that to happen, your son can no longer be.”
Julie’s stomach dropped. She opened her mouth but no sound came out. Where Rossella had offered to buy her son off of her, his grandmother was telling her in no uncertain terms that he would need to be disposed of. Soon.
Every moment she spent under that roof could be a step closer to tragedy.
“Simply something to remember,” Amira said lightly, offering Julie a mirthless smile.
The older woman brushed past Julie, and she could feel the heat of the dragon emanating off of her. Instead of heating her, it chilled Julie to the bone.
I have to get out, she thought, scrambling for the diaper bag the moment the door clicked shut behind Amira. I can’t stay here with these fucking insane dragons!
Eight
Antonio
The moment Julie fled from the house, the air around Antonio heated up unbearably. His dragon was intimately aware of every movement of his mate, and as soon as she went so far that he couldn’t sense her anymore, it lashed out with pure, unquestioning fury.
He scrambled out of the bathroom, having been getting ready to turn in for the night.
Julie, Antonio thought, his senses reaching out to her and Tony, but she was too far already.
She must have been running like crazy.
With a growl on his lips, he tore out of his private suite, a snarl on his lips. He didn’t need any evidence to know that it was his mother who had to be behind this. Julie wouldn’t simply leave like that, not after the day they’d had together.
He ran up the stairs to the roof, barefoot, his white shirt partially unbuttoned and his slacks straining around his thighs as his dragon fought against him. It was a struggle keeping the beast in until he could get out into clear air. The moment he threw the door leading to the roof open, the beast tore forward, twisting his body in the change.
His muscles elongated, tearing him in all directions at once. Within a couple of steps, he had reached the edge of the roof and thrown himself off of it toward the brightly lit courtyard below. Before he could ever get close to it, the massive, dark copper wings that sprouted from his back had opened and carried him into the skies.
His muzzle burned with the dragonfire within, struggling to be kept inside. He wanted to lash out, he wanted to break something, he wanted to roar – he wanted his mate back. It took heavy concentration to get himself to actually reach out with his now more powerful senses to search for Julie, instead of just flying around aimlessly in his boundless fury.
Where are you, he called, cursing that he had never given her a dragonstone pendant – it would have made it easier to find her now.
It didn’t take long until he sensed her, though, tracking a path through the forest to the east of the villa. He made a beeline for her, cutting over the treetops as he closed in on her quickly. Without thinking about it, he swooped down, stretching out his clawed feet, and snatched her suddenly, but gently off the ground in a cage of talons and muscled feet.
Julie screamed, but Tony laughed at the top of his lungs. The tiny dragon’s heartbeat was reverberating in Antonio’s ears, and it filled him with pride. Though too young to shift yet, the boy already recognized that which was so natural to their kind.
“Antonio!” Julie gasped. “Let me down!”
She wasn’t hurt, he made sure of that, but he also wasn’t about to put her down yet.
Not yet, he projected, the sound ringing in her ears. But soon.
He knew exactly where he was going to take them. It was no more than a twenty-minute flight, and by the time Antonio set Julie and Tony down, the boy was once again blissfully asleep in his mother’s arms, completely unfazed by the sudden flight. It was more than could be said about Julie.
With her hair scattered around her in a wild mane, she stared at Antonio as if he was a madman as he touched down first as a dragon, and then changed into his human form. He was smoothing back his hair as Julie glared at him, looking about ready to try and deck him again.
“You… You… I don’t even know what to say to you!” she hissed.
“You had plenty of words in the skies,” Antonio said, walking up to her and spinning her toward the small cottage he had flown them to.
She’d cussed up a storm during the flight, calling him every vaguely-close-to-an-actual-curse thing she could in the presence of a small child. He had particularly enjoyed ‘you overgrown, pompous winged lizard’ as an insult.
“Your brother at least had the decency to get an airplane,” Julie growled as they stepped into the house.
Antonio flicked on the lights and wordlessly scooped up the child from her arms, settling him in a ridiculously oversized leather chair in the large living room, making sure Tony couldn’t roll out of it in his sleep. Julie was standing in the middle of the room, shaking with anger, and something that Antonio couldn’t put his finger on.
Whatever it was, it needed to be resolved, now. If this little outburst had taught him anything, it was that as much as he’d thought losing his riches would decimate him, he now knew that it was nothing compared to the pure panic and fear of being left without his mate. The moment she’d disappeared from his radar, he’d thought his world would collapse right then and there.
He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her into his lap as he sunk into a comfortable couch close to Tony’s chair. She struggled for a moment, but his grip was as iron as it had been when he’d carried her through the skies, and just as gentle.
“Julie,” he said, trying to put all his patience into his voice. “What happened? Where were you running?”
She sat rigidly in his lap, like a wooden doll, avoiding his gaze. He could see tears brimming in her gorgeous green depths, though, and his stomach twisted. Nothing in the world should be allowed to make her sad.
“Was it my mother?”
Her attention snapped to him.
“How did you know?”
“It’s always my mother,” he answered with a sigh, relaxing his shoulders as she uncoiled slightly and leaned into him a little. “What did she do?”
“You’re making it sound like she goes around stirring up trouble,” Julie said with a mirthless chuckle.
“Elderly dragons that have lost their mates rarely have anything better to do.”
“Uh-huh,” she answered, collapsing against his chest now.
She felt so right against him, like she was never meant to be anywhere but right there. His arms tightened around her as if of their own volition, his dragon confirming everything he’d been trying to deny for days now. There was no way in the world that he could ever be capable of letting her go. The year without her had been hell,
and then he hadn’t even been so unquestioningly certain that she was his mate.
Now that he knew, all bets were off.
“Tell me.”
“She… well, she said that when you and Rossella got married, she would bear you an heir. And that this heir would be your… firstborn,” Julie said, her voice shaking a little.
The growl that rose in his throat was terrifying, his expression darkening. It was one thing for his mother to meddle and plot, but to so clearly threaten his son – there could be no excusing that. He had no doubt that Amira had banked on this, hoping that Julie would run and that he would not follow.
That she would think so little of him was just an insult added to the injury.
“And then you ran to protect yourself and Tony,” he deadpanned, the statement ringing true as no answer came from Julie. “She is wrong,” he said sharply, grabbing Julie by the chin and turning her face to look at him. “Understand this, Julie. She was wrong. I would never allow anyone to hurt my child, or you. Not my mother, not anyone. It simply will not happen.”
The look she gave him told him that she wasn’t being entirely truthful. He got the nagging feeling that there was something she wasn’t telling him.
“What else are you hiding?” he asked, a bark in his voice that he rushed to smooth out. “You will never have to be afraid of me, Julie. I know I haven’t done much to make you certain of that so far, but I swear I will. You can, and you must, tell me everything.”
She clearly hesitated, but after looking at Tony, Julie took a deep breath and turned back to him. He could feel how uncomfortable she was, and deep inside he cursed the fact that he had not gone to her himself, sending Giovanni to look for her instead. So much could have been avoided if she had not been brought in front of Rossella and Amira.
“Rossella, she offered to buy the baby. She said she’d raise him as her own, and that she’d make it worth my while. Not that I would ever agree to it, but I don’t think I would have been out of the country before something horrible happened to Tony. Just like your mother, I think Rossella wouldn’t have tolerated a… what did she call him? A half-breed?”
Her nose crinkled in disgust and Antonio was overcome with such raw rage that he could barely keep himself from letting the dragon take control. He wanted nothing more than to fly to his home and confront his mother, and then his betrothed, for what they had done to his mate.
But his first commitment lay with his child, and Julie. It had never been as painfully obvious as now – he had lost them once, and he hadn’t even known it. He couldn’t do it again.
“I swear to you, Julie, la mia bellezza, that I will never let anyone, anyone, hurt you or Tony. There’s nothing more important to me than having you two with me, and being able to keep you safe.”
It was the first time he truly felt like what he was saying came from the hearts of himself and his dragon. For most of his life, he had been doing what tradition demanded of him and what his bloodline expected. This, however? This was what he needed.
Without sparing it another thought, knowing that the path forward was clear, he pulled Julie into a kiss he intended to never break.
Nine
Julie
The kiss was raw and powerful and demanding, leaving her reeling. He didn’t give her a moment to gather her thoughts when he kissed her again, his arms rowing over her body, pulling her closer. To her surprise, Julie found herself leaning into the embrace, and the kiss.
It wasn’t just that this was Antonio, the man who was the father of her baby, and the one that she had been fantasizing about since they parted ways. There was more here, something that she’d been trying so hard to deny, and yet what blossomed in her chest so readily.
She felt safe with him. And happy. And like she could finally be who she wanted to be. It had nothing to do with his wealth, or his family, or anything that came with it. It was just his presence, the strength he exuded, mingling with that understated sweetness of his that had swept her off her feet the first time, and that she suspected could do it again over and over, no matter how much she tried to deny it.
His arms on her body felt perfect, and she wanted more. Despite that, her palms went flat against his chest and she dragged herself out of the kiss, twisting in his lap.
“We can’t do this. You’re going to be married in what, a week?”
His eyes, swirling with gold, crinkled at the corners as his palms drifted down her back and stopped on her waist, sending coils of heat thrumming through her.
“I might get married in a week, but it will not be to anyone other than the woman in my arms right now.”
As if to accent that, he squeezed his thumbs against her hips for a moment and then pulled her closer, having her straddle him. He was so hard that Julie could feel his cock throb against her crotch.
“What are you telling me here?” she gasped as he leaned in, trying to steal another kiss from her.
Her mind was running a mile a minute, but her heart seemed to be blossoming in her chest.
“Enough with the questions,” Antonio growled, sliding his hands under her ass and standing up from the couch as if she weighed nothing.
He carried her through the living room and into a small back room, gently lowering her down on the bed. The door between the living room and the bedroom was left ajar.
“But,” she started, only to be quieted by a firm kiss.
“No more questions,” he told her, pulling back only to tear his shirt off his chest and toss it aside.
The whimper was as involuntary as her hand was traveling up his toned, heart six-pack, loving the way he pressed into her touch. He was carved perfection, nothing had changed in that regard since she’d last seen him. If anything, she was glad that her memory had fooled her into thinking that he was maybe less than what he was actually.
At best, she could assume that it was her subconscious trying to protect her from the disappointment that any man following Antonio would be. Of course, there had been no one but him since Italy, and he was telling her that the same was true for him. Any doubts she might have had were quickly extinguished as he stole a kiss from her, his tongue forcing into her mouth and sending tendrils of need blossoming through her.
Her hips moved willingly as he undid her jeans and tore them off, and her arms rose as if on their own volition when he pulled her shirt off. There wasn’t an ounce of modesty in her mind, because the way he ate her up with his eyes told her that the extra stretch marks and the pregnancy pounds that she still hadn’t shed – and maybe she never would – did nothing to make her any less attractive to him.
If anything, she felt sexier now. She had given him a son, and he worshipped her for it, above and beyond anyone else.
He pulled the cup of her bra down and sucked one nipple into his mouth, making Julie groan and arch her back up, looking for more contact. It was like no matter how close she was, it wouldn’t be enough. She wanted more.
Her fingers tangled in his hair, tugging at it every now and then when she needed a kiss, or when his fingers slid down her stomach and teased her inner thighs. He pressed his palm against her wet sex and she whimpered, her panties soaked before he ever touched her there.
“You’ve missed me,” he whispered, and she palmed his thick, throbbing cock in response.
“You’ve missed me,” she countered, grinning victoriously as he growled, nipping at her nipple.
Nimble fingers undid the button and zipper of his pants, but before she could slide her hand down the front of his boxers, he pulled back and shucked the pants off. Julie hauled herself up on her elbows, taking a moment just to stare at the magnificence that was the father of her child and the one man who could make her do stupid, reckless things… like not running immediately from a clan of ruthless dragons.
He was her dragon. Though she knew that she didn’t have official ownership of him, it felt like she did. It felt like he would always be hers, and she didn’t know how she could be certain of it. Right
at that moment though, she didn’t want to question it, just enjoy it.
His cock was veiny and the tip was dark purple, a bead of precum clinging to it. Her mouth hungered for him, but not as much as her pussy did. When he reached to pull her panties from her hips, she helped him willingly, her legs spreading to invite him in.
“So hungry for me,” he said approvingly, his voice low and dangerous and sending a thrill down her spine. “Will you beg for me?” he asked.
“Will you beg for me?” she countered, wrapping her hand around his cock and tugging once, twice, making his eyes roll back in his head.
“Allora, no begging,” he said, pinning her down on the bed with his wide, powerful body.
Julie laughed, though the sound was smothered by Antonio’s kisses. It became clear why in a moment, when he guided the head of his cock to her entrance and rocked forward slightly. She’d forgotten how truly big he was, and it didn’t help that she had been out of practice for nearly two years. Her body tensed beneath him for a moment, but Antonio didn’t rush her.
He took his time, working himself into her with slow, deliberate thrusts, all the while muffling her cries with his mouth and tongue. He growled against her lips and she ate it up, clinging to his back with her fingers and nails as he opened her up for him. It was like heaven all over again, like that night they’d shared, but even better now since it wasn’t just sex.
It hadn’t entirely felt like it then either, but now there was no questioning it. They were more than two bodies coming together in passion. They were parents to a beautiful baby boy, and lovers despite everything that was going on around them – everything that Julie frankly didn’t want to, nor was she capable of thinking about at that moment.
“Just like I remembered,” he whispered against her lips, catching another whimper as Julie clenched around him.
He was grinding into her with agonizing slowness, every thrust forward filling her to the brim and every pull back making her ache for him. He was rubbing against that spot inside her and it was making her dizzy with need, her breaths coming in short pants as she clung to him, begging him to let her cross to her orgasm.
