Dragon's Pleasure (BBW / Dragon Shifter Romance) (Lords of the Dragon Islands Book 3)

by Isadora Montrose

  “Who are these dragons?” asked Lord Voros of the Treasurer.

  Lord Lindorm consulted the scroll in his hands, but his lips twitched. “Felipe of Estremaura. Richmond of Jersey. Nils of Lindorm. Kian of Lindorm. And Ivan of Balaur,” he said formally, pausing between each name.

  “What is your purpose, lordlings?” asked Voros according to the ancient formula.

  “We seek permission to find our brides,” responded all five in a roar. The room buzzed with laughter. Feet stamped the ancient flagstones.

  “Do we grant permission to these dragons to hunt and capture virgins?” Voros asked the councillors.

  Every lord stood. “If they swear to marry them,” they shouted back. More dragon laughter echoed off the walls and shook the rafters.

  Lindorm rose again and held out his long arms for silence. “Do you so swear, Felipe, Richmond, Nils, Kian, and Ivan?” he slowly intoned.

  “We do,” the applicants cried.

  “The Mate Hunt is commenced,” declared Voros solemnly. “May good fortune accompany each of you on your sacred quest.”

  The rafters again rang with approval. Dust motes drifted down on the velvet robes of councillors and applicants. The five young dragons looked at each other and attempted to grin.

  * * *

  Ivan Sarkany placed a careful hand in the small of his sister-in-law’s back as she navigated the cobblestones in front of the Chateau Lind. He glared at the worn set of sandstone steps that led up to the front doors and turned to meet his brother’s equally concerned eyes.

  “Here,” Hugo said. “Take this.” He thrust the leather satchel he was carrying at Ivan and took his left arm from under his wife’s elbow. He swept Leah into his arms and strode up the steep flight of stairs.

  “Welcome, Hugo,” said Lady Lindorm cheerfully. The dim, cavernous lobby was illuminated by the fire burning in the great fireplace, but the space was still chilly. Hugo carefully set his burden down and steadied his wife’s swollen form until she found her balance.

  “You remember my wife?” he asked Inge Lindorm. “Leah, you met Lady Lindorm on our wedding day.”

  Leah Sarkany put out a plump hand and shook Inge Lindorm’s firmly. “How do you do?” she said.

  “Of course I remember your wife, Hugo,” Inge Lindorm said pleasantly. “Welcome to our home, Leah. You will want to put your feet up, my dear.” She turned to Ivan and held out her hand to him. “It is good to see you again, Lord Ivan.”

  “Thank you for inviting me,” Ivan returned. He breathed in the slightly damp air of the hall. Beneath the aroma of the apple wood and elm burning in the fireplace, and the polish used on the ancient oak paneling, he smelled eau de Lind. That essence of Lindorms that centuries had infused into this castle.

  Suddenly, he was in a grip of a lust even more powerful even than those that were waking him nightly. He swallowed and looked around him. What the hell? She was here. That was the only explanation for the woody he was sure his wool trousers did not adequately conceal. As casually as he dared, he placed Hugo’s satchel in front of his crotch.

  In agony, Ivan followed his hostess and Hugo and Leah up the broad marble steps to the third floor, trying to listen to Lady Lindorm’s comfortable chatter as she told them where the dining room was and how to find their way there. He could not focus on her casual instructions. He just hoped Hugo was paying more attention. What was she doing here?

  The afternoon sunshine was valiantly trying to illuminate the spacious bedroom he was ushered into. The oak paneling had been whitewashed to compensate for the fact that there were only two tall, narrow, east-facing windows. Ivan saw a four-poster bed draped with gold satin and a desk and chair and a couple of armchairs flanking a bow-fronted dresser, before Lady Lindorm spoke.

  “The house is so full, I’ve had to put Felipe Balcazar Mendez in with you,” Lady Lindorm said amiably. “Unfortunately, the Estremauras will not be here for several more days. There is a second bed in the dressing room, Ivan, you can toss Felipe for it. We will meet for drinks before dinner,” She nodded and turned.

  Wordlessly, Hugo took his satchel from Ivan’s death grip. He winked at his younger brother and escorted Leah down the hall in their hostess’s wake leaving Ivan with his tormenting thoughts. He didn’t mind sharing with Felipe. It wasn’t unusual to have to share a bedroom at a large house party. And it would permit him to do a little digging into Balcazar Mendez’s trip to Juist.

  What he minded was finding Christina’s scent permeating the Chateau Lind. He was going to go mad if he had to breathe in the scent of that female for a fortnight. What in the name of all that lived, was Christina van Waals doing here in France? Could she be related to the Lindorms? Ivan hoped not, but why else would she be here? It was unlikely any Lindorm would dare to bring his mistress to this house.

  And if she was related to the Lindorms, he had just stepped into even more shit. No way those dragons were going to be cool with him sleeping with one of their females. No more than he would have been if someone had messed with one of his cousins. He had totally screwed himself with that one night in St. Moritz.

  At least, this room was free of Christina’s enticing scent. He could think here. He wandered into the dressing room. It was a narrow, windowless, paneled room with one wall of closets and drawers. A skinny door swung silently open to the corridor when he pushed lightly on it. Presumably it was there so a servant could come and go without disturbing the occupant of the bedroom.

  The bed in the dressing room was a modern single and the mattress was longer than that of the four-poster. He could be cramped sideways or lengthwise. But what did it matter where he slept? He was never going to close his eyes if he had to be in the same room with that tormenting witch — as it seemed likely would soon happen. Let Felipe sleep in splendor. He brought his bags into the little room and began to unpack.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Ivan had found no trace of Christina’s exotic scent on his way downstairs to the drawing room. Perhaps his fevered imagination had conjured it from nothing? He held that comforting thought until the footmen opened the double doors and he walked into the crowded room.

  She was standing by a tall window. The light of the sinking sun transformed her blonde mane into a glowing nimbus about her lovely face. She was talking to a tall man as blond as she. He could hear her laughter in his bones, but she didn’t even turn her head when he paused on the threshold. So much for his magic.

  Inga Lindorm glided across the palatial room with her hands outstretched. “Come and meet my nieces,” she said cheerfully. She did not escort Ivan to where Christina held court, however, but to a family group that included two pink and white teen-aged girls. Gretchen and Beatrix van Waals. Lady Lindorm it transpired had been born Inge van Waals. Lady Severn was her first cousin. As Christina was undoubtedly another niece. He was so fucking screwed.

  After an agonizing half-hour of making small talk with strangers, all of whom looked at him as if he had two heads, dinner was announced. Ivan escorted the sweet-faced Gretchen to the dining room. She resembled both Christina, and Nils’ beloved. The Lindorms all seemed to favor robust blondes. Gretchen’s blue eyes sparkled and her conversation was guileless. Perhaps she didn’t know she was dragon bait? Not that he was tempted with that seductress in the same room. But why else was the child here?

  Ivan found his place card about halfway down the long damask covered table. Directly in front of him, a colossal silver epergne studded with brilliant flowers and fruits proclaimed the Lindorm’s vast wealth. Glittering tigers and pythons wrestled amidst unlikely palm trees. Saddled elephants lifted serpentine trunks to seize leopards and smash them underfoot. All in all, a charming seventeenth century tableau for the dinner table – as well as twenty pounds of solid attestation to the Lindorm wealth.

  Christina van Waals was sitting opposite him, on the other side of the epergne, between two male Lindorms. She was almost completely obscured by the huge silver table decoration. At this form
al meal, talking across the table was bad manners, but with that monstrosity between them, conversation was impossible. But he could peer around the tigers and elephants. Except that he was supposed to be conversing either with pretty little Gretchen on his left, or imposing Lady Severn on his right.

  When Lady Lindorm at the head of the table, turned from Hugo to Lord Drake on her left, that was the signal for the entire table to switch partners. Ivan let Gretchen finish telling him about her dressage classes and swiveled his head to address Lady Severn. This was the opportunity he had been waiting for. If, as Lord Te Kanewa’s words suggested, the Severn Isles were the key to finding his mate, Lord Severn’s wife was a good place to start.

  “Won’t you call me Anna?” she said graciously. “Your brother’s wife is delightful.”

  “Yes, she is,” Ivan agreed. “I only hope I meet a woman the half as lovely and kind as Leah.”

  Anna Lindorm smiled maternally at him. “May your Mate Hunt be short and sweet,” she said formally.

  Ivan inclined his head. “Thank you. May I know the name of the woman opposite?” He pointed with his chin at Christina.

  Anna’s blue eyes widened and then narrowed. “She is my adoptive daughter,” she said. “Christina.”

  Ivan’s heart sank. She was Lindorm’s niece. Lord Severn’s daughter. He should have remembered that prophecy had a history of being misleading. But Christina’s presence at this party was at least explained. She was part of the family. Which meant he really had screwed a woman connected to all these dragons. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.

  He forced himself to listen to Anna as she began to discuss the events planned for their amusement. And then it was time to talk to little Gretchen again. She was looking a shade crushed after her conversation with Kian Lindorm. What had that graceless lad said or not said to her? Ivan exerted himself to charm the teenager out of her discomfiture, and soon she was prattling happily about her horses again.

  * * *

  Nestled between two of her cousins, Christina settled in for yet another boring formal dinner. She had virtually nothing left to say to Anders or Oskar that could be said in company. She did not dare ask them how they had spent their day. She knew they had been on patrol and did not want to prompt them into indiscretion. She settled for discussing the movies they had last watched. Not that she wanted a blow by blow description of the latest action flicks. But it was better than sitting mute.

  Her mother was seated beside that rat Ivan. He alternated between beguiling her cousin Gretchen and Mamma. Gretchen’s eyes were getting bigger and bigger the longer she sat beside him. Mamma’s face had taken on that softness that indicated she was pleased. Did Mamma think she had found Gretchen a dragon lord? Was that bastard seducing both her mother and her cousin?

  At last the interminable meal ended. They all rose to return to the drawing room for another round of conversation. Thank goodness, even the Eldest had ended the antiquated custom of the gentlemen staying to drink and smoke while the ladies had tea alone. Anders offered her his arm and Aunt Inga caught her eye so she could not just slip off to her room. She had to wend her way behind her stately aunt to help dispense tea and coffee and endure more tedious conversations.

  Aunt Inga waved her towards the samovar. Christina filled tea cups and passed them out with a feigned ease, until Ivan Sarkany put out a well-groomed hand for one. She stiffened her spine, smiled benignly, and filled the delicate china cup with the hot tea. She. Would. Not. Make. A. Scene. Tempting as the prospect of scalding this dragon was.

  “Thank you, Mevrouw,” he said coolly as he took the cup from her. His fingertips brushed hers and she flinched. “It is, of course, delightful to see you again.” His heels clicked and he moved away to make room for the next person.

  Underneath her demure evening dress her nipples peaked and ached. It was as though her entire body was bewitched. She was damned if she was going to spend a week watching that bastard court little Gretchen. Except he had gone to speak to her Aunt Melisande and was handing her the cup of tea Christina had poured for him. Not even her dragon hearing could distinguish what they said over the buzz of rage that filled her head.

  And then Aunt Inga was speaking and the room hushed. “We shall play a game,” she announced. Footmen wheeled in a trolley on which several boxes were stacked. “Gretchen, Beatrix, come and choose, my dears.”

  The Waals sisters rapidly settled on Trivial Pursuit. “You girls shall be captain of your teams,” Aunt Inga said as if she had just had the thought. She separated the unmarried dragons into two groups. Christina found herself drafted into Gretchen’s group and winced as Ivan was directed to join them.

  Aunt Inga had the correct idea. The game made the evening less awkward and displayed the natural loveliness of Christina’s young cousins. The guests were soon laughing and joking and having a good time. Ivan seemed to be in his element as he encouraged the guesses of Gretchen and the other youngsters. Christina participated as little as possible, only offering a suggestion when everyone else was stumped.

  She looked up from the card in her hand to find Ivan’s gold eyes boring into hers. She willed her skin not to flush, but her cheeks heated anyway. Deliberately she met his angry eyes, licked her lips, and focused on the words she was supposed to read aloud. What had he to be angry about? She was the one who had been left aching for what she could never have.

  * * *

  Christina tossed restlessly in her bed, her head thrashed from side to side.

  “You belong to me. Only to me. This is mine.” A large hand covered her pussy and pushed hard enough on her aching crotch to raise her hips completely off the bed. A second hand grabbed the flesh of her right hip and squeezed. The hand left her throbbing sex and gripped her other hip. Even though she tried to press her legs together, a thick hard cock forced its way past her tender and swollen tissues into her passage.

  A deep laugh rumbled above her and she struggled to open her heavy eyes. The big hands shaped her thighs and pulled them around a granite hard waist. “You are mine. Your pussy belongs to me. Only me. You get wet only for me.”

  With every crude announcement that huge cock rammed into her sheath and rubbed against the ridges of her G-spot. The fierce tone and fiercer thrusting aroused her even more. The juicy noise of their movement filled her ears and excited her further.

  Christina spasmed and pleasure speared through her entire body as buttocks, thighs and nipples contracted in fierce waves. But her rough lover wasn’t done. His hips continued to piston into her. Shock waves of release rocked through her body again, and again, until she was limp and her legs fell from his hips without volition.

  “Only mine,” the bass voice growled into her damp hair. “Only mine.” He flooded her passage and Christina woke up with her nightgown gone and her skin wet. The sodden sheets were pulled askew and the pillows lay strewn on the floor as if she had indeed spent the small hours of the night tussling with a dragon lord.

  It was dawn. Daylight seeped in through the edges of the latched shutters. The room was dim, but it was morning. She felt as if she had not slept. As if that incubus had ridden her hard all night. Her pussy was sore. Her throat felt as dry and hoarse as if she had spent the night screaming. When she got out of bed, her thighs cramped and her knees wobbled. She staggered to the bathroom clinging to the furniture.

  Enervated and shaken, Christina stood quaking under the hot shower until she had scrubbed away every trace of her debauch from her bruised and tormented flesh. Afterwards she was not surprised to see that the flush of arousal was still painted across her breasts and neck and halfway down her belly. Worse yet, she still felt unbearably turned on by that careless piece of dragon candy. Except the entire episode was all a bad dream, wasn’t it?

  She needed exercise. The swimming pool in the deepest level of the Chateau tempted her. She found her swimsuit and pulled her robe over it. The halls were dim and silent. Not even the servants were up. Christina wended her way down s
taircases. First wood, then marble, then wood again. Finally, she reached the narrow stone steps that led to the converted dungeons of the original castle. Not even Lord Lindorm needed his own prison. The chateau had purpose-built wine cellars. Turning this area into a luxurious pool had been Uncle Thor’s best idea.

  She was soon slicing through the water letting its silken glide wash the tension from her muscles. Her legs made very little wake as they smoothly kicked her down the pool. Her arms cut through the water just as effortlessly. The rhythm of her powerful crawl calmed her mind. It didn’t matter that Ivan Sarkany was here sniffing around her little cousins looking for a wife. It was none of her business what that snake did. He was not her destiny. Felipe was. Anger was as useless as it was unnecessary.

  * * *

  From the shadowed recesses of the half-lit pool deck, Ivan watched as Christina churned up and down the pool. Her long creamy limbs glowed brightly, he could see the round juiciness of her thighs and bottom. She might be decently covered in that bright red tank, but he could remember just how lovely she was naked. His imagination stripped the suit from her lovely breasts and imagined them unfettered and bobbing in the cool water.

  He knew he should retreat to the men’s changing room again and strip off the swim trunks he had borrowed. He had come to Chateau Lindorm to celebrate his Mate Hunt. His fate was to wed a sweet, untouched maiden who could be transformed into a fertile dragoness. It was his duty to pursue one of those chaste nieces of Lindorm’s and accept his fate.

  But just a whiff of that Valkyrie had his senseless cock leaping like a hooked trout on a fishing line. It took all his resolution to stay out of the water and merely observe as the lithe movements of her lush, athletic body shot Christina’s delectable form from one end of the pool to the other.

  Like all enclosed pools, this one stank of chlorine. But over the eye-watering reek was the intoxicating scent coming off Christina like smoke off a fire. He felt breathless, burning, incapable of moving. He fought to remain in his dark corner and preserve his honor. He fought not to claim his mate.