by Gaja J. Kos
That last part was directed at Santino.
He swore, his fingers almost crushing mine. “I’ll fry the stronzo.”
“No, my friend.” Caz smiled, and there was nothing warm in the expression. “That pleasure is mine.”
18
“Grab what you need,” Santino said once we were inside the cozy cabin again.
It had taken a few exchanges, but eventually Caz had given in to Santino’s demand that he should stay behind. Caz had sworn to the gods that he would fry Santino’s scales if Kauer showed up at the morass and he wasn’t there to kill him himself, but even I could tell there was a fair chance the PI would remain behind, running the show from whatever dump he was hiding in. Besides, I wasn’t entirely convinced Kauer was under the spell. I hadn’t sensed anything on him back in Piran. But if he was still a free man, then why was he doing the Rusalkas’ bidding? Because they ensnared his men?
I kept my thoughts to myself while the two Perelesnyks argued, catching bits of their conversation. It seemed Santino was adamant not to draw the Rusalkas’ attention any more than he already would, and two dragons, while effective, just might cause irreparable damage when it came to stealth.
Grumbling, but in agreement, Caz had taken off a few moments earlier, the wide span of his wings cracking those branches that reached just a little too far out onto the shore. A part of me was still terrified of his massive form, the glint of his scales even more vivid than nature after a refreshing spring storm.
I shook away the memory and focused on Santino’s words, miserably failing at the task. “Huh?”
“We can’t be sure if the twenty-four hour deadline will hold,” he repeated. “The cottage isn’t secure enough to withstand such an attack.”
I watched him stock up with a few more handguns from the small safe hidden in the wall, the dark duffel bag now almost perfectly full. “And we’ll go…?”
“Underground.” There was a hint of a smile lining his words, even if the hard set of his gaze that lingered on me remained the same. “After all, every dragon has his lair.”
I opened my mouth, but no words came.
Of course he had a lair. It was only logical.
But as it appeared, my mind was processing the information at a below average pace. I realized I still thought of Santino as a man—a human male. And they usually didn’t have dwellings hidden under the surface of the earth. At least not in times of peace.
I chewed on my bottom lip. Seeing Santino without the image of a dragon springing to life in my mind perhaps wasn’t such a bad thing, even if it made me forget about facts that should have been obvious. Maybe what we had—what we started to nurture between us—was still salvageable. A ghost of a smile touched my lips, and I drew on that imprint of warmth, savoring every heartbeat of strength it offered.
I walked over to the corner where my—much smaller—bag was still stashed away from that morning we fled from Piran, and heaved it across my shoulder. Perhaps for the last time. My views on murdering the entire morass hadn’t changed even in the light of Caz’s news, but now I was at least sure that—regardless of the outcome—my fugitive days were nearing their end.
Freedom or a grave.
But no more running.
And that was fine.
I headed towards the kitchen to pick up some supplies, but Santino stopped me before I even crossed the threshold. “The food is already downstairs. So is the coffee.”
I whirled around and leaned against the rustic doorframe. Santino was moving through the airy living room with liquid grace, all those honed muscles that adorned his naked form rippling in breathtaking harmony. I knew then. I truly knew.
Despite the sting of his lies—or, rather, the ugly omission of truth—the attraction I felt towards him was still very much alive. As was the affection.
What Santino had done for me, but even more so, all those moments we shared that had wrapped me in bliss I hadn’t believed existed… None of it could be erased.
In silence, I observed him gather the rest of the provisions, and before I could catch myself, my mind filled with thoughts—wondering just how all this magnificent strength would manifest in his dragon form. The good looks were an inherent part of every Perelesnyk, thanks to the incubus side of their nature. I knew as much from theory, and Caz had definitely proven it to be true. But there was something about Santino that made me believe it wasn’t merely the sexual power drawing me to him. Quite the contrary, actually.
I frowned. It wasn’t only my perception, some illusion I wanted to believe in…
The past Santino had spoken of, the confession that eerily resonated with my own, marked him as what he had fought so hard to make himself out to be. Human.
Human, with human flaws and skeletons that did not rest idly in his closet, but trailed behind him like shadows—a living, breathing part of him.
It was then I remembered that flash in Caz’s eyes—that brief glimpse when surprise, and not the good kind, had won over the composure and easygoing attitude he’d flown in with. Santino might have shared his secret, but it wasn’t the only one he fought to drown in his depths.
“How did you know of the morass’s location?” I asked, clutching the duffel bag so tightly my knuckles turned white.
He paused, the half-turned position of his body giving me a glimpse of his firm ass, as well as his sculpted chest. I blew out a thin breath as desire swept through me, but even the fire kindling in my core wasn’t enough to drive away the fear that crawled through my veins and wrapped its cold talons around my throat.
Something dark touched Santino’s eyes, but I sensed no malice in his demeanor. Only a kind of bitter resignation.
Which was worse, I couldn’t tell.
“Downstairs.”
I nodded weakly, then followed him through a narrow cellar door, all the while fighting the eerie premonition that this just might be the one truth we couldn’t survive.
Expectations can be funny things, sometimes. As a human, I’d always imagined that a dragon’s lair was some cavern tucked beneath a mountain and filled with the crunchy bones of their victims—not to mention overflowing with gleaming treasure the beasts had plundered from unsuspecting men. Naturally, that changed when I became a Rusalka and gained more intimate insight into the many faces of the supernatural. I knew the bones and treasure were something belonging to myth, not reality, but the idea of a gloomy cavern stuck with me.
So when Santino led me through a secret door in the basement, then deeper and deeper underground, I was more than a little surprised to find that his lair was, in fact, a home. A bunker, actually, even if it didn’t have the typical claustrophobic feeling those types of explosion-proof boxes normally gave off. The walls were set wide apart, the furniture sparse, yet tasteful, and the ceiling—well, the ceiling was so high I had to crane my neck just to take it all in.
Designed to accommodate a dragon, I thought, noting that, indeed, every inch of the space was built to withstand a shift into a much, much larger form.
While Caz had been almost frightfully big, I couldn’t help but wonder if the proportions of the lair were just an architectural kink, or an indicator of Santino’s even grander form. Somehow, I was betting on the latter.
An involuntary shiver slid through me, but I firmly reminded myself of what I told him in the woods. Why all that anger had welled up inside me when the carefully constructed lies and omissions tumbled down.
I loved him.
I wasn’t a Rusalka, prey for the dragons, any longer. But even if I were, I doubted my feelings for him would have changed. Things would have been infinitely more complicated, but I was positive the core of it would stay the same.
I had asked Santino for honesty, and that was precisely what I needed to offer myself, as well. I couldn’t let some old fears control me just because it was hard. So I squared my shoulders and followed Santino through the wide chamber, my feet padding lightly against the concrete floor.
He took me
all the way to the far corner, where bookshelves dominated the concrete walls. A rug was stretched across the bare ground with a love seat perched atop it, and a small club table positioned by its side. It appeared that even in his lair, Santino had stayed true to his tastes.
Briefly, my gaze skimmed the many hardcover and paperback volumes, and all too easily I imagined Santino sitting here, enjoying the quiet of his solitary fortress below the surface.
I dropped my duffel bag on the carpet when he sat on the couch, then claimed the empty seat next to him. The hem of the shirt I was still wrapped in slid dangerously high up my thighs, and something heated came to life in Santino’s silver gaze as he glimpsed the newly exposed skin. My own breath faltered. There was nothing keeping me from seeing the hardness of his erection grow.
The memory of how good it had felt to have him sheathed inside me exploded in my mind, bringing fire to my loins and making me yearn to obliterate this wretched gap between us. But I held my ground, inhaling deeply.
“Any man in his right mind would take you right now, piccola,” Santino whispered, his voice low and thick with hunger I knew all too well. “I can smell your arousal, Liana. I can taste your need for me in the air, so potent and seductive, I want nothing more than to explore its invitation.”
I swallowed. Hard.
I wanted to say yes. I wanted to take him up on that offer, to feel his flesh pierce my core as his mouth claimed mine, so passionately and thoroughly as only he could.
And yet the words that spilled from my lips were nothing of the kind—even if my voice remained husky with burning, almost overpowering need. “Answers first, Santino. You owe me that much.”
“That I do, piccola. That I certainly do.”
He trailed his fingers down my chest, following the line of the unbuttoned shirt collar all the way to the swell of my breasts. But just as my nipples tightened, just as I was on the verge of forgetting my resolve and begging him to knead that sensitive flesh, Santino pushed off the couch. He strode towards the perfectly clear area in the center of the space, the distance between us a painful relief.
“I desire you, Liana. I desire you so badly I burn for you with each moment we spend apart. I know… In my heart, I know that you are my mate. That you are the one I have been waiting for all these centuries. The one to illuminate the darkness, to spend eternity with, loving each other’s scars. My every instinct is thrashing to keep you by my side… But I want the choice to be yours. And I want you to make it with no more secrets lying between us.” He took a shuddering breath, then locked his gaze with mine, the silver so vivid a small sound bubbled into the air from my throat. “This is me. All of it. And if you still wish to speak with me after, I will answer anything, anything you ask me, cara.”
His voice was so raw, I couldn’t even breathe. The weight of his pain pressed upon my chest, the hurt visible on his handsome features bringing tears to my eyes. But I didn’t let them fall.
All I said in a broken whisper was, “Show me.”
Magic spun around Santino in a fierce storm of power, temporarily sweeping him from my sight. I watched the almost electric haze grow, saw him rise towards the looming ceiling with a kind of haunting grace that was captivating and terrifying at the same time.
A soft breath left my lips when the magic faded, and the person standing before me wasn’t the silver-haired, charismatic Italian man any longer, but a magnificent dragon with scales that gleamed like moonlight and eyes of perfect obsidian black. My gaze drifted along his form, along the powerful, silver ridges, then down to the curved talons of such a light argent they were almost white.
Santino stretched his leathery wings slightly, almost imperceptibly, but otherwise made no move. Only observed. And waited.
Waited to see if I would recognize him.
If I would run.
I met his gaze and swallowed. The tales of a fiery death whispered in the morass, the nightmares every Rusalka braved...
All of it was true.
Mesechyn wasn’t a legend.
He was standing before me, his scales glimmering as brightly as the harvest moon on a clear October night.
19
Mesechyn looked at me with those onyx eyes, unblinking. Without meaning to, I held my breath while my heart hammered inside my chest so wildly it sent shivers rushing through every inch of my body. And yet, despite the shadows of terror clawing at my chest, I didn’t move.
I didn’t try to run away.
Not because there was nowhere for me to go, but because I remembered. I remembered Santino’s smile, the warmth dancing on his features every time he looked at me—an echo I was seeing even now.
Mesechyn was a murderer. But Santino wasn’t.
Slowly, I forced some air into my lungs.
Although the shift in the world had altered who I was, I still originated from the very race he hunted. That part of me would never cease to exist, just like I could never forget that I had once been human—a human who had taken her life in a moment of despair after her parents had disowned and thrown her out because of a boy she had thought she loved.
No, I wasn’t just a mermaid. I was three beings, pressed into a single body, each as vital as the next. And Santino—he knew. He knew of my past, and yet all he had done was try to save me. How could I give him anything less than the chance to explain his own darkness in return?
I didn’t know whether my resolution showed on my features, or if he simply felt that I’d stared long enough at the creature who brought nightmares to every Rusalka’s dreams, but the magic swirled around him once more, and when the cocoon of power dispelled, he was Santino again, standing naked on two perfectly human feet.
With trembling knees, I got up from the couch and took a step forward. Then another.
The hurt flashing across his face tore at my heart, and while a part of me wanted nothing more than to wrap him in my arms, my instincts still pleaded caution.
“Sit with me,” I whispered.
Santino remained still for a while longer, then slowly crossed the empty space gaping between us. He swiped a black robe from the nearby armchair and wrapped it around himself, then strode past me to the love seat—mindful not to come too close. That small gesture was enough to dispel any lingering doubts.
Despite having stayed, despite having made up my mind, Santino still didn’t want to do anything that might spook me.
I released a breath and joined him on the couch. The heat of his body washed over mine, the scent I had come to recognize as his now mixed with a hint of fire.
With a start, I realized I didn’t mind it.
This was Santino. All of it.
And I was just as tempted to wrap myself in that ensnaring perfume.
I licked my suddenly dry lips when our gazes met, and despite the roaring of my instincts—placed a sweaty palm on his knee.
“Why me?” I asked. “Why would you save me?”
Santino closed his eyes. A trembling exhale uncurled from his chest, then, gently, he covered my hand with his, his thumb drawing tentative circles across my skin.
“Because I love you.” He looked down at me, the silver in his eyes a blend of shadows and embers. “Because the legend, the hunter, while all too real, isn’t who I want to be any longer. Hadn’t wanted to be for a very long time.”
I swallowed past the lump in my throat, the admission of his history lying between us like a void. I didn’t question Santino’s affection for me, and my own response to his proximity was perfectly clear, but I still needed to tread with care. Our relationship was too fragile, and the embers of who he had once been could burn the gossamer vines with even the smallest of flame.
“What changed?”
Although he didn’t release my hand, he stiffened. “Do you really want to know?”
“I do.”
He leaned back, resuming to draw circles on my skin, but the caresses became more guarded. Perhaps even a little strained.
“Nothing I say will change
what I did,” he said quietly. “And I want you to know that I’m not trying to excuse my actions or the blood I carry on my hands. Even if I had been made into a nightmare, it does not relieve me of my responsibility.”
“Made?” I whispered.
The shadows on his features darkened. “I was orphaned before I reached my second year of life. It was only much later, with no small amount of Caz’s help, that I discovered my true parents had been killed by rallied villagers—killed because they would not reveal the location of their nest.
“For centuries I believed my parents were the vampire and witch who raised me, that I was some oddity, born of a blend of magic and blood immortality.” He sighed. “I should have recognized the lie when I first encountered another of my kind. But by that time, I was already integrated too deeply in the twisted reality my stepparents had formed… I couldn’t accept the offered truth, even if a part of me fought to.”
I sucked on my lip, frowning. “But why would they lie to you? Adopted or not, it shouldn’t have made a difference…”
“It did to them.” His smile was filled with so much sadness I clutched his knee tighter, wishing I could syphon away the pain. “They wanted a weapon. And for that, they had to isolate me from my kind. Perelesnyks are hunters, but we are not murderers. Not without a cause.”
Unlike some of my sisters, I thought.
A jolt of anger—and remorse—sliced through my insides. The Rusalkas feared the incubi dragons based on a single man’s actions. They—we—allowed that fear to grow into hatred for an entire species, even when the rest of the world saw us in the exact same light.
I shuddered. Gods, this was such a mess… A mess I had inadvertently been a part of.
“So they took you as a child and shaped you to their liking.” I shook my head. “That’s horrible, Santino. How could you have known that what you were doing was wrong? They overrode your moral compass, your instinct, before it even had the chance to develop…”
