Chapter 1
Dylan’s return to consciousness was immediate. One second, he was in a world of darkness, the next, completely alert to the fact he was lying flat on his back on what felt to him to be a very uncomfortable surface.
But he didn’t open his eyelids as quickly. Instead, he continued to act as if he was still out of it as he used his dragon senses to ascertain exactly where he was, and hopefully why.
Because one thing he knew, as immediately as he had returned to that consciousness of self, was that beneath some sort of light covering, he was in his human form and completely naked.
Dylan concentrated on that sense of touch.
The material beneath him wasn’t the silk sheets he was used to, but some sort of rough cotton. The blanket draped over him didn’t have the soft comfort of his duvet either, but felt scratchy against his bare skin.
Hearing next.
Noise. Lots of it. Metal clanging on metal. The whoosh of curtains being drawn. People walking, the floor beneath them causing a slight squeak with every step. The sound of human heartbeats. And voices. Lots of voices. All of them human too. Some softly murmuring. Others loud and demanding. One even shouting out abuse at the top of his lungs.
Next came smell.
The seductive aroma of honeysuckle and ripe peaches.
Beneath that a mixture of more perfumes that all coalesced into an amalgam of odors that irritated Dylan’s nostrils.
Human bodies.
Disinfectant of some kind.
Lastly, blood.
Along with the blood came a sense of pain. Varying degrees of it.
Not the pain and blood of one human, but of many.
Danger, his dragon warned.
Yes, but of what kind, and from whom or what?
More to the point, where could Dylan possibly be for there to be so many humans this close to him? Not that he avoided humans particularly, but he did prefer them in twos or threes rather than the dozen or so heartbeats he could detect now.
The uncertainty of his surroundings made him glad of his earlier caution. If he had transformed back into his dragon form when he woke, as his defenses had all cried out for him to do, then that pain and blood might have been enough to send his dragon into a frenzy of violence.
Dylan frowned in concentration as he tried to recall his last conscious thought. He remembered that he and Garrett had just completed a job for Pendragon Security, the company owned by all the Pendragon brothers. Dylan had decided to go for one last lone flight above the English capital before joining Garrett and returning to the family castle in the mountains of North Wales.
It had been a clear evening, the stars visible around him, his own dragon presence cloaked so as not to alarm the humans swarming like ants on the busy and brightly lit streets below. The next moment had come a darkness so complete, the last thing Dylan remembered was his dragon free-falling from the sky.
Something that had never happened to him in all his sixteen-hundred-years’ existence.
Nor did he recall any of his seven brothers, also dragon shifters, ever having mentioned this having happened to them.
He had no recollection of being hit by anything. No memory of pain. Just that sudden and complete blackness and then falling.
He could only assume, as he wasn’t in any pain, that his dragon had healed any injuries he might have suffered when he hit the ground, before he had shifted back to his human form and resumed wearing his clothes. Which, curiously, he no longer seemed to be wearing. He could heal in human form too, of course, but his dragon could do it much quicker.
He—
That seductive aroma of honeysuckle and ripe peaches was coming closer. So near, it saturated Dylan’s senses, dulling, muting everything else, until he felt almost drugged or drunk from the euphoria of that insidious smell.
My God, he had never smelled anything so delicious in his life before.
Mouthwateringly so.
Cock rousing.
Hell, his cock wasn’t just aroused, it was rock hard and throbbing.
Want.
Need.
Claim.
Dylan curled his fingers into the stiffness of the cotton sheet beneath him to stop his talons from piercing the ends of his fingers, as his inner dragon clawed and clamored to be set free.
He lay rigid on the bed now, teeth bared in a grimace, his eyes remaining closed as he desperately fought his body’s instinct to shift into his dragon.
What the hell was happening to him?
More to the point, what was that intoxicating aroma?
He heard a curtain being drawn back, a couple of squeaky footsteps, the curtain being drawn again, followed by several more of those noisy footsteps approaching where he lay.
“Can you tell me where you’re in pain, Mr. Pendragon?”
Mine, his dragon purred in satisfaction.
Dylan’s eyelids flew wide open at the first sound of the female’s voice. Nor did he need his dragon’s endorsement to know that the woman exuding that delicious perfume, and now standing beside where Dylan quickly realized he was lying on a bed inside a curtained cubicle, was his fated mate.
He took in everything about her with his first intense glance.
Rich auburn hair lay straight and gleaming to just below her narrow shoulders. She had dark green eyes, the color of a flawless emerald. Creamy smooth cheeks, small nose, and full and kissable lips above a slightly pointed and determined chin.
He couldn’t see her body as it was covered by a knee-length white coat, but she looked to be slightly voluptuous. Perfect.
The name tag on the lapel of that white coat read “Dr. Holly Wilson.”
His fated mate was a doctor.
How much of a coincidence was that, when Dylan had long been the healer for his dragon shifter family? The two of them would be able to work together—
“Mr. Pendragon?” Holly prompted again as the patient in cubicle six, rather than answering her question, continued to look at her with the most intense blue eyes she had ever seen in her life. So deep a sapphire blue, they almost seemed to glow as brightly as the jewel they resembled. She had seen his eyes when she checked his pupils earlier, of course, but the patient had been unconscious when she did so, not looking at her as if he wanted to eat her.
She took a cautious step back from the intensity of that fierce and unearthly glowing gaze.
A step, she noted with a slight warming of her cheeks, that allowed her to look down the length of what she knew was a tall, hard, muscular body. That single glance revealed a lengthy and thick erection that tented the blanket she and the nurse had draped over him earlier after undressing him to look for injuries. A blanket that wasn’t long enough to cover the bottom of his legs or his feet dangling over the end of the bed.
Unfortunately, all Holly’s previous examination had revealed was that this man had no visible injuries to indicate why he was unconscious. Not a single bruise to mar that perfectly toned, over six and a half foot body.
So perfect, Holly’d had to speak sharply several times to the nurse assisting her as they were undressing him, before the other woman acknowledged her instructions.
Inwardly, Holly had echoed the fascination as they cut away and removed every item of his clothing. The name on his driver’s license said he was Dylan Pendragon. Age thirty-five. Home address in North Wales. He was also the most breathtakingly handsome man Holly had ever set eyes on.
He had thick black, overlong hair. An olive complexion. A face that looked as if it had been carved from a single piece of smooth marble, with high cheekbones, an aristocratic nose, sculpted lips, and a strong, square jaw indicative of an arrogant nature.
An arrogance possibly explained by the price he would have paid for his discreet designer-label clothes and the expensive gold watch on his wrist of a make Holly had heard of but never seen before. She wasn’t in the habit of being around people who could afford to wear fifty-thousand-pound gold wristwatches.
She knew Dylan Pendragon had been unconscious when someone stumbled across him in the hospital grounds. His clothing and that watch said he wouldn’t normally have been brought into the Accident & Emergency department of a busy and understaffed public hospital. No doubt he usually attended a private clinic when in need of medical attention.
They had also removed a wallet from the inside pocket of his leather jacket containing his credit cards, several business cards for a company called Pendragon Security, and ten twenty-pound notes. There had also been some small change in his jeans’ pocket. All of it was now logged and safely sealed in the envelope on the bedside cabinet.
“Holly.” He finally spoke, that intense gaze not wavering from her face for so much as a second.
His deep, husky voice sent a shiver of awareness down the length of Holly’s spine. “Dr. Wilson,” she corrected in a brisk and professional tone. “I’ve carried out a physical examination and could find no injury that would have caused you to become unconscious,” she continued in that same businesslike voice. “We’ve also taken some blood work for analysis, but now that you’re awake, perhaps you could—” Holly took a hasty step back as Dylan Pendragon surged up into a sitting position before swinging his long legs over the side of the bed. Thank God he took the blanket with him. It was one thing to imagine his erection, another thing entirely to be able to see his cock in the thick and heavily aroused flesh. “Mr. Pendragon—”
“Where’s the blood you took?” he demanded harshly as he rose to his feet, again taking the blanket with him, this time to wrap it securely about the flat tautness of his waist.
“You shouldn’t be standing—” She broke off as he took a firm grip of her arms. “Mr. Pendragon—”
“Where the fuck is the blood you took from me? Tell me!” Those intense eyes glared into hers as he gave her a slight shake to emphasize the demand.
She gave a dazed shake of her head. “It’s probably still at the nurses’ station waiting to go to the lab. We’re a little short-staffed tonight.” She grimaced. “We’re a little short-staffed every night— Where are you going?” she demanded as he released her to step forward and make an opening in the curtains surrounding his bed.
He turned to give her a single narrow-eyed glance. “To retrieve the blood you took from me, of course.”
Of course?
What the hell did that mean?
Holly frowned. “I assure you, your blood wasn’t blue but as red as my own.”
He eyed her suspiciously. “Why the hell would my blood be blue?”
Her sarcastic humor was obviously lost on this man. “I was attempting to make a joke.”
“There’s nothing in the least funny about my blood going to a lab for analysis,” he snapped before stepping out into the corridor.
Holly hurried to stand in the gap he’d made in the curtains and watched as he strode down the hallway toward the nurses’ station. His arrogant bearing was that of a king or a warrior rather than a naked man wearing only a hospital blanket about his hips. Well, king or otherwise, Sister Petit was on duty tonight, a martinet if ever there was one, and Dylan Pendragon was about to receive a severe setdown from the older woman.
To Holly’s amazement, after a brief conversation, most of it on Dylan Pendragon’s side, Sister Petit meekly handed over the four vials of blood Holly had taken from him earlier.
What the hell—
Holly stepped back into the cubicle as her rebellious patient turned and marched back down the hallway with the same determination he had left with only seconds ago.
“Where are my clothes?” he demanded.
Holly recovered from the daze of witnessing Pamela Petit’s meek acquiescence. “You were unconscious until a few minutes ago,” she reminded him impatiently. “You can’t leave.”
His jaw clenched. “Look, right now, I’m resisting the urge to throw you over that bed and fuck you into unconsciousness, so I would advise you to tell me what the fuck you did with my clothes!” Those blue eyes were definitely glowing now.
Piercingly so. Unearthly so. Almost as if Dylan Pendragon could see into her very soul. Nor could Holly deny the wild racing of her heart and the trembling of her knees at being told he wanted to “fuck her into unconsciousness”. Not that she would let him, of course. She hadn’t remained a virgin still at twenty-seven by accepting the numerous sexual suggestions made to her by the male patients.
Besides, she had enough complications in her life already without introducing an imposing eccentric into the equation. No matter how gorgeous he was.
It had been too long since she’d even been out on a date. That was all her reaction to him was. Working nights for months didn’t give her a lot of time for a social life, and she usually slept most of her days off.
She straightened. “I’m afraid we had to cut your shirt and jeans from you so that I could carry out my examination. The leather jacket is still intact, though,” she added lamely as a dark scowl creased his brow.
The hand not holding the vials of blood clenched at his side. “And just how the hell am I supposed to leave here wearing only a leather jacket?” he bit out furiously.
“Not necessary, bro.” Another imposing man stepped into the cubicle, blond-haired and as tall if not taller than Dylan Pendragon. “I brought you some fresh clothes, just in case.” He held up a backpack.
Holly felt totally intimidated at being alone in the cubicle with two of the tallest men she had ever seen. Two of the handsomest too, she acknowledged distractedly.
The newcomer—she found it difficult to believe, with their different coloring, that this man was Dylan Pendragon’s brother, but that nevertheless appeared to be the case—had shoulder-length blond hair and pale gray eyes that seemed to darken and swirl as he looked at her with the same intensity as his brother. He was as muscular as his brother too. Wide shoulders. Muscled chest. Tapered waist and lean hips shown to advantage in the faded blue denims and the darker blue polo shirt he was wearing. Which, considering it was winter and the temperature outside was almost at freezing, hardly seemed like suitable clothing for the season.
He turned to Dylan. “Fated mate?”
“Yes,” the other man confirmed grimly as he pulled on the fresh clothing and placed the blood vials into the backpack.
“She’s a beauty.”
“And mine,” Dylan Pendragon growled.
Growled?
It certainly sounded like a growl to Holly. Nor did she care for being discussed in this way by these two men, the newcomer’s conversation as strange as his brother’s. Had he just called her a fated mate? To which his brother had replied “and mine”?
The second man held out a hand to her. “Garrett Pendragon.”
There was another deep rumble in Dylan Pendragon’s chest as Holly would have returned the gesture. Instead, she dropped her hand back to her side before it could make contact. “Dr. Holly Wilson,” she supplied with a glare in Dylan’s direction. “How did you know your brother was here?” As far as she knew, there had been no home contact telephone number in Dylan Pendragon’s belongings, just the business one on those cards. Which meant no family member had yet been informed of his whereabouts.
“I tried all the hospitals in the area after he went missing,” Garrett Pendragon dismissed.
“Oh.” She nodded. “Well, your brother was brought into A&E an hour or so ago, unconscious, with no visible wounds to explain the reason why. He’s retrieved and kept the bloodwork that may have helped identify the problem,” she added irritably. “In fact, he’s been something of an arrogant pain in the ass since he woke up.” She lifted her chin in challenge as Dylan’s scowl deepened.
Garrett Pendragon ignored the rumble in his brother’s chest as he took a step closer to her to confide, “He has a drinking problem and doesn’t like people to know about it.”
Holly’s brow cleared. “Ah. So he was, in fact, in an intoxicated stupor when he was brought in?” She hadn’t smelled any liquor on Dylan or his clothing during her examination, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t drunk. Alcoholics were notoriously clever at hiding their addiction.
“Undoubtedly.” Humor glittered in pale gray eyes as Garrett gave his brother a mocking glance.
Dylan narrowed his lids to glare at Garrett. Dragon shifters didn’t even drink alcohol. Oh, they could drink it, but it wasn’t worth the bother or expense when it had absolutely no effect on them. Right now, he just wanted to get out of here as quickly as possible. He knew where Holly Wilson worked, and once he had unraveled the mystery of his unexpected fall to earth, he intended to come back and claim her as his fated mate.
“You can go now,” he compelled her.
Auburn brows rose at his command. “You see,” she told Garrett before turning back to Dylan. “I think you’re somewhat confused as to who is in charge here.”
No, Dylan wasn’t in the least confused.
And any lingering doubt he might have had as to whether Holly Wilson was his fated mate had just evaporated.
A dragon’s compulsion of humans was absolute. It was what he had used on the nurse earlier to retrieve the vials containing his blood.
The only person not susceptible to that compulsion, human or otherwise, was a fated mate.
Holly Wilson was his fated mate.
His human fated mate.