Chapter 5
Dylan was aware of the flow and taste of the aphrodisiac in his saliva even as he couldn’t resist deepening the kiss. He groaned low in his throat as his arms moved like steel bands about Holly’s waist to mold her soft curves against his harder ones.
She tasted and smelled so fucking good, of that insidious combination of honeysuckle and ripe peaches. His senses were saturated with it. With the taste and feel of her.
Claim.
Now.
Dylan wasn’t so far gone in the mating lust he didn’t realize how illogical that demand was. Granted, they were standing on a deserted beach, so no one would see them, but the wind was bitterly cold and not conducive to the two of them getting naked together. Dylan might not feel the cold, but Holly certainly would.
Besides, he needed to explain the situation to Holly before even thinking of completing the mating. Chloe and Tegan, also human, had run away, not exactly screaming, but still desperate to get away, once Nathaniel and Bryn explained the situation to them. Izzy was slightly different in that her family had long been connected and servants to a Russian dragon shifter family. But even Izzy had initially balked at the idea of being a dragon shifter’s fated mate.
The very fact that Holly was a doctor showed she had a logical mind, and dragon shifters, creatures of myth and legend, were hardly logical. Hell, most humans didn’t believe they had ever existed, let alone still roamed the earth now. He doubted Holly would believe in them either. Not until Dylan had shown her his dragon, at least. Something that couldn’t happen on a public beach either.
He broke the kiss reluctantly, hands framing her face as he gazed down at her longingly. Her cheeks were flushed, eyes bright, her lips slightly swollen from the kisses they’d just shared. It took every effort of Dylan’s considerable will not to cast caution to this cold wind and claim her right there and then.
Because that single kiss, during which Holly would have taken in some of the aphrodisiac in his saliva, had almost certainly begun their mating.
Dylan, as the healer of the family, had developed an injection to counteract the dragon shifter mating aphrodisiac, and he had also formulated another injection for birth control. But he hadn’t taken either of them himself yet. There had been no reason for him to do so when he hadn’t yet found his mate. Nor had he expected to see Holly today.
Having her kiss him so impulsively had taken that choice out of his hands.
The only choices left now for both of them was to mate and live together for centuries, or to have Holly refuse that mating and both of them would die. Sooner rather than later.
He drew in a deep and controlling breath. “There’s something I need to talk to you about too.”
“Does it have something to do with the fact that all of your family seem to know me by name, even though we’ve never met before?” she teased.
Intelligent as well as beautiful. But Dylan had already known that. His mate was everything, and more, he could ever have wished for.
But Holly had also made herself responsible for her younger sister. A connection that, as his mate, Holly would one day have to say goodbye to. Maybe not for years, but it would happen one day. As a dragon shifter’s mate Holly would age far more slowly than her sister. She would live for centuries, not decades. She would still be young and beautiful when her sister was a grandmother.
Or Holly would die within the next three weeks, and Dylan would die shortly after.
None of this was how Dylan had wanted to claim his mate. If he claimed her. Like Nathaniel, Deryk, and Bryn, Dylan knew he couldn’t just take his mate, he had to give Holly the choice as to whether or not she could accept all that entailed. Could accept him.
“Did you drive all the way from London today?” Instead of answering her, Dylan asked a question of his own. He was worried about those dark circles beneath her eyes and the pallor of her face. She also looked slightly thinner than a week ago.
Evidence of the strain Holly was under because of her sister’s actions?
Dylan believed so. Driving all the way here from London in one day wouldn’t have helped alleviate that strain.
She nodded. “I took two days’ holiday. I brought an overnight bag with me, and, if necessary, I was going to stay at a B&B tonight and then drive back tomorrow.”
Dylan gently smoothed the hair back from her temple. “And your sister?”
“I daren’t risk leaving her alone at our apartment and having Gregori Markovic track her down.” Holly grimaced. “I moved her, and her computer,” she added dryly, “into a small hotel overnight.”
Which meant there was no problem with Holly staying overnight. “Let’s go back to the castle. You can stay the night in one of the guest bedrooms, and we can have dinner together—in my private sitting room, not with the rest of the family,” he assured at her slightly panicked expression. “We can go back to London together in the morning.”
It was a tempting offer, Holly acknowledged longingly. She felt safe here with Dylan. As if nothing and no one could hurt her when she was with him. But if she drove straight back to London tonight, she could be there for Gayle.
“Garrett is back in London.” Once again, Dylan seemed able to guess her thoughts. “Give me the name of the hotel and I’ll ask him to keep a protective—and undetected—eye on your sister overnight.”
Holly’s longing to stay here, to have dinner with Dylan, deepened. It would be so nice, just for once, to be the one who was cossetted rather than always being the responsible one.
Besides, Dylan might kiss her again. Might do more than kiss her. There was no doubt her body, aroused and throbbing from that single kiss, wanted more. So did Holly.
She could still taste Dylan on her lips. Feel the hardness of his muscular body pressing against her own. As for the touch of his hands against her skin… They had felt so warm against her much colder flesh. Warm and protective.
Holly had no idea why the word protective kept coming into her mind whenever she thought of Dylan. Which, she readily admitted, was a lot. Dangerous was a far more accurate description of him, for all the Pendragon brothers she had met so far. They were all huge and very muscular men, extremely tall, and they all, without exception, exuded an air of danger that warned of their leashed power.
Leashed power?
That was an even stranger description for her to have used in regard to the brothers. Tall and powerful they might be, but they were all urbanely charming too. Well, maybe not Bryn, but Deryk had seemed warm and indulgent toward his wife, and Nathaniel had been gentleness itself with his baby daughter. The only time Holly had seen Dylan in the least aggressive had been when he’d learned she’d taken blood from him at the hospital.
Of course, there was the matter of the drinking problem Garrett had mentioned. Although Holly still found that difficult to believe. Dylan projected none of the usual symptoms of the alcoholics who stumbled their way into the A&E department of the hospital on a regular basis, just for somewhere warm to sit for a few hours. Nor had she ever smelled the least whiff of alcohol on his breath or clothes. So maybe—
“Does it usually take you this long to make a decision?” Dylan teased.
She grimaced. “As it happens, yes.”
Dylan released her to step back and hold up his arms in an unthreatening manner. “I promise I won’t even touch you again if you don’t want me to.”
The problem with that was Holly wanted him to touch her again. She could imagine nothing more pleasurable than having Dylan slowly undress her, caressing and kissing every inch of her as he did so, arousing her even further, until she—
“Unless and if you want me to,” Dylan repeated softly, knowing by the blush on Holly’s cheeks and the feverish glow of her eyes that the mating aphrodisiac had already started to saturate her system. That in a few hours’ time, her body would be aching and desperate for release.
The blush deepened in her cheeks, and her gaze avoided meeting his. “Let’s have dinner together first and see what happens, hmm?”
Dylan knew exactly what was going to happen to Holly in the next few hours.
The deepening of her arousal.
The aching need of her body.
An insatiable desire to have his cock inside her.
To be filled and claimed by him.
Holly had no idea what was wrong with her.
This guest bedroom in the castle was beautiful. Decorated in pale lilac and cream, it had a white four-poster bed and a luxurious silk duvet and pillows in pale lilac and purple. There was also a spacious shower room adjoining the bedroom, as large as the kitchen/breakfast room in the apartment she shared with Gayle.
The suite was beautiful, decadent, and all Holly could think of was lying in that bed with Dylan and having him kiss and make love to her.
She ached to feel his lips claim hers.
She needed to have his hands on her.
Was trembling from the desire to have his cock buried deep inside her channel, filling her and easing and satisfying this aching arousal.
That need was so much stronger than it had been a week ago. It felt almost as if she’d been drugged since arriving in Wales and seen Dylan again. Injected with something that made her want to rub herself all over Dylan’s naked body. To take his hard cock inside her and wildly ride them both to completion.
A wanton need Holly had no explanation for.
She had never felt like this before in her life. Never desired a man so desperately, she wanted to launch herself at him. To rip off his clothes before impaling herself on the thick length of his aroused cock.
Maybe a cold bath would help? She’d heard that worked to ease a man’s arousal.
All the bath seemed to do for her was intensify the arousal. Even rubbing the soap over her own body increased that painful ache. Her skin seemed hypersensitive to the slightest touch, even her own.
Most humiliating of all was that a single caress of her soaped fingers on and around her throbbing clit resulted in a body-shaking orgasm so intense, Holly could do nothing but gasp.
She was still trembling from the intensity of that release as she stepped out of the bath to wrap a towel around herself, securing it at her breasts before going through to the bedroom. Her nether lips felt slick with her own release, and her skin was hot, burning, rather than chilled from the bath water. Nor had that climax eased the desire in the slightest.
The itching was back too, with a vengeance. It no longer felt like itching but as if millions of tiny shockwaves were passing through her body, causing her nipples to harden and ache, and her clit to throb.
She’d been under a lot of strain lately, predominantly from this situation with Gayle, so maybe this uncharacteristic behavior was in response to that?
She certainly couldn’t sit down and eat dinner with Dylan in this state. He would know, surely, just from looking at her flushed face and fevered eyes that something was seriously wrong with her. It would be too embarrassing if he should guess those symptoms were caused because she was so aroused, she no longer had control of her own body.
Holly’s eyes stung with the sudden onset of the tears that, seconds later, began to cascade hotly down her cheeks. She gave a choked sob, burying her face in her hands as she gave in to those tears.
She had no idea how long she was consumed by those deep and racking sobs, but she gave a start as she felt warm arms wrapping around her and drawing her close to the firm strength of a muscular chest. Dylan’s chest, Holly realized as she recognized the feel and warmth of him before relaxing against him with a relieved and welcoming sigh.
“You aren’t alone anymore, Holly,” he murmured against the dampness of her hair. “I’m here now, and I’ll protect both you and your sister. You never have to be alone again,” he assured her gruffly.
Holly appreciated him saying these things to her, even if they were only said as a way of comforting her. And they did comfort her. Filled her with a strength that had begun to ebb since they’d parted at her suite earlier. Having Dylan’s arms around her, holding her, reassuring her, brought back her belief that maybe, with his help, this situation could— No, it would resolve itself without any bloodshed.
She drew in a deep breath before slowly lifting her head, smiling slightly as she looked up into his concerned face. A dark and handsome face that took her breath away just to look at him. “I’m not sure I’ve done anything to deserve you being so kind to me or offering to help me.”
Dylan stared at her in amazement. Holly didn’t believe she’d done anything to deserve his kindness?
She’d done everything, she was everything to him now. The sun, the moon, the stars, his fated and life mate. Being apart from her even long enough to allow her to take a bath and change before dinner had caused him pain. Hearing her sobs as he approached the bedroom to escort her to dinner had felt as if his heart was being ripped from his chest.
Holding her in his arms, breathing in the aroma of her arousal, almost brought him to his knees. Even with her hair wet from the shower, her face bare of makeup, she was still the most beautiful woman in the world to him. She always would be.
“I meant it, Holly,” he spoke firmly. “It’s taken me a long time to find you, but I’m here to stay now, and I will protect you. From anyone and anything.”
She eyed him a little warily as she pulled out of his arms and took a step back. “I only want— I just need you to do what you said and talk to Gregori Markovic on my sister’s behalf.”
Dylan’s arms felt empty without Holly in them. He felt empty. He also sensed Holly pulling away from him emotionally as well as physically. That the intensity of his vow had unnerved her.
He nodded. “That’s the reason I’m coming back to London with you.”
There was a frown between her beautiful green eyes. “You’ll explain the situation to him? Make him see that Gayle isn’t guilty of anything except gullibility? We can give him back the fifty thousand pounds, and someone else took the rest of his money. Possibly someone he knows, if they were aware of the bank account,” she added speculatively.
“Aeron is already looking into that possibility.”
The color first flooded and then drained from her cheeks. “You told your brothers the reason I’m here?”
Dylan’s brothers already knew exactly why Holly was here, and it had nothing to do with her sister or the mess Gayle had gotten herself into. Garrett had barely stepped through the door of the castle a week ago after they’d flown back from London together before informing the rest of the brothers Dylan had met his mate. Another one of them finding his mate after sixteen hundred years of searching was reason enough for them all to celebrate.
It was also the reason his family had all started drifting into the sitting room earlier, curious to see and meet his mate.
Just as the moment he and Holly returned from the beach, his brothers’ heightened senses had told them the mating had begun even if it wasn’t yet complete.
None of which he could tell Holly yet. Despite what he’d hoped earlier, after the way she’d withdrawn from him just now when he assured her of his protection, Holly wouldn’t be ready to hear any of that until after he’d ensured her sister’s safety.
In the meantime, the mating aphrodisiac was already in her bloodstream and would cause her severe discomfort. An arousal only Dylan, as her mate, could satisfy. An arousal he wouldn’t allow any other man to satisfy. Ever.
“Are you in a relationship?” The idea had only just occurred to him. If there was a man in Holly’s life, Dylan hoped he would bow out of it gracefully, because there was no way he would allow any other man anywhere near Holly, including his brothers, until after they were mated. And maybe not even then.
She gave a dismissive laugh. “Junior doctors don’t have time for relationships.”
“Good.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Good?”
He grinned. “Less competition for me.”
Holly appreciated Dylan’s lighthearted flirting. At the same time, she knew it was only another way of cheering her up after her emotional meltdown.
She had no illusions about the way she looked. Red hair. Green eyes. Pale skin that burned in the sun rather than tanned. Her figure was slightly voluptuous from too many hospital cafeteria meals eaten at odd hours because of the long shifts she worked. Dylan was breathtaking. The sort of gorgeous that graced movie and television screens. He could, and no doubt very often did, have any woman he wanted.
In fact, Holly now wondered how she’d had the temerity to kiss him earlier.
It had been purely impulsive, of course. A reaction to Dylan having agreed to help her. Admittedly, he had kissed her back, but that could merely have been out of politeness. Whatever his reason, she mustn’t read too much into it. Or his flirting. Once he had helped her to resolve this situation with Gregori Markovic, Holly doubted she would ever see Dylan again.