Chapter 7
“Which one of the Romanov brothers is Vaughn?” Deryk prompted as he drove the two of them back to the Mikhailov Palace.
“The youngest.” Izzi had no idea how old Vaughn actually was. Like the Pendragons, the Romanovs brothers all seemed to have stopped aging in their mid-thirties. She only knew Vaughn was the youngest because the two of them had long shared an affinity as the baby of their two families, often sitting together and lamenting over their overprotective older brothers. “He has blond hair and green eyes,” she supplied as Deryk looked none the wiser.
He scowled. “Good-looking bastard.”
Izzi could hear the note of jealousy in his voice. “All the Romanov brothers are handsome.”
His mouth tightened. “Have you and any of them ever—”
“No,” Izzi assured him quickly, not liking the dangerous edge she could now hear in Deryk’s tone.
She had known the Romanov brothers since she was born. It would have seemed slightly incestuous to have ever thought romantically about any of them. Which didn’t mean she hadn’t noticed how good-looking they all were. A woman would have to be brain dead not to have noticed that!
“Were you and Petrov lovers?”
She frowned at Deryk. “This really isn’t the time for this conversation,” she dismissed impatiently. “All that should concern either of us right now is that Vaughn has been attacked.”
Deryk knew that, and he was as worried as Izabella was by this assault on the youngest of the Romanov brothers. He knew Bryn was also concerned by the timing of it. Vaughn had been attacked within a day of their own arrival in Russia, which didn’t look good for the Pendragon brothers. Especially as Deryk had been missing when it happened.
But right now, all Deryk could think about was whether or not Izabella and Petrov had been lovers. “I need to know about you and Petrov, Izabella.” The thought of her and the Russian together intimately bothered him so much, he was in danger of crushing the steering wheel in hands that were threatening to shift into claws and talons.
He could feel her eyes on him as she answered. “Not that it’s any of your business, but no, we’re not and never have been.”
Deryk’s relief was tangible; the tension in his shoulders relaxed, as did his hold on the steering wheel.
“But that doesn’t mean I have any intention of being intimate with you either,” she added firmly.
Deryk scowled his displeasure. After a millennia and a half of taking what he wanted, when he wanted it—taking who he wanted when he wanted them—patience was not a part of his nature. It wasn’t a part of any dragon’s nature.
But it seemed it was something he would have to learn if he wanted to please his reluctant mate.
Which wasn’t easy for him when Izabella told him it wasn’t his business whether or not she’d had lovers. He didn’t liked that at all. And neither did his dragon.
He sighed deeply. “I should warn you before we get back, the likelihood is that the Romanovs are going to think that either Bryn or I are responsible for this attack on Vaughn.”
She drew in a sharp breath. “Why would they think that?”
He shrugged. “Has anything like this ever happened before?”
Her brow furrowed. “Not that I’m aware, no.”
He nodded, having expected that answer. “The friendship between our two clans is still tenuous. We haven’t built enough of a relationship yet to completely trust each other.”
“And that’s enough for them to think either you or your brother attacked Vaughn?”
“Dragons don’t always take the time to think before they react,” he murmured.
“Really?” Izabella gave him a pointed glance. “But there are seven of them and only two of you.”
Deryk shrugged. “We don’t always calculate the odds either.”
“But you were with me tonight.”
“And Bryn spent the evening with the Romanovs. So which one of us do you think they will suspect of having attacked Vaughn? Don’t worry about it, Izabella,” he soothed as she still frowned. “I’m perfectly capable of defending myself if I have to.” Although he was seriously hoping to avoid the situation deteriorating to out-and-out war between the two clans.
All was in uproar when they reached the Mikhailov Palace, dozens of lights on all over the building.
As soon as they stepped out of the car, Izabella told Deryk she was going to the kitchen in search of her parents, leaving him to enter alone through the front door.
Servants were rushing to and fro in the huge marble entrance hall, but one paused long enough to direct him to the sitting room where four of the Romanov brothers were pacing the ornately furnished room. Bryn stood silent and brooding, and alone, beside one of the windows.
Deryk felt four pairs of dragon eyes turn toward him as he went straight to his brother’s side. “What the hell happened?” Bryn hadn’t been able to tell him much on the phone earlier, except Vaughn Romanov was down and to get his ass back to the Mikhailov Palace now.
“Vaughn was on his way to an assignation, but before he got there, he was attacked on a side street,” Bryn supplied with his usual terse manner.
“Attacked how?” Dragons were invulnerable for the main part, and Vaughn should have been able to fend off any sort of attack by a human.
“They tried to cut his head off with a machete-like knife.” Bryn nodded as Deryk raised surprised brows. “It was obviously someone who knew it was one of the few ways to kill a dragon.”
“Shit.”
“Where the hell were you?” Bryn demanded to know.
“With Izabella.”
“Can she verify that?”
“Does she need to?”
Bryn glanced at the four glowering Romanov brothers. “Oh I think so, don’t you?”
Boxing Izabella into a corner was exactly what Deryk didn’t want, and if he claimed her as his alibi, then that was exactly what he would be doing. Once his presence at Izabella’s apartment became public knowledge, her parents would then also become involved, and he doubted Izabella was any more ready to talk to them yet about the two of them than she was the Romanov brothers.
Because, as far as Izabella was concerned, there was no “them” to talk about yet. If ever.
His mouth tightened. “I’m not involving Izabella.”
Bryn turned so that his back was toward the watching Romanov brothers. “Are you fucking insane? These guys are just itching to take retribution for their brother.”
Deryk shrugged. “Then let them try. I’m in the mood for a fight tonight.”
His brother studied him closely. “The evening didn’t go well?” Once again, Bryn had been the one to make excuses for Deryk’s nonappearance at dinner.
He grimaced. “I think Izabella’s reaction to the idea of mating with me is worse than Chloe’s was to Nathaniel.”
Bryn scowled. “You should have talked to her before starting the mating. Explained the situation to her.”
Deryk raised his eyes heavenward. “Well, I know that now. Wait until meet your own mate, breathe in her scent, and let’s see how well you do explaining before claiming her,” he added irritably as Bryn still looked condemning.
His brother snorted. “I’m not expecting to ever meet my mate.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Because I’m a bad-tempered cuss at the best of times. And for me, it’s rarely the best of times.”
“True,” Deryk drawled. “But I’m a selfish, egotistical bastard, and I’ve still been blessed.”
A frown appeared between Bryn’s bronze-colored eyes. “You really think of a mate as a blessing?”
His eyes widened. “You don’t?”
Bryn shrugged. “I’ve managed without one so far. Having observed the effect on Nathaniel, and now you, I see no reason to change that.”
“And when you become dragon and stay that way?”
“Then you and the brothers will have no choice but to kill me. I’m resigned to that fate.”
Deryk had thought a part of him was too until he met Izabella. She had turned his life around in a matter of seconds. Now he wanted to live, to spend the rest of his long life with her. All that mattered to him was Izabella. Her safety. Her happiness.
But there was no describing the depth of those emotions until they were experienced firsthand. Nathaniel had tried when he met Chloe, but Deryk really had no idea how this would feel until it happened to him.
Goddess, he hoped Bryn found his mate. His brother might be a bad-tempered grouch, but he was also loyal and steadfast to his brothers. Deryk loved him; they all did. No way did they want to lose him.
Thinking of their brothers… “Have you spoken to Grigor?”
“He’s already on his way from Alaska. Uh-oh.” His glance moved across the room. “Vlad just came in.”
Deryk turned slowly. He hadn’t really needed to be told Vlad was here. He had felt the frisson of the other man’s energy the moment he entered the room.
Piercing eyes as black as coal were narrowed on him as the other man spoke briefly with his own brothers before crossing to where Deryk and Bryn still stood slightly apart from the Russian dragons.
“Vaughn is recovering,” he bit out economically. “The damage is extensive, and it will take him some hours to heal himself, but luckily, the knife did not succeed in cutting the spinal cord.”
Deryk didn’t particularly care for the way the other man’s gaze remained fixed on him. “I haven’t been anywhere near Vaughn tonight.”
“So I understand.”
Deryk eyed the other dragon warily. “You do?”
Vlad’s nostrils flared. “Izzi has already spoken to me and explained you were with her all evening.”
“What?” Deryk was too surprised to take umbrage at Vlad using that affectionate name for his mate.
The other dragon’s gaze met his coldly. “It would seem you have mated the daughter of my humans without my permission?”
Izabella had told Vlad about their mating? Why had she? Goddess, did that mean she had accepted it? Accepted him as her mate?
Remembering her vehemence earlier, Deryk didn’t think so.
But she had defended him, given him an alibi for this evening, and by doing so had placed herself in a difficult position.
Had she told her parents too? If she had, then Deryk needed to go to her. To be beside her and protect her from their possible anger.
He met the other dragon’s gaze challengingly. “Izabella is free and over twenty-one. She doesn’t belong to you.”
Vlad stiffened. “She and her family are under my protection.”
He snorted. “Then you did a piss-poor job of it, didn’t you?”
“You arrogant Welsh bastard!” the Russian roared, hands turning into taloned claws.
“Not here.” Bryn stepped between them as Deryk’s talons also appeared. “And not now,” he rasped. “We have a badly injured dragon, and our first priority is to discover who tried to kill him, not start arguing amongst ourselves.”
Black eyes glittered as Vlad continued to glare at Deryk. “We will settle this after we have found and destroyed the person who dared to attack my brother.”
“Just name the time and place,” Deryk came back coldly.
Vlad nodded. “Oh, be assured, I will.”
He nodded abruptly. “In the meantime, I need to go and check on my mate.”
The Russian dragon’s jaw tensed grimly. “She is with her parents, who are no happier than I am with this development,” he warned.
“Fine.” Deryk nodded. “I’ll be back in time to help once you’ve decided the best way to look for whoever attacked Vaughn. But in the meantime, I need be with Izabella and reassure my future in-laws of my intention to take care of Izabella for the rest of my life.”
It was also too soon in the mating for the two of them to be apart for even this length of time. His cock was rock hard with need, so he had a feeling Izabella’s desire would also be reaching fever pitch again very soon.
“How could you do this to us, Izzi?” Her father paced their private sitting room at the back of the house. “How could you do this to the Romanov family, whom we have served for so long?”
Izzi had been sitting in an armchair listening to questions like this for the past ten minutes. Ever since she had told Vladimir Romanov that Deryk had been with her this evening, and so couldn’t possibly have attacked Vaughn.
Rhetorical questions when her father never paused long enough to allow her to answer any of them.
Except he seemed to have run out of those questions for the moment. “I have done nothing to the Romanov family except spend the evening with one of their guests.”
Tears glistened in her mother’s eyes. “You said you have mated this man.”
“I said he had mated me,” Izzi corrected. “I didn’t say I had any intention of accepting the mating.” Although that clamoring in her body had intensified again. Making her ache. Making her want. Making her squirm in arousal, as her clothes seemed too restrictive on her oversensitive body.
Meaning she had to get away from her parents before she started shaking from the sexual need building inside her.
“We owe everything to the Romanovs,” her father continued to lecture. “Our livelihood, our wealth, our family’s very survival. I am not sure Vladimir will even allow this mating.”
Izzi surged to her feet. “It is my choice to make, not Vladimir’s.” Her family had served the Romanov family faithfully for centuries, quite often to the detriment of their own happiness. It was a practice that not only seemed archaic in the twenty-first century, it was archaic.
Her father’s eyes widened in shock. “You cannot talk about the Romanovs in that disrespectful way—”
“But I can,” Deryk announced as he walked into the room and immediately strode to Izabella’s side. He was able to feel the tension and trembling in her body the moment his arm moved about her waist, informing him her sexual need had already risen to an almost unbearable degree. “Make no mistake, Izabella is my mate,” he announced to her parents in a voice that brooked no argument.
Anton Mikhailov looked as if he were about to burst a blood vessel. “Vladimir is not happy with the arrangement.”
“Vladimir can kiss my—” Deryk reined back his anger as he remembered who he was talking to. The last thing he wanted to do was alienate Izabella’s parents. “Vladimir and I will come to some sort of agreement on the matter.” He felt Izabella stiffen beside him. “Izabella and I will come to an agreement with Vladimir,” he corrected.
“Do you intend to take our daughter back to England with you?” Anna Mikhailova interjected quietly.
“Wales. And that will be up to Izabella.”
She looked at him in surprise. “It will?”
Deryk had given some thought to this mating after their conversations earlier today and this evening.
Izabella was Russia. She had lived here all her life. Taking her back to Wales with him would cut her off from all that was familiar to her. From her family and friends—not including Petrov, of course. That was a parting Deryk had no objection to, in the slightest. But Izabella also wanted to finish her university degree. Removing her from Russia now would not make his mate happy, and her happiness was of paramount importance to him. It was all that mattered.
Deryk had never envisaged living away from his brothers, but if remaining in Russia was Izabella’s choice, then he would do everything in his power to ensure that it happened.
Including sucking up to the arrogant Vladimir Romanov, whose permission he would need in order to remain in the Russian dragon’s territory.
“It will,” Deryk confirmed for Izabella. “I understand your need to finish your time at university here. Although we do have universities in Wales,” he added teasingly.
She looked confused. “You would be in agreement with my staying here to finish my law degree, despite the mating?”
“I would seek permission from Vlad for us both to remain in Russia, at least until after you finish university, yes.” It would probably kill him to be apart from Izabella for so many hours a day, and once they had offspring, it would become even more difficult, but Deryk had no intention of curtailing Izabella’s life to suit his own.
He might be that egotistical and selfish bastard he had described to Bryn, and have been born in the late fifth century. But Deryk would hope he hadn’t brought all of that chauvinistic attitude with him to the twenty-first century, even if compromise went totally against his own dominant nature, and his dragon’s need to claim and possess his mate totally.
He inwardly thanked Chloe for helping him to understand that concept, at least, before he had met his own human mate.
But, Goddess, this was going to be hard work if he had to talk over every decision with Izabella before making it.
Suck it up, big guy, he heard Chloe taunt inside his head, knowing how much his sister-in-law was going to enjoy seeing him mated.
The rueful smile on Izabella’s face indicated she was also aware of how difficult that compromise had been for him. Which she would be, having lived with the Russian dragons all her life; Vlad’s arrogance rivaled even Grigor’s.
“Izzi’s place is here,” Anton Mikhailov insisted. “We have a duty to the Romanov family.”
However, that need to compromise did not extend as far as Deryk’s future in-laws. “Izabella’s only duty now is to me. As mine is to her.” And from the increased trembling of Izabella’s body as it rested against the side of his, and the erotic aroma of the arousal only he could detect, his duty—and pleasure—now involved doing something to ease her physical discomfort. “If you will both excuse us?” His arm tightened about Izabella’s waist. “Izabella and I have some things we need to discuss in private.” His tone dared the older man to challenge him.
Anton Mikhailov wisely chose not to do so, allowing Deryk to guide Izabella out of the sitting room.
“My bedchamber or yours?” Deryk prompted urgently the moment they were alone together in the hallway.
Izzi wanted to say neither. But the arousal of her body was now so painful, she needed a relief she knew only Deryk could give her. That didn’t mean she accepted their mating, only that her need was too desperate for her to be able to ignore it any longer. But neither did she want one of her parents following her to her bedroom and finding the two of them together.
“Yours,” she decided through tight lips.