Page 25 of Tempt the Dragon
Chapter Seven
He hadn’t meant to call her that, because he’d known how combative she was already feeling. But hell, this situation with her was driving him nuts. She’d been right there with him, feeling every beat of arousal just as acutely as he had. More importantly, her beast had been there too. He’d felt the joined pressure of both beasts, reaching out to each other to claim theirpeace, and he knew she’d felt it too. But she hadn’t wanted to feel it. She was still conflicted and he needed to respect that.
The problem was he wanted her too desperately and it was fucking with his sanity. Frustration had him constantly getting into spats with her when he was normally the easygoing Drakon, the calm, decisive one.
Entering his room, he went straight to his closet, wherehe stripped off the ruined jacket, shirt and pants, tossing them all in the trash. It never mattered what clothes he wore to work—even though the others often had comments about his flair for style over sensibility—because losing a battle wasn’t an option. Tonight, however, he’d been off his game. Not only had the vampires snuck up on him, but some idiot bastard had shot him. Normally his reflexeswould’ve been quicker—with his heightened senses the arrow coming at him would’ve been detected and he’d have used his power to aim it in another direction before it could make contact. He was losing it, there was no simple way to put it.
After removing the rest of his clothes and his boots, he walked out of the closet naked and continued to the bathroom. Once there, he opened the glass doorsto the shower stall and stepped inside. He turned the water to hot and waited while it warmed before stepping under the spray.
He would’ve fucked her right there in the front seat of the truck. That had been the plan. His beast was ready and so was he. All he’d had to do was unzip his pants, free his dick and enter her. A weight so heavy he’d almost buckled under the pressure rested on hisshoulders and Aiken dropped his head before sighing.
He was ready to be what they’d once been and that fact was slowly killing him. But who was he kidding? What they once were couldn’t simply be defined by sex. Those two years they were together, the physical attraction had been just the tip of the iceberg. Their emotional connection had been much stronger, until for a time they’d actuallyseemed as one. It had taken him a long time to realize that may’ve been Mel’s biggest problem with them as a couple.
Why couldn’t he just let her go, to be what she wanted to be? The simple answer was because what Mel wanted to be didn’t include him, not in the way he needed it to. He could understand her need to prove she could take care of herself; she’d had to do so all her life. It wasalso understandable that she continue to maintain her place in protecting humans in the way she’d become accustomed to doing. If she accepted her beast, none of those things needed to change. Aiken’s only issue was, she believed that to do all these things she had to deny the most basic part of her being—the Drakon. It was frustrating and demeaning to still feel this way about her and for an instanthe wished he could carve the beast that had selected her out of his human body. To put that bastard on the side of the road and keep on riding. That thought had him clenching his fists because there’d never been a time in all his years that Aiken hadn’t wanted to be a Drakon.
“I’m sorry.”
It was a whisper, yet he’d heard it as if she’d yelled directly in his ear. Turning his head slowly,he saw her standing on the other side of the glass door, still fully dressed, staring at him with eyes that he could’ve sworn flashed from one color to another. But that wasn’t possible. He’d never seen Mel’s Drakon eyes. She’d never revealed them to him or to anyone else.
When he didn’t speak, she touched her fingertips to the door. “I never meant to come back and open these wounds again.I’d never intentionally do that to you.”
She didn’t speak the other words but he knew she was thinking that she’d never intentionally do that to herself either. Because, just as he’d told her, this torture worked both ways.
“I just really need to complete this job.” She paused again, this time looking away from him momentarily before returning her gaze to his. “I really need this money,Aiken. If that means I have to endure all the pain I’ve caused by walking away from you all those years ago, then I will. But you have to believe it’s not intentional. I would’ve stayed away from you for eternity to spare you this.”
All he could do was stare at her because everything else caused horrific discomfort. Trying to breathe while she talked, with the pain she was experiencing etchedall over her face, was like swallowing glass. His eyelids felt like bricks as he tried to blink to clear his thoughts. At his sides the fingers that had clenched while he’d tried to contain the roiling conflict of emotions inside flexed and just as he lifted a hand to touch the glass where her fingers were, she walked away.
The curse that came next was quick and vicious and he closed his eyesinstead of watching her leave again. No amount of hot water or brutal scrubbing could rid him of the searing pain that occupied every part of his body, human and dragon. She was everywhere, and not there, at the same time and when he finally walked out of the bathroom, it was with the weary thought that this was his life. Forevermore, he would carry this feeling with him and there was nothinghe could do to stop it.
She’d already set herself up on the couch and he didn’t have the strength to argue with her, not again tonight. So, he stayed in the bedroom, falling onto his bed and begging for sleep to come next. But life was just a bitch that insisted on raining all her power on him, and he only tossed and turned for longer than he cared to admit, before finally sitting up in bedto stare at the wall. There were many paintings and portraits in the Office, most of which had been selected by Theo or Bleu. It was mainly their space, after all. But when Aiken came on board with the clan, he’d been given his choice of empty suites in the space and he’d chosen this one, on the far east side of the mountain. Windows hadn’t been a big thing for him because there was nothing in theoutside world he’d needed to see. All he’d had to do was close his eyes and Mel’s face would appear.
That hadn’t stopped him from buying the picture she’d seen one day when they were working in France. Some unknown artist had painted the wind and he’d thought it was ridiculous. She’d thought it was beautiful and he’d bought it, intending to give it to her as an anniversary gift, but the breakuphad come first. Looking at it now, he wondered if she’d seen it last night when she’d slept in here. Even if she’d seen it, what would it have made her feel?
Likely nothing.
Throwing back the sheets he eased off the bed and walked into the front room, stopping when he saw her laying on the couch, staring up at the ceiling in the same way he’d just been staring at his wall.
“I don’twant you to give me the money.”
She said that again as if she’d known he would offer it to her. The thought had crossed his mind. The way she said she needed it so desperately made him want to just go to his bank account filled with money from his numerous investments and the portion of his salary from the Legion Security Company he didn’t spend on clothes, and just give it to her. That’swhat Steele had done when Ravyn had wanted to sell that cursed dagger she’d stolen. He’d bought it from her to save her life, not realizing that there was so much more to the dream that had brought his mate to him.
Unlike Steele, Aiken didn’t have dreams about Mel dying. He only dreamed of the good times they’d had. The long walks and deep, intimate conversations they’d shared which had broughtthem closer than he’d ever been to anyone before.
“Why do you need it so badly? Are you in trouble?” If she was, he would help. Heartache aside, he cared about her and would battle on any realm to keep her safe.
“No. But she is.”
“Who?”
“Rosilda. She needs surgery and will require around the clock care during rehabilitation and probably afterwards as well. I can’t be there allthe time with her, but I want to make sure she’s taken care of. I owe her that much.”
Rosilda Thomas was the closest to a mother Mel ever had. She’d rescued Mel from the human foster care system when Mel was six years old, two years after Mel’s Drakon parents had left her on the Human Realm and were subsequently killed. Born of a jaguar shape-shifter father and human mother, Rosilda had thelong life span of a preternatural but the ailments of a human, which he figured caused a few questions in giving her medical history to human doctors. Crossing his arms over his bare chest, he leaned back against the wall.
“I could bring her here. Get her set up in one of the apartment buildings I own, make sure the surgery is scheduled and that she has the care she needs.” He’d do that andso much more for her if she’d just stop running from him. No. He’d do it even if she wasn’t with him.
Shifting her gaze to him, she shook her head. “I don’t want you to do it for me, Aiken. She took care of me when no one else was there.Ihave to do this for her. I have to repay her for everything, and this is the only way I know how.”
This was the woman he loved. The woman who lovedher foster mother enough to hunt down a killer in order to earn the money to save her life. In this moment his heart swelled with emotion for Mel. Even though he thought she was wrong in one aspect of this situation. If Rosilda had given Mel all the love of a parent, then that’s likely all the woman wanted from Mel in return. But this insane belief system Mel had created about being worthy of loveand showing gratitude when love was given had been ingrained in her mind since her parents’ death. To Mel’s way of thinking, her birth parents hadn’t thought she was worthy of being a Drakon and so they hadn’t taught her all she needed to know about the race of dragon shifters and hadn’t left her with anyone who could. That had broken her heart and led her to the decision that her only option wasto break Aiken’s heart in the process.
