Holly continued to frown. “You seem to be taking all this rather calmly.”
“Ya think?” Gayle eyed her sister derisively. “I’m sure Grigor would disagree with you. This whole dragon-shifter thing is crazy, and I certainly didn’t give in to the mating without a fight,” she explained ruefully.
Holly chuckled. “That’s the sister I know and love.”
She laughed softly. “I appreciate I haven’t exactly been the easiest person to live with since Mum and Dad died, for which I apologize.”
Holly’s eyes widened. “Who are you, and what have you done with my real sister?”
“Very funny!”
Holly placed a hand against Gayle’s forehead. “No, I can’t detect any fever,” she mused.
Gayle slapped her sister’s hand away. “Stop having fun at my expense and concentrate on giving me advice for my current predicament.”
Holly immediately stopped her teasing. “What have you done?”
It came as no surprise that her sister knew whatever had happened, Gayle was the one in the wrong. “I’ve been me.” She grimaced.
“Oh.”
She chuckled ruefully at Holly’s pained wince. “Most definitely oh. As I said, when Grigor told me all this stuff, I wasn’t very…polite. I’m afraid I hurled a lot of insults, both at him personally and the whole being-his-mate thing. To accommodate my feelings, Grigor has now come up with this idea that we can be mates but not live together all the time.”
“Is that even possible?”
“Exactly what I said. But apparently, Grigor thinks it’s possible for us to be together only during the times we’re driven to mate.”
Holly gave her a searching glance. “But you no longer want just that?”
Gayle looked down at her hands. “I’ve fallen in love him.”
“With Grigor?”
She gave her sister an irritated glare. “Do you know of anyone else I’m mated to?”
Holly stood. “It’s just a little hard to take in still. When I left here, you were being your usual obnox—stubborn self,” she amended with an apologetic grimace. “I come back a week later, and you’re mated to Grigor.”
Gayle’s smile was self-derisive. “Don’t worry, you can say my usual obnoxious self. I’m well aware of what a brat I’ve been. But I sincerely hope that behavior is in the past. In part because that obnoxious behavior caused the Pendragon brothers to lock me in the dungeon a couple of days after you and Dylan left, after I tried to leave.” She chuckled.
“No!” Holly gasped.
“Oh yes.” She nodded. “I was still locked in there when Grigor and I first met. God, I was a bitch to him.” She winced. “To all of them.”
“Well, they seem to have forgiven you,” Holly drawled.
“Did you know they have a torture chamber down in the basement too?”
“What!”
Gayle grinned at her sister’s shock. “Apparently, they haven’t used it for centuries. Although Grigor did threaten to get some shackles from down there and chain me to his bed if I didn’t start behaving myself. Don’t worry,” she soothed as Holly’s expression turned to one of horror. “He decided to use the curtain ties instead.”
“Grigor tied you to his bed?”
“It was so hot!” she confided with a blush.
Holly seemed at a loss for words as she paced the sitting room of Grigor’s suite, totally inarticulate when she did finally manage to find her voice again. “I can’t believe… That’s… Grigor tied you to his bed?”
“Only after I tried to run away. And then he—he punished me by pleasuring me until I thought I was going insane,” she recalled dreamily.
Holly put her hands over her ears. “I really don’t need to hear the details, thank you very much.” She slowly removed her hands as Gayle grinned at her. “I’m finding it really difficult to hear these things about my baby sister.”
Then perhaps it would be wise for Gayle to keep all the other hours of lovemaking, and the positions, to herself.
“So if you love Grigor, why don’t you tell him so— Hmm, I’m guessing that stubbornness again,” Holly realized at Gayle’s pointed stare.
“It isn’t just stubbornness,” she defended. “What if he doesn’t feel the same way about me?”
“What if he doesn’t?”
“Well, I… It would be utterly humiliating to say those words to him and not have him reciprocate.”
Holly shrugged. “No one ever said love was neat and tidy.”
Except Gayle knew she had nothing left where Grigor was concerned but the little pride she had managed to retain. If she told him she loved him, and he didn’t feel the same way about her, she would be left with nothing. Completely vulnerable. And she didn’t react well when she felt vulnerable.
“You and he have been mating for days.” Holly frowned. “Didn’t you once find the time to discuss how you feel about each other?”
She shook her head. “Grigor thinks I’m as much of a brat as Dylan does.”
“You’re also his mate, and I don’t care what Grigor told you, there is no way the two of you can live apart without it causing both of you severe physical and emotional pain.”
She blinked. “There isn’t?” The thought of Grigor being in any sort of pain because of her, after the things he had suffered through the past sixteen hundred years, was completely anathema to her.
“Do you want to live apart from him?” Holly probed.
“Of course not.” Even the thought of it made her shudder.
“Then you had better find a way to tell him that. It’s up to you whether you admit to being in love with him, but I would advise that you do.”
Gayle gave her sister a teasing look. “You still haven’t told me if you enjoyed your mating with Dylan.”
Holly cheeks colored a blushing red. “I’m not going to allow you to deflect this onto me, young lady. We were talking about you and Grigor, not Dylan and me.”
“I—” Gayle gasped as a roar sounded out so loudly, it seemed it even rocked the foundations of this sturdily built castle. “Grigor!” she recognized, not hesitating by so much as a second as she threw open the door and ran out into the hallway, hair flying out behind her, the robe flapping about her bare legs before she came to an abrupt halt at the top of the stairs. She looked down into the entrance hall.
All the Pendragon brothers and their mates were there, including a brother she had never set eyes on before, marking him as Rhys. Nikolai and his three men were also there.
All of them, without exception, were trying to pull a partially shifted Grigor away from the blonde-haired and terrified woman he had lifted and pinned against the stone wall with only his clawed and taloned hand about her throat.
“You have to calm down, Grigor,” Gayle soothed as she watched him pace like a caged tiger she had once seen in a zoo, something she had disliked intensely. The rest of the family had thankfully left the two of them alone in the family sitting room, and Gayle had long gone past the stage where being dressed only in Grigor’s robe seemed of any importance. “Grigor?” she prompted warily as he continued to pace.
“She came here to kill you.” His voice was guttural, his eyes glowing red, his features more dragon than man, taloned hands clenched at his sides.
It hadn’t needed a genius to realize the woman Grigor had pinned to the wall was Sybil Rider. As everyone else was failing in getting Grigor to release her, and recalling the last time something like this had happened, Gayle had run down the stairs and ordered him to release the blonde woman.
Grigor had looked at Gayle for several long seconds with those fiercely glittering eyes before he finally seemed to realize it was his mate talking to him. It took another couple of seconds for Gayle’s words to sink in before he abruptly released the terrified woman, allowing her to slide down onto the flagstone floor, a hysterical and sobbing heap as she clutched at her bleeding throat.
“She did,” Gayle acknowledged softly. “But the i
mportant thing to remember is that she didn’t succeed.”
Grigor’s dragon didn’t agree.
Maim.
Kill.
Destroy.
For a very brief time, Grigor had needed to do all three of those things. Had wanted to rip into Sybil Rider with his talons, tear out her heart, before pulling her apart limb from limb for so much as daring to threaten his mate.
“Was that Rhys I saw earlier?” Gayle prompted softly, recalling the tall and dark-haired man she didn’t know but easily recognized as being another Pendragon brother.
Grigor nodded. “He was the one to find Sybil Rider and bring her here. He’s always been our best tracker, but he isn’t at the castle very often these days,” he added with a frown, as if he had just realized that.
Gayle was finding it difficult to block out her last vision of the other woman being hauled back onto her feet by a cold and deadly furious Nikolai Volkov. She really didn’t want to think what was happening to Sybil Rider right now, but she doubted it was anything the other woman would survive.
It would be hypercritical of Gayle to object when what she most felt was relieved at not being under threat anymore.
Although quite where that left her and Grigor, she had no idea.
And she was in no hurry to find out either. “Why is that?”
Grigor shrugged. “He and Aeran usually end up arguing over something trivial. I suppose after sixteen hundred years together, that’s to be expected. And as Aeran is mainly based at the castle, Rhys prefers not to be.”
Gayle hadn’t noticed that tension between any of the other brothers. But she’d only ever had a sister, and she and Holly often disagreed, so why should Rhys and Aeran be any different? She had found Aeran to be the easiest of the Pendragon brothers to get along with, but maybe that was because they were both computer geeks and she wasn’t one of his brothers.
She was also deflecting again, Gayle acknowledged with an inward grimace, discussing Rhys and Aeran in an effort not to talk about herself and Grigor.
She still wanted Grigor, she loved him, but she no longer felt as if she was being burned from the inside out by the heat and need of their mating lust. No doubt Grigor’s desire to claim her had become less urgent too.
Did that mean he would now be willing to let her go back to London with Nikolai and his men?
Even the thought of being away from Grigor for any length of time made Gayle’s stomach churn and her chest ache. “Grigor—”
“Volkov will be going back to London tonight, if you wish to accompany him.” Grigor made it a statement rather than a question. He had told his mate he would always ensure her happiness above his own, and he was determined to stand by that promise. His own pain at the looming separation was something he would have to deal with once Gayle had left. “He and his men have two vehicles, so you won’t have to travel in the same one as Sybil Rider.”
Gayle’s face was pale. “Is leaving what you want me to do?”
Grigor gave a humorless laugh. “I want whatever my mate needs to make her happy.”
“And if going back to London doesn’t do that?”
He sighed. “You have already stated that it does.”
“Maybe I no longer feel that way.”
Grigor gave a snort. “Don’t let the mating heat fool you into believing you wish to stay here with me. We both know that isn’t true.”
Gayle knew she would now be happy living anywhere that Grigor was. Including his cave in the wilds of Alaska if that was where he chose to take her.
But she had only to look at Grigor to see that the lust-filled dragon-shifter mate she had spent so many days and nights making love with was no longer ruled by his emotions. That he was once again the coolly remote and controlled Grigor who had initially annoyed the hell out of her.
“Fine,” she snapped. “I’d better go and pack, then.”
“If that’s what you wish to do.”
Gayle looked at him searchingly for several more long seconds, looking for something, anything, even the smallest chink in Grigor’s emotional armor to give her the courage to tell him she had fallen in love with him.
There was no emotion in those dark eyes.
Not even affection.
Chapter 14
“What the hell are you doing hiding away in here when Gayle is about to leave with Volkov?” Dylan demanded as he strode into Grigor’s study without knocking.
His jaw tightened. “I am giving my mate the space she needs to make her happy.”
“Are you?” his brother challenged. “Or does it make you happy to be mated and yet not have the responsibility of a full-time mating?”
Grigor surged to his feet. “You know nothing about my relationship with Gayle.” Least of all that having Gayle leave him was like ripping his own heart from his chest.
“I know she’s upstairs right now, crying in my mate’s arms,” Dylan snapped.
“What?” He scowled. “Why?”
“You know, Grigor, I’ve always admired you.” Dylan leaned against the side of the desk. “We’re all aware of the selfless sacrifices you’ve made over the years regarding your own life in order to ensure our family’s survival.”
“And?”
“Haven’t you ever, just once in your life, wanted to be selfish and take something for yourself alone?”
Grigor drew in a ragged breath, knowing the answer to that was never. Not until he met Gayle and recognized her as his mate. Once aware of who and what she was to him, he had seen and wanted nothing else but her. His greatest desire was to ensure her happiness. Unfortunately, that happiness didn’t include him.
“Gayle has a job offer in London with Markovic’s organization,” he dismissed. “If she’s crying, then it’s because of the thought of another separation from her sister.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“I beg your pardon?” Grigor was still the nominal head of this family, even if his own mate chose not to respect that fact.
Dylan gave an impatient shake of his head. “Gayle is…complicated. Stubborn and proud. But underneath that, she’s scared of needing anyone. Her sarcasm is all bluster in an effort to hide that vulnerability.”
“You think I don’t already know that?” he derided. “She’s been running rings around me with that sarcasm since the moment we first met.”
His brother chuckled. “Me too, if I’m honest.” He sobered. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t know or understand why she behaves that way.”
“And you think I don’t?” Grigor’s expression was grim as he paced in front of his desk. He had made love to and with Gayle for days, had tried to show her, through that lovemaking, how necessary she was to his life. She still wanted to leave him. “If I try to use our mating to cage her, then she’ll only fight all the harder to be free.” He gave a shake of his head. “I won’t do that to her.”
“Even if she’s miserable at the thought of leaving here?”
“As I said, she’s upset at the thought of leaving her sister, not me.”
“Sure about that?”
Grigor sighed. “It’s for the best, Dylan. Besides, Nathaniel and Chloe are sometimes apart when she travels to London to see friends. Tegan and Bryn are too. And Izzy attends university every day.”
“And our brothers hate every minute of their separation, can only bear it because their mating is already established. Holly and I have been mated for a week, and even this brief separation while I talk to you is painful for me. Your own mating with Gayle has existed for even less time than that.”
Grigor avoided meeting his brother’s probing gaze. “And we’ll be together again when the mating lust becomes too uncomfortable for one or both of us.”
“We mate for life, damn it,” Dylan growled. “Our mating connection, once we find it, is as necessary to us as breathing. We certainly don’t live apart from our mate.”
“Gayle never wanted this mating, Dylan,” he snapped as his brother would have voiced anothe
r protest. “She only agreed to it because the alternative was death for both of us.”
Dylan gave a frown of frustration. “Are you sure?”
“Very.”
His brother sighed deeply. “And what about you? What do you want?”
His hands clenched at his sides. “I want my mate at my side every minute of every day and every night.”
“Then tell Gayle that!”
His eyes narrowed. “If I did, then our mating bond would make her feel compelled to stay for my sake. I won’t ever use emotional blackmail to hold on to her.”
“And being apart from her could drive you insane from the worry over her safety and the mating lust!”
“I am fully aware of that.” Grigor grimaced. Like Dylan, even the separation from his mate of a single floor of the house was enough to cause him, and his dragon, to clamor to be with Gayle again. “I’ve already spoken to Volkov in regard to Gayle’s safety when she’s in London. He’s assured me it won’t be a problem to ensure two of his men are watching over her during the hours she isn’t working with them. I never thought I would say this,” he said self-derisively, “but it helps that Volkov and Markovic are aware we’re all dragon shifters.”
Dylan laughed softly. “Those two men keep so many secrets already, what’s one more to add to the list.”
“True,” Grigor drawled. “I won’t ever—” He reached out to grip the edge of the desk as a sudden crippling pain ripped through his whole body. “Gayle just left,” he gasped, falling to his knees as the pain became excruciating.
“Fuck.” Dylan fell to his knees to draw the collapsed Grigor into his arms. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”
Gayle stared miserably out the darkened window of the second black SUV. Something she had been doing for the last hour, since the moment the vehicle pulled away from Pendragon Castle.
And misery was something of an understatement as to how it felt to leave Grigor. It was as if her heart and lungs, at the very least, had been ripped from her chest, robbing her of breath and a heartbeat.
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