“After which you threatened me,” Tegan reminded him through gritted teeth.
“Yes. Well.” Baker gave an uncomfortable glance toward the woman he was with. “I thought we could have had something. But obviously you felt differently, and once you made that clear, I backed off. I certainly haven’t been lusting after you ever since— What is your problem?” he demanded of Bryn as he growled low in his throat.
“I advise you to leave before you find out,” Bryn rasped in warning, his teeth having turned to sharp points in his mouth, his talons in danger of breaking free at the mere thought of this man even thinking of lusting after his mate.
Baker took a step back at that growl and the unearthly glow Bryn knew would be in his eyes. “Lesley and I were leaving anyway.” He rushed round to the other side of the table to grasp the blonde by the arm, pulling her to her feet and tugging her along beside him as he left, casting several looks behind him to make sure he wasn’t being followed as he hurried away.
Which was when Tegan came out of her haze and became aware of the curious glances of the late-night drinkers still occupying the bar.
What was she doing?
Yes, she’d been feeling frustrated that this uncontrollable desire she felt for Bryn only seemed to be going one way, but instead of suffering the humiliation of telling Bryn how she felt, she’d verbally attacked Steven. He was right, she was out of control. And it had to stop.
“Not my finest hour.” Tegan winced once she and Bryn were once again in the privacy of the elevator going up to their suite. Well away from those speculative glances in the bar, thank God.
“No,” Bryn grated, facing rigidly forward.
She scowled. “You could try lying to me.”
“Why would I do that?” He sounded genuinely puzzled.
“Because a mate is supposed to put his partner’s wants and needs first.”
“And you would rather I did that by lying to you rather than tell you the truth?” Bryn’s brows rose, but he still didn’t look at her directly.
“Well. No. Not all the time.” A blush warmed Tegan’s cheeks. “But a bit of poetic license wouldn’t go amiss when I’ve made a fool of myself.”
“I will try to remember that in future.”
“You do that.”
“And you.” Bryn moved so fast, his body was suddenly pinning Tegan’s to one mirrored side of the elevator before she even had chance to realize what was happening. “You will not ever flirt with, speak to, or challenge any other man again but me.” He grasped her wrists and pressed them to the wall either side of her head. “Do you understand?”
Be careful what you wish for, immediately entered Tegan’s mind.
Bryn was every bit as intense and out of control now as she’d earlier wished he might be. Too much so, if anything.
His eyes glittered that deep bronze. A nerve pulsed in one tightly clenched cheek. His lips were a thin line, his chin jutting forward. As for the heat of his muscular body pressing against hers… It was as if that heat claimed her everywhere it touched, and the bulge of his arousal was pressing against her mound.
He ground that erection against her. “Do. You. Understand?”
“Well. Yes. But—” She broke off as the elevator doors opened and Bryn kept hold of one of her wrists in order to pull her out in the hallway.
“No buts, Tegan,” he rasped, his breath warm against her flushed cheek as he pressed her body against the wall. “Mine,” he added in a guttural voice Tegan barely recognized as belonging to Bryn.
Possibly because it didn’t?
The Bryn she knew was maddeningly calm, even cold, on occasion.
This Bryn was anything but controlled, and the wild intensity in his eyes looked feral.
She swallowed before answering him in a reasoning tone. “Could you just back off a little?”
“No.”
She chewed on her bottom lip. “Not even if you’re…hurting me?”
“Nice try.” Bryn bared his teeth in a smile, causing Tegan to press even harder against the wall behind her as she saw the rows of sharply pointed—dragon’s?—teeth. “The release of your mating scent tells me hurting you is the last thing I’m doing.”
Her eyes widened. “You can smell it?”
“Yes.”
It was more than a little humiliating to realize her own body was betraying her. “Can your brothers smell it too?” It would be even more embarrassing if Dylan was able to detect her arousal when he arrived here tomorrow with the antidote to her torment.
“We can all scent Chloe.” Bryn looked far from pleased at the possibility his brothers might scent Tegan too.
“You know I have no control over this.” She pulled out of his grasp even though it bruised her wrists to do so. “Nor will I have any of my actions dictated by you.”
His eyes narrowed to slits. “Meaning?”
“Meaning I’ll talk to and flirt with whoever I damn well please.” She marched down the hallway, the key card to their suite already in her hand.
Bryn caught up with her as she opened the door, his fingers curling about the top of her arm as he swung her back to face him. “I forbid it.”
“You forbid it?” she repeated incredulously.
That nerve pulsed in his jaw. “You are my mate.”
“And you’re mine, but I don’t recall telling you what to do!”
He straightened. “I have not talked to nor flirted with any other woman.”
“I haven’t flirted with anyone either,” she defended impatiently.
“You spoke to and laughed with several other men during the party this evening.”
“That’s called keeping my job.”
Bryn eyes narrowed. “How far are you willing to go to keep that job?”
“Not that far, you arrogant, over-bloated dragon!”
“I apologize.” But he didn’t look particularly sorry. “And my dragon didn’t like you talking to those other men either.”
“Your big scary dragon doesn’t frighten me,” Tegan shot over her shoulder as she marched inside the vestibule of their suite.
He raised dark brows as he followed her inside and closed the door behind him. “How do you know my dragon is big and scary?”
“Because you’re big and scary,” she snorted disgustedly.
“Then perhaps, as his mate, it would be advisable if you were to stop poking his sleeping dragon,” a voice drawled from the darkness of the sitting room.
Tegan turned sharply in the direction of that voice, a gasp catching in her throat as a man stepped out of the shadows into the light of the vestibule.
Not Dylan.
But Grigor, the eldest Pendragon brother.
Chapter 11
“Nathaniel contacted me to tell me about the baby and alerted me to the fact there’s something wrong here in New York,” Grigor said in answer to Bryn’s question as to what he was doing there. The three of them were now standing in the sitting room lit by a couple of standard lamps. “When I spoke to Dylan, he seemed concerned because he couldn’t get here to you until tomorrow morning. So here I am.” He shrugged those broad shoulders.
Tegan had met the eldest Pendragon brother once before, briefly, during one of her visits to Wales to see Chloe. Grigor was by far and away the most imposing of the brothers. Even taller than Bryn but with the same muscular body, he kept his dark hair overlong, his handsome face appearing as if it were carved from granite, and dominated by shrewd and piercing dark brown eyes.
Did that mean his dragon was also brown?
Somehow Tegan couldn’t envisage the proudly haughty Grigor Pendragon as an uninteresting brown dragon—
“Red,” Bryn supplied softly.
Tegan looked at him sharply, sighing as she realized he’d been reading her emotions again. “But his eyes are dark brown.”
Bryn shrugged. “His dragon is red.”
“Wow.”
“Can I hope the two of you have now finished with this private convers
ation regarding the color of my dragon, and we can continue discussing what is really important?” Sarcasm dripped from Grigor’s deep and compelling voice.
Tegan raised her chin. “As in how you got in here in the first place?”
The eldest Pendragon brother gave a humorless smile. “No human lock and key could keep a dragon out if he wishes to enter.”
“We humans mainly use key cards in hotels nowadays,” Tegan answered with saccharine sweetness.
Bryn had accepted his mate challenging him at every turn, but he doubted his brother would have the same patience with Tegan’s independent spirit. Bryn might be set in his ways, but Grigor was even more so. He pitied his eldest brother if Grigor’s mate should also prove to be an independent and lippy twenty-first century woman. He pitied that mate too, knowing Grigor’s iron will to be impenetrable.
It was unfortunate Grigor was here at all, considering the situation with Bryn’s mate was still undecided. But he couldn’t be angry at Nathaniel, or Dylan for telling their eldest brother Bryn had met his fated mate. It had happened so rarely, only twice before Bryn, that it was a reason for the whole family to celebrate.
Except Tegan wasn’t yet his mate, and there was still no guarantee she ever would be.
“Your mate appears to need to be informed of the correct manner with which she addresses me.” Grigor confirmed his lack of patience with this twenty-first century women.
“I’m standing right here if you have something to say to me,” Tegan taunted. “And Bryn isn’t my mate.”
Grigor narrowed his obsidian gaze on Bryn. “Why isn’t she?”
“Still standing right here,” Tegan taunted.
Bryn bit back a grin at his mate’s continued defiance and concentrated on his brother instead. “When or if we mate has nothing to do with you,” he stated coldly. “In the meantime, you will treat my mate with the respect she deserves.”
“If you mate?” Grigor thundered predictably.
“It’s our choice, okay?” Tegan moved to stand beside Bryn.
“No, it is not okay—”
“Grigor.” Bryn spoke in a chilling voice.
His brother’s nostrils flared. “You’ll die if she refuses the mating.” He breathed in deeply. “You both will if you do not complete the mating.”
“Did you just sniff us?” Tegan gaped.
Grigor gave a haughty nod. “I can scent your mating has already begun.”
“Oh God, he can smell it too,” Tegan groaned.
Grigor shrugged. “I only stated the truth.”
“Then perhaps you should try working on your lack of tact rather than berating me for my lack of awe in your presence!” She eyed him impatiently. “And I don’t think either of us needs reminding of the fact if we don’t complete the mating we both die.” She drew in a deep breath. “But while all of you may have had sixteen hundred years to get used to the idea, I’ve only known I’m a dragon’s mate for a matter of hours.”
Bryn placed a protective arm about the stiffness of her shoulders as she continued to glare at his brother. “I don’t think your presence here is serving any purpose, Grigor, except to upset my mate.”
To his surprise, his eldest brother chuckled. Something that occurred even more rarely than Bryn’s own displays of humor.
Tegan narrowed her eyes on the eldest Pendragon brother. “I’m glad you find something amusing about this situation.”
“I somehow doubt that.” Grigor was still smiling as he settled himself comfortably in one of the armchairs. “She is more than worthy of being your mate, brother.”
“If you don’t stop talking about me rather than to me, I swear I’m going to—”
“I am paying you a compliment, human,” Grigor snapped. “And while I might approve of you as Bryn’s mate, you could still do with learning a little humility.”
“I could?” Tegan bristled incredulously. “Have you taken a good look at yourself lately, you arrogant, pompous, overbearing bloody dragon!”
Much as Bryn was enjoying this exchange between his mate and his brother, he couldn’t allow the situation to deteriorate any further. “Do you intend staying the night, Grigor?”
He nodded. “If neither you nor your mate have any objections? It is my intention to fly back to Wales with Dylan in the morning.”
“I—”
“If you will excuse us, Grigor?” Bryn cut off what he guessed would be Tegan’s objection to the idea of Grigor staying here, placing his arm firmly about her waist. “It has been a long day for Tegan, and she has to work again tomorrow,” he reminded for her sake rather than anyone else’s. “The couch pulls out into a bed,” Bryn informed his brother before he all but dragged Tegan into the bedroom and closed the door behind them.
Tegan immediately pulled free of him. “What an arrogant, pumped-up—”
“Dragon with preternatural hearing,” Bryn reminded her dryly.
“Smug bastard,” she completed forcefully.
“I believe the human saying is ‘it takes one to know one’,” came Grigor’s amused answer from the adjoining room.
Tegan looked about to explode. “He— I have never— He’s bloody impossible!”
Bryn chuckled. “He likes you.”
“Well, the feeling isn’t mutual, buddy.” She spoke loudly even though she knew it wasn’t necessary.
“I’ll grow on you with time,” Grigor answered.
She snorted. “Like a fungus!”
Grigor gave another appreciative chuckle.
Bryn grasped Tegan’s arms and kissed her hard on the lips. “Thank you!”
She looked slightly dazed. “What for?”
Bryn pulled her through to the adjoining bathroom before turning on the shower as a way of preventing their conversation from being heard in the sitting room. “You and Chloe are the first people to make Grigor laugh in more centuries than I care to think about.”
Tegan frowned. “We are?”
Bryn grimaced. “Not much succeeds in amusing a being that has been alive for sixteen hundred years.”
Tegan felt her anger fading. Yes, Grigor was high-handed, and little insulting, but how awful to exist in a world where there was no laughter or fun. “How long has he been like that?”
“More centuries than me.”
She shuddered. “God.”
“Exactly.” Bryn nodded. “Chloe has been like a breath of fresh air into our family. Izzy, Deryk’s mate, is less abrasive and more understanding of dragon ways and hierarchy, having been brought up within a family of them, but she also makes her presence felt. The three of you obviously intend to drag us all into the twenty-first century, kicking and screaming, if necessary.”
Tegan chuckled at the image of her, Izzy and Chloe being able to drag these huge, imposing men anywhere, least of all somewhere they really didn’t want to go. “Are we going to actually use that shower, or do you intend to stand here talking all night?” She eyed him speculatively.
Bryn heard the seductive huskiness in her voice and saw the invitation in her eyes. “What did you have in mind?”
She moved closer to him so that their bodies were almost touching. “Well, as Grigor can hear everything that takes place in the bedroom…” She glanced at the glass-sided shower cubicle in the corner of the room and quickly filling up with steam. Condensation also dripped down the tinted glass and tiled walls onto the shower floor.
His brows rose. “Is it safe to have sex in there? What if one of us slips on the wet tiles?”
“We’ll do our best not to.” Tegan spluttered with laughter at the continued look of horror on Bryn’s face. “Have you never had shower sex before?”
“Have you?”
“I asked first.” She wasn’t about to admit she hadn’t.
“Good point.” He continued to eye the glass cubicle dubiously. “I’m not sure showers had been invented the last time I had sex.”
Her eyes widened. “Truly?”
Bryn gave a slow shake of his hea
d. “One of my brothers was killed by dragon hunters in the nineteenth century. That sort of thing tends to put a bit of a dampener on a man’s sex drive.” He grimaced.
“I’m sorry about your brother… But really? Two centuries without sex?” Tegan’s incredulity was barely contained.
“I’ve already explained—”
“That it’s only a few human years. Even so…” She couldn’t see a human male, especially one as gorgeous as Bryn, refraining from sex for three months, let alone years.
Tegan also knew, from the response of the other women in the hotel to him, this lengthy period in Bryn’s life without sex certainly wasn’t due to a lack of offers. So it really was a case of Bryn not being interested.
Until her.
Both of them had been in a state of arousal since the moment they first met.
Because they were fated mates.
Nor was Tegan complaining about the lack of women in Bryn’s bed for the past couple of centuries. Learning she was his mate seemed to have given her a healthy dose of possessiveness where he was concerned. The same possessiveness Bryn had displayed toward her before Grigor interrupted them.
“So, what do you think?” She quirked one dark brow as she turned in the direction of the shower.
“If you’re sure neither of us will slip and hurt ourselves—”
“I’m not sure of that at all,” she dismissed lightly. “But it might be fun to try it and see. Let’s live dangerously, hmm, Bryn?” she encouraged huskily.
Living wasn’t something Bryn had been doing at all until Tegan came into his life. Existing, yes; living, no.
But Tegan made everything brighter, more of a challenge. Even taking a shower together. The thought of that shower including sex with her was more than enough incentive for Bryn to start stripping off his clothes.
Tegan quickly followed his example as she removed her dress, jewelry, and wristwatch before placing the latter safely on the sink vanity. Bryn’s cock stood to full and demanding attention as she stripped off her bra and panties to stand nude in front of him.
She stepped forward and placed a tentative hand on his bare chest. “You really are a magnificent specimen of manhood.”
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