“I didn’t even think girls could be Dragons…” Commented Mateo out loud to himself.
“It was a safety precaution, Ignacio.” Rafael tried to explain. “We were only children then. Father and Mother wanted to keep us safe and they knew people would come after us in an effort to get at our sister. It was why they sent her away, Ignacio.”
Ignacio stood there, fuming as he glared at his brother. Ladon, slipping around the guard, took a few steps towards the three brothers with the intention of throwing in his own knowledge and perspective of the matter. He was stopped by the hand of the guard on his shoulder, which he snorted at and shrugged off before turning back to the brothers.
“He is right,” Ladon said. “…and it is why I need your help. Why she needs your help.”
“What are you talking about, Mr. Drayce,” Rafael asked, turning his focus to Ladon again. “Why does she need us?”
“To make a long story short,” started Ladon. “The same family who once managed to kidnap your sister when she was an infant have managed to get their claws into her again… and the Balaurescu family lacks the ability to bring her back.”
“…and what is your relation to our sister, Mr. Drayce?” Asked Rafael as his brothers just watched with shock and awe over this entire revelation. “Why have you come to find us and not one of our extended family?”
“The Balaurescus’ lack the ability to bring Isidora back from her current captors,” Ladon said. “The Visconti family out of Italy has taken her… and they are a rather vicious group to deal with. The history of their family is often a violent one. Your family in Romania is older than the Viscontis… and they are fewer in number.”
“You still haven’t said what your relation to our sister is, Mr. Drayce. Why have you come and not one of our family?”
“I’ve come to care for her,” Ladon admitted. “I am a suitor for her hand in marriage… as was Enzo Visconti before all of this…”
“Pfft… suitor for marriage?” Laughed Mateo. “Yeesh, it’s not like she’s royalty or anything. Come on.”
“She may as well be, Mateo.” Chided Rafael with a brief glance towards his brother. “She is the only female Dragon in the world. I would say she is a step above royalty in her importance and value to our world.”
“Our world?” Asked Mateo.
“Do you really think we are the only three, well four, Dragons in the entire world, Mateo?” Rafael asked, rolling his eyes at his younger brother.
“Well… no…” Mateo muttered under his breath, glancing away.
“So, you, a suitor for our estranged sister’s hand in marriage, have come here seeking our help in rescuing her from being the captive of… another suitor.” Rafael pieced together, turning his attention back to Ladon. “Do I have that correct, Mr. Drayce?”
“Well that is putting it rather simply, but yes,” Ladon answered.
“How was she taken captive?” Rafael asked.
“What does that matter?” Interrupted Ignacio. “If she really is our sister, we should go and help save her!”
“We have only the word of this stranger that she was even taken captive in the first place.” Snapped Rafael towards his brother. Ladon was fairly certain they didn’t get along very often. “For all we know, he has come here out of some desperate attempt to break apart a union our sister chose for herself.”
“Enzo Visconti told Isidora that the Balaurescu were not her birth family,” Interrupted Ladon with irritation. “When she demanded to know the truth from the people who raised her, they refused. Enzo had promised to tell her everything if she only came to the Visconti Estate in Milan. A clear set up to imprison her if their history is anything to go from.”
There was a brief silence between the lot of them. The three brothers remained before him, each one sporting a similar glare of speculation as they looked at him. Even Manuel, Lucia, and Maia all hung back and kept quiet for that heartbeat of time.
“I swear on my own life,” he continued, his voice lowering. “She is being held against her will, I am certain of it. I would not have come to you if it were not the only choice I had.”
The three DeLeon brothers looked between themselves for a moment, but no one said a word. The only one of them who had even known Isidora existed seemed to be the least concerned over the entire thing… and the one with the most control. Ladon felt his gut tighten with worry that he would be turned away.
“I’ll help you,” Ignacio said, surprising Ladon with how sincere he sounded.
“Me too!” Said Mateo, offering Ladon a friendly grin. “I’d love to meet my baby sister!”
“Thank you,” Ladon said, feeling relief for the first time since this had all begun. “Both of you.”
“What about you, Rafael,” Mateo said, turning towards his brother. “You coming?”
Chapter Seven
She was going to spend the rest of her life here.
At least, that was how she felt. It had been three days since she’d woken up with an iron collar around her neck and realized she had flown right into a trap set for her by Enzo and his family. In those three days, not a single thing of note had happened other than a deliciously rotated menu of meals brought to her on a tight time schedule. Since her rooms were archaic at best in their décor, she had no clocks or any sort of electronic to help her track the time, but the timely arrival of her food each day gave her something to count on.
In three days, how had no one come for her? She had to wonder it. Had something happened to her family in Romania? If not, why had they not come? Yes, of course, she had never actually told anyone that she had been leaving or where she was going… but by now they had to have noticed. They had to have known she had gone to the Visconti Estate looking for answers. Surely, they couldn’t have been surprised by these Italian snakes pulling the same stunt again.
If she was never found, never saved, what would happen? The entire Dragon world knew of her by this point in her life, and the suitor process… and her sudden disappearance was something a number of nearby Dragon families would surely take notice of. Then again… no one outside of her family in Romania seemed to know the tale of her kidnapping as a child… so why would the story be shared this time around?
Her head spun with thoughts of what was going to happen next. Not only to her… but to everything. All she had been told since waking up with the collar around her neck, was that Enzo considered her to be a bargaining chip of some sort or another, and nothing more. Her hand reached up, her fingers slipping under the cold iron as she held the collar for a moment, wondering if it would ever be taken off. Her stomach twisted into knots at the thought of what her life would be like if it was left on.
Someone had to be coming for her. There was no way she was going to be so easily forgotten about and left to whatever Enzo and his family had planned. If her family in Romania wasn’t going to come for her, she knew that Ladon would. He had to know that he was going to be the one she chose to marry, didn’t he? Of course, he did. After their last meeting there had to be no doubt in his mind that she had made her choice already… so he had to be coming for her. He had to.
She settled down onto a comfortable, albeit ornate, sitting couch in the suite of rooms she was being held in. Her hand still hung from the collar as her mind slipped away into a different world. She imagined what would happen when Ladon came for her. How he would arrive in his strong, impressive Dragon form and lay waste to the Visconti Estate. He and Enzo would battle, for sure, and it would be a vicious and bloody one at that. Ladon would be hurt, but not too badly, of course. Perhaps a cut to his arm or his shoulder. But he would take down Enzo in a fiery finale that would leave him as nothing more than a heaping pile of smoke and ash.
Victorious, he would claim the key to her freedom from Enzo’s smoldering corpse and race to free her from her prison tower. Once transformed back to his Adonis-like human form, he would be nude… and she shuddered at the idea of what his body
looked like, unhidden—strong, lean and fit from what she had felt through his shirt the last time she had seen him. The lines of muscle, she imagined, cut across his chest, stomach and arms like a perfectly carved masterpiece. His Greek heritage shining through his oiled, olive-toned skin.
He would break down the door to her little prison, his muscles glistening with the sweat of his efforts, and sweep her off of her feet. He would free her neck of the iron collar, kissing her raw and tender flesh with his loving lips in attempt to heal her. Overcome with his desire and longing for her he would find himself unable to resist her.
Memories of their last encounter bubbled to the surface and her mind ran with them. She imagined the feel of his hands caressing her body, finding their way to places they had never made it to the first time around. She shivered, goosebumps exploding across her skin, as she imagined the warmth of his hands against the more sensitive parts of her body.
Suddenly, in her little daydream, the billowing white dress she had imagined herself in was gone and they stood nude against one another. Warm skin against warm skin. The hand that clutched the iron collar around her neck fell slowly to her lap as she imagined the heat of his skin against hers and how firm he would feel pressed against her. Her hand slipped between her legs.
She imagined that, when he leaned in to kiss her, he did the same thing he had during their first kiss. His hand would slide gently up along her jawline and into her thick, dark hair. Their lips would work against one another as if their lives depended on it. She imagined the feel of his hands across every inch of her body… and as his hands found that tender space between her legs… so did her own hands in reality. She nibbled at her lip, rubbing and caressing her womanhood as she imagined what Ladon would do to her.
The daydream shifted again. They lay on a plush and comfortable bed and for the first time in her life she felt the hard, throbbing rod of a man buried within her. Her mind went wild with thoughts of how it would feel to be deflowered by a man, by a Dragon, such as Ladon. How his hips would roll and rock against her over and over again, the chiseled figure of his hips and waist rubbing with tantalizing heat against her inner thighs. Her fingers slipped behind the thin cotton of her panties, sending shudders through her body as her fingers worked in tandem with her imagination… leaving her body pulsing and her fingers slick. She imagined the sounds he would make as he reached his own point of climax… she wondered if he would cry out her name.
*
Night had begun to fall, the sun making its slow dip below the horizon before leaving her world in darkness. She had spent the past few hours picking away at the dinner she had been given and watching the sun move across the sky. She knew she couldn’t wait any longer. Four days now and she was nearly convinced no one was coming to rescue her from her lavish little prison here in Italy. She was going to have to save herself.
Transforming and just smashing her way out to freedom wasn’t an option with the collar around her neck. Reaching up, she once again grabbed at that collar in what was becoming a disturbing new habit she was not happy about. Getting the key for it wouldn’t be easy.
Enzo had already seen right through her once already… so she had to assume he would be keeping a suspicious eye on her every time he came near. Not that he came near her very often, actually. Since their last little conversation, she had only actually seen him once and that was, apparently, just to supervise the first time she had been brought food. No one else had spoken to her either. Not even when she tried to be friendly with the various servants bringing her meals, did she get a word. Not even a ‘you’re welcome’ to her ‘thank you.’ Somehow, she was going to have to make a break for it. She just had to figure out how.
Hours passed. The lights of surrounding homes lit up the hillsides as if stars had fallen to sprinkle the ground below her window and yet they brought no inspiration with them as she stared out in frustration. She was disappointed in herself. She should have been able to figure out how to get herself out of this situation. There had to be something!
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The entire estate seemed to rattle and shake around her. Artwork rocked and fell from the walls around her as more precarious bits and knick-knacks toppled over left and right. Isidora braced herself against a wall, her eyes wide as she watched everything shake around her.
“What the...” She gasped.
As soon as the shaking stopped, she heard voices and commotion throughout the house. It sounded as though people were yelling from all over the place, yet she couldn’t quite make out what they were saying. Before she was able to get her feet under her again, another intense explosion of sound rocked the house and sent it rattling once again. It sounded as if a wrecking ball had smashed through the opposite side of the house.
Nervous, scared, and confused she did the only thing she could think of and tried to make a break for it. She wasn’t safe here… and she needed to take her chance while she had it and use the chaos to cover her escape. She went straight to the door. While usually kept locked, it seemed it didn’t matter anymore. The shaking of the house combined with whatever destructive trauma had just plowed into it had left the doorframe warped and that lock no longer useful. With a surge of hope, she grabbed the handle and pulled.
“Oh come on, you sonofabitch!” She swore, yanking at the wedged door. “Open!”
As if she’d spoken the magic word, the door released from its frame with a cracking pop that sent wood splintering where the lock had done its best to hold. The force of it finally releasing sent her stumbling back a bit but she managed to keep her feet. Without hesitation and with excitement growing in her heart, she scrambled to her freedom.
Not even five steps down the hall and she came to a screeching halt as an all-too familiar sound hit her ears. The snarling hiss of a Dragon.
She ran towards the sound rather than away from it, knowing that her cavalry had finally arrived to bring her home. The moment she reached the top landing of a rather impressive and ornate split grand staircase she was met with a sight of pure destruction and chaos. The entire front entrance of the Visconti Estate, along with a portion of the main foyer where the stairway ended, had been reduced to smoldering rubble. Dust and smoke continued to rise from the destruction, and through those crumbling remains she spied a sight that sent her heart racing. Dragons.
Chapter Eight
Wasting time was not an option. Without an ounce of hesitation, Isidora flew down the staircase two at a time and rushed towards the Dragons she had seen through the crumbling entrance of the estate. As she moved, she saw members of the household, staff and family, launching into a full-scale mode of defense. No one seemed to pay her any mind as she sailed down the stairs and picked her way through the rubble of the main foyer. Apparently in their swift move to action and the panic underlying it all they hadn’t noticed their little captive making a break for it.
Somewhere in the back of her mind she wondered how the locals of this area would react to a battle of Dragons taking place in their backyard. Then again… the nearest human home was a good ten miles from the estate, which had likely been orchestrated due to instances just like this one. Keeping the truth of their world away from that of humans was one of the biggest rules amongst their culture… and it was the only reason they had managed to survive as long as they had.
As she emerged from the rubble of the estate entrance she realized that she was quite late to the party. Standing before the crumbling estate in all of their glory, were her rescuers. Four, fully grown male Dragons stood flank to flank and ready to battle. Her eyes went wide as she took them in. Their colors were magnificent and like nothing she had ever seen before. One looked as if he had been dipped in pure gold, his scales shimmering in the light of the Dragon fire burning all around them. Another looked to be the color of blood… a dark and ominous crimson, while the third seemed to be a jeweled emerald. She had never seen Dragons of such brilliant color… and it shocked her to her core in a way she was surpris
ed about.
The fourth Dragon, who seemed to be taking the lead as he stood with the other three, was a stony gray… and compared to his companions looked to be a ghostly apparition beside them. Somehow, even though she had never seen him transform, she knew that Ladon had come for her. The fierce look of fiery determination in those reptilian amber eyes and the way his stony claws dug into the Earth told her that this Dragon was the man she had dreamed would rescue her.
She finally realized that these four Dragons were squaring up against something… and as her dark eyes shifted she drew in a gasping breath of air. Another six Dragons, obviously the Viscontis, had come together some yards away, eyeing the group of her saviors with malice. She knew what was about to happen.
As she scrambled to find a place to hide but still watch what was going on, she noticed a familiar aspect to one of the Dragons amongst the Visconti. A single scar, running along the Dragon’s right cheek close to his mouth. It stuck out stark and red against the dark blue of his scales, puckering as he snarled to bare his teeth. There was no doubt it was Enzo.
In that moment, two things happened. First, was that Isidora realized that the key to her freedom had to be with the remnants of Enzo’s clothes. Once he transformed they would have been shredded, and she highly doubted he bothered to strip or have someone gather his clothes amongst all of this chaos. If she could find his clothes… she could find the key to the collar.
The second thing that happened was that all hell broke loose around her. Enzo charged towards Ladon, who reared back and met the Visconti Dragon halfway. They collided with a thundering smash that shook the ground around them. The rest of the Dragons took cue and attacked one another. It was pure chaos everywhere she turned.
She ran, doing her best to dodge and weave amongst the chaos around her. Too close for comfort, a Dragon claw smashed and dug into the ground nearby and she threw herself to the side. Her instincts were spot on and she thanked her lucky stars for it. The moment she landed, a blast of heat exploded in the air above her and sent a wash of heat that pressed her into the ground. Gasping, she glanced up before climbing to her feet.
There's Something About Dragons: A Paranormal Shifter Romance (Dragon In My Heart Series Book 4) Page 7