Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
Casimir
I leapt down the spiraling stairs as fast as I could with Anna in my arms and my dragon trumpeting in my head.
Careful. You don’t have permission to lose control. We have to listen to her limits. Respect them.
My fingers shifted to claws as I laid her on the desk, slicing clothes free from her body and exposing the soft pink bra she wore underneath with a plain black thong that nonetheless set my blood on fire.
The dragon in me wasn’t listening. It was rushing forward, peppering her exposed body with kisses as I drank in every sinful curve and dip of her body. She leaned back on her elbows, her eyes rolling back under half-closed lids as she gasped and moaned softly under my touch.
This, this is what it should be like. I had dreamed of this day for decades with my imaginary mate, and now she was here. She was finally here. The best part of it all was she wanted me too. I could feel it in the rush of her heart and smell the sweetness of her arousal in the air between us.
But I couldn’t lose myself in that beautiful morass of exposed skin and whimpering pleas. There was something more here that I had to remember, that I had to act upon.
Trust.
On many levels. Even as I pulled down her bra and my lips wrapped around one nipple, I forced my beast to recognize what was going on in the moment. The single emerald mate mark on her skin practically glowed in my eyes as a reminder.
Anna was trusting us. Both of us. She had said she wasn’t ready to give me everything, to let my dragon own her and vice versa. Yet she understood I was barely in control, that every waking moment was spent thinking about her, dreaming about her, fantasizing about her, and nothing else.
She wanted me too. Wanted to explore what this was. But she was nervous, and rightfully so.
I groaned into her breast as she grabbed at my hair, pulling it tightly. Pulling me tightly. My teeth grazed her nipples in response, and she arched up into me harder than before. Her body was sinuous and writhing beneath me. Feminine and strong. Perfect.
My dick strained hard toward her, but I didn’t cave. I couldn’t cave. There were more layers to what was happening here than I would likely be aware of. But I knew some, even as I traced a zigzag pattern of kisses down her stomach and past her bellybutton, her moaning and gasps driving me insane.
She was trusting me as Caz, as her fated mate. Trusting that I would do what I had said. What I promised. I would restrain myself.
But more than that, she was opening herself up to someone with power. All her life, people with stronger dragons had taken advantage of her, using her and others like her.
To grant me that trust, to believe that the monster inside me wouldn’t use it or abuse it? That was utterly mind-blowing.
Remember. We aren’t hunters. We are her mate. We do as she wants. Whatever that might be. No matter how hard. We can rise to any challenge.
For her.
My dragon roared in agreement now. We weren’t like the others in her life. We were better. We were her mate!
And we would show her that. What was a little more pain for us? The scars on my back were far worse than having to take it slowly with Anna. I would endure a thousand more lashes for another second with her. Because she was the end to our loneliness. The end to all our pain.
And it began with what was right in front of my face.
I lapped out with my tongue, tasting her for the first time through her already soaked thong. More proof that she wanted us just as badly as we wanted her.
Growling with triumphant possession, I tore the underwear from her body and buried my face in her folds, drinking deeply of her delicious taste. I had no reference to compare it to, but I knew I wanted all of it and nothing else. Ever.
“Fucking hell!” she yelped, slamming her arms down into the desk and spreading wide.
Finally, the damn thing had a purpose for being so big.
I ran my tongue lightly across Anna’s clit, and she practically leapt from the desk, every muscle tensing before she sighed delightedly and melted into a puddle. Her legs were mine to control as I wrapped my arms around them, pulling them wide and exposing her to my eyes and my tongue.
She tasted like honeyed perfection. I traced every line and explored every inch of her pussy. My mate wasn’t the only one reveling in the moment. I basked in it. For the first time, I didn’t feel like a moron for holding back. The decision to keep all this for Anna was right.
I’d had a life of privilege, everything I wanted either handed to me or within my power to take.
Anna had fought tooth and nail for every scrap she’d ever possessed.
Now I was finally able to give her something she deserved.
Something that wasn’t another person’s castoff or rejection, or quite literally garbage.
And I got to give her that. Me. Her mate.
Slipping my finger inside her, exploring the warm, soft inside, I did exactly as the books had described and curled it upward, finding the soft spongy bit as I did and rubbing the pad of my finger over it ever so gently.
Anna hissed through suddenly clenched teeth, her hands finding her breasts and grabbing them, pinching her nipples and rolling them beneath her fingertips. I groaned into her pussy at the sight, nearly emptying myself across the side of the desk.
I had known I never wanted anyone else to touch her, ever, but I hadn’t factored in seeing Anna touch herself. That was different. And amazing.
“Don’t stop,” she begged, only then cluing me in that I had paused what I was doing to watch her run her hands down her body and back again. “I’m so close, Caz. Please.”
I grinned, happier than I had ever been. This was where I was meant to be. Treating my mate the way she wanted and deserved.
Working a second finger into her pussy, I resumed my focus on her clit, growling mightily as she cried out and held on to my head. Her legs twitched and clamped shut over my ears, but I didn’t stop. I kept going. Pushing her over the edge as she writhed and called out my name through her climax.
My name.
I might not have claimed her body yet, but she was mine, and my dragon let out a triumphant growl that filled the room and spilled out beyond. An unmistakable possessive sound.
It was perfect.
Burning pain exploded out from my chest, and I fell back in surprise, my growl turning to a cut-off groan as it intensified.
At the same time, Anna arched up off the desk further than before and screamed. The world was pain. Hurting. I tried to shove it aside. To get to her. To protect my mate.
I fell over top of her, the pain adding a wicked hot burn to it as her eyes found mine.
Then the heat exploded outward, and we both gasped. My cock twitched and jumped as Anna dug her fingernails into my back and cried out in a much different tone.
We came together unexpectedly, my cock spraying myself and the side of the desk, and her body twisting and jerking underneath me. But none of that mattered as my eyes drifted downward, taking in her body.
“Beautiful,” I whispered, staring at the new additions to her mate marks that had exploded out of the single line she’d had before.
Now instead of fading as it swooped back down toward her breasts, it extended down between them and out over her ribcage on both sides.
In addition, new swirls were starting above her breasts, but they were not done yet.
“Wow,” Anna breathed.
I smiled. “I know. They’re beautiful.”
“Yeah.”
Something in her voice drew my eyes upward, to find she wasn’t looking at herself.
I leaned up off her, and she pulled herself into a sitting position at the side of the table, her hands on my chest, tracing the purple lines across my body.
“Turn,” she ordered, pulling at my right side.
I lifted my arm to see that the lines now swept back just below my armpits and likely continued into my lats.
I didn’t want her to see that ugly sight again so soon, but an order from my mate was an order I intended to follow.
So I turned, trying not to shudder as her fingers ran along my torn and shredded back, tracing lines over bumps and scars.
“These are mine,” she said as I completed my turn.
“All of this is yours,” I said, waving a hand at my entire body. “Even the cum-stuck leg hair.”
Anna laughed and pulled me in close. “The only thing I don’t like about that is that I didn’t get to have a hand in it.”
“You will, when you’re ready,” I promised, kissing her deep. “Both hands, in fact.”
We laughed and continued to press tender kisses to one another’s mouth, simply basking in the quiet peace of the moment. Just the two of us, without a care in the world for those few minutes.
I wasn’t sure I’d ever felt so calm.
“Does this mean your cousin won’t come after me again?” she asked after a bit, leaning back to run her fingers over her own body. “Still just feels like skin to me.”
I touched my chest and her mate marks on me. She was right. It felt no different.
“Not yet,” I rumbled, unhappy about the topic change. “Not until I claim you.”
“What’s their problem anyway?” she asked, meeting my eyes, the violet circles the same color as the lines on my chest.
I was never going to get bored of that. Ever.
“Where do I begin?” I said with a bit of frustration, turning to sit on the desk next to her.
She leaned her head on my shoulder in a casual, easy motion. The closeness made my dick jump. Again.
“The beginning?” she suggested.
“My father and my uncle were twins,” I explained. “In every way, except one.”
“What one?”
“That blackened birthmark on my uncle’s cheek. He came out that way,” I explained. “My father is older, but over the years, my uncle began to believe that he came out first. That he was born first, and is the rightful heir to the throne, but because of it, his parents lied and switched the order.”
“He thinks he should be the ice tyrant over you?”
“He thinks he should have been there over my father.” I shook my head. “It’s insane, but I get it. My father was paraded about as the heir, as the next ice tyrant, and Mirko was relegated to the shadows. Kept hidden. It’s almost inevitable he would develop a complex about it.”
“I see.”
I nodded. “Things got worse when my father died.”
The words came out as smoothly as I could manage. Thankfully, Anna didn’t seem to react to the tiny, easy to miss hesitation before I said the word died.
“I think I’m beginning to see,” Anna said. “He chose that time to put his claim to the throne. To oust you.”
“Only verbally. I think he was going to challenge me formally, but then the battle with the Red King happened, and he didn’t.”
“He saw you were stronger, that you would beat him.”
I shrugged.
“Crap,” Anna said, deflating slowly. “And now I’m a threat to everything because, as your mate, I could provide an heir.”
“And lock him out of a claim to the throne unless he got rid of all of us.”
“And Dirk.”
“Dirk would give him the throne,” I said immediately. “He wants nothing to do with it and has made that clear. He’s said he’ll abdicate immediately if something were to happen to me.”
“Something tells me that won’t stop your uncle.”
I conceded that point with a nod.
“You’ve really dropped me into the middle of it,” she said.
The smile attached let me know she was trying to be lighthearted about assigning actual blame, but I bulldozed my way past that. She was completely and totally right.
I should have told her everything before bringing her here.
“I know, and I’m sorry. I should have given you more information and let you make a decision for yourself before I dropped you into this pit of snakes.” I bared my teeth. “But I swear to you, Anna. On my life, I will be dead before anyone harms you.”