Chapter 36.2
Maxim
I have seen Vasili Romanov when he is angry. I have seen him when he is furious. I have seen him when he is vengeful and sadistic and violent.
But truly, I have never seen him quite this dangerous.
Vasili hovers in the air above this bed where I am tending my mate. I am the best one here to care for Neo, because Zara can barely leave Zephyr’s side while his dragon is so gravely injured.
Clearly, Vasili does not see this in my favor.
His pretty face is cold with suspicion. His narrow eyes glitter with malice. A flush of fury stains his sharp cheekbones with the ruddy tinge of bloodlust. He is wearing the respectable black trousers and blazer and cherry-red tie of the Friday uniform. But I am not deceived.
I know he is armed to the teeth.
This knife he grips, gleaming and deadly at my throat, is barely a glimpse of his arsenal.
In truth, I am fortunate to be breathing.
He could crush my airway with one clench of his casting hand.
Clearly, Neo too knows this. He knows firsthand the violence of which our lover is capable.
“Okay, V, just take it easy,” my bookworm says carefully, sitting very still beside me, shirt unbuttoned to expose his impressive physique. “Look, I know we haven’t talked about this. But there hasn’t been a whole lot of time. And so much has been happen—”
“Silence.” Vasili’s command slices the air like a guillotine.
Poor Neo, riddled with guilt that my kitten should never be made to feel, tumbles to an unhappy silence.
It is true that, since swooping in to rescue our Zara from the Faerie queen, Vasili has been in a rare mood. Zara says he is feeling stabby.
I must agree, this is so.
Indeed, I am waging a fierce inner battle not to give way to my own alpha instincts, with Neo in heat and needing me, and a rival alpha invading our bedroom. Besides, Vasili is pumping enough Mogadon aggression into the air to make any dragon agitated.
I lay a discreet hand on Neo’s muscled thigh to warn him. My mate must take care not to provoke the demon that lurks under our snake’s glittering skin.
Above all else, I must protect my Neo.
Vasili’s gaze darts to that offending physical contact between me and this boy he views as his. He bares his fangs in a menacing hiss.
Under my skin, my dragon stirs and rumbles.
Still, I am not my beast. And Vasili, under all his pissy temper, is more than angry. I am no telepath, and I have not yet bitten him. But I see the truth behind my love’s outraged glare.
He feels he has been… betrayed.
By both of us.
He is my love. And he is hurting.
This knowledge makes my chest bloom with pain and sorrow.
“Sweetheart,” I say gruffly, ignoring the knife at my throat to hold his vicious gaze. “No one here means to betray you. While we were alone on the mountain, Neo had his first superheat. It is the moon’s fault. Or it is no one’s. You cannot blame him for doing what he must.”
“Oh, I don’t blame him… much .” Vasili’s waspish tone makes our bookworm flinch like a bee sting. “I’ve been waiting for him to go into a proper heat since Zara and I bit him. No, I blame you , Rasputin. Don’t you dare pretend you weren’t lurking and lying in wait for your moment to ravage him—”
“Um, well, actually…” Neo clears his throat. “The night of the superheat? That was my fault. Like Max said, we were all alone. He wanted to find Zara for me, but I, like, couldn’t wait. And besides…” He sucks in a big breath and the words tumble out. “I’vebeenkindofintohimfor, like, a long time?”
“You don’t say,” Vasili snaps.
His hand tightens around the blade until his knuckles turn white. His body lowers until the deadly tip grazes my throat.
Truly, Neo’s confession is not helping.
“C’mon, V.” Neo shoots me a worried look. “Max is an honest, brave, just totally decent guy. He’s, like, honorable. You know he is.”
Moved by this praise, I swallow against the blade nudging my throat.
“Honorable.” Vasili sneers into my watchful gaze. “That dragon is trespassing on my property and he damn well knows it.”
Annoyance flashes through me. My nostrils flare wide. “Neo is not your property.”
“Well, dragon, he’s certainly not yours—”
“Good grief.” Neo’s brows rush together with a spurt of defiance. “I’m not a chew toy for the two of you to fight over. You can share me the same way you share Zara and Ronin.”
My cold heart flares with an ember of warmth.
This is the warmth of admiration for my brave kitten, standing up so resolutely to this terrible man who is known to have bullied him, his first years at the Academy, until poor Neo’s life was barely worth living.
The warmth in my chest is also the glow of hope.
This is what I have wanted from the start—Vasili and me sharing all our mates. Yes, we are both alphas, and it is rare for a queen to take more than one. But Zara has taken three. And Lucius, he has always welcomed me.
“That’s your heat talking, Mercury.” Vasili scowls.
He is still holding a knife to my throat. But his gaze sneaks away from my wary face to crawl down Neo’s naked chest in a way that makes me warm for a very different reason.
Vasili’s eyes narrow at Neo. “If you want two cocks stuffing your needy little hole, darling—and a third filling that naughty bookworm mouth—there’s no need to go sneaking around behind my back with this horny dragon. Rest assured I’ll take the matter up with Ronin and Lucius the moment we return.”
Neo squirms in the way he always does when someone mentions his hole. His squirming triggers a flood of my mating scent that heightens the tension in this bed.
“Um, totally not gonna say no to that,” our bookworm mumbles, rosy with blushes. “I can take more than one dick inside me at once, just like Zara and Ronin do. But Max is part of this too, V. He’s part of us .”
The ache in my chest presses against my throat until it burns.
This is the ache of love.
I am in love with my new mate.
Of course, Neo will not know this until I bite him. But, clearly, now is not the time to say so.
Vasili’s gaze veers from Neo’s defiant face to mine, then wanders down my bare chest, over my pierced nipples, to the erection jutting through my open zipper.
Even with this knife at my throat, my dragon wants what he wants.
He wants both of them under us.
He wants Vasili. And he wants Neo.
The tip of Vasili’s tongue touches one sharp fang and his gaze turns wicked. Delicately, with a degree of control I envy, his levitating body lowers until he straddles my hips. Now he is kneeling over me on the bed, arm extended to rest his blade against my jugular.
Despite the clear danger, the promising possibilities offered by this new position open before me.
My cock twitches and swells.
In my chest, my dragon rumbles.
The merest hint of a smile curls one corner of Vasili’s cruel mouth. Now, with his smoky lids lowered, I truly cannot read him. Without touching my aching dick, he trails the tip of his knife down my chest and circles one of my pierced nipples.
I swallow hard and say thickly, “Dushenka.”
Sweetheart.
I speak to him in Russian when we are private.
“Hmmm.” His gaze flickers sideways, to where Neo sits watching. “I’ll tend to you and your microheat in a bit, First Boy. For now, you just run along. I have something to say to our dragon in private.”
“No. Not until you promise me you’re not gonna kill each other,” Neo says stubbornly. “Or else I’m calling Zara. I mean it.”
My alarmed eyes veer to meet Vasili’s. In this, we are united.
Already our sovereign carries too much weight on her slender shoulders, with a distressed and grieving Zephyr to manage and that heroically injured dragon to heal.
Until they are well, we must not demand that she referee a testosterone-fueled cockfight between two of her alphas.
Vasili’s voice tightens with impatience. “At the moment, Mercury, you’re getting off lightly from this little infraction. I’d advise you not to press your luck.”
Neo’s uncertain face turns toward me. I dredge up a reluctant smile to reassure my mate.
“Go ahead, kotyonok ,” I say gruffly. “I promise I will not kill him. Yet.”
Vasili snickers at the threat.
Neo looks skeptical, but he buttons his shirt and climbs out of bed. He toes into his loafers and says firmly, “I’m not going far. So you two better behave.”
With that warning hanging over both our heads, our determined bookworm marches to the door and lets himself out.
His worried face is the last thing I see before the door closes between us.
“You do realize he is going straight to Zara.” I eye Vasili, who is still straddling my hips and tracing his knife slowly down my abdomen.
“I’m fully aware.” The flat of his blade slides under my stiff cock. When I cannot bite back a moan, he flashes me a mischievous look under a fallen wing of gilded hair. “You’re very priapic just now, dragon.”
As I frown in confusion over this English word I do not know, my love shifts to our native tongue. “I’m simply saying you’re hard. You’re shockingly hard for this terrible warlock who’s threatening to gut you in your bed.”
My heart softens for him, but my cock gets harder. The mere thought of Vasili Romanov using that knife on me while he fucks me makes my entire body tingle and my barb threaten to engage.
Truly, the tangled knot of need and longing I feel for this creature is perverse.
“You will not gut me,” I manage to say, gruff with all the love for him I am barely containing. “And you are not terrible. You do not deceive me. No matter what you wish others to believe.”
“Hmmmm.” Now I cannot read him at all. But I cannot believe he intends to let me wiggle off the hook so easily.
Not after I have taken what he perceives to be his.
Still, when he lays his cold blade lengthwise across my hot abdomen and begins unwinding his tie in a languid twist, I hardly know what else to think.
Perhaps he means to garrote me.
“Whatever can you be thinking?” His malicious voice acquires a mocking edge. “You look positively nauseous.”