“Not at all. Their ancestors might not have had good intentions when they bound their bodies to wolves, but the descendants are quite normal, some good some bad, just like dragons andhumans.”
She tilted her head. “Why didn’t you want to tell methat?”
He grinned. “I wanted you to think about me, not some big hairy dogs.” He rubbed his nose against hers in an Eskimo kiss, and her heart turned over. The man was romantic as well as sexy. He couldn’t be more perfect if she’d wished upon a shootingstar.
“I am definitely only thinking of you.” She kissed him, letting the passion burn like a winter fire in the middle of a snowstorm. Kissing a dragon was the most intoxicating thing she’d ever experienced. But then, all too soon, she had to bring herself back to reality, if only for a littlewhile.
“Mikhail, what are we going to do about the jewels? Or the police, for that matter?” The last two days had been a wild sort of dream, but she had to face facts. She was a suspect in a jewel heist, and if she wasn’t already fired, she would be the moment she came back. Her life, the one that she’d worked so hard to build, wasover.
He stroked a lock of hair behind her ear. “I have friends in high places. Or, more accurately, friends who have friends in high places. I will make sure you won’t suffer for what I’ve made youdo.”
She shook her head. “It’s not that easy. This isn’t a trivial robbery. I don’t think anyone can call themoff.”
He was silent for several long seconds. “I’ll figure somethingout.”
She closed her eyes and tucked her head under his chin. He didn’t seem to understand the depth of their situation. She couldn’t just leave with him and the jewels and live happily ever after. They’d stay on every major agency’s wanted list for the rest of their lives. Mikhail could easily mesmerize his way out of trouble if he had to, but what abouther?
That voice inside her head, the one that whispered negative thoughts, came to thesurface.
He doesn’t love me. He’s just infatuated. He’ll get tired of me like all my other boyfriends, and what then? I’ve destroyed my career and put a target on my back. For what? Greatsex?
Piper wasn’t going to be stupid, not when it came to men. No matter how perfect Mikhail felt, she couldn’t just pretend that they could walk off into the sunset and live happily ever after. He was a dragon, so he would stay young and beautiful forever, and she was just a human. One who would grow old and die. She hadn’t forgotten what Belishaw said about dragons mating humans, about how it would kill him. But if they weren’t fully mated yet, perhaps there was stilltime.
But she couldn’t tell Mikhail that she was planning to leave. He wouldn’t understand. He would feel betrayed, and he’d had enough of that in his past already. But she had no other choice. He could run off to the wilds of Russia and never have to worry about his life or livelihood. But shecouldn’t.
We aren’t mated, and we aren’t in love. We’rejust…
She didn’t want to label the wild and passionate experiences she’d had with Mikhail. It was everything she’d always wanted with a man, but at the end of the day it was still lust. She couldn’t destroy her life simply because she wanted a few more nights in his bed and in his arms. Even as she tried to convince herself of that, she knew deep in her bones that there was something more, something deeper betweenthem.
It can’t be love, but whatever it is, it’s scaring the hell out ofme.
If she let her heart stay in control rather than her head, she’d stay with him, and damn the consequences. But someday, when he grew tired of her, her heart would break and her life would be over. She would have risked everything for him, and it would only destroy her. There was no way she could stay, facing that outcome. Piper could only pray that someday he’d forgive her for what she had todo.
13
Dragon kind was no less cruel than mankind. The Dragon, at least, acted from bestial need rather than bestialgreed.
—AnneMcCaffrey
Randolph Belishaw could still tastethe sweet flavor of Jodie Harkness on his lips when he left the London residence she was renting. He was growing more and more attached to the woman, and that was dangerous. From the first kiss they’d shared, he’d glimpsed her as a little girl, running about a large backyard, her pigtails bouncing as she’d chased a puppy. He’d known then that Jodie was his true mate, and the longer he stayed around her, the more his dragon would bond with her, demand to claimher.
But Randolph could not afford to mate a human, not when they lived so short a life. He was the eldest son of his family. He had duties and traditions to uphold. Better to find a dragoness someday and continue theline.
His dragon keened with a sharp, protesting cry inside his head. It wanted Jodie—it wanted her and no one else. With practiced patience, he pushed the dragon back down inside his head, takingcontrol.
Still, the thought of never seeing Jodie again made his chest tighten. He shook himself as he descended the townhouse steps and began the journey home. He usually took a car, but tonight he wanted to enjoy the bite of wintry air. He stayed on the pavement, watching the streetlamps glow, creating a hazy halo around the opalescent domes that protected thelights.
“Mr. Belishaw.” Someone called his name. He turned around. A man stood only ten feet away. A man herecognized.
“Mr. Sinclair!” He nodded and gave a bow of respect. Though the man was not part of the prime minister’s inner cabinet, he was one of the most powerful men in Parliament. Word was he would be running for the top position in the next election. “This isunexpected!”
“You can be a hard man to find. One has to take an opportunity when it presents itself.” Conrad Sinclair stepped closer. “I was wondering if you might have dinner with me. You see, I have something of a sensitive nature that perhaps you could shed some lighton.”
Belishaw’s brows rose in surprise. “Me?” He hadn’t the faintest clue what Sinclair would want to talk to him about, either as a member of Parliament or as a dragon. He only knew the man by the briefest acquaintance in the dragon world and not at all in the human world, other than in the capacity every human with a TV knewhim.
“Yes. Very important. Do you have time thisevening?”
Belishaw checked his wristwatch. “I suppose Icould.”
