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.”
Twenty-Three
Anna
Caz wasgrowing near.
My eyes popped open, and I sat up in bed. The bedroom was silent, and no noise came from outside the door either. Yet the insistence, the innate knowledge that he was getting closer pressed on me nonetheless.
These premonitions had been growing stronger ever since things between us went to the next level, but no further changes had happened. Our mate marks were growing, providing incontrovertible proof that we were meant to be together.
As if I needed more confirmation.
The pleased rumbling of my dragon in my chest echoed that sentiment while also scaring the shit out of me. I wasn’t used to an active presence in my body. The connection between me and her was growing stronger as well. The increase in her activity coincided with each new mate mark that blossomed on my body.
The more I bore his marks, the stronger she became.
What would happen if I let him truly claim me and complete the mate bond? Would she come alive entirely? Would I be able to shift? I drew in a sharp breath.
Would I be able to fly one day?
It was scary. All of it. My dragon. Shifting. Mate marks. Caz.
I was falling for him. There was no point in trying to deny it any further. Not to myself, not to him, or anyone else. I shuddered at just how strong the pull was becoming. Just the night before, we’d come together again, and I had almost lost control and told him to do it, to bite me and claim me fully as he fucked me.
The words had been on my tongue, hanging there while I screamed his name and writhed ever deeper into the comforts of his bed as he licked me with the same eagerness as the first, second, and third times. With him, it was like every time was new.
And it was always about me. I’d reached for him, tried to return the pleasure with my hands and my mouth, but Caz was stern on that point. The first time I touched him was when I was ready to dive in headfirst. Without holding back.
He called it the world’s longest foreplay.
I knew it had to be torturing him, but the discipline, the strength to hold himself back was impressive and attractive in its own way.
But I was losing the battle. The only thing thathad stopped me from begging him to claim me the night before was that I’d come on his face before I could speak.
The euphoria that created had brought with it a new friend this time. One that hadn’t reared its head in a few days.
Guilt.
My eyes flicked to the door as a pressure increase in my mind said Caz was almost here. I still couldn’t hear him, but it didn’t matter. He would arrive soon. My dragon knew when its mate was near.
I sighed. That was the problem. My dragon was happy. Caz was happy. I could be happy, if I let myself.
But I couldn’t. Milly and Ella were still out there somewhere, suffering at the hands of an elite while I was doing nothing but receiving pleasure from one. Fromtheelite of the elite. It wasn’t right.
I missed them. Badly.
I sat upright suddenly, a fresh thought coming to me in conjunction with the loneliness of having no friends to talk to.
For years, I had relied on Milly and Ella to help guide me. Just as they did with me. The three of us trusted one another utterly.
And without them here, I wasn’t sure if I was making a mistake. Not about Caz being my mate. There was too much proof he was, including thelines swooping across my chest that were the color of his eyes.
But just because he was my mate didn’t mean I was reading him right. I trusted my friends’ judgment. They would tell me if I was right—if Caz really wasn’t what the rumors all said or if I was letting my pussy do the thinking, blinded by the way he touched me and made me feel.
Milly would see through him in an instant. I knew that. If he was faking, she would be able to tell. It seemed hard to believe, but he could be. After all, this was a man who could have anything he wanted. Anything at all. Yet somehow, he was just as into me, as I was him.
