Vaughn (Russian Dragon Heat 2) Read online

  “Sorry.” She placed the keycard in his palm, but was careful not to touch his flesh again. Just in case she hadn’t imagined their reaction to touching each other earlier.

  “Stay behind me, please,” Vaughn instructed in his husky and yet melodious voice as he unlocked and opened the door. The broadness of his body filled out the doorway, and his head almost touched the frame above.

  “No one has been seen entering my suite until now who wasn’t authorized to do so,” she assured as she followed him inside.

  “Yet,” he bit out, his gaze searching every part of the sitting room.

  It wasn’t a large or luxurious suite, just a tiny sitting room, and then a bedroom with two single beds. Opposite that was a bathroom. Leonid didn’t believe in spoiling his dancers with too many comforts. It made sense in a way; they were rarely in their hotel rooms because they were usually at rehearsals or actually performing.

  “What are you doing?” She frowned at Vaughn as he quickly checked the sitting room, including behind the curtains, before moving down the hallway with the obvious intention of doing the same with the bedroom and bathroom. He moved with that same predatory and soundless grace she had noticed earlier.

  “Confirming there is no one else in the hotel suite,” he dismissed.

  “The flower is already here, on the table.” Anastasia had seen the white lily lying on the coffee table as soon as she entered the sitting room.

  “And the person who delivered it could still be in here.” Vaughn strode down the hallway.

  Anastasia stared at the flower. It was the same white lily that had appeared all the other nights.

  Because white lilies were so often present at funerals, most people believed they represented death. But Anastasia had actually looked up its meaning and knew that the flower also symbolized virginity and purity.

  “Do not touch it,” Vaughn bit out harshly as he returned from the bedroom.

  Anastasia instantly retracted her hand before her fingers had the chance to touch the beautiful, delicate white petals. “It’s just a flower,” she defended.

  “And I don’t want you to touch it and contaminate what is evidence of someone else’s presence in this hotel suite.” Vaughn reached down to pick up the flower before raising it to his face.

  Anastasia told herself afterward that she must have been mistaken, but it seemed to her that Vaughn Romanov actually sniffed not just the petals of the flower, but the long green stem.

  That he then picked up the card, delivered with the single bloom, and also raised that to his face before seeming to sniff again.

  Vaughn was able, with his enhanced dragon senses, rather than his less receptive human ones, to detect the faint scent of another human on the stem of the flower and the accompanying card. As if whoever had delivered them had worn gloves of some kind. The scent wasn’t strong enough for him to be able to differentiate it from several others in the room.

  Anastasia.

  Irina Boyarova; her scent was all over the hotel suite and so could have contaminated the flower and card.

  Another female who could be the maid that came in daily to change the sheets and towels.

  Vaughn didn’t detect a male presence in the suite, other than his own. Which, although it helped to ease the inner jealous rumblings of his dragon, wasn’t helpful in detecting the identity of Anastasia’s stalker. Or whether she had a lover.

  So far, none of the human dragon mates, neither the Pendragon brothers’ nor Vladimir’s, had been already committed or married to someone else. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t going to happen. Vaughn hated to imagine what might befall that human male when, or if, it should occur.

  The important thing right now was that he didn’t sense that to be the case with Anastasia.

  “May I see?”

  Vaughn blinked back into total awareness of his surroundings. Not that he had been unaware of Anastasia for even a second. She was now, and would be so for, hopefully, the rest of their long lives together, his primary concern. Her happiness and wellbeing was now everything to him. As was her safety.

  He held on to the card, a part of him not wishing her to be contaminated by the evil intent he could sense merely from touching the small oblong of white paper. “It says ‘Why won’t you die?’” He growled the words.

  Mine, his dragon echoed before going wild inside him, once again wanting to be set free.

  Bite.

  Rip.

  Kill.

  Vaughn silently echoed those sentiments. No one, absolutely no one, was allowed to threaten or harm his mate, by word or deed. So much so that if Vaughn could take Anastasia back to Russia with him right now, to the safety of the family dacha where he had recently spent three months alone, then he wouldn’t hesitate to do so.

  Unfortunately, he knew Anastasia wouldn’t agree to that.

  She didn’t yet know that he was a dragon shifter, let alone that she was his fated mate.

  It would take time, and a patience Vaughn was no longer sure he possessed, to seduce and make love to Anastasia until she was ready to hear any of those things.

  He could only hope he was strong enough to continue to maintain control over his hunger to claim her, for himself and his dragon, until that time came.

  The words on the card weren’t anything Anastasia hadn’t read before.

  She had found the mysterious delivery of the flowers disturbing at first. But as the days passed, with no one appearing to admit to sending those perfect blooms and she had remained unharmed, she’d grown dismissive of what their appearance might mean. They were only harmless flowers, after all, the words written on the cards meant to frighten her.

  Besides, the ballet company would be returning to St. Petersburg in ten days’ time, and she doubted the sender of the flowers would bother to follow her back there.

  In the meantime, Vaughn Romanov had stated it was his intention to share the suite with her.

  Anastasia eyed the couch where Vaughn had said he would be sleeping. Even if it opened up into a double bed, as Vaughn claimed it did—although how he knew that she had no idea; probably the same way that he knew everything else about this situation—there was no way a man his size would fit on it lengthwise. Widthwise might be a bit of a squeeze too.

  This man was huge.

  Which in turn made her think about his “mighty hammer.”

  Anastasia had no idea where these thoughts were coming from.

  Her life so far had consisted of a few early years in an orphanage, which she mainly didn’t remember, and then ballet, ballet, and more ballet. Oh, she’d had some time to study and finish her education too, but the ballet was so all-consuming that at twenty years of age, she had never even had a boyfriend, let alone—

  Let alone what?

  Vaughn Romanov was proposing sharing a hotel suite with her, not a bed, and even that was only for her protection.

  She eyed him from beneath her lashes. What would it feel like to become the center of the sexual attention of a man like Vaughn Romanov?

  He looked to be in his mid-thirties and possessed a confidence he wore as easily as he did his perfectly tailored black evening suit.

  With a sexual experience to match?

  No doubt.

  Whereas Anastasia didn’t have the first clue about how to—

  How to do what?

  Anything that wasn’t about the ballet, she acknowledged ruefully.

  It would be foolish of her, despite that lightning shock of awareness she’d felt earlier, to even think about Vaughn as ever becoming her lover. Of his ever wanting to. His services had been hired by the ballet company to act as her bodyguard, nothing more and nothing less. Even if she didn’t think she needed one.

  She looked down at the carpet now instead of at him, embarrassed at even having those thoughts about him. “I’ll sleep on the couch.”

  The first indication she had that Vaughn had crossed the room and was now standing in front of her was when his highly polished
black evening shoes stepped into her view. It was followed by that zing of awareness when she felt his fingers beneath her chin as he tilted her face up until she was looking directly into those piercing green eyes.

  “You can join me on the couch, if you wish to,” he murmured softly. “Otherwise, you’ll be spending the night alone in your bedroom. As you usually do.”

  A frown furrowed Anastasia’s brow as those last two words seemed to be a question. One accompanied by the narrowing of his eyes. “I share the room with Irina,” she defended.

  “Yes, but I somehow doubt that young lady always occupies the second bed in your room,” he drawled. “Does she?”

  Anastasia’s cheeks heated. “I’m not about to discuss Irina’s sleeping arrangements with you or anyone else.”

  “Especially not Antipov,” Vaughn said knowingly.

  She scowled her irritation as she stepped away from him and his disturbing touch. “I’m very tired. I think I’ll go to bed now.”

  “You usually eat when you return to the hotel after a performance.”

  “How do you know that?” It irritated her intensely that this man seemed to know so much about her when she knew practically nothing about him.

  Knowing he was one of seven brothers and a member of the elusive Romanov family living in a place in St. Petersburg didn’t count when all the family was a mystery to everyone who lived there.

  Vaughn could see that Anastasia, after remaining mainly silent when he was talking to Antipov at the theater, was now starting to seriously chafe against both Vaughn and his knowledge of her daily routine. She had shown the latter by the abrupt manner in which she had moved away from him just now.

  As her bodyguard, Vaughn needed to know her movements so he could protect her.

  As her fated mate, he now insisted on knowing them.

  As her future lover, he wanted to know exactly how to ensure her happiness, emotionally and physically.

  To that end, he intended for Anastasia to eat before going to bed. “I haven’t eaten this evening either,” he explained softly. “There wasn’t time before going to the theater.” Unlike him, Anastasia didn’t look as if she should miss even a single meal, especially after a grueling evening of dancing.

  But nor did she look as if she wanted to sit down and eat this late-night meal with Vaughn, a man she had not only just met, but who’d simply moved into her life, front and center, without any encouragement from her.

  She could have no idea of just how much further Vaughn was going to move into her life.

  Anastasia would be his life from now on.

  His brother Vladimir, newly mated, resented anything and everything that kept him away from that mate.

  The Pendragon dragon shifters were all mated too, and the passing of time hadn’t made any difference to their love and possessiveness over their mates.

  Anastasia might find Vaughn irritating now, but she had no idea of the iron control he was having to exert in order not to claim her right here and now. Without thought or consideration to the fact she had no idea dragon shifters even existed, let alone that she was the fated mate of one of them.

  Insisting Anastasia eat dinner with him was Vaughn’s compromise to what he really wanted. Not that he was going to put it quite that way… “I’d really like it if you would join me,” he encouraged gruffly.

  She frowned at him for several seconds, as if she knew she was being played, before nodding. “I usually have—”

  “Chicken salad and bottled water.” Vaughn winced as he realized, from Anastasia’s stunned expression, that he had once again, as far as she was concerned, at least, overstepped a line by knowing what she liked to eat and drink.

  As far as Vaughn was concerned, he was behaving exactly as a dragon shifter should by attending to the health and welfare of his mate. Dancing the ballet took a lot of Anastasia’s strength and energy. Besides, he knew that she always chose to eat after she had returned to the hotel each evening, just as he also knew she always ordered the same thing.

  “I’m starving,” he continued conversationally as he picked up the telephone receiver and put in the order for both of them.

  “Rare steak?” Anastasia’s nose wrinkled with disgust once Vaughn had ended the call.

  Vaughn could quite easily have eaten the steak raw, but he had ordered it to be cooked rare out of deference to her. He doubted she would enjoy sitting opposite someone who had a plate in front of them of raw meat floating in its own blood.

  He shrugged. “It’s a personal preference. Perhaps you would like to shower while we wait for the food to arrive?”

  Those perfect pink lips curved into a teasing smile. “Are you trying to hint that I smell, Mr. Romanov?”

  “Not at all,” he hastened to reassure.

  He hadn’t known until tonight what his favorite scent was, but now that he had met his fated mate, he knew that it was a combination of honeysuckle and oranges.

  “And my name is Vaughn,” he added huskily.

  Anastasia’s smile widened. “I know. I was only teasing.” She sobered. “Won’t you need some other clothes to change into before going to bed?”

  Vaughn almost grinned at how nervous she sounded at the possibly of him walking about the hotel suite in just his underwear—black boxers this evening. “I knew this was the hotel where the ballet company are all staying, so I left my things downstairs with the concierge when I arrived earlier. I gave him a nod when we walked through hotel reception—” He broke off as a knock sounded on the outer door. It was far too soon for it to be room service with their meal. “I think that’s probably someone delivering my things now.”

  He’d only brought a single backpack with him with a change of clothes. Firstly because he didn’t like to carry too much with him when he was flying as his dragon, but also because one of his abilities was to disappear and reappear his clothing at will. Usually with the intention of shifting into his dragon. That wasn’t happening this evening, so he would behave as a human would rather than his dragon.

  Besides, having been alive for centuries, he and his brothers had accumulated such wealth, they could probably all buy new clothes every day for the rest of their lives and not even see a dent in their bank accounts.

  Anastasia used Vaughn’s brief distraction when he insisted on answering the door to try to collect her chaotic thoughts.

  Two hours ago, she hadn’t even known Vaughn Romanov, and now he stated he intended being with her twenty-four-seven.

  In the role of bodyguard, admittedly, but it was still disconcerting for a woman who had never even been alone with a man before to suddenly find herself sharing a hotel suite with one.

  Chapter Four

  “Okay?” Vaughn gave her a reassuring smile when he returned and dropped his small bag near the coffee table.

  Was she okay? Probably not. Certainly, those few minutes of having Vaughn’s attention on something other than her hadn’t been long enough for her to completely regain her equilibrium.

  Everything had happened so fast earlier at the theater that it was only now the full force of the situation was becoming apparent to her.

  The flowers had been arriving for the past three weeks, ever since they arrived in Paris, to be exact. Admittedly, it was disconcerting to arrive in her dressing room after a performance or back at the hotel and find one of those white lilies waiting for her. But the flowers themselves couldn’t hurt her. The cards had started arriving with the flowers a week ago and they weren’t pleasant. But so far, there hadn’t been any sign of anyone actually following through on those threats. Anastasia hadn’t been involved in any unexplained accidents.

  Obviously, Leonid felt differently about the situation, which was why he had arranged for her to have a bodyguard.

  Vaughn Romanov, to be exact.

  A man who made Anastasia tremble every time she looked at him.

  A man who had set her pulse racing the first time his hand touched hers.

  A man’s touch sh
e longed to feel again, if only out of curiosity to see if she had that same bone-deep reaction to him.

  There was something primal about Vaughn Romanov. Something bordering on feral lurking in those pale green eyes. That, along with his predatory way of moving, kept the air charged with— With what?

  As Anastasia felt her nipples bead to hardened berries and an unaccustomed warmth gush between her thighs, she knew her awareness of Vaughn to be purely of a sexual nature.

  She dragged her gaze away from his wide shoulders and muscular chest. “As you suggest, I’ll go and take my shower now.” She didn’t wait for him to reply before hurrying down the hallway to the bathroom.

  She closed the door behind her before leaning back against it to draw in long and ragged breaths in an effort to calm her once-again racing heart.

  How on earth was she supposed to sleep with a man like Vaughn Romanov just feet away from her on the other side of the wall of her bedroom?

  Despite all Vaughn’s efforts to engage Anastasia in different subjects while the two of them ate their late dinner together, the conversation was stilted at best.

  Worse than that, it was almost as if Anastasia was frightened of him. It was there in the way she wouldn’t meet his gaze. In the fact she was only picking at her salad, when he knew she hadn’t eaten since lunchtime and must be hungry.

  It wasn’t helping that Vaughn knew she was probably completely naked beneath the knee-length cotton nightgown and matching robe she had changed into after her shower. The practical garments weren’t in the least sensuous in style. But the fact Anastasia was his mate made anything and everything she wore, or didn’t wear, sexy.

  She stood abruptly during a particularly long lapse in conversation. “I’m going to bed.”

  “You haven’t finished eating.”

  Her eyes widened at Vaughn having reached the doorway into the hall before she did, her hand raised to her throat in alarm. “How did you do that?”