Page 23 of Vex (Dragon Brides #12)

Vex had a month to convince his mate to stay with him forever, and he was wasting an afternoon at Zane's house.

He was a fool.

Twenty-six days. That's how much time he had left before Luisa would make her decision about whether their trial month was worth extending. The countdown felt like a sword hanging over his head, each passing hour bringing him closer to the moment when she would walk away forever.

He'd had Luisa on his estate for a week, and it was its own kind of torture. He'd asked her to come, to stay, to be his.

And now he had no idea how to do it.

He could negotiate trade agreements that affected entire star systems, could command respect from criminals and kings alike, could shift into a form that could level buildings with his fire.

But put him in a room with the woman fate had chosen for him, and he turned into a stammering fool who couldn't figure out how to bridge the careful distance she maintained between them.

If he'd truly been the playboy lord he'd pretended to be on Aetis, they would have spent every moment naked in bed. The dissolute rake would have seduced her with practiced ease, would have known exactly which words to whisper against her skin to make her melt in his arms.

But that man had been a mask, a performance designed to serve his mission. Now, faced with being himself, Vex felt like he was fumbling in the dark.

The most he'd done was hold her hand while they strolled through the garden.

The gentle getting to know you wasn't a waste. Vex cherished every moment at Luisa's side. He just wanted more of them.

All of them.

He wanted to wake up with her pressed against his chest every morning, wanted to know what she looked like when she was completely relaxed and unguarded.

He wanted to hear her laugh without the careful edge she kept in her voice, wanted to see her eyes soften the way they had that one night when she'd let him hold her.

The hunger for her was a constant ache, made worse by her proximity and the careful boundaries she maintained.

There was some sort of block between them, something they couldn't surmount.

It wasn't physical distance. They shared the same space, ate meals together, walked through his estate while she learned about his world. But there was an invisible wall between them, built from her past betrayals and his own uncertainty about how to be the man she needed.

Luisa was made of defensive walls. She'd opened up to him a bit one night, explained more of her childhood, of what had brought her into Brant Tallyer's orbit. He'd almost marched back to his ship and flown to Aetis to destroy the man.

His mate didn't cry. But she let him hold her.

The memory of that night was burned into his consciousness with perfect clarity.

The way she'd curled against his chest on the library sofa, her voice steady and matter-of-fact as she'd described a childhood that would have broken most people.

Hunger, abandonment, the desperate choices that survival demanded.

She'd spoken like she was reciting someone else's history, but he'd felt the tremor in her hands where they'd gripped his shirt.

And in the morning, he had sent a note off to the concierge letting him know he would consider it a personal favor if Brant Tallyer was never employed again.

She'd grown up learning that powerful men were dangerous, that offers of protection came with prices she couldn't afford to pay.

How could he convince her that he was different when every instinct screamed at him to claim her, possess her, keep her safe in ways that probably looked like cages to someone who'd fought so hard for her freedom?

If someone could help him overcome this block, maybe it was an actual playboy lord.

Zane.

His youngest brother had a reputation that was both legendary and completely deserved. Zane moved through relationships with the casual confidence of someone who'd never met a woman he couldn't charm.

Where Vex was all duty and restraint, Zane was pure hedonistic pleasure, living exactly the life their noble birth afforded him without the weight of responsibility.

Vex would never tell his brother that part of his dissolute rake version of Lord Vex was based on his youngest brother. It felt too much like an insult. Besides, neither Zane nor Rook knew exactly what it was that Vex did for the king, and he intended to keep it that way.

As far as Zane knew, Vex had met Luisa on a trip, and that was that.

Rook would hear the same, if he and his mate ever made it back to Vemion.

"You have that pretty human stashed away, why are you here?

" Zane asked with a smirk as he joined Vex on the patio behind his home.

The space was elegant granite fitted in intricate patterns, with comfortable seating arranged to take advantage of the spectacular valley view.

Flowering vines filled the air with sweet perfume, the perfect place for entertaining. "Or do I finally get to meet her?"

Vex growled.

The sound rumbled from his chest before he could stop it, purely reflexive and completely revealing. The thought of Zane meeting Luisa, of his charming brother turning that practiced smile on his mate, made smoke threaten to curl from his fingertips.

"Oh, it must be true love!" Zane laughed.

The delighted expression on his brother's face was insufferable. Zane looked like he'd just discovered the most entertaining secret in the galaxy, his eyes bright with mischief.

It could be. Maybe it was. Maybe it would be.

If he could figure out how to touch his mate.

"I can't visit my brother?" Vex asked.

"You can do anything you want. I don't see why you would though, when you have a beautiful woman—I'm assuming she's a beautiful woman—waiting for you back home." Zane's grin was pure wickedness.

"She had business to attend to," he said. "I thought I might visit."

"Business." Zane was doubtful.

She was on a call with her contact at the IDA filling them in on the data she'd found and what she'd destroyed. He couldn't tell Zane that.

Luisa's professional competence was one of the things he admired most about her, but it was also another barrier between them. She had a life, a career, responsibilities that existed completely independent of him. She didn't need him the way his dragon insisted she should.

"I don't think your mate should be able to think of business at this point in the relationship."

"How did you—I never said." With the looming threat of Luisa leaving at the end of the month, or sooner if she grew tired of him, Vex hadn't said a word to anyone of the true nature of their relationship.

He wanted to shout it from the skies.

But he was afraid.

Vex, who'd faced down armed criminals and negotiated with hostile governments, was terrified of a slip of a woman who barely reached his shoulder. Afraid she'd leave. Afraid she'd stay for the wrong reasons. Afraid he'd somehow damage the fragile trust they'd built by wanting too much, too fast.

He didn't know how to be afraid, and he certainly didn't like it.

"I've never seen you dance with a woman twice. Moving one into your home after a week-long vacation? You'd only do that with your mate." Zane looked insufferably pleased with his own deductive abilities. "Have you introduced her to Mother?"

"I haven't introduced her to anyone yet. She's not—we're not … How?"

Zane's eyes widened, and his grin turned into an open-mouthed smile. "Surely you know … how? Don't tell me—"

"Yes, I know how. Just because some dragons need to taste every woman that crosses their path doesn't mean the rest of us have … insufficient needs."

"So what's the matter?" Zane leaned forward in his chair, suddenly serious despite the lingering amusement in his eyes.

"We met, and it was …" Fiery. Passionate. Perfect.

A lie.

Every moment of their initial connection had been built on deception, on the roles they'd been playing for their mission.

The dissolute lord and his pampered mistress had chemistry that could have set the casino on fire.

But what did Vex of Vemion and Luisa of Aetis have?

They were still figuring that out, still stumbling through the awkward process of learning who they really were when the masks came off.

He'd been playing a part. She'd been hiding herself. Now they were exposed, and every move felt all the more real.

"The spark's left already?" Zane seemed doubtful.

"I want her more than anything." The words were ragged. "But I don't know … how."

"Have you tried talking to her?" his brother asked, voice on the edge of sarcasm.

"All we do is talk!"

"Have you tried talking to her about sex?" Zane's expression was perfectly serious now, no trace of his earlier teasing. "Have you had sex with her?"

"Yes," Vex ground out through gritted teeth.

"And you can't do it again because …"

Because the last time they'd fucked it had been to distract him from asking about her past.

The memory was a double-edged blade, cutting him with pleasure and pain in equal measure.

Her mouth on his, her body welcoming him home, the way she'd whispered his name like a prayer.

But underneath it all was the knowledge that she'd used their connection as a weapon, wielding her body to deflect questions she couldn't answer.

"If I met my mate, brother, I wouldn't let something as stupid as a lack of communication tear us apart. So, as surprising as this might sound, I think you need to go and talk to her. Or did you want to sit here and gossip all day?"

Vex glared and got up.

His chair scraped against the granite as he pushed back from the table. The sun was already starting to sink toward the horizon, painting the sky in shades that reminded him of Luisa's eyes when she was angry. He'd wasted enough time.

Little brothers were useless.