Pia Saves the Day by Thea Harrison

filled his nostrils, choking him. From an immeasurable distance across the starry night, Death, whose name was Azrael, turned to face him.
    Azrael whispered his name.
    Dragos was well acquainted with that old bastard. They were, after all, brothers. Azrael, also known as the Hunter, was a part of the dragon’s nature, as Dragos was a part of his.
    He said to Azrael, You will not have me .
    Azrael gave him a pale, elegant smile. At times Death could appear quite alluring. Green eyes glittering, he said, One day I might, brother . You are immortal, not Deathless, and nothing in this universe lasts forever.
    Opening his jaws wide, the dragon let out a furious roar, and Death vanished in a blast of heat and light.
    Dragos woke with a start.
    Sunlight poured through the large windows of the bedroom. Pia nestled against his side, her head resting on his arm. She was deeply asleep.
    Shaking off the dream, he lifted his head and let his gaze roam down her nude body. Her luminescent glow was not quite as apparent in the bright light of day. Instead, her skin retained a faint, pearly sheen. While the effect was subtle, it was still all too obviously inhuman.
    Her current position accentuated the hourglass shape of her body. She had marks on her skin, faint smudges of bruising and reddened scores of bite and scratch marks. She was already healing, and by midafternoon the marks would be gone completely.
    A more civilized man would care that he had marked her. Perhaps the other Dragos would have cared. He touched one fading bruise lightly with his finger. Being neither of those two men, and intensely possessive, he would be sorry to see them disappear.
    Then he regarded his own body. He was so much bigger than she, harder and more calloused, and yet he had marks on his skin too. As he shifted lazily against the sheets, the scratches she had made on his back reminded him of her own passionate response to him.
    Carefully, so as not to wake her, he leaned over her sleeping form and mouthed, “You are so very much mine.”
    He was a fierce creature at the mildest of times. Now, the intensity of his feelings for her shook even him. And so, she was still a fool to have allowed it, let alone to have welcomed it as she had.
    He eased her head off his arm and replaced it with a pillow. She never awakened. They had not stopped making love until well after dawn, and clearly he had worn her out.
    Slipping out of bed, he went to the bathroom to sluice off quickly in the shower. After a few moments of searching in his closet, he located faded, cutoff jean shorts that he slipped on. He didn’t bother with any other clothes, or with shoes. The summer day was already acquiring heat, and besides, they were alone on the estate.
    He left her to search for food in the kitchen. The refrigerator was well stocked with both carnivore and vegan dishes that could be consumed with a minimum of effort. Someone had planned well for them.
    Standing at the counter, he ate most of a roast chicken. Once the sharpest edge of his hunger had been satisfied, he went exploring.
    The office— the other Dragos’s office—drew him. He took his time discovering all the different components, glancing through file drawers, reading the first pages of contracts, studying building plans strewn all over a round, mahogany table. The construction site by the lake would be quite a compact complex when it was completed, combining both offices and living quarters.
    Without having to be told, he knew that nothing left out in plain view would be vitally important. Any sensitive materials were either locked in the recessed wall safe he found hidden behind a paneling, or password protected on his computer, or hidden in the inaccessible recesses of his mind.
    Raging against his lost memory was an exercise in futility. He clamped down on the emotion as he tried several combinations on the computer, yet failed to discover the right password.
    What would the other Dragos use as a password? He