Free Take Me by T.A. Grey Page B

rule. Zeke isn’t the right man for this position, Dominic.”
    “Mother, I know this,” he said.
    “Then you know what’s at stake if you don’t get elected.” Her voice softened as she came towards him. She let her guard down and he saw the burning pain of his father’s death still lingering in her eyes. It had only been a few months since they’d lit his dead body and let the flames take him. “Your father was a great man. It’ll be hard for any to take over in his place, but if anyone can do it, you can, my son.”
    “Mother, I’ll win the presidency. Don’t worry about it.”
    She nodded, blinking fast as tears filled her eyes, and then she gave him a tight smile. “Of course you and Lady Julianna will only help to prove to the people that you are traditional just as your father was. She will make a fine bruid .”
    Dominic looked away. He doubted that. He didn’t like being quick to judge but Julianna didn’t seem like the type to care about women’s issues and that would be her responsibility as his queen.
    A knot settled in his chest like a lead ball.
    It felt wrong even thinking about mating with Julianna. It had nothing to do with the fact that they’d barely spoken when they met last night. Last night when he’d handed his family’s ring to her. The same ring that he’d forcibly removed from Helena’s finger not but a few months earlier. Did Julianna say anything? No, she just tipped her lips into a gracious smile then left for her rooms.
    He’d hoped that maybe once he met Julianna that same fire he’d felt for Felicity Shaw would be there. He’d thought that maybe, just maybe, he’d been so long without a bedmate that his lust-filled mind had overtaken him.
    But then he and Julianna sat and talked quite genially over a glass of blood and he’d never been more bored. She was not passionate. She did not fire his blood. She didn’t even capture his interest. He’d rather read an encyclopedia on insects than talk to her. It had been that bad. Of course, it didn’t help that all he’d wanted to do was go after Felicity. He had been unable to stop replaying their short time together.
    Julianna did nothing for him.
    He certainly did not have fantasies of pulling her expensive dress up, touching her wetness, then filling her over and again with his cock.
    Nope. Not at all.
    Even the thought of doing such a thing with the doll-like Julianna made his skin shrivel like a prune.
    But he had to do it. His mother was right. He needed a bruid before he ran for office and there wasn’t much time for that. He needed one famous enough that everyone already knew her and would accept her graciously. Julianna would fit the part perfectly. Even her father was ready with his constituents to back his political campaign. All he had to do was mate with Julianna.
    He’d been thinking it through since last night and could only come up with one decision. He must take Felicity as his mistress.
    A slow smile curled over his lips.
    “What’s that look?” his mother asked warily.
    He flicked his gaze to hers and smiled for real. “It’s nothing. Just making plans. Let’s get back to our guests now, shall we?”
    He turned for the door but his mother grabbed his arm and tugged. He turned back to her, one questioning brow raised.
    “Son, you will mate with Julianna, won’t you?”
    “Of course.”
    Another unwanted mate to be saddled with. He’d done it before for five hundred years. He could do it again. Anything for his people. Anything to keep the weres , especially Zeke, from taking over. That would put three weres against two vampires on the council. He couldn’t have that. Not when his father had taken that seat for more than four hundred and fifty years.
    “What about Ms. Shaw?” she asked. “I don’t have to give her the job. I can make this all go away. You know it’s for the best.”
    Dominic regarded at the door, envisioning Felicity sitting on the sofa wearing that dress made to drive a