Dragon Fever (18 page)

The rush of the fireball was an instant, searing inferno. The jet was engulfed.

“Farther back,” Torch warned. “Rave can take it when it blows, but we can’t.”

His friend tucked Esme into one of the seats of the SUV. Torch ziptied Anjali’s hands and all but tossed her into the back. Piper bit her lip as she met Anj’s shocked gaze before Torch slammed the door.

There was more to that story, she knew, but it was a mystery for another day.

The pilot and the broken-armed man hovered indecisively, eyes shuttling from the burning wreckage to the SUV to the foothills beyond.

Torch snorted. “I suggest you come up with a good excuse for Ashcraft. Although you’d probably be better off jumping into that fire. Or you can let Ashcraft find a way to explain the tragic crash of his private jet while you run far, far away.”

They took the last option, the pilot quickly outdistancing his injured companion.

Torch eyed Piper. “You gonna freak out now?”

“Have I yet?” she countered.

He snorted again, more gently this time. “Rave never believed in true mates.”

She gave him a lopsided grin. “And I never believed in dragons.”

“Then you two are perfect together.”

They weren’t perfect at all. They were only…well, human and dragon. They’d both worked so hard for others, they’d all but forgotten themselves. Now they had something that was just theirs. Something rare and precious.

Something magical.

She gazed up at the beautiful beast hovering in the night sky.

“Rave will take you back to the Keep,” Torch said.

She barely heard him, or the SUV pulling away. All her senses yearned for the dragon, for Rave.

He touched down delicately in front of her just as the plane exploded. Heat and light radiated around his spread wings, but only a mildly warm breeze brushed back her hair.

She took a step toward him. Now she knew where those chest and arm muscles came from…

He peered down at her, a touch of the wild animal in his wary gaze. He huffed, and a curl of smoke drifted up from his narrow muzzle.

“You don’t scare me,” she murmured. “You came to save me. You held the plane when I was landing it, didn’t you? I was coming back to you. I swear I had nothing to do with Ashcraft’s plans, or Anjali’s. Do you believe me?”

Slowly he twisted his long neck to bring his triangular head to her level. His glinting eye studied her. The pupil—slit like a cat’s—widened, and she saw herself reflected. She didn’t look like herself; she looked…wild, free.

Like the true mate of a dragon.

She lifted her hand to his muzzle. The scales were hot, but almost velvety smooth. Though overall dark, each scale at its edges had an opalescent rainbow sheen—the ichor—like a jeweled treasure hidden in the shadows.

“You aren’t hidden anymore,” she said. “I found you.”

He ducked his great head under her hand, almost as if…

Rather than waiting for her doubts to sink her, she ran her fingers down the crest of spines. The spines thickened along his neck and back, but over his wing joints, there was a bare spot.

Just big enough for a certain curvy booty…

He ducked his shoulder, his bent foreleg making a nice stair step.

And then she was riding a dragon.

She wrapped her arms around his neck as he tensed and sprang into the sky.

Her strong legs clamped under the flex of his flight muscles.

Oh man…

The foothills fell away beneath them, the burning jet nothing more than a distant warning.

Despite the cold, desert night and the wind in her face, Piper glowed with warmth. Partly from the hot dragon between her legs, but also from a thrilling joy.

This pure, life-sustaining clarity was what she sought when she looked through her microscope at a drop of water. And here she’d found it, in flames and the night sky, aloft on dragon’s wings.

Rave took a wide, looping turn, so easy she didn’t fear falling off. But if she did, she had no doubt he’d catch her.

It was a good thing she was so confident, because when the lights of the city gleamed just beyond his outstretched muzzle, he started arrowing downward.

She recognized the medieval turrets of the Keep—now the design aesthetic made sense, as did the remote position on the edge of town—and when they were directly over the middle, Rave folded his wings and dove.

She laughed aloud as they descended in a tight spiral into the well of the secret garden.

Rave landed near the pool, so gently the water barely rippled and she didn’t even realize they’d come down. But then the huge body beneath her shimmered with the opalescent energy of the ichor as he changed.

Before she could react, he was twisting to take her in his arms.

For a moment, the vast wings still flowed from his human shoulders, but then he was the man who’d first captured her imagination.

Now she knew he’d never let it go.

Not that there was much left to her imagination. Since he was utterly naked.

“That’s convenient,” she murmured.

His thickening cock nudged her thigh. “When you laughed, I knew,” he said. “I knew you were mine. Not just my solarys, not just my treasure, but my dragon’s mate. My heart.”

He cupped his hands under her chin, tilting her head up to take her mouth in a wild kiss. Tongues tangled, and their breaths turned to gasps. He stripped her bare in a heartbeat, his hands claiming every inch of her.

She did the same, finding taut muscle and smooth skin where wings and spikes had been.

“You’re glorious,” she murmured. “So strong. So beautiful.”

“So yours.”

His growl vibrated through her, weakening her knees and sending a burst of hot, wet need through her core.

She ran her hands over the map of his treasure. “You’re really okay? When that black smoke hit you…” She looked up at him when he clasped her hands together. “You know I wanted no part of that, right?”

“I know.” His gaze glittered down at her. The pupils slitted, revealing more of the stormy blue-gray. “If you want my ichor, you have only to ask.”

He dropped to his knees in front of her, his hands trailing down to her hips. “You are my solarys. The light and the heat of my dragon. The heart of my treasure. My life. How I won you when I never believed such a one as you existed…” He shook his head, then leaned forward to press a kiss to her navel. “You are the flame within me now.”

She feathered her fingers through his hair so he looked up at her. “I want you inside me.”

He took her hard and fast and she welcomed him with equal intensity. The fear and shock that had left her heart pounding before turned to passion, flaming through her blood.

She screamed when she came and his roar echoed her.

When they floated in the pool afterward, she touched her mouth. Her lips were swollen and tender, but only from kisses.

“It’s the mate bond. Through it, I can share some of the healing power of the ichor with you, just as you were able to call to me.” He kissed her wet hair. “Who hit you?”

She snuggled against his chest. “He’s dead.” She should be more horrified by that, she knew, but they would have killed Rave. Maybe some of the dragon’s unblinking ferocity was in her now, borne on the mate bond.

His arm tightened possessively. “I would kill him again for you.”

“It’s over.”

She knew it wasn’t, but she would hold onto the illusion, just for a little bit.

Rave seemed inclined to agree. “I need to get a bed down here.”

“You have a lovely bed in your suite. The garden is perfect just like it is.”

He huffed out a breath. “You’re right. We can use the bed upstairs when we are being civilized.”

She turned in the circle of his arms to float over him. “I like you wild.”

He ran his hands down her back to squeeze her ass. “That delights me since I want to show you some very wild things.”

“More secrets revealed.” Dipping her head, she kissed the bare skin above his heart.

Though he didn’t move beyond a satisfied sigh, a shockwave moved through the water, sending ripples bouncing back at them. Each little wave was topped with sparkling rainbows.

His eyebrows rose. “What was that?”

She looked down. “Rave,” she gasped.

Where she’d kissed him, a stylized sun burned in his skin, its rays spiraling across his pectoral muscle. After a heartbeat, it faded to the half-hidden metallic gleam of the rest of his markings. The water settled with one last stray gleam like a shooting star.

“Hmm, see?” he said smugly. “I am yours.”

Rising up to balance her forearms on his broad chest, she sputtered. “What… How…”

“You claimed the dragon. It sings for you, burning through my hide. My solarys, marked on my skin.”

Tentatively, she traced the new lines. “Does it hurt?”

“Only the thought that I might have lost you.” His deep inhalation floated them both higher in the water. “We thought we would keep you locked up down here at the center of our hoard.”

“Oh really?” She dug the points of her elbows into his ribs.

He winced. “Really. But now I understand that’s a terrible idea.”

“Good thing,” she said wryly.

“His solarys is a dragon’s breath and fire. I could no more hide you away than the dragon. You are both meant to shine.” He rolled her in the water, anchoring his hips between her legs. “Now confess. You have no reservations about loving a dragon-shifter?”

She widened her eyes at him. “Loving a rich, sexy, smart, and powerful man who turns into a beast in bed even when there’s no bed
and
can fly me to the stars? I think I won the jackpot.”

“You think?” he growled.

She wriggled against him, centering his bulging length at her center. “Well, it might’ve been pure dumb luck.”

“You can roll my dice as many times as you want,” he said. “But you’ve already won it all: my treasure, my heart. My love.”

Turn the page to read Chapter 1 from DRAGON FATE, the next story in the Masters of the Flame series.

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MATING FEVER

Masters of the Flame: Book 2

DRAGON FATE

He longed for the fury of the mating fever.

She had the magic to touch his dragon heart.

Unlike the other Nox Incendi dragons, Torch Dorado never sought his treasure, the hoard that would bring peace to his inner beast. But when he hunts down Anjali Herne, he may have found the first scintillating jewel to tame his dragon heart.

But Anjali is a threat to the security of all dragonkin, and he’ll have to make her believe he is not the fire-breathing, maiden-munching monster of fairy tales. Well, there may be a little munching and a lot of fire…

Chapter 1

Torch Dorado spread his wings and soared above the highest turret of the Keep.

He swept down hard, muscles straining in his chest, talons clenched tight to hold onto his precious burden, aiming for the heart of the storm.

Had to get above the clouds, quickly, though that was more because of his mood than any particular necessity. No radar was calibrated to pick out his current shape, and while naked human eyes were capable of seeing, human minds weren’t able to believe.