The Protector (Fire's Edge)

by Abigail Owen

  Lyndi bowed against her restraints, head dropping back as every buzzing, throbbing inch of her zeroed in on one single spot. That hot as sin mouth doing deliciously naughty things to her body. His tongue twined around that nub, curling and pulling before drawing it into his mouth again. The sucking hit a rhythm, and it felt as though her blood oozed closer to him with each draw.

  A tingling started up at the base of her neck, but before it could shoot down her spine and outward, he yanked his head back. Then, moving at a speed only supernaturals could claim, he had her unbound and turned around, hands flat on the mattress, ass in the air.

  “No.” The protest sprung from her lips before she even realized she didn’t want it like this.

  Immediately he stopped. Finger under her chin, he tipped her head so he could see her eyes. “No?”

  She blinked at the emotions in his eyes. Lust, need, demand…and fear. Fear? Why?

  “Not from behind,” she whispered. “It’s too…”

  She was going to say impersonal. He’d laugh in her face if she said that. Or ask too many questions.

  Before she could find a different word, he spun her back around to face him and had her pinned against the wall, his cock aligned at her entrance before she could catch her breath. “I’m going to try to go slow,” he promised through gritted teeth.

  He pushed inside her, the thick shaft of his cock spreading her just as she’d known it would, with the welcome burn of stretching.

  “Yes,” she hissed, wrapping her legs around him as he fed himself into her an excruciating inch at a time.

  He paused, shoulders heaving with each controlled breath. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “I want all of you.”

  “Fuck.”

  “Exactly.”

  He pushed more, strong arms holding her up and against the wall without even a tremble, now pumping his hips in incremental thrusts, deeper with each.

  But not deep enough.

  Using her legs as leverage, Lyndi shoved her hips against him and he slid home, balls deep inside her, filling every fucking inch of her in the most delicious, pain-edged way. Every nerve in her body lit up as though an electric current passed through her, leaving her pulsating.

  “Fuck me,” he groaned.

  “Yes, please.”

  Her words seemed to unleash him. He slammed one hand against the wall, the other wrapped around her waist to hold her steady as he proceeded to pound into her, the thick base of his cock butting up against her clit with each out of control thrust. Lyndi held on tight for the ride, letting the sensation slam through her, building and swelling, until the tingling from before once again started up at the base of her neck, stronger this time.

  Her body clamped down hard on him as the gathered storm of sensation singed down her spine to her womb then exploded outward. Levi threw back his head on a roar as he swelled inside her, stretching her more, then released, grunting with each pulse as she milked his cock dry of his seed.

  Suddenly, Lyndi found herself wishing like hell…

  No. She shut the thought off before it could go any further.

  His essence would do nothing inside her, no matter how much she wished it otherwise. Even if a small part of her, the part that refused to die no matter the reality, desperately wished it could be otherwise. All female-born dragons were sterile.

  Instead, she focused on the glorious sensations washing over every nerve in her body. Breathing hard, Lyndi dropped her head to Levi’s shoulder as her body slid away into a world of sublime release. Every ounce of tension drained from her muscles, leaving her limp, even as lingering jolts of pleasure trembled through her body.

  Followed by thoughts.

  She closed her eyes against them, but they wouldn’t leave her alone.

  Not regret. But…what the hell happened now?

  Because, just as she’d always suspected would be the case, she didn’t want to give this up. Give him up. A truth that scared the ever-living fires of hell out of her. Even her dragon gave a small whine of concern.

  He’s leaving. The choice is out of your hands.

  Gods that hurt.

  …

  Levi had no idea what alerted him to the change in Lyndi’s state of mind, a subtle tensing around him maybe. He was still sheathed inside her.

  Hell. She’d taken all of him. Every thick, long inch.

  All he wanted to think about was doing that again. And again. And…

  She sighed, the sound wrapping around his heart, and he acted on pure instinct. Pulling from her body, he swung her so that he was carrying her and walked them both over to her massive bed. The covers were all askew, so he tucked them both between the sheets and lay down facing her, keeping her close.

  She stared at him, eyes wide, but quiet. Very un-Lyndi-like, which scared him more. “Don’t,” he said.

  “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t let the world intrude. Not yet.” He wasn’t ready. If she wanted to go back to the way things had been…

  I’m leaving anyway.

  Lyndi’s smile was edged in a bitter kind of sadness. “The world never went away,” she said.

  “It did for me.” In her arms, everything became simple. Beautiful.

  Lyndi squirmed, and he knew without asking that she’d felt it, too. “What do you want?” she asked.

  “Want?” He trailed a finger over her shoulder, absorbing the silky, warm feel of her skin. “I want a connection.”

  “You’ll find your mate someday—”

  He shook his head. “You’re not hearing me. I didn’t say mate, I said connection. It’s not about the fates, or destiny, or continuing my family line, or a political advantage. A true connection comes with no strings, no expectations.”

  He paused, taking in her stunned expression, and offered her a crooked, self-deprecating smile. “Don’t laugh.”

  “I wouldn’t laugh at that.”

  “Don’t shut me out, either,” he countered.

  She glanced away, and he trailed his wandering hand to tip her chin so she’d look at him. But the second their gazes collided, Lyndi shook off his touch. He tried not to let that sting.

  “What do you want from me?” she asked. “You know that this is all we get.”

  Come with me.

  Levi barely managed to keep the words from bursting out of his mouth. At the mere thought, everything inside him stilled and then rushed forward again. What was he thinking? He couldn’t ask that of her. Could he?

  Lyndi stared, still waiting for an answer, searching his gaze which he held steady on her even through his own panic. Too soon. Asking her anything like that was…too soon.

  “That’s not fair,” he said instead, hating every damn syllable.

  She closed her eyes and leaned forward, brushing his lips in a kiss that was a hundred percent regret. “That old cliché?” she whispered.

  “I want more than what we’ve had,” he said. “Don’t you?”

  But what could they possibly have? Every option, every choice, was a door slammed in his face. She’d never leave the boys, and they couldn’t take them to the clans.

  Orphans were anathema to most dragon shifters. Dragon shifters needed an anchor for their human side when they shifted. Family and tightknit bonds. Orphans who’d lost all that more often than not lost themselves to the beast within and had to be put down before they went on a rampage that could expose their kind to humans, not to mention potentially kill a lot of people.

  While no one—not just Levi—had been all that happy about Lyndi starting her orphanage here in the first place, the clans would be even less accepting. The Alliance barely tolerated them…for now. Besides, putting the boys in the middle of a war wasn’t the answer, either.

  Lyndi swallowed, then shook her head. “Please don’t ask me for more.”r />
  Levi grimaced, heartsick because there were no good answers here. No path that didn’t lead to hearts cracked wide open. “Dammit,” he muttered.

  “Don’t,” she whispered. She pushed to sitting, taking the sheets with her to cover her body, hiding from him.

  Levi let her pull away, giving her the space she silently asked for but making an equally silent vow. This wasn’t over. His dragon rumbled his agreement. He wasn’t sure how, and she didn’t realize it yet, or maybe couldn’t let herself acknowledge it, but she was theirs now.

  Lyndi bit her lip. “We shouldn’t have—”

  “Yes, we should,” he cut her off. Then leveled a stony stare on her, daring her to deny the perfection that was their bodies coming together.

  “It complicates things.”

  “Yes.”

  Frustration had her frowning in that familiar way. “We—”

  “Should definitely do it again.”

  “Not what I was going to say.”

  “Why? Not good enough?”

  “I didn’t say that, either.”

  He smirked. “So I was good enough.”

  She blew out a frustrated grunt.

  “Mind-blowing, you might even say,” he continued as though she’d made no sound.

  “Don’t be arrogant.”

  With a shrug, Levi got out of the bed and left her sitting there watching while he grabbed his pants off the floor and pulled them on.

  “Hey…” she said. “What happened to doing it again?”

  He turned to find her watching him warily, eyes a wounded dark color, as though his leaving her hurt.

  He desperately wanted to get right back in that bed, but, maybe for the first time ever with Lyndi, he also knew exactly what he was doing. If they slaked their need with marathon sex, she’d call it a day and slam the door in his face on his way out.

  End of story.

  No way was he letting that happen. Now that she was his, even in this one small way—an incredible, drop-to-his-knees-in-thanks kind of way—he had no intention of giving her back. They’d figure it out. All of it.

  But keeping her as his would only work if they both decided to make it work. He couldn’t fight all the stumbling blocks in their way and her at the same time. That meant getting Lyndi out of her own head and out of her own way. And he only had a week to do it.

  He stalked across the room and she stayed very still, tipping up her chin to face him down, exactly like he knew she would. Levi planted his hands on the bed and pressed a long, tender kiss to her lush mouth. The touch set him to pulsing again.

  With sheer force of will, he shoved away the sensation and drew back, lips hovering over hers, eye to eye so she could see exactly how much he meant this. “I plan to claim your gorgeous body over, and over, and over, until you’re walking sideways. That’s how much I want you.”

  She opened her mouth, but only a squeak emerged, her eyes glowing red with an answering desire. He’d give thanks to the gods later. “But I need you to stop fighting me, fighting this.”

  The glow dimmed and she shook her head as though trying to clear it.

  “You have a week to figure it out.” Hopefully, she did.

  Unable to stop himself, he kissed her again. Fiercely, when what he wanted to do was linger. To take off all his clothes and slip between the decadent sheets just to be able to hold her.

  She wasn’t there. Yet.

  Gods above, he intended to get her there.

  Because walking away from her was about the hardest damn thing he’d done in a long time.

  Chapter Four

  Tineen Sabre paced through the halls of his mountain, his mind working through the arguments to be made for the proposal he had presented to the Alliance.

  A mating that would be to his political advantage. He needed the council’s blessing.

  This plan was the last positioning move of a carefully played chess game—a critical step in his plans to take down the Huracán team. A multipronged approach of disinformation, escalation, and lies that he’d had his team quietly enacting since this past winter.

  But the mating he’d proposed…this would weigh the game in his favor. He’d make the Huracáns lash out. Make them tip their hands and show their true characters. Then the Alliance would have no choice but to disband and punish them.

  Finally. Something they should have done months ago—years, really—before he’d lost one of his men.

  Tineen hardly heeded his surroundings as he walked. A solid fortress of rock. The headquarters of the Alaz team of enforcers. His enforcers.

  He had led and fought beside these men for almost two centuries, since the creation of the team, established at the same time as the Alliance. Losing even one of his men was unacceptable in his mind. That was an unforgiveable blow that he laid at the feet of the Huracán enforcers.

  He and his team had been doing their duty, and his man had paid with his life.

  The Alaz team had been sent to help deal with the traitor Rune Abaddon stealing mates. Worse, the woman the Huracáns had been protecting had illegally been mated by Drake Chandali anyway. Putting aside the other mates the Huracáns had illegally claimed, everything about that fight in Yosemite last winter, that entire situation, had been tainted. Stank with the putrid scent of lies and cover-ups.

  Only he couldn’t argue his case. The Alliance had “orders” from the High King himself to keep the Huracáns intact and put Drake in charge.

  Fucking cowards.

  No way had Pytheios dealt with this personally. The council was hiding behind trumped-up orders as an excuse not to have to punish a blood relation of the High King. If the Alliance weren’t going to disband and punish the Huracáns for the results of their decisions, not to mention every traitorous action they’d taken these past few years, then someone had to step up and show them the way.

  He had taken the mantle of that responsibility upon his own shoulders. Unsanctioned and in secret.

  Rounding the corner, Tineen stopped in the doorway to the war room. Every screen showed the various maps of the region his team watched over, monitoring for dragon fire heat signatures anywhere in the central strip of the north American continent. His territory.

  “Leave,” he commanded the enforcer on duty.

  Only the two of them were currently in the mountain, working under a skeleton crew while the rest were on special mission at the Alliance’s orders. Without question, his man obeyed, and Tineen closed the door behind him. Then he punched a series of codes into one of the computers, joining a secure virtual meeting room.

  He was the first to arrive on purpose, allowing him time to stand himself prominently in the screen, hands clasped behind his back, shoulders straight, ready to state his case again, if needed.

  Five minutes later, he hadn’t moved by so much as a twitch when the screen flickered and a room appeared, taking up several screens. The Alliance Council was already assembled around an oval table, facing the camera on their end.

  Comprised of one dragon from each of the clans, no way could he miss the fact that Ogun, the member representing the Green Clan, was missing. Had Mathai figured out that the green dragon was after his position as the leader of the Alliance? Ogun had been arrogant, though loyal to the old regime of kings. He’d been Tineen’s biggest ally in terms of how the Huracáns were handled.

  “Where is Ogun?” he wondered aloud, because not commenting would raise red flags.

  Mathai said nothing.

  “Called back to his king,” Zhuron finally answered. The representative of the Black Clan, Tineen’s clan as well, looked as though he wanted to shift uncomfortably in his seat, face pinched.

  Ogun seemed to have played himself out of the game. Interesting. And possibly a warning for me.

  “Tineen,” Mathai greeted him coolly, as though he hadn’t spoken
at all. The tall, lanky man with a shock of white hair at odds with red-tinted dark eyes showed zero emotion as usual.

  Tineen nodded in return. Then waited. He wasn’t going to start by asking what they had decided. That put him in an immediate position of lesser power. The beggar coming to the table for scraps.

  “You haven’t found Rune Abaddon,” Mathai said.

  Tineen hid a frown. This was not what he’d come to discuss.

  Rune. One more offense to lay at the Huracáns’ feet. Like salt poured into a wound, the Alliance had sent the Alaz team on a fool’s errand, trying to track down their traitor. Tineen’s men were currently supposed to be scattered across the Americas in a fruitless search for a ghost, leaving the Huracáns to guard the western portion of his territory in his team’s absence.

  Fuck that.

  Instead, he’d taken advantage of the order, right under the council members’ noses. What the Alliance didn’t know was that he had given his men a different mission.

  He’d sent them throughout the Huracán territory to the west, stirring up unrest within the dragon colonies throughout, giving those shifters reason to mistrust their local enforcers. Simultaneously, his men had been rounding up the undesirables and illegals—orphans, rogues, and law breakers—that those excuses for enforcers should have dealt with years ago. Clean out the territory and push out the men who had failed in their duties.

  And now to drop the hammer.

  “That is true,” he said to the council now. “Rune has gone quiet.”

  Not entirely a lie. The man hadn’t popped up as far as Tineen knew, not that they’d been actively searching for him.

  Mathai didn’t so much as twitch. “We would like your team to step up your efforts.”

  Tineen narrowed his eyes, debating the merits and impacts of that decision.

  The Rune mission had given him an excuse for his men to be out in the field and in territories other than their own. The Alliance had just given him even more leeway. That noose he was slowly tightening around the Huracáns’ necks was about to get easier to hold on to. Except…the expectations of the Alliance in terms of actually taking down Rune would also increase. “Why?”