by Ruby Dixon
Claudia.
My mind fills with vague flashes of memory. Of hiding in the school bus from another dragon attack. The dragon landing. Claudia, wearing swim goggles and dragging me out of the safety of the bus while a dragon waits outside.
Falling off the dragon.
Oh god, I remember falling. Fear makes my mouth water, and I feel stunningly close to vomiting. I slow my breathing, ignoring the beads of cold sweat that pop onto my skin. Calm. Calm. You’re clearly safe. You didn’t fall, or you’d remember landing.
Weird. I really don’t remember landing, though. A new whimper escapes my throat. Am I dead? Is this death? Is death supposed to hurt this stinking much?
A low, rumbling sound, almost like a purr, fills the black space around me.
I freeze, not daring to open my eyes.
That…had sounded a bit like a purr, if a cat was the size of, oh, a jetliner. Fear makes my bones feel like jelly, and even though I want to be quiet, my breath begins to rasp in short, echoing gasps, loud even to my own ears.
Oh god. Oh god. I’d been falling. That was the last thing I remembered. Who’d caught me?
What caught me?
I squeeze an eye open, greatly daring.
Something stares back at me. Something with a scaly, horned face the size of a Volkswagen. Something with eyes that swirl in color from black to gold to black again. Something that purrs with fierce intensity and hovers inches away from my face.
A dragon.
I scream.
Epilogue
One Month Later
CLAUDIA
Give me a new challenge, Kael demands. One that will test my skills. You’re not trying hard enough.
I roll my eyes at his smug tone, but I’m having fun. I hold up my stopwatch, reset it, and then glance around. “All right. You want challenging? Let’s do challenging.” I eye the vista around us. We’re on the roof of the tallest building in Old Dallas, Kael perched atop the edge like a big, dangerous bird. I scan the ruins and then lay out the course. “Those three towers over there,” I tell him, pointing at the three farthest broken buildings. “Touch each one, and then fly upside down to number four over there.” I point at another building. “Then I need you to go under that overpass down there and pick up one of the cars and throw it into the Trinity River.”
He snorts, a puff of smoke pluming from his nostrils. Child’s play. How much time do I have?
Kael doesn’t know jack shit about time, but he knows he has to go fast, and he gauges how much time he has based on my reactions. So I pick something that seems do-able but not too easy. “Two minutes.”
Start the timer, then, my mate, and prepare to be impressed.
“Oh, I’ll be impressed,” I tease, and tighten my reinforced harness. If we’re going upside down, I need to be prepared. I hook one arm under my handlebar and then ready my stopwatch. “Ready to do this?”
And what do I win if I ‘blow your mind’ this time, my mate? There’s a sexy tease in his mind that makes my skin prickle with delight. I like that he’s picking up some of my euphemisms, too.
I pretend to consider my options, though we always play for the same thing. “Hmm. A kiss?”
Do I get to pick where? And he sends me a rather naughty visual.
“Yup.” I grin and pull my goggles down over my eyes. “Let’s do this. On my mark…” I click the stopwatch. “Go!”
Kael heaves himself into the air with such speed that it feels like my brains rock backward. I laugh with crazy delight as he pounds his wings through the air, racing for the nearest building on my obstacle course. One touched, and then the next in quick succession. I cling to the saddle handlebar as he hits building number two and bounds off of it so hard that the metal frame collapses behind us.
You’re making a mess, I call out gleefully.
Don’t distract me!
Off he goes to building three. Once he slams his legs into it and twists, we’re off to number four. Immediately we flip in mid-air, and I smother my scream, holding on tight. Flying upside down is terrifying—and also a huge rush. I’m strapped in well enough that I know I’m not going anywhere, but it still steals my breath every time. I jolt as we smack against building number four, and then Kael rights himself, diving low to go under the overpass. He glides along, grabs a car, and then we’re making a beeline for the distant Trinity River.
By the time he dumps it in, I’m laughing with the sheer pleasure of flying.
Time? he asks, but I can hear the pleased amusement in his thoughts. He loves my reactions to his crazy antics in the air.
I click the stopwatch and check it. “Minute fifty-eight,” I admit, impressed. “You’re faster every time we clock this.”
I enjoy the rewards, he tells me slyly, and tilts his wings, then begins to beat them, rising higher. After a ‘bet,’ we always head to our favorite spot—the sandy shore of our lake—for a quick bath and some fooling around. Now let me think of where I would like my kiss this time.
And I chuckle, because I know he doesn’t have to think about it. Kael always likes my mouth in one particular spot, because it always leads to more.
A short time later, we’re both naked on the shore, and sweaty from a round of lovemaking. I’m lying atop Kael, my legs sprawled over his hips, and my breasts and crossed arms resting on his chest. He’s become an enthusiastic advocate for woman-on-top, which apparently isn’t much of a thing with his people, since the females have to be defeated and dominated. The first time I pushed him onto his back, I thought he’d lose his mind. Now it’s one of our go-to positions.
Well, along with missionary, doggy, and every other position we can possibly think of. We just really, really like sex together.
“I suppose we should get up soon,” I tell him, tracing a finger over the scales on his shoulder. His claws are gliding up and down my back, lightly scratching at me.
He arches an eyebrow at my words, and I blush, because it’s clear from my thoughts that I’m not in a hurry to go back, no matter what I say aloud. I like our private time. Melina’s back in the city for the most part—though we run errands for her when she sends a message now and then—but Amy still lives in our apartment with us. She’s still wearing my dirty clothes and using my shampoo, and when we’re gone, she takes to her ‘panic’ room that we’ve set up a few floors down in the building’s old security room. In case of emergency, Amy can lock herself into a room with a steel door and reinforced walls. She has a flare gun she can pop off in case of danger, and several air horns to alert us if we’re nearby and somehow miss a big honking dragon horning in on Kael’s territory.
For the most part, things are quiet, though. Male dragons have been largely absent from our area because they sense a male with his mate and don’t wish to disturb our nest, Kael tells me. We see an occasional red or two, but Kael’s able to drive them away.
Ironically enough, since we’ve ‘settled’ in this territory, we’re protecting Fort Dallas. The dragon attacks have stopped since this is now Kael’s territory instead of a place to fight over. Dakh is somewhere on the outskirts of the city, I think, but we don’t go looking for him. I don’t like leaving Amy alone, even with the panic room set-up, because I remember all-too-well that Kael tore apart a building to get to me.
If I have to choose between Sasha and Amy, I choose Amy. I know that Sasha must be safe out there somewhere, and I feel guilty that she didn’t get to pick her fate. But it has to be better than what was waiting for her back in Fort Dallas. I tell myself that. Often.
Sometimes it helps the guilt, sometimes not.
At some point, when Amy’s safe, I do think I’d like to go searching for Sasha and Dakh. I want to know what happened to my friend—one way or another. And I want to travel to see what the rest of the country is like. Are there bigger, better cities than Fort Dallas? What about the dragon girl in Fort Orleans? There are so many places I want to visit since we can fly anywhere…but Amy’s safety comes first. I don’t know t
hat she’d be safe on Kael’s back, or if other dragons would be attracted to her scent and attack us to get to her.
Heck, one of our first rules for Amy was to not masturbate. Ever. It was as embarrassing for her to hear as it was for me to tell her, but we can’t be too careful. Just like a shark can pick a droplet of blood out of the water from miles away, I suspect a mate-less dragon could follow the scent of a lone unmated female’s arousal from a long, long distance.
So we stay in our territory, and that means Amy’s always at home. I like having my sister there, but at the same time, I like alone time with my dragon, too. So we tend to fly off regularly and make out like bunnies in public places. On the back of a car, in an old bank lobby, on a roof. On the shore here. Wherever and whenever we can get a few moments alone.
We have sex a lot…and it’s had a few other unintended consequences. I study Kael’s handsome face, wondering if now is the right time to bring up what I want to talk about. I trace a teasing finger over his pectoral. “So. What were you like as a child?”
Kael thinks for a moment and then shrugs. I do not remember.
I bite back my frustration. One of the side-effects of Kael’s transport here was the madness. Unfortunately, the madness has sucked away a lot of his memories of his land, and all he recalls are occasional fragments. Memories are missing, leaving big gaps in his knowledge, and that means we don’t have a lot of information to go off of. “You don’t remember anything at all? What about when drakoni females get pregnant? How does that work?”
He gives me an amused look and rolls our twined bodies over on the sand until I’m under him. Shall I show you how a male drakoni claims his female? He shifts his hips, and his cock—still deep inside me from our mating minutes ago—strokes inside me.
I bat at his shoulder. I don’t want sex right now—okay, I’m a terrible liar, because I do. But I want to talk about this. “I need to know more about your kind, Kael. Do you know if females have babies in battle-form or what?”
He shrugs and gives his hips a delicious, grinding roll. I do not remember.
“Well, think,” I reply tartly.
He pauses, sensing my mood, and I feel him sorting through his muddle of memories. Edges of madness touch my mind, but a moment later, he pushes them away, his eyes swirling back to amber. I have a memory of my father.
It’s a start. “Oh?”
He rubs his cheek, and the white scar that is there. I remember disobeying him, and he gave me this. It was back in…the other place. His eyes go vague and unfocused for a moment. That is all I recall, other than I deserved it.
Great. “That’s not super helpful, baby. Do…do you think father dragons have high emotion?” I bite my lip, worried. Kael is calm around me, but what if that changes?
He snorts and leans in to nip at my neck. No more than any other time. I was not a drakoni youth that listened very well. He lifts his head and narrows his beautiful amber eyes at me. Why is this so important?
A stab of terror shoots through me. Now or never. I lick my dry lips and put my hands on his cheeks, cupping his face. “Because I’m pregnant.”
Kael hesitates. He blinks his gold eyes, and I watch as they flare to black, then swirl back to gold.
And he smiles. I can feel pride and joy bursting through his mind, and his hand slides to my stomach and he caresses it. My child?
Yours, I tell him, my throat too thick with tears to speak.
He grins, and it’s clear he’s happy. I am, too. I’m terrified, sure, but I’m happy. Things are going to be okay, I realize. This isn’t an end to our happiness but a beginning.
I mean, I need to know if I’m going to have an egg, or a dragon hatchling, or if it’ll come out human, but…we’re in this together.
We’ve got this.
And I smile back up at my beautiful, fiery dragon and feel a surge of happiness. “Pleased?”
The look he gives me is incredulous. The fire in my blood carries my child and you have to ask?
I grin and pull him down against me. “Come on, baby. You know by now that I always have to ask.”
His chest rumbles with laughter as he tangles his hands in my hair and pulls me closer. I do know this. Ah, my Claudia. My mate. My everything.
And as he nuzzles my throat once more, I’m full of love and hope for the future. I have no idea what it’s going to bring…but as long as I have Kael?
It’s going to be amazing.
Author’s Note
Dear Everyone!
I hope you liked this!!!!! I’m using a billion exclamation points because I’m so excited this book is finally coming out. I wrote this many years ago but wasn’t satisfied with how it had turned out, so I’ve completely rewritten it, changed tenses, added scenes, and all of that good stuff that makes you want to beat your head against a door when you are in the middle of the book. Of course, once you’re done with the book, you’re pretty happy with how the darn thing turned out! <3
These books have a very different setting than my other series but I think you’ll agree that all the fun, juicy stuff that makes a book exciting (fated mates and their bond, etc) is all in there. This will be the first book in the FIREBLOOD series. Book two will be Sasha and Dakh (obviously!) and book three will be Amy, with a possible book four for Melina (depending on how sales go). I plan on doing one a quarter, and the books will be longer and more intense read than the average barbarian book. I hope you’ll find them worth the wait!
A lot of people have been asking if this means Ice Planet Barbarians is coming to an end. I still have several more books in me and as long as sales are strong, I’ll continue to write them. This is just a bit of a mental break for me to switch gears and do something new in-between IPB books. Please be assured that I haven’t forgotten our big blue guys! It’s just sometimes a writer needs a change of pace.
As always, thank you so much for reading and being such amazing fans. If you have questions for me or want to talk about the series, head on over to my Facebook page!
<3
Ruby
Ice Planet Barbarians
Does a big brutal alpha male possessing his delicate human female make you as happy as it makes me? If you liked FIRE IN HIS BLOOD, I’d love for you to give it a try. As always, my books are free to read in KU!
You'd think being abducted by aliens would be the worst thing that could happen to me. And you'd be wrong. Because now, the aliens are having ship trouble, and they've left their cargo of human women - including me - on an ice planet.
And the only native inhabitant I've met? He's big, horned, blue, and really, really has a thing for me...
Ruby Dixon Reading List
ICE PLANET BARBARIANS
Ice Planet Barbarians
Barbarian Alien
Barbarian Lover
Barbarian Mine
Ice Planet Holiday (novella)
Barbarian’s Prize
Barbarian’s Mate
Having the Barbarian’s Baby (short story)
Ice Ice Babies (short story)
Barbarian’s Touch
Calm(short story)
Barbarian’s Taming
Aftershocks (short story)
Barbarian’s Heart
Barbarian’s Hope
Barbarian’s Choice
BEDLAM BUTCHERS
Bedlam Butchers, Volumes 1-3: Off Limits, Packing Double, Double Trouble
Bedlam Butchers, Volumes 4-6: Double Down, Double or Nothing, Slow Ride
Double Dare You
BEAR BITES
Shift Out of Luck
Get Your Shift Together
Shift Just Got Real
Does A Bear Shift in the Woods
SHIFT: Five Complete Novellas
WANT MORE?
For more information about upcoming books in the Ice Planet Barbarians, Bear Bites, or any other books by Ruby Dixon, like me on Facebook or subscribe to my new release newsletter.
Thanks for reading!
<3
Ruby
