Fury of Fire (17 page)

Smoke swirled as the ambushing SOB swept in from the ocean like the grim reaper. Deep purple with a blue underbelly, the dragon bared his fangs. Bastian snarled back and, crouching low, tucked his injured wing in tight. Yeah, he might be down, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t deadly.

The Razorback circled the rail yard: one, twice, a third time. Bastian waited, conserving his energy. He would only get one shot at the big male…a single exhale of his poisonous electro-pulse. But one was all he needed. If he hit Deep Purple in the face…game over.

“Tell me where he is and I’ll be merciful.” Carried on smoke, Deep Purple’s voice rolled on an accent. The thick brogue could only mean one thing. The male came from the other side of the pond…from the Scottish pack. What the hell was he doing in Seattle? “I’ll kill you quickly. Return your ashes to your kin.”

“Sporting of you.” Pivoting on his hind legs, Bastian kept pace with the male circling above him.

“Where is he?”

“Who?”

“The infant.”

Bastian stifled a growl. The rogue wanted the baby…just another male to turn into a mindless Razorback solider. Deep Purple landed on the steel edge of the warehouse opposite him. Less than fifty feet away, he perched and waited, stalling for time. With a weapon like fire-acid, the male knew exactly what was happening beneath Bastian’s scales.

Smart. Deadly. Deep Purple was a lethal opponent with the patience to match. As a warrior, Bastian admired him for it. As a Nightfury? He wanted to rip the rogue apart. Gregor Mayhem belonged to his pack now. Nothing would change that.

“You can’t have him.”

Deep Purple didn’t like the news flash. “Tell me or—”

“Or what? You’ll kill me?” The spikes along Bastian’s spine rattled, chiming against one another as he prepared for imminent attack. “Not a very effective way to locate the infant.”

Razor-sharp talons scraping steel, the male moved forward. “I’ll rip you to shreds…like you did my…” Moisture glinted in the male’s eyes as his chest heaved. Bastian’s eyes narrowed. Interesting. Deep Purple was in serious pain, the emotional kind. He recognized the devastation, the total mental breakdown, before the male hid it behind aggression. This wasn’t about Razorback business. Deep Purple was here for himself. “You murdered her…my Caroline. You—”

“Is that what Ivar told you?”

Wings flared outward, the Razorback snarled at him.

“Nightfuries don’t hurt females, warrior,” Bastian said. “We tracked a nine-one-one call. She bled out before we could reach her.”

“You lie!” With a pain-filled roar, the male breathed in, telegraphing his intention.

Bastian inhaled, filling his lungs with smoky air. The electro-pulse rocketed from his throat, hammering the Razorback’s fireball midstream. Fire-acid sprayed backward in a blinding arc of blue-white flame. The psychochemical, lightning combo of Bastian’s strike slammed into the enemy dragon’s face. As Deep Purple roared, the poisonous gas in the air ignited.

Heat and sound went supersonic.

The explosion flashed bright white as it blew the Razorback off the roof. Hurled backward, Bastian slammed into parked railcars, scattering them like dominos from a box. Underneath the heap of twisted metal, shards of shrapnel cut deep into his damaged scales. Hot and wet, blood welled, running down his side and…

God. That hurt.

“Get up,” he growled at himself. Shit, even his voice was shot, nothing more than a rasp on thin air. Then again, that made perfect sense. He couldn’t breathe around the pain expanding inside his chest. “Get…up.”

Flailing, he used his tail to toss railcars left and right. If he didn’t get on his feet, he was dead. Wick, too. The fire was burning out of control, consuming everything in its path. He needed to reach his warrior before the flames did. But…the smoke. He couldn’t see a fucking thing.

Sirens sounded in the distance.

Humans. The cavalry was coming.

Using his talons, he dug deep, dragging himself out from beneath the train pile. As he rolled to his paws, his left leg buckled. Fantastic. Just what he needed. A broken bone. With a hop, Bastian sucked wind and stumbled sideways. His body wasn’t working right. His vision was tunneling, the pressure behind his eyes becoming worse by the second. It clawed at him, dragging him down until his head felt sloppy and loose on his shoulders.

No. Hell, no. He refused to pass out. His invisibility cloak was down. The fire department and police were coming. If they found him here…

Jesus. He needed to stay with it.

But as he fought, clawing his way toward his fallen comrade, Bastian couldn’t stop the inevitable. His injuries pulled at him, sapping his strength. He was out of time and energy.

His luck had just run out.

The Crime Scene Investigation facility was a fascinating place. Lots of people. Lots of activity. Kind of like a human beehive full of lab rats.

If that made any sense. Which it didn’t but, what the hell? The analogy worked for him, so Rikar went with it.

With his arms crossed, one leg bent, his boot planted against the wall, he leaned back to watch all the buzzing. He shouldn’t be here. It was an “authorized access only” area. At least, that’s what the sign said before he walked past the front desk. The humans would’ve freaked out if they’d seen him, but with his magic up and running, they hadn’t. So here he stood—invisible—in the wide, central corridor, getting the lay of the land.

What he needed was a map. With titles of the labs and descriptions of the tests performed in each. But with Sloan in a snort over his performance in the kitchen earlier—sensitive bugger—Rikar wouldn’t be getting any directions through mind-speak from his buddy. Ah, well. Teasing their resident computer genius was worth the trouble. Maybe in the future, though, he’d plan it a little better. Like for a time when he didn’t need his friend’s help on a mission.

His eye on a pretty lab technician, Rikar uncrossed his arms and pushed away from the wall. Time to take a stroll. Maybe introduce himself to an evidence bag or two labeled “ashes.” And the female was his first stop. With her above-average energy, she’d take the edge off his headache; heal him up nice and quick.

The added bonus? Information. She’d tell him exactly where to go to find what he wanted.

With a thought, Rikar ditched his leathers, conjuring a pair of Dockers and a blue button-down to take their place. A holstered Glock on his hip, he clipped an authentic looking SPD badge to his belt front. And booyah, he was ready for his meet and greet with the pretty lab rat.

And yeah, he was a big, fat liar.

Females hated that. He knew it, and had she meant something to him, Rikar might have felt badly for what he was about to do. But such was Dragonkind’s MO: hit and run, love ’em and leave ’em…fast. Preferably with no memory of the loving.

He’d remember, though. Which was more than enough for both of them.

Rikar slid in behind a group of males as they walked past him. With a mental flick, he lifted his invisibility cloak and blended in, using them for cover. No one noticed his sudden appearance. Then again, humans never did. They were too busy rushing from place to place, heads down, yapping on cell phones that would eventually give them brain tumors.

Christ, it was a helluva way to live.

But that wasn’t any of his business, was it? The female technician, however? Hmm, yeah. In about thirty seconds she’d be all business, closing up shop to take a meeting with him.

He got a birds-eye view of her through the glass and…thank God for floor-to-ceiling glass walls. She looked even better up close.

With a quick glance, Rikar surveyed the CSI offices again, looking for a private space to take her. Laid out with precision, all of the labs lining the corridor looked the same: sliding glass doors, stainless steel countertops, high-tech equipment, and low-backed swivel chairs. Man, Sloan would love this place…which was another difference between him and his buddy. The male would’ve spent hours snooping around. But no way, not him. Rikar couldn’t wait to get out. The lab was suffocating, confining…like being in a freaking fishbowl. All the little fishes on display for the world to see.

Rikar breathed in through his nose and out his mouth. He should’ve expected his reaction to the squat human building. Small spaces gave him the creeps. But the female? She would make him forget for a while.

Dark hair pulled away from her face, she was bent over her worktable, looking good enough to eat. And as she filled small vials with clear liquid, Rikar imagined filling her from behind. He’d tip her hips up and…oh, yeah. That was exactly how it was going to happen.

Reaching her lab door, Rikar peeled away from the group and turned into her fishbowl.

Without looking up, she said, “Whatcha got?”

Hmm, nice voice…husky but all business, with a hint of the South. Louisiana, maybe. Realizing he was empty-handed, Rikar conjured an evidence bag just like the ones he saw open on her table. He rustled the plastic. “Something looking for a home.”

That got her attention. Turning her focus away from her science experiment, she gave him what he wanted…eye contact. And bingo. Instant attraction: pupil-dilating, mouth-parting, female hormone-surging chemistry. She was totally into him…or rather what he looked like. Fucking A. He was so totally on board with that.

“Hey.” Rikar smiled, sending a whole lot of I-want-you-too her way. He pointed to his chest with one hand, lifted the plastic baggie with the other. “New guy. Not sure where I’m going…or who to give this to.”

“That happens.” She smiled back and racked a test tube. Stripping off her rubber gloves, she came around the corner of the countertop toward him. “The lab’s like a big maze…confusing the first visit or two.” Less than three feet away now, she held out her hand, and Rikar got his first taste. She smelled good, so fresh and new. “Let me see what you’ve got, and I’ll point you in the right direction.”

“Why don’t you take a break instead?” Reaching out, he cupped her outstretched hand in his, putting them palm to palm. “Get to know me a little better.”

“Umm…” She blinked, her soft gasp music to his ears. He laced their fingers together. “I’m not supposed to—”

“No one will ever know,” he murmured, laying it on thick. With a gentle tug, he walked backward, pulling her toward the door. “Time for a break…don’t you think?”

And just like that, he was in…leading her by the hand down the corridor.

Cloaking them both, Rikar hid them from the eye in the sky—all the cameras that humans liked to install everywhere. He didn’t want anyone to see where they were headed. He wanted to lay the female out, sure—take the edge off by feeding—not get her fired.

Yeah, and wasn’t he a peach? A lying paragon about to bang a female blind and leave her just as fast.

Rikar pushed the thought aside. It was what it was…he would get her off, take what information he needed, and get gone.

Finding an empty office, he tugged her inside, locked the door and, when she offered her mouth, he went to work blissing her out. He didn’t ask her name. She didn’t ask his. Thank Christ. He wasn’t in the mood for pleasantries. Not that he ever was, but as he took her good and hard—made her beg before letting her come—he wondered what it would be like to have a female of his own. To have someone waiting for him at the end of each night. To hold her close after he loved her each day…to not have to hunt anymore.

Wishful thinking.

He would never be like Bastian. That male was strong—above board—ready to sacrifice his own happiness for the good of the race. Rikar was too selfish for that. Too aware that losing his heart to a female would end more than just badly.

So this was it. A fast fuck with a beautiful stranger in too public a place was as good as it would ever get for him.

Half an hour later—well fed and orgasmed out—he left the pretty lab tech in a blissed-out heap and headed down the corridor. He was looking for Chuck, the skinny, wild-haired geek who occupied the last lab on the left. And, thank you God, no long search and retrieve necessary. The kid was in his lab, the purple streaks in his acid-blond hair a dead giveaway.

Stepping over the threshold, Rikar slid the glass door closed behind him.

“Hey, bro,” Chuck said, all surfer-dude, glancing up from his microscope. “What up, man?”

Rikar tipped his chin at the evidence bags cued up on the techie’s workstation. “Looking for the results on the ash samples.”

“Sorry, dude. Haven’t got to ’em yet. Everything’s cued up, but big-time backlogged. Brian’s out sick tonight.”

“S’all right.” Rikar came in close, getting into the lab rat’s personal space. The male squawked, protesting when he grabbed him by the scruff of the neck. Chest to chest now, he took control of the human’s mind, calming the male. “Look at me, Chuck.”

Vacant-eyed, the human complied.

“Are all the samples in the box? No stragglers?”

Almost boneless in his arms, Chuck relaxed on a sigh. “Nah…that’s all of ’em.”

“Good,” Rikar murmured as he got busy rooting around inside the human’s head. With a gentle wash, he scrubbed the male’s mind clean: taking his memory of the ash samples, telling him that he’d never seen or heard of them. If the two cops showed up before Rikar got a chance to scrub them, there’d be a whole lot of what-the-hell-do-you-mean-you-lost-our-evidence? But, hey, that wasn’t his problem, was it?

After sitting numbed-out Chuck in a chair, Rikar crossed the lab. Peering inside the box, he studied the samples for a moment, noting times and dates. He raised a brow. Ivar had been busy. There were at least six samples sitting there, giving him the Ivar salute. Rikar grabbed the entire load. Sloan would want to test them. Though, Gage—the Nightfury’s biochemical expert—would’ve been the better choice. But that wasn’t going to happen…not with Gage off protecting Haider’s back at the Archguard’s fucking festival.

Whipping up a backpack, Rikar stuffed the samples inside and headed for the door. Time to get the hell out of Dodge. Chuck would come to in a couple of minutes, along with the female he’d pleased. Besides, the fishbowl effect was starting to get to him. Nothing was big enough in the human world. Everything they built seemed compact, substandard in size and—

“Rikar.”

Bastian’s voice came through mind-speak loud and clear. But shit. Something was wrong. His best friend didn’t sound right.
“Here.”

“Need you.”
Bastian coughed, the harsh rasp sounding wet, like the male was choking on something.
“Wick’s down. I’m…in…deep shit.”

“Where are you?”

“Rail yards. Humans…coming.”

“Hold tight.”

“Hurry,”
Bastian said through the static.

The connection between them snapped, cracking like brittle wood. Fuck. His best friend
was
in deep trouble if he couldn’t hold the link to mind-speak.

Moving like an F-18, Rikar rocketed past the front desk and out CSI’s front door. As he shifted and took to the sky, his wings blew a huge gust of wind. Air hit the parking lot with the force of a hurricane. Alarms shrieked and humans came running, weapons drawn, as cars went flying, flipping end over end.

Metal crunched against metal, and electricity arced, sparking as an SUV took out a telephone pole.

Rikar ignored the auditory soundtrack and climbed, uncaring of the damage he left behind. Normally, he avoided the hurricane routine. Tonight, though, he would’ve leveled the building if necessary. His best friend needed him. The humans could go to hell.

The wailing sirens were getting closer. In another two minutes the humans would be on top of him. The nightmare scenario hammered Bastian, prodding his get-up-and-go. Too bad his adrenaline was pretty much tapped out. He could’ve used a shot of it right now.

Reaching deep, he dredged the last of his reserves, forced himself to keep moving. Pain tightened its grip, tearing at him like barbed wire. His vision wavered. Bastian blinked as his mind followed suit and shorted out, flickering like an overloaded electrical circuit. It was like getting the plug pulled on his cerebral cortex. And as mental acuity went down the drain, he landed in Blanksville. What did he need again? Something important. Or maybe it was
someone.

That thought sparked another.

Yeah, definitely
someone.

He groaned. That was it. He needed to go home…to her.

Digging his claws in, Bastian dragged himself another few feet. Wet earth pushed between his talons, mounding over his knuckles. The fuel-soaked ground burned the raw patches of flesh exposed by his shot-to-shit scales. He didn’t care. He had to find Wick and get them both back to the lair.

The harbor beyond the bank of warehouses was the only option. And yeah, that was going to be a bitch. Especially the saltwater part.

Bastian cringed. He hated the swimming almost as much as he hated elevators. But with his energy stores gone, he couldn’t cloak himself, never mind Wick. The dark inky water would do what he couldn’t: provide enough cover until Rikar performed his knight-in-shining-armor routine.

Dragging his broken leg, Bastian crawled over a burning pile of timber. His eyes stung from the smoke as he squinted to get a line on Wick. The male had to be close. The building he’d been introduced to skull first was just ahead and—

Something shifted behind him.

Bastian spun, his bladed tail arching wide. The dark shadow ducked and lunged, coming straight at him. He caught the load in the chest. Anguish rippled through him as he lost his footing and…fuck. He was going down. Would die for making a rookie mistake.

Goddamn it. He knew better than to assume anything in a firefight. The Razorback wasn’t dead. Or retreating from the truckload of humans less than a mile away. The rogue had played it perfectly. Was practically on top of him, coming in for the kill.