The Protector (Fire's Edge)

by Abigail Owen

  Then he did something with his thumb, pressing up and through her folds and steady at the base of her clit, lifting that bundle of nerves so he could suck.

  Once. Twice.

  On the third harsh drag, he tripped an orgasm that slammed through her like wildfire, only he didn’t let up and all she could do was hold on for the ride as he milked every last shudder from her body.

  With a final cry, she went limp against the floor, the hand behind her no longer holding her upright.

  “I’ll add the way you come for me to the list,” he murmured in a self-satisfied voice.

  If she’d had enough energy, she would’ve smacked him. Vaguely she was aware of strong arms scooping her up against a solid chest. She floated through into his bedroom. “I didn’t know we could hold a steady stream of fire and use our mouth and tongue at the same time,” she murmured drowsily against his neck.

  His low chuckle reverberated against her. “I’ll show you how, and you can return the favor.”

  The sudden image of doing just that had her smiling secretly. What sounds could she drag from his body? Already recovering, thanks to that accelerated healing which meant most dragon shifters could spend a lot of time getting off if they wanted to, her body thrummed with energy that image gave her. That and something more. A giddiness that she hadn’t experienced since maybe the first time she’d shifted. Needing a place to redirect it, she bit down on his bicep.

  Just a playful nip.

  Levi jerked with a grunt. “Don’t do that unless you want payback in kind.”

  The dark slide of his voice, his dragon so near the surface, sent a shiver through her. “Oh? And where would you like to bite me?”

  “Everywhere.”

  Like creatures in the wild, other predatory shifters like wolves often bit when they claimed a mate, or to mark their territory. Because of their unique mating marks, dragons didn’t do that as much. But the instinct was still there. Just buried.

  With a wicked wiggle, she sunk her teeth into him again, then licked the spot, liking the red welts that showed. Yeah. This marking thing was satisfying in the strangest way.

  “That’s it.” He tumbled her forward.

  With a squeal, she sailed through the air to bounce across the bed, still neatly made with a red and black plaid quilt. In a flash, he pinned her with the bulk of his body and bit down on her arm in the same spot she’d done to him. Only he wasn’t finished. He nuzzled his way across to her breast, stopping to suck on her nipple once, bowing her back off the bed as she chased his mouth, then released her and bit the softer underside.

  A sting of pain…followed by heat…followed by a rush of need.

  Lyndi moaned and felt his smile against the softer skin of her belly as he nuzzled down to the curls at the juncture of her thighs where he paused to tease with his tongue just long enough to get her hips moving before he sank his teeth into the flesh of her inner thigh.

  Lyndi jackknifed with the sensation. More heat. More rush. Only to squeal again as he flipped her to her stomach. Hands explored the backs of her thighs, the globes of her ass, then, as he slipped a finger inside her, he bit again, marking her right cheek, pumping that finger that wasn’t nearly enough through the sting.

  A telltale tingle started to gather, and she whimpered. And somehow he must’ve heard in the sound how close she was. Because she found her ass hitched up higher, knees spread wide and a hard cock pressing at her entrance.

  She stiffened. “Not from beh—”

  He wrapped a hand in her hair and tipped her head so that she had to go down on one elbow.

  “Look at me.”

  She obeyed, all instinct and wanton need, to encounter molten copper eyes in a beautifully harsh face. The slash of his cheekbones flushed, straight eyebrows drawn together in a fierce frown of command. His gaze ate her up, and suddenly she had an idea of what he was seeing. Her splayed for him, vulnerable and open, her hair a riot of black, spilling over her back, mouth parted and panting, eyes lit red with her fire, and staring at him as he controlled her pleasure.

  “This will be anything but impersonal.” A growl had entered his voice, man and dragon claiming her as one.

  Her dragon pushed forward, rippling under her skin, joining them so completely that Lyndi wasn’t even sure she wasn’t shimmering with the change.

  “Do you trust me?” he asked. Demanded.

  “Yes.” Her voice wasn’t her own but her dragon’s, smoky and dark.

  Fierce satisfaction edged the smile that stretched his lips as he pushed into her from behind, stretching her body with that now familiar searing burn. But the angle this time…fuck.

  She might just come from this one slow slide.

  Pushing back into him, she shuddered as her body took every thick inch, straining around him, so full of him she felt whole. With every sensation, every movement, his gaze held hers mesmerized.

  “Don’t take your gaze away, min eneste,” he said.

  She didn’t want to, even if she could. Expression taut, he pulled out just as slowly, then pumped into her, hard and fast, pushing her forward on her elbow. His cock dragged along every beautiful nerve, the angle sending her into a deeper blissful state.

  And again, the slow drag out, hard and fast in. He set a pace that let her glide with him, lost in the waves, giving in to his control and letting him gift her pleasure in return. He kept that up, pace increasing with the rising tide of need, cock stretching her more with each pump until he possessed her body, inside and out.

  With a grunt that almost sounded like pain, he swelled inside her, turning thicker and longer with each stroke if that was possible.

  “Do you feel what you’re doing to me?” he demanded.

  She was too far gone to answer, just feeling.

  “Do you feel how I want you?”

  Every touch, every look, had worshipped her, made her feel special.

  “Answer me.”

  “Yes,” she groaned.

  His eyes flashed dragon, slitted and gold, and so damn possessive she melted from the inside. He thickened inside her channel.

  “I want you.”

  Oh, gods.

  He kept pumping, holding her gaze steady with his, not letting her look away.

  “I want you, Lyndi,” he insisted. “I want everything about you. Even when you fight me.”

  She swallowed, emotion blending with the clamoring of her body and upending her world.

  “I want to make you mine in no uncertain terms,” he growled. “And I want to fill you with my seed and put a baby in your belly.”

  To make a baby, both partners had to will it into existence as they coupled. Only she was sterile. It was the most painful thing about her existence, and hearing that from him should have hurt. Instead, maybe because of the way he said it, the words only ignited the same wish inside her. And, for the first time maybe ever, she let go and just let herself want.

  “Yes.” The word punched from her. “Gods, yes. Fill me up.”

  Without more warning than that, she bore down on him as a second orgasm ripped through her body, sending shockwaves through her so hard that her vision went black then exploded with color.

  With a roar, Levi released inside her, the heat of his seed only sending more waves of pure, unadulterated pleasure through her. Together, gazes locked, bodies locked, she took him over and over as they both drained the pleasure from their bodies until finally, in sync, they slowed, calmed, and collapsed together.

  Gods, if only…

  A ripple of shock unsettled her. What was she thinking, even imagining a child? Of picturing her belly swollen with the baby Levi made with her. A wish that should put the fear of death into her.

  Only she was too blissed out to worry right this second. She’d worry later. In a wonderful, limpid world of pure contentment, she was vaguely aw
are of him sliding from her body only to press a soft kiss to the bite mark on her backside. He rolled her over and placed another to the one on her thigh, then her breast, as he crawled up her body, then her arm, before he lay on his side and eased her into him, pulling the covers that he’d somehow worked out from under her over their bodies.

  She opened her eyes and turned her head to him, absorbing him. “Is that something you want?” she asked quietly. “A child?”

  Sadness darkened his golden eyes. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I could just see it so…clearly.”

  “But is that what you want?” she pressed, heart turning heavier by the second.

  He paused, throat working as though trying to swallow back the truth. “Yes,” he said slowly. “But I want you more. Don’t run away from me again like you did at Drake’s wedding.”

  Lyndi bit her lip. “I didn’t want to run away then,” she owned up. “I had to. Us being together…it’s not fair to you. I didn’t want to ruin a future you could have if I’d never come along.”

  “Isn’t that my decision?”

  She closed her eyes but didn’t turn away, instead burrowing into him. Because this hurt maybe more than even she’d expected it to, and he was her only refuge.

  Against her, he took a big, shuddering breath.

  “Rest, min eneste,” he whispered, lips at her temple.

  She wanted to ask him what those words meant but couldn’t summon the energy to form the words, eyes drifting closed.

  Chapter Ten

  Levi stared at the woman in his arms, trying not to let panic swamp him. He shouldn’t have said that earlier, during the first of many times they’d come together tonight. Not any of it.

  In the heat of the moment the wish had seemed so…vital. And she’d been right there with him, screaming her yes for all the world to hear. But the sadness after…

  Gods, he hated himself for that.

  He’d kept them busy since, trying to hold the world at bay by building a bubble of pleasure around them. But it couldn’t last, and as soon as the harsh light of day intruded, he had a feeling she’d regret all of it.

  In a brush of a touch, he traced the bite mark he’d left on her bicep. Thanks to her healing, the bruising was almost gone. He should feel guilty that he’d bruised her at all. Only she’d done the same to him.

  Satisfaction welled inside his chest, like a spring bubbling up from the ground.

  She’d bit him a lot, the urge to mark her claim maybe even as primal as his own. Lyndi might not have understood what they were doing, but he sure as hell did. He’d never, in all his hundreds of years, experienced even the twinge of an urge to mark another woman in the same way. Or to will a baby into existence through their union. If anything, in the past he’d been extra careful to keep his mind from such thoughts. But given this was Lyndi, he’d let himself yearn, just for a heartbeat, for a miracle. To be able to give her something he knew she never let herself hope for. To create a life with her and keep them both forever.

  Almost a violent need to make her his own. In every way.

  But, despite how she’d claimed him in the grip of making love, he still knew she wasn’t ready. Not for what he had in mind. If he even hinted at wanting to mate, he’d lose her. Lyndi talked a good game, put on a tough show, but underneath all that bravado, she was terrified.

  He was, too, dammit.

  “You’re staring again,” she mumbled, eyes still closed.

  Levi grinned. Instead of answering, he traced a teasing touch over the slopes of her breast, across her stomach and into damp curls to find her silkily ready for him. Her lips curled into a sweet smile.

  In a swift move he rolled, taking her with him, positioning her so that he lay on his back and she straddled him, his cock pinned between his stomach and her damp heat.

  “I like staring at you,” he said, letting his gaze roam over her flushed features. “I don’t plan to stop.”

  Her eyes, still sleepy, went wide and then she smiled, dimples in full evidence, the beauty of it reaching inside him, bursting into warmth in the region of his heart, then spreading outward in a hurry as she slid down his shaft, impaling herself on him. Leaning forward, she laced their fingers together, pinning his hands to the mattress on either side of his head and using her grip as leverage as she slowly, torturously, undulated her hips.

  Staring into his eyes with a small smirk—after last night, she knew better than to look away or close her eyes—she set the pace.

  And he enjoyed every fucking second of the slow build, already on the brink of coming, holding it at bay through sheer will until the muscles inside her fluttered around him, her eyes flaring with red fire and, with a long moan, she came. Levi let go, tipping over into the abyss of sensation with her, filling her with himself and wishing like hell he could take root inside her—for her as much as for him—but loving her even more, though that could never happen.

  She might not realize it yet, or be ready to acknowledge it, but Lyndi would always be his.

  With a sigh that sounded so content his insides clenched in response, she leaned forward to kiss him soft and slow, humming a little, the sound anchoring inside him, as though she’d tied her heart to his.

  Wishful thinking on his part.

  With a reluctant grumble, she drew back, expression turning rueful. “We should get back. They’ll wonder where the groceries are.”

  No, they wouldn’t. In the middle of the night, between bouts of mind-blowing, soul-rending sex, he’d called in a favor and made Hall go get them this morning.

  Hall hadn’t said anything then, beyond grumbling about favors needing a time limit, but Levi had no doubt the green dragon was storing up something for later. No way could he not comment. Probably when they returned, which just gave him another reason to want to linger here.

  But Lyndi wasn’t wrong about needing to get back. With a gusty sigh, clutching her to him so he didn’t break the physical connection, still buried deep within her, he levered them both out of bed. Lyndi laughed as she wrapped her arms and legs around him to hold on tight, the sound doing something to his soul that was this side of pain.

  Gods above. He’d dreamed of this. Had almost lost hope of this after so long.

  Don’t lose her, his dragon said.

  Yeah. No shit.

  He walked them right into the bathroom where he turned the shower on extra hot, the way all dragon shifters liked it, and stepped inside. Only the friction from walking combined with the heat of the water, and already he was swelling inside her.

  Lyndi gasped then giggled. “Again?”

  Levi pinned her to the wall and pumped his hips, stomach clenching as he captured the raw sound of her moan with his lips. Then he grinned and pumped harder. “Again.”

  Keeping his hands off her now that his dragon had staked a claim by fire—not a mating, but a claim—and he’d staked his own with marks all over her body, was going to be damn difficult. Leaving her behind even harder.

  One day left.

  It took monumental effort to shove the panic of that reality down deep. He refused to ruin this moment he had with her, here and now, to focus on a future so darkly murky with doubt.

  It took another two hours before they finally arrived back at the mountain. He hated to do it, but they’d left one car at the grocery store, which meant going back to get it. Pulling in behind Lyndi as they finally made it home, he remembered to turn on his phone, which he’d shut off after his call with Hall. Only to have the thing light up, dings going off in rapid succession as a series of texts and voicemails hit all at once.

  Hurrying out of the truck, he took one look at Lyndi’s face, pinched with concern, and knew she’d done the same thing.

  Only she had her phone up to her ear, listening to messages as she hurried into the training center, through the weight room, around to
the left of the lockers, past the bunk beds and into the kitchenette where she slapped a hand on the scanner.

  “Dammit. I knew we shouldn’t have—”

  He put a finger to her lips, stopping the words before they could hurt him. “Don’t say it.”

  The earliest message had only been sent ten minutes ago. There was little they could have done, even here, and no message that the team had gone out was included in those he’d skimmed through in the seconds he’d had.

  She stared at him as the panel silently whooshed open. Then she nodded, and he took his hand away. “Let’s go.”

  Neither questioned where they were going. They already knew where the full team would be assembled. The war room or the large conference room next door.

  Sure enough, sound filtered down the hall from the larger conference room.

  Levi pulled up sharply as they turned the corner. “Holy shit.” A packed room…including Aidan and Sera.

  Despite the immediate concern that had his dragon prowling in his head, Levi grinned. “Fuck, rookie, it’s good to see your ugly mug.” He wrapped the blue dragon, once one of Lyndi’s orphans, in a hug, slapping his back.

  “You can’t call me rookie anymore with these pups on the team.” Aidan hitched a chin at his orphaned brothers who glowered back through cracking smiles.

  Levi shrugged and moved to Sera. “You, too, gorgeous.”

  She hugged him back, then moved to return Lyndi’s hug.

  “Where’s Blake?” Lyndi asked.

  Sera’s gaze flickered, the emotion hard to pin down. “In the tunnel with Demyan. He’s gotten too big to fit down human-sized hallways. He…still can’t shift.”

  Lyndi nodded her understanding. Sera’s son from her human marriage had shifted in the same instant Sera had after she’d been turned. As though mother and son were linked. But he didn’t seem to be able to reverse it.