Fury of Fire (Dragonfury Series #1)

steel tub.
    God, the enemy was getting smarter, using their brains for a change.
    Hurrah for them…the rogue jerk-offs.
    Moisture beaded on his skin. Rikar swiped at it, annoyed by the drip-drip-drip in his eyes, wondering what…
    Christ, the droplets weren’t from the water. It was sweat.
    Bigger alarm bells rang inside his head, taking him into apocalyptic territory. A fever…the only thing guaranteed to kill a frost dragon. And he was sliding fast. He never perspired. Ever. He was too cold-blooded for that.
    Rikar shifted around in the tub, the agony worsening with each breath. “The…anti…venom?”
    “Coming. Ven’s gonna—”
    The airlock hissed as the clinic’s glass-paneled door slid open.
    “What the fuck?”
    The question cracked the quiet wide open, coming at Rikar like a short burst of automatic gunfire. He recognized that deep voice. Bastian. Thank God. His best friend was here. He would—
    “Oh, my God!” Female voice…short pause…a bit of a shuffle, and then, “Here, Bastian…take him. And you…” Another pause. Light footsteps coming closer and, “Status report. Right now.”
    “Ahh…he’s…shit, I’m…” Sloan’s stuttering pierced through the mind fog that imprisoned Rikar. Wow. That was new. The male sounded shell-shocked, shaken out of his normal calm.
    But why?
    Rikar concentrated hard, fought through all the thick-white-and-fluffy mucking up his head, searching for the answer.
    Someone cleared his throat. “Slashed right forearm. Poison’s gone deep. Anti-venom’s coming.”
    “Are you IV-equipped?”
    “I…we—”
    “If you are, I need a bag…stat.”
    Small hands touched his face, then slid away; one landed on his throat and found his pulse while the other moved around to cup the nape of his neck. Oh, man, that felt good. The touched eased him, took some of the pain, scrambling his molecules in a reenergized frenzy. Hmm yeah, that was better. He wasn’t tumbling down the rabbit hole anymore…he was floating, buoyant instead of sinking inside his own skull.
    The voice came again: soft, lyrical, and steady as hell. Female and Bastian…here together. Rikar’s brain kicked over. Not good…so not good. Bastian’s female—the one named…something…what was it?…hell, he couldn’t remember—was touching him. And he was taking from her, his body drawing on her energy to fight the infection now streaming through his blood.
    A nasty snarl rolled through the clinic.
    Oh, Christ. Bastian was going to rip him a new body orifice…the stem-to-stern kind. Once he claimed her, a male never shared his female. Ever. Her hands on him was a bad idea, tantamount to suicide.
    But, God, he needed the white-hot energy she was feeding him.
    Still, Rikar made the effort, jerked in the water, squirming to get away from her. She held firm, moving his arm from under the ice. With a gentle touch that made him groan, the female checked his injury, soothing him with soft words before turning to bark orders at the others.
    Unable to stop himself, Rikar slipped beneath her spell even as he marveled at the unfairness. Sure, she of the glorious energy would probably save him, but it wouldn’t matter. The game would end the same way, because the instant the healing sleep let him go, Bastian would hand him his balls on the end of a blade.

Chapter Twelve
    One, Mississippi. Two, Mississippi. Three, Mississippi. Four —
    “Breathe,” Bastian growled at himself because, God knew, the rolling count—all those stupid Mississippis—weren’t doing a thing to calm him.
    Shit. Shit. Shit .
    Myst. Oh, God, she had her hands on Rikar. His female was touching another male… feeding —
    Another snarl rolled out of him. He couldn’t help it. The possessive part of him—the one ruled by his dragon—was taking over, amping up territorial instinct until Bastian didn’t know which part of him would explode first; his head, his heart, or motherfucking lungs. All were getting a workout, and not in a good way.
    Yeah, no Nautilus here. Just pure animal rage. The kind that kept a male jacked to maximum velocity when another got in between him and his female.
    God. He was losing his mind…with an infant in his arms.
    Not that he could feel him. The warm weight in the crook of his arm barely registered on his psycho scale. He was too fixated on Myst, which was not good news…not for him or the little guy. If he lost control and attacked Rikar, the baby would get hurt…so not what he