STORY EXCERPT

“Right or not, sir, I must get back to work. My work is important and I am the sole person who can perform my job.” Gherret knocked on the door again, more insistent. “So, if you’ll please allow me to return to work.”

“Answer one question for me first.”

Gherret swallowed, hard. That lump didn’t disappear. Nor did the intense anatomical reaction Cyon procured. One that he couldn’t analyze. He didn’t want to. It…it scared him.

Gherret couldn’t look away from Cyon’s eyes. They spoke to him, drew him in, comforted him.

He shook his head. Eyes are incapable of drawing a person in. “If it’ll earn me permission to return to my lab.”

Cyon stared at him a long moment, his intense gaze peeling away at his mind. He wanted in, to get close. Gherret shut him down before he could dig any deeper. He didn’t dare share his mind with anyone. His brain was as complicated and dangerous as Zhett’s was deadly.

Cyon’s shoulders straightened. “You know who I am.”

“Everyone knows who you are, but if you need reminding, I assure you Doryan would be willing to scan you for any possibility of brain trauma and short term memory loss which may have occurred during your abduction. Zhett would be pleased to fill you in on Hynesin history.”

Cyon’s eyes widened for a brief moment.

Then, his lips curled into a devastating smile. Gherret swayed, falling back against the door for extra support.

“You are adorable.”

Gherret lifted a fist and coughed. “Yes, trauma to the brain can cause a person many delusions without accompanying—”

“Hey, hey.” Cyon tenderly lifted Gherret’s chin with his pointer finger. His entire body stiffened from the contact. He didn’t care for being touched. He preferred his solitude. This was bordering on too much for him to process. “No brain trauma. I promise you.” Cyon’s smile faded. He lowered his hand to his side again. “Gherret, you ran from me. Why? Why would you run from your mate?”

There. He said it. He put it out in the open in spoken words.

“I-I didn’t run. I’m not partial to running. As you can see”—Gherret motioned to his boots—“if I possessed any intention to run, I was sorely mistaken in my choice of footwear. I walked. At an increased rate of speed.”

Cyon arched a brow. Silence stretched for a second or two.

Then Cyon chuckled, a low, gravelly sound that make his skin hum. Gherret groaned inward. He had to get away from this man.

“I answered your question. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

“You didn’t answer my question. You avoided it.” Cyon tucked his thumbs in the belt loops of the strange pants with all of those pockets. “Please.”

The door slid open. Gherret flailed his arms as his body fell backward. Cyon lunged forward, grabbing him by the waist as another set of arms came up under his own.

Cyon snarled. “I have him.”

The silver blues of Cyon’s eyes turned dark, dangerous. Gherret scrambled back, into the arms of the lab technician, pushing Cyon’s hands off his waist. If he were a fire dragon, like Valken, he would have an explanation for the intense heat that shocked him when Cyon touched him. He would explain away the heat his body seemed to adopt in Cyon’s presence. If he were more accustomed to the intimate responses between mates, that dangerous glint that reflected from Cyon’s dragon in his eyes would not have frightened him so much.

“No. No you don’t.” Gherret shoved deeper into the room, aware that he was pushing the technician back as well. Cyon prowled after them until Gherret threw up a hand. “Stop! You can’t come in here. There are biological compounds that can react to your genetic makeup. I haven’t studied them enough to know how they’ll affect you or your brothers. You must leave.”

“I will not have you placing yourself in any danger.”

“I’m not in danger. I have a complete understanding of the compounds I’m working with, down to their molecular make up and their atomic stability. I cannot say the same for you.” Gherret was desperate to deter Cyon. He managed to stand on his own two feet and straighten out his shoulders. He tried to disguise the way his body trembled. Part of him didn’t want to fight Cyon.

That was his illogical dragon. His logical side stood ground and refused to back down.

“And right now, you are a danger. A danger to yourself as much as you are a danger to me. You are unauthorized to have access to this lab. Should you decide to try to enter, I will call for reinforcement and have you removed.”

Cyon’s expression hardened. His eyes shuttered as he regarded Gherret with a strange light.

Gherret took a small step back, increasing the distance between them, and pointed to the open door. “Leave. Now. I have work that I must return to. I cannot be distracted.”

“Is that what I am? A distraction?” Cyon ran a rough hand through his hair. Gherret fought to keep his reaction to the mussed look hidden. “I’m your mate, Gherret. I should be a distraction.”

The air around the technician grew heavy. Gherret pressed his lips together. There was no point arguing the truth. As he had told Tyrus when Zhett first brought Dante back to Dalistine, it was easy to detect the connection in the air between mates. Cyon was no exception, even if he wished he were.

 “Distance will prevent such distractions.” Gherret couldn’t bear the look in Cyon’s eyes, the one behind the hardened shell. The look that tapped into the man’s open soul. “It’s best for us both.”

ADULT EXCERPT

Cyon loved the way Gherret’s diamond-white scales surfaced a fraction of a second before he drew his talons down his body. Unusual licks of gray obscured their shape and color. Gherret’s head fell back against the wall as he moaned. His hands grabbed hold of Cyon’s shoulders.

“A device.”

Cyon followed his talons with his mouth, kissing and licking down to Gherret’s protruding cock. “What did the device do?”

He brushed his lips back and forth across Gherret’s cockhead. Gherret jerked, his hips undulating. The sight was so fucking erotic that it tested Cyon’s control.

“It-it stretches…”

“Yes?” Cyon flicked his tongue out and licked him from root to tip. Gherret folded over, bracing his arms on Cyon’s shoulders.

“He called it a ‘butt plug.’”

Cyon smiled. So his little mate had a toy?

“You won’t need that while I’m here.”

“I’d rather you than some mechanical object covered in artificial flesh material.”

Cyon chuckled and straightened up, pulling Gherret’s legs around his waist. He rested his aching dick along the seam of Gherret’s ass, concentrating on his breathing while he admired the fair-skinned, elegant-boned man he would call his own after tonight.

Gherret’s hands caressed his face, brushing back through his hair, then coming up under his jaw. “I can see you contemplating just how gentle you need to be with me.” He kissed the corner of Cyon’s mouth. “I assure you, I’m not as delicate as I may appear.”

“Don’t open that door, Gherret. You’re a virgin.” The very prospect of claiming Gherret with all the raw hunger that had mounted inside of him over the last few weeks was a dangerous prospect for his little mate. He couldn’t possibly understand what he was suggesting. “Not tonight.”

“You are quite alluring when you let your dark, sexual nature out.”

Cyon groaned, pulling Gherret away from the wall.

“Damn it, sweetheart.” He squeezed Gherret’s ass with his free hand, enjoying the sound of his mate’s excited gasp. “Stop prodding me.”

“I am simply stating a fact.”

Cyon dropped Gherret onto the center of the bed and knelt between his knees. Gherret scrambled onto his hands and knees. Cyon caught him about the waist and pulled him back, bringing his mate to straddle his waist.

“Where are you going now?” Cyon narrowed his eyes, catching the subtle changes in his mate’s eyes. His pupils widened, his nostrils flared, and a hint of scales outlined his cheeks. “I thought this side of me was alluring.”

“It is.” Gherret dipped his head and pressed a line of soft kisses along his neck. Cyon groaned, tipping his head as Gherret’s warm lips worked up to his ear. His cock jerked when Gherret rubbed his ass against his sensitive skin. “I want you inside me, Cyon.”

Cyon shivered with pure pleasure. He poured lube into his hand and spread it over his dick as Gherret continued to slowly drive him over the edge with his mouth against his chest. With another squirt of lube, he teased Gherret’s exposed crack.

Gherret shot up, his mouth coming off the top of his abs.

“Cold.”

“Stimulating, isn’t it?” Cyon cast him a dark smile. He nipped one of Gherret’s pearled nipples, delighting in the sound of his husky shriek. His mate’s cock dripped juice onto his leg. Cyon reached between them, pinning his mate’s hips close to his, and found that sweet little hole. He flicked his fingers across the puckered entrance, enthralled by Gherret’s reaction. The man crooned and wiggled, and looked so fucking adorable doing so. “Everything I want to do to you will be stimulating.”

Gherret lowered his head, pressing his forehead to Cyon’s. He dug his fingers into Cyon’s shoulders as Cyon breached his entrance. Gherret’s lips separated on shallow breaths.

“Yes, my sweet mate. Everything will feel so damn good.”

Cyon slipped a second finger beside his one, pressing deep into the hot canal. He twisted slowly, gauging his actions by Gherret’s reactions. He started a slow in and out, scissoring and stretching the unused muscles. Gherret’s forehead pinched and he whimpered.

“Cyon,” he breathed.

“Yes, darling?”

“I don’t want to wait for you any longer.”

Cyon strained to keep his fingers moving. He didn’t want to wait any longer either, but Gherret would hurt if he moved too fast.

“I know…it’ll hurt at first. I’m okay with that.” Gherret’s startling green eyes opened, now showing his dragon’s form, and met his directly. “Please.”

How could he deny his mate? Deny himself? Cyon lifted his chin and caught Gherret’s mouth, kissing him deep. Gherret’s fingers dove into his hair, holding him tight, feeding into their kiss.

Cyon eased Gherret onto his back and hooked his arm under a knee without pulling away from his mate’s delicious kiss. His throbbing dick was still wet with lube as he pressed his tip against Gherret’s hole. He pulled his mate’s leg up, opening his body wide, and pushed into the resisting walls of Gherret’s ass.

Every muscle in his body tensed. Anticipation ran wild. He connected with his mate, soothing his anxiety and excitement.

“Relax, sweetheart. I’m going slow.”

“I’m okay.”

Cyon continued to push, working past the tight sphincter muscles until, at last, he broke the barrier. Gherret sucked in a sharp breath. Cyon gazed down into his mate’s pained expression, holding still within the walls of his body.

“Gherret.” Cyon’s voice was pinched. He needed to move, to drive deeper. His mind was spinning, his nerves short-circuiting. The pressure around his cockhead was intense, incredible, and maddening. Gherret looked up at him. “We can take our time.”

He shook his head.

Then, the damn man tilted his hips, drawing Cyon deeper.