Dragon Scorned

22. Ryker

Natalia’s girlfriend showed up out of the blue while I was waiting for Natalia and River. I wasn’t pleased she was here, but there was no getting rid of her. She said if Nat was participating in illegal activities, then she wanted in.

I told her she could stay, but I didn’t want to hear another sound come out of her mouth. I never cared for people. They always got in my way and fucked shit up. It’s how the hunters were able to take me.

Some stupid punk thought he could beat me in a car race, call it whatever you want, but I never back down from a challenge. I didn’t know if it was my dragon, or me, that was the adrenaline junkie. But, like the asshole I am, I accepted.

Most dragon shifters had a need for speed. We were always hunting down the quickest cars so we could drive as fast as we could fly. Well, except Jax, I still don’t know why he was driving that shit stain truck. It wasn’t flashy or fast.

I raced the kid and like every single person, he got in my way. He zipped in front of me, causing my car to go into a nosedive off the side of the road. When I woke up from the accident, I was surrounded by hunters. There was no fighting my way out, so I played good boy for three years. Biding my time till the perfect opportunity came for me to escape.

Two minutes after midnight, River pulled in, driving the most obnoxious pink car I’ve ever seen. I gagged a bit at the color as she pulled in next to my hunter-green Bugatti Chiron

“That color on that MC20 Cielo should be a crime. I didn”t peg you for the pink girl drag?.” I told River as she slid out of the driver”s seat.

A smirk hit her face, but Natalia spoke up from the other side of the car before she could say anything.

“It would be my car you are talking about, and it was a custom paint job.” Natalia snapped.

I laughed, “That explains the bubblegum pink color then. You really did this car a disservice, though, painting it that color.”

Natalia narrowed her eyes at me, fury swirling in her gaze. She crossed her arms and stomped her foot, acting like a child that was told they couldn”t have cookies before dinner. I mean the girl was shorter than River. I’d say at least four foot eleven, compared to my six-foot frame she looked like she was a child.

“Here, before we do this, I got you something,” I told River, pulling out the small red box I had in my car.

I watched the frown on her face as she opened the package. “Ryder, what the hell is this?”

She gestured to the hand in the small box. To my surprise, she didn’t look angry, just confused and maybe a little repulsed. Maybe my drag? was just as deranged as I was.

“He hurt you. No one is allowed to hurt you but me. So, I took the hand that he used to plunge the needle into your neck.” I told her, a smile spreading across my face.

Her gaze connected with mine before returning to the hand. A wide-eyed River just stared at the hand, processing my words.

“What the fuck?” Natalia hollered. “Ryder, what the fuck is she going to do with a severed hand?”

Both Natalia and Lainey looked horrified, but River just looked amazed. I wouldn”t tell her friends she appreciated my gift, though. That would just cause unnecessary confrontation.

“That’s not really the kind of gift girls like to receive, dude,” Laniey added.

“That”s very…thoughtful?” Her tone made it sound like a question rather than a statement. “Can you keep it for me? I wouldn”t know what to do with it,” River asked, carefully placing the lid back on the box and handing it back to me.

“I’ll do anything for you,” I told her, giving her a wink when her head snapped up to me. I saw the desire cross her face, only a moment before confusion took its place.

It was so much fun to play with her head. She had no clue what to make of me. I saw the want within her, though. My drag? craved me, even if she didn’t want to admit it to herself. I could see it in her eyes.

I finally took the box from her and placed it in my car, before turning around and facing the three women staring at me with very different expressions. Two were horrified and one was in awe, looking at me like I just gave her the moon and not a severed hand.

“Let’s go,” I told them, walking over toward the professor’s building. They had their own three-story smaller building that housed all the offices. Knox’s was on the third floor, number three-six-three.

The walk wasn’t far from the student parking lot and I used my chameleon power to conceal us in the night. I only used the smallest amount so it wouldn’t be noticeable to the woman following silently behind me.

Moonbeam cursing me with this did have its perks. I wasn’t completely mad about it. I could easily blend into any of my surroundings, allowing myself to hide in plain sight. I was just recently using it on others. I finally told Knox and Tate about it, and they let me practice on them.

I could conceal bigger items, it just drained me faster. My power had limitations, but I was getting good at gauging my breaking point. Having us blend in with the night wasn’t using too much of my power and I could probably last for an hour or more if I had to.

Once we reached the building, I grabbed the handle and pulled it open. The office building was unlocked, like I knew it would be. They never locked the building itself, just the individual offices.

When we were all inside I released my chameleon power. There was no need to hide us inside, no one but us was on campus.

I pulled open the door to the stairs, gesturing the women inside. River was at the back of the line and I didn’t like that one bit. Was Natalia crazy? She was almost kidnapped less than twelve hours ago, and she was going to allow River to bring up the rear.

My anger burned inside me at the lack of safety and protection this girl offered to her so-called best friend. There was no way I would let her walk behind me, not after what happened earlier today. If I had known she was bringing up the rear, I would have walked behind her from the start.

Not to mention the view of her ass would have been an added bonus. I could watch it all damn day. Seeing her climb the steps up to the third floor was a real treat. I just wanted to reach out and run my palm along the curve of her plump backside. I wondered if it turned a pretty pink when I smacked it. Just the thought of marking her creamy skin had my dick straining in my pants.

Fuck, Ryker, get it together. Now is not the time to think about all the dirty things I wanted to do to River. Tate thought she would put me in my place, but she was proving him so very wrong. I think she loved that I was unhinged, she just didn’t know what to make of me.

“What office?” Natalia whispered from down the hall.

“Three-six-three.”

River and I said simultaneously.

I stopped and looked at her, the unspoken question hanging between us.

“I had a one-on-one session with him in his office today.” She huffed, “I missed it due to everything that happened, but I still needed to know where to go.”

Interesting, what were you planning on doing with my pretty dragon, Professor Knox? Curiosity got the better of me and I finally asked. “Why are you having private sessions with Professor Knox?”

Her eyes danced around the hallway, looking everywhere but into mine. The curiosity burned hotter, now I really wanted to know. Obviously this was making her uncomfortable and I didn’t know that was even possible.

I narrowed my eyes at her, my brows pinching down. Finally, she met my mix-matched stare and took a sharp inhale.

“I don’t know anything about dragons, so he”s going to teach me. I didn’t even know about obsidian stone until we learned it in class. It seemed important enough that I should have learned about it a long time ago.”

Her words were rushed as they flew out of her mouth on one long exhale, like if she talked fast enough maybe I would miss what she was saying.

But I didn’t. Ooh, no, I caught every word, and I was pissed. What kind of parents don’t teach their kids about their own fucking species.

She saw the shift in my eyes, I could feel it, my beast climbing to the surface.

“My parents died when I was five. My grandparents raised me and just wanted to keep me safe,” River quickly said, trying to defend her useless guardians.

“Keeping you ignorant does not keep you safe. It makes you vulnerable. Knowledge is power…and power, drag?, power is everything,” I told her, keeping eye contact and accentuating every word.

Her breath got caught in her throat as she took in my words. I watched as she poked her tongue out and licked her lips. My gaze bounced between her eyes and her mouth. We were so close now, all I had to do was reach out and trail my finger along her skin, the mate bond would activate and I could claim her as rightfully mine.

My true identity would be revealed to her then, and I was having a hard time remembering why that was a bad thing. I wanted nothing more than to throw her against this wall and bury myself deep inside her tight cunt.

Knox and Tate told me to keep my identity a secret for now, but River was not the girl to keep it from. She was not going to run screaming to Moonbeam about me, she hated those fuckers as much as I did.

I reached up to cup her face, hesitating. My fingers were so close that I felt the heat radiating off her.

Natalia cleared her throat from down the hall and River jumped away from me. I clenched my hand into a fist, angry she interrupted the moment we were lost in.

I walked over to the office door and pulled the keys out of my pocket, shoving the correct one into the hole and turning.

River gasped behind me, “How did you get his keys?”

“I live with him drag?, I told you to trust me.”

“Wait, I thought you lived with Tate?” She asked as we made our way into the office.

“I do.”

I didn’t say anything more than that. She was a smart girl who could put the puzzle pieces together on her own. I saw the change in her face the moment it all clicked together. A shy smile spread across her face before she concealed it. Does my girl like the fact that we all live together? Or just that Knox and Tate live together.

I’m not stupid, I know they had some kind of relationship when I was gone and that they were trying to end it for River’s sake. But, with the look she had on her face now, maybe she didn’t exactly want it to end. I decided to push the issue, if nothing else it would be fun.

I came up behind her, leaning over to whisper in her ear. “Does the idea of Knox and Tate fucking each other turn you on drag??”

Her sharp inhale told me all I needed to know, the scent of her arousal just solidified it. “Do you want to watch them fuck each other while you get yourself off?”

I twirled a loose curl that fell out of her braid around my finger. Tugging lightly on it and watching as it bounced back into place. She turned her head slightly, just enough so I could see the pink flush on her cheeks.

“Or, would you rather Knox fucks Tate, while Tate fucks you?” I asked. She shifted back and forth on her feet, yearning for friction. “I bet your pussy is weeping just thinking about it, your clit just aching to be touched.”

A small moan left her lips, and my dick twitched at the sound. This was as much torture for her as it was for me. If her friends weren”t here, I would already have her bent over the desk screaming my name.

“Have you told Tate your little fantasy? That you like the idea of watching him and Knox together,” I asked her, watching as she bit the corner of her lip. I wanted to rip it out of her mouth and bite it myself.

The scent of her arousal grew, and her pink flush turned to a beautiful cherry red.

“No? Ooh, you should drag?.”

“Do you two need a room?” Natalia asked, once again interrupting us.

I contemplated how pissed off River would be if I cut out her tongue. I thought better of it, though. She would never forgive me if I harmed her best friend.

“If you guys are quite finished, we found it.”

River’s attention snapped to Natalia, and she walked over to the desk. The file was sitting on top of it, and she flipped it open with a shaky hand.

There was a picture of a hunter clipped to the first page, the same hunter that tried to kidnap River earlier. I watched as River flipped through the file, it didn’t tell us much, just information about him because he was seen snooping around the outskirts of the university.

“That”s the guy whose hand I gifted to you.” I smirked, pleased that I took out a threat to her.

“Well, this was pointless.” River seethed, slamming the file closed.

“It”s okay, babes. We will look into the list of properties Jax gave us. There has to be something at one of them.

Tate had told me earlier about the Moonbeam properties list, so that wasn’t a surprise to me.

“Come on, let”s get out of here before we get caught,” Lainey said, grabbing Natalia”s hand and heading to the door.

Once we got to the cars, Natalia left with Lainey, leaving River to drive her car back. I called out to her before she got in the disgusting colored car.

“I have another present for you, but I can’t just hand it over,” I told her, reaching into my car and pulling out the file I took from the hunter. I turned it her way, showing her ‘River Moonstone’ scrawled across the front.

“That”s my name. Give it to me, Ryder,” she demanded, holding her hand out.

“I’ll tell you what. I’ll race you for it,” I told her, tossing the folder back into my car. “If you win, It’s all yours.”

She looked at me hesitantly, “And if I lose?”

A deep chuckle left me and I stepped closer to her, towering over her so she had to crane her neck back to look up at me.

“Ooh, if you lose, drag?, you’re mine.” I told her in a low voice. A small squeak left her lips at my demand.

She only hesitated a moment longer before nodding her head in approval. A smile spread across my lips. I had her now. There was no way I would lose.