Battle Bond: An Urban Fantasy Dragon Series (Death Before Dragons #2) - Lindsay Buroker Page 0,85

up, but I barely noticed anything except Zav. A strong carnal desire coursed through me, urging me to get closer, to wrap my body around his.

Zav? I thought, my mind the only thing I was in control of. Can you hear me?

He was scrutinizing me, but he didn’t give any indication that he heard the words. Was Dob blocking my thoughts somehow?

“What’s going on?” the man asked, rubbing his shoulder and staring at me in confusion.

The guy next to him groaned and rolled to his hands and knees, more out of it than his colleague.

“You should be healed enough to get out of here now,” Zav told them without looking away from me. “Go the way the woman did and do not look back.”

His voice rang with power, power that sent a shiver of desire through me, and the two men, though confused, hurried obediently away.

“Any chance you’re hot?” I smiled and stepped close enough to Zav to rest a hand on his chest. “I’ve never seen you without that robe on, and I’m terribly curious what’s under it.”

That cheesy line made me want to gag. Zav! I shouted in my mind. Listen to me. Can’t you hear my thoughts? Dob is in the other room. Maybe he’s in here by now, sneaking up behind you.

“Are you?” He arched an eyebrow and let his gaze dip to my half-bared chest. He slid an arm around my back and pulled me closer, then gazed into my eyes.

Dob wasn’t right, was he? That Zav was actually attracted to me? It was ridiculous.

Zav leaned closer, his forehead resting against mine. I see his compulsion on you, he spoke into my mind.

Thank his scaly ancestors! My hand caressed his chest through his robe. I sure hoped he could tell Dob was making me do that and that I didn’t want this. It was irritating as hell that his gaze and his hand on the small of my back were turning me on. I was going to blame Dob for that, too, not the long, long time I’d gone without male companionship.

I can break it, Zav added, but as soon as I do, he’ll know.

Can you hear my thoughts?

From the way he was peering into my eyes, as if seeking an answer there, I assumed not. Great, how was I supposed to tell him he was in danger right now? I envisioned Dob sneaking around behind him with some giant dragon-slaying weapon. Or would he simply shift into his regular form and snap down with massive fangs and break Zav’s human neck?

I assume he wants to catch me off guard and take advantage of my distraction. Zav rubbed my back through my thin shirt, fingers trailing up my spine.

Pretending to be into it, as Dob expected?

My body responded with embarrassing enthusiasm, and I leaned into him, aroused by the tingle of power washing over me, by his roaming hands, by his gaze locked onto mine.

I still can’t sense him. Zav lifted his other hand to my face, fingers gentle and caressing where Dob’s had been cold and cruel. Play along for a minute, and we’ll see if I can make him think I’m more distracted than I am.

Play along? I wished it were a game, that I had control over my body and that I wasn’t doing this, that I wasn’t mashing my breasts to his chest and lifting my lips to his for a kiss achingly full of longing and desire. The raw power that raced over my skin lit my nerves on fire, and I struggled to remember what was going on, to think of the danger and not of his hand on my ass, his lips nibbling at mine. My ragged breaths echoed in my ears between our kisses.

I hoped Zav believed I was only responding this way because of Dob, that I wasn’t this pathetically into him. That I wasn’t groping him through his robe, wondering where the seam was so I could touch real flesh and lean, sculpted muscle. That I wasn’t pressing against him, tempted to wrap both legs around—

My brain snapped like a rubber band, and Dob’s influence vanished in an instant.

Zav whirled away from me, leaped across the canal, and crashed into Dob. He was still in his elven form, and he’d been approaching with a glowing white sword I hadn’t seen. I’d been too busy being horny.

Snarling, I yanked out Chopper and Fezzik as Zav flung up his hands and Dob was hurled twenty feet. He