Good. The syringe was still there, safely tucked away, waiting for him to palm it. Filled with powerful neural toxins, the drug was a lethal cocktail, packing enough punch to down three dragons, never mind one. Overkill? Probably, but Ivar wanted to be sure. Nothing could be left to chance, not with a male as powerful as Hamersveld coming to dinner.
He’d sent Hamersveld directions to 28 Walton Street—his new lair—earlier in the day. Which cranked his shit the wrong way. The second he’d connected through mind-speak and relayed the information, apprehension had taken hold. Even now, it poked at him, making his stomach churn. Ivar swallowed, combating a truckload of uncertainty. Had he made the right decision? Was trusting Hamersveld the smart thing to do?
The questions circled, fraying his nerves, filling him with doubt, making him want a do over. A take back… whatever. Too bad backing out now wasn’t an option. He lay exposed, and no matter how much that chafed him, he must see it through to the end. Bastian and his merry band of bastards had a water dragon in the fold. A young, inexperienced one, sure, but powerful nonetheless. Which… fuck a duck… qualified as a huge advantage in the war he fought with the Nightfury pack. Ivar needed a male to counteract Bastian’s power play, and like it or not Hamersveld was it.
His only means to the end. Still, revealing the secret location of his lair didn’t sit well.
And no wonder. Even though he commanded a large pack, three-quarters of his soldiers didn’t have a clue where he lived. Where he laid his head down each day and flew away from every night. It was safer that way. A tactical advantage he needed to thwart Bastian’s efforts to find him. Beyond ruthless, the Nightfury assholes weren’t above torturing the males under his command to acquire the information, so…
Right. No doubt. The less his soldiers knew, the better. Although, to be honest, keeping his location on the down low served another purpose too: insulation from the larger Razorback population meant privacy. All he needed, and a commodity he never took for granted. What little quiet time he managed to get was precious. As leader of the Razorback nation, he had too many demands on his time and not enough hours in the day.
Beyond frustrating, but normal, he guessed. Especially since he was now going it alone.
Lothair—his best friend and former XO—had helped lighten the load, taking on half the responsibly, allowing Ivar to spend time in his laboratory. Something he loved, and an environment in which he thrived. Test tubes and microscopes. Air locks and playing with viral loads. Right up his alley. Scientific experimentation enlivened his mind and fed his soul, challenging his skills, all while furthering his cause.
Which was… what? Extinction of the human race. Wipe them out and free the planet from the yoke of their stupidity… from their selfishness too. For that alone the humans deserved to die. They were fucking up the planet, killing the ozone layer with greenhouse gases, polluting the oceans and water tables, taking more than their fair share while forcing other species into extinction.
All without giving a shit.
It couldn’t go on. Mother Earth was dying, the slow, painful death difficult to watch, so… no help for it. Only one thing left to do. Treat the underlying cause like an infestation of cockroaches and exterminate the human race. Poof… gone… done. Problem solved once and for all.
So far, though, success eluded him.
Now he was months behind, unable to keep his promise to Rodin—leader of the Archguard. Head of one of five dynastic families that rule Dragonkind, the male wanted the humans gone almost as much as Ivar did. A political animal, Rodin was a powerful ally, providing funding for Ivar’s pet projects and all the soldiers he needed to fill the Razorback ranks. Perfect in so many ways. He got what he required while Rodin cooled his heels in Prague, three thousand miles away. Geographical distance plus money equaled ultimate control. Ivar’s favorite kind of equation.
Now all he needed was his experiments to bear fruit.
Easier said than done. Each failure hammered the truth home, and as the memories surfaced, Ivar came full circle, his thoughts landing back on his best friend. Sorrow tightened his throat. Mind-blowing loss. Pain come to life. Son of a bitch, it still hurt. Such a waste of time. No amount of mourning would bring his friend back. Lothair was dead. Gone. Murdered by the enemy. Never to return. Grief cracked him wide open, beating on him until he bled inside: for revenge, for the opportunity to even the score and return the favor. Fucking Nightfuries. The murdering bastards. Bastian had taken the only male Ivar had ever loved.
Clenching his teeth, Ivar snarled, feeding his fury. A life for a life. Somehow—someway—he would make the Nightfury commander pay. Take something precious from the male and even the score. On his honor, he vowed to see it done.
The elevator doors slid open with a gentle hiss.
A soft ping followed, echoing in the silence, coaxing him over the threshold into what would eventually become the Razorbacks’ common room. He stepped through, barely noticing the devastation. The smell, though, struck him like an open palm. Musty and damp, the rot of decaying wood mixed with the scent of newly poured concrete. Rubbing the tip of his nose, he headed for the opposite side of the room. Thick dust beneath his boot treads, he left a trail of footprints in his wake and strode toward the floor-to-ceiling windows. Cracked in places, the glass took up the entire back side of the old fire station. Moonlight shone through the panes, casting shadows on the floor and across the exposed, pitted brick walls.
Ivar’s mouth curved. The property was a complete travesty. Even so, the old building pleased him. Despite all appearances, the place was solid, and the structure sound, so… no. He didn’t give a rat’s ass that it sat on the brink of decay. Neglected, after all, didn’t mean useless. Besides, the humans’ abandonment of the fire station, and the thirteen acres that accompanied it, worked in his favor. No one cared what he did. No one noticed either. Not the city or its inspectors or his neighbors. Everyone kept to themselves, happy someone had bought the eyesore, leaving him to fix it up and to his own devices.
Excellent. Just what he needed… time, and lots of it.
For what? To finish construction on the underground lair. His worker bees—the humans he imprisoned for the task—were hard at work, in a frenzy to please him and complete the system of hallways, bedroom suites, and living quarters 150 feet below the surface. His laboratory, and the sophisticated equipment it housed, was already set. Thank fuck. At least the place he considered his sanctuary was up and running. A few more months would see the rest of the high-tech facility finished. Only then would he turn his attention to the building aboveground.
Skirting rotten floorboards that gave way to the large hole in the middle of the room, Ivar stopped in front of the double French doors. His dragon radar pinged as he scanned terrain beyond the firehouse. He sighed. Shit. No Hamersveld yet. The male was now a full hour late. Not cool on the punctuality front. Even worse for the fact that he couldn’t raise the warrior through mind-speak, the cosmic equivalent of a cell phone for their kind. Every time he tried dialing in to send out the call, static came back at him, washing in, fading out, pissing him off while simultaneously making him worry.
Ivar frowned, suspicion circling. One that involved the Norwegian bugging out and saying the hell with it. He examined the possibility from all angles, not wanting to believe it, hoping it wasn’t true. He needed Hamersveld in the fold, not swimming the Atlantic and headed for home, but…
Anything was possible. Especially after going another round with the Nightfuries last night.
The bastards had come on strong, backing up their resident water-rat, protecting Tania Solares, KO’ing his plans to put the high-energy female in a cage. He’d had one picked out, the perfect home for her in cellblock A. With her off-the-charts energy, she would’ve made a spectacular addition to the five females he’d already imprisoned. An incredible bedmate too. Now he had less than nothing. Just an empty cell where Solares belonged and an absentee sea dragon with etiquette issues.
The annoying prick. He could’ve called. Pinged him through mind-speak to tell him he’d changed his mind… that he’d opted out of the Razorback agenda and back into his antisocial tendencies.
“Asshole water-rat.” His growl echoed through the quiet, then banged around inside his head. Damn it all, another setback. One more failure to add to the pile. Disappointment circled deep, bringing anger with it. God, what a mind fuck. He’d had such high hopes for Hamersveld and the special brand of strength the warrior would bring to his pack. “Fucking hell.”
Everything lay in tatters now. His strategy. His agenda. The hope of a new XO to see to the needs of his pack. Shaking his head, Ivar curled his hands into fists, feeling his internal temperature spike. Ivar put the kibosh on his temper. Anger wouldn’t change a thing. Neither would wallowing in the loss. Only action would right the situation and salvage the dream he held in his heart. He was a fighter, goddamn it. A warrior born and bred, with killer skills and a razor-sharp intellect. If he couldn’t figure a way out of the mess, no one could and—
