Free Fury of Seduction (Dragonfury Series #3) by Coreene Callahan

pain-in-his-ass Nightfuries were in for a surprise.
    “Make the call.” Ivar handed the iPad back to his warrior. “Triple our numbers.”
    Dark eyes gleaming, Denzeil’s mouth tipped up at the corners. “Planning a little surprise party?”
    Ivar returned his warrior’s smile. “Dead Nightfuries as goody bags, okay?”
    “My favorite kind.”
    His too. And although death didn’t visit Bastian’s pack often, tonight would be different. Ivar could feel it in his bones.



Chapter Seven
    Turning the corner, Mac punched it, hauling ass as though his feet were on fire. The corridor’s dead end loomed like a police barricade. Ancient stone blocks stacked one upon the next, the wall stood waiting like an angry ogre, Black Diamond’s formidable energy shield standing guard right alongside it. Mac cursed through clenched teeth. Wonderful. Just terrific. Color him unhappy. Stupid frickin’ portal and its pissy attitude. The thing was screwing with his plan, slowing his roll, getting in his way.
    And oh goody, guess what?
    He was headed straight toward the fucker, speed somewhere south of supersonic.
    Baring his teeth, Mac upped the pace. The sound of his footfalls rebounding in the hallway, he roared toward the thick barrier. Fifteen feet out, he unleashed a spell, requesting safe passage through the portal. Magic whiplashed, warping the air as the shield denied him. Mac snarled at it. Jesus. He didn’t have time for this shit. He needed the doorway to open. And open now. Otherwise he was in fora face full of granite and an inevitable pileup when the Nightfuries hammered him from behind.
    Ten feet from the dead end. Now seven.
    Mac slowed down. Taking a running leap at the thing never worked. He’d only get zapped with energy shards on the fly-through. The exact opposite of what he wanted right now. Especially with the beacon throbbing inside his head. He didn’t trust his dragon half yet, and if he went into magical overload? He might lose Tania and the ability to track her. He couldn’t let that happen. It was the only thing holding him together right now. She needed him, and for the first time since his change, so did the Nightfuries.
    Thank God. The switch felt good. Felt right. Like he mattered—deserved to be included—for a frickin’ change.
    Sending another demand, he thumped on the door with his mind. Stone rippled. Mac growled, satisfaction ghosting through him as the wall moved from solid to wavy. A symphony of ass-hauling whistling in his ears, the boys pounding out a rhythm behind him, Mac employed his p’s and q’s and asked for safe passage into the LZ.
    No sense pissing the contrary thing off.
    The energy shield had a mind of its own and, more often than not, a bad attitude: whiplashing without warning, closing up fast, spitting males back out after chewing on them for a while. Sometimes it refused to open at all, leaving his new buddies stranded on the wrong side of the doorway, forced to sleep in the underground tunnel connected to the LZ until it decided to let them through.
    Not that any of the guys complained about the occasional exile. They liked the pissy bastard. Praised the invisible force field that protected the lair. Revered it forkeeping their home hidden from outsiders, both human and Dragonkind alike.
    Three feet away.
    Throwing his magic like a sidewinding pitch, Mac banged on the portal again. The shield hissed. His vision narrowed. Energy shards lengthened into a kaleidoscope of color, spinning around, zapping him with static electricity.
Come on
...
come on
...he thumped on it again...
don’t fuck with me
...another rap with magical knuckles...
please, open up...I’ll do any—
    The floor lights blinked off, plunging the hallway into darkness.
    Rikar pinwheeled, circling his arms. “Holy shit.”
    “Fuck me,” Bastian growled at the same time, his voice overlapping his XO’s.
    Skidding sounded, boot soles sliding on concrete as the Nightfuries put the brakes on behind him.