She snorted and, to his intense disappointment, released him. His entire body yearned to have her hands back on him. How messed up was that?
Well, he was pretty messed up. He knew that.
She bent down and tossed moss up onto the rocks with a bit more force than strictly necessary. “If I hadn’t been tricked into wearing that damned collar—Demeti’s strong, but my beast is resistant to that kind of energy.”
Lucas grimaced. “You must be some pissed.” He straightened with a fistful of moss, and was treated to Aria bending low to rip up more. Her luscious hips and rounded buttocks riveted him, and for a moment, his body ached so badly he couldn’t breathe.
Another hunk of moss was wrenched from the ground. “If he wasn’t already dead, I’d slice Udo into tiny pieces,” Aria growled.
Lucas forced air into his lungs, and then winced as another insect took a chunk out of him. “How come these things aren’t biting you?”
“Nikolai has some kind of mojo that keeps them away.” She shot him a guilty look. “I should have asked him to extend it to you.”
Figures the big guy would just let him suffer. Lucas squished another one.
“You’re a prime target with all that blood,” she noted. “Have the deep cuts healed?”
“They’ve started to.” When she frowned, he realized they likely would have been by now, if he’d been a Dragon. Morphs did have accelerated healing, but he must be too drained for it to be at full capacity.
The two climbed back up the rocks and started piling the moss to make beds.
“If those cuts are still open, we should get them cleaned up,” she said. “I can help you with the ones on your back.”
The thought of her hands on him put his mind into a tailspin and tightened his entire body. With Nikolai due back at any moment, perhaps not the best strategy. “No, thanks, that’s okay. But getting the blood off is a good idea.” His gaze followed the stream toward the pond. He couldn’t see it from here, but they’d passed it on the way to the rock ridge. “I’ll be right back.”
“Nikolai said not to go too far.”
That the comment implied who the leader was of this crazy enterprise, annoyed him. “I’ll be fine.”
“We could just use the water in the stream...”
“Look, I’m sure I can handle a bath in a pond.”
She planted her hands on her hips. “Fine. Don’t blame me if you get eaten.”
“It’s a pond,” he pointed out. “Not the Pacific. No sharks.”
Aria’s red brows drew down. “Is that a predator? What’s a Pacific?”
“It’s an ocean. Haven’t you spent any time in the human realm?”
“Nope. Not much use for Dragon shifter mercenaries there.”
She had a point. As he turned to make his way down the rock ridge, she asked a question.
“What does a Komodo dragon look like?”
He looked back at her, confused. “Why?”
“I just wondered.”
“They are huge lizards, about ten feet long. Very impressive, but scary.”
Her lips twisted. “Scary is good. But they don’t have wings?”
“Bloody hell, no. They aren’trealDragons.” He stared at her. “They are nothing like you.”
“Okay.” She returned to piling moss, bending low to grab an armful. It tilted her hips into the air, giving him one more eyeful of the well-rounded female butt.
