Close Protection (5 page)

And she welcomed it.

Chapter Six

That had been…amazing…wonderful…fucking fantastic.

Zane sighed, his head resting back against the wall as Ashlee cuddled, buck-naked and dozing, in his lap. He was naked as a baby himself, and the worn leather of the couch stuck to his ass, but he didn’t care. He wouldn’t have moved even if a dozen wild horses had stampeded through the place. Sitting there with an armful of warm, sleeping woman was the most content he’d been in years.

Ashlee snored slightly. The cutest thing he’d ever heard. Gently, he shifted her to a more comfortable position and blood flowed back into his leg in a rush. The resulting feeling was like a centipede had decided to tap dance all over his leg in running spikes. For such a small thing, she could be a dead weight when she was asleep.

Dropping a kiss on the top of her head, he leaned back again, making sure his hand brushed her back idly. Their session on the desk had blown his mind. Then on the couch…whoa. He’d have wet dreams about what they’d done on the couch for the rest of his life. He’d never had sex like it. Never felt that soul-deep connection with a woman before.

Sex had always been a sword of Damocles. He’d always had to be careful and monitor his wolf carefully to ensure the beast didn’t decide to come out and play, or watch his strength in case he got carried away and hurt his partner. The only way for him to relax had been sex with a she-wolf or some other paranormal type creature as hardy as he was.

Not with Ashlee. There was just something about her, something calming. Something that called to his wolf and calmed the creature, even though he’d been pissed as all hell at her comments about werewolves. He’d never had that before. All his life he’d had to watch his temper in case the beast used his anger to hijack his body and take control. Go on a little furry joy-ride in the middle of the city rather than the wilds on the outskirts where he usually allowed it to roam.

He speared his hand through her hair and lifted, watching the strands trickle through his fingers. What was it about her? There was nothing special about her. She was human, just human.

His human. Possessiveness hit him like a tidal wave. Took his breath away. He watched as his hand tightened in her hair. She was
his.
Yes, that felt right. His. His woman. His…
mate?

The words resounded in his skull like the clang of a bell, the sound echoed from within by the howl of his wolf. Yeah, yeah. He shot a thought to the creature, the dumb human finally gets it.

Mate.

For a man who’d spent most of his adult life avoiding even a mention of the word currently burrowing through his brain, it was a revelation. His eyes widened as he looked down at her, as if seeing every detail with fresh eyes. Mate, he had a mate.

A scream ripped through the air, making him jump. In his lap, Ashlee shot bolt upright, pushing her hair back to look around with sleepy eyes. God, she looked fantastic. All warm and sleepy and sexy—

Another scream brought him out of his amorous daydream. Shock coursed through his system as he recognised the voice.

“Shit. That’s Destiny. Get dressed. Quick.”

Dumping Ashlee on the couch, he shot to his feet and started to hunt down his clothes. If something could make the hard as nails Dryad scream, then the shit had hit the fan big time. Another scream ripped through the air, followed by a bellow of rage. Fuck. That was Trent. Further away, roars informed him that the dragon-boys had joined the party as well.

Finding his pants under the desk, he hauled them on in savage jerks. Within, the wolf woke, pacing and ready for war.
Not yet,
he told it, jaw set in lines of grim determination. He needed to assess the situation as a human before he let the creature out to play.

“Stay here and stay down,” he ordered over his shoulder and ran for the door.

*

Stay down? Fuck
that!

Ashlee didn’t know what werewolf women were like, but just because they’d just had the best sex since, well,
ever,
that didn’t mean she was going to roll over and play dead, or possum, on command. This was
her
bar, and no way was she going to hide in the office while some dumb-fuck pixies trashed the place.

Shaking with nerves and indignant rage, she scooted around the floor to gather her clothes. The bra was long gone down the back of the sofa, so she hauled the shirt on without it. Her fingers moved at light speed, shoving buttons into whatever holes she could find as she slipped her shoes on, and then grabbed the skirt. So what if she’d gotten the shirt on crooked and her hair was a mess? If anyone noticed in the middle of what was going on out there, then they could just kiss her ass.

A half-second pause was all it took for her to recover her dad’s old baseball bat from behind the door before she yanked it open to follow Zane out into the corridor. Instinct made her step back almost instantly. Not a moment too soon. A second later the gap where she had been was filled with flying pixie.

Sticking her head out for a quick peek, she checked the coast was clear before stepping over the groaning form on the floor. Screams of rage and pain, and the clanging of pots and pans as they were used offensively, reached her ears from the kitchen.

Lips set into a firm line of determination, Ashlee turned the other way toward the main bar. No matter what other measures Zane and his team had cooked up, her chef Alfonso had always maintained that his second calling was as a ninja. Sounded like he was having a ball.

She pushed the remains of the door open and stopped dead. The bar was in chaos. Utter chaos.

Pixies thronged the main area, where Zane held court in his wolf-man form. Snarling with rage, he took on what looked like twenty, turning and twisting as he lashed out with clawed hands and feet like some kind of furry version of Bruce Lee.

As she watched, another pixie went flying in a graceful arc over the bar to take out most of the optics. She winced as he hit, shattering all the bottles in a melody of broken glass. Great. That was going to cost a damn fortune.

Her gaze shifted to the corner of the bar. The customers who hadn’t already fled were crouched there behind Destiny. But the petite Dryad didn’t look so good. Instead of using her powers to attack the pixies, the wood of the bar itself had turned liquid and wrapped around her, glowing faintly pink.

“Fuck…” It had to be a spell. There was nothing else it could be. Ashlee shot a look at the cowering customers.

“Someone call the damn police,” she yelled as she turned toward the main fight.

A pixie rushed her, murder in his eyes, but she was ready for him and hyped up on rage that Roth had dared to attack again. If she found that bastard, she was giving him the mother of all headaches. Swinging back, she let fly with the bat, clocking the pixie right up and under his jaw. The strength of her blow took him off his feet to land atop a table. It shattered under his weight.

“All breakages must be paid for,” she quipped as she passed him. Skirting around the main battle with Zane, she got a glimpse of Roth the other side, a smug look on his handsome face. A face that wouldn’t be half as handsome when she got hold of him.

A deep snarl warned her, and she side stepped another flying pixie, rushing across the debris-littered floor to reach Trent. The Gargoyle was still where he’d been stationed, trapped into stone form by a UV lamp at his feet.

Spells she couldn’t do, but electrical appliances? Yeah, she was all over that like a bad fucking rash.

Determination fuelled Ashlee’s muscles. She didn’t bother tracing the cord and cutting the power. Instead, she swung for the lamp with all her might. The bat hit the side with a bang, shattering the bulb and cutting the light at the same time. Lifted by the impact, the lamp left the ground, flying through the air to smash into the back of a pixie’s head.

“Woohoo!” she yelled in triumph, fist-pumping as Trent’s bellows filled the air.

Freed from stone, he waded into the fight like an avenging angel, bending pixies into pretzels as he fought to reach Zane’s side. She had to admit, the wolf and the gargoyle made a damn impressive team.

Another pixie headed her way, a la Wolf Airlines, so she ducked behind the remains of a table. She sure hoped her insurance was going to pay for all this. Pixie damage. Was there even an option for that?

“The police are here,” someone yelled from the other side of the room. A second later the blue and red flashing lights streamed through the window.

Then the shit hit the fan.

Screaming at his men to retreat, Roth took his eye off the ball. Zane lunged, grabbing the pixie around the waist to haul him into a deadly embrace. Bloody splattered on the floor, Roth’s body jerking as Zane’s claws tickled his intestines. Cops streamed in through the shattered door, guns out and trained on the two paranormal warriors in the middle of the room.

“Everyone freeze!”

And everyone did. Apart from Zane, who just growled and tightened his grip on Roth. The pixie whimpered, his skin pale as the contents of his circulatory system flowed down his legs.

“We got a feral. Get Simmons in here!”

Shit. Ashlee shot to her feet, panic filling her as a new guy stepped through the door. Dressed like the rest, his vest had ‘Paranormal Suppression Unit’ printed on the front.

“No! Don’t, he’s not feral.”

Shoving the table out of the way, she stumbled to get between Zane and the police. She’d seen the news; she knew what they did to feral wolves. They called it mercy. She called it murder. A game to see how much lead they could put into the wolf before it died.

“Ma’am, gonna need you to step out of the way. It’s a dangerous animal. It needs to be put down.”

“Fuck.” Trent’s low voice joined the conversation. She whirled around to find the gargoyle back in human form, his hands out to show he wasn’t armed and a concerned look in his eyes as he looked at his colleague. “C’mon Zane, man. Drop the toy and let’s go home.”

Zane growled, lips curling back as his eyes shifted from the police to Trent and back again. He shifted his stance, hind claws digging into the soft wood of the floor. Obviously he considered both a threat. Trent swore softly and backed up a couple of steps, leaving Ashlee in front of him.

“Miss, you might want to back off,” the gargoyle rumbled in a deep voice, the worry easy to hear in his gravelly tones. “I’ve never seen him this far into his wolf before.”

Ashlee had actually started to back up when Trent’s words clicked with something in the back of her mind. Wolf. The first time they’d met, Zane had asked her how she’d commanded his wolf. She blinked, and stood firm. That was it. She had to command his wolf.

“Zane. Put him
down.
”

The command rang clearly through the trashed room. The cops went silent. Trent went silent, with an aura of ‘I hope you know what the fuck you’re doing,’ and even the terrified customers in the corner went quiet. In fact the only person who wasn’t quiet was Roth, who was crying softly, no evidence of the handsome model-type she’d first met in his terrified, blood splattered face.

Zane’s eyes, all yellow-gold now with no hint of the blue of humanity, locked onto her. Fear made itself at home in the back of her mind, yammering suggestions about running, but she ignored it and met Zane glare for glare.

“Put. Him. Down.”

Zane bared his teeth. Vicious fangs almost as long as her fingers.

Fuck. He wasn’t buying it. How the hell did she ‘command his wolf’?

“Get in position.” Simmons muttered quietly to the men around him. “We’re going to need to take him down.”

There was shuffling and Zane flicked an ear in their direction but didn’t take his eyes off Ashlee.

She folded her arms, and plastered her best pissed off expression on her face. Sure, she was quaking in her boots, but she was female. She could do ‘I’m fine’ until she was blue in the face. An annoyed little dog of a werewolf wasn’t going to phase her.

“Down!
Now!
”

Her voice cracked through the quiet like a whip, the sharp tone bringing both Zane’s ears forward toward her. He lowered his head. She felt the blood drain from her face. Shit, this was it. He was going to charge and she was done for.

Roth hit the deck, landing in a little heap of sniffles and tears to bleed gently onto her floor. She flicked a concerned glance down to make sure he was still breathing. He was an asshole yeah, but that didn’t mean she wanted him dead. Not really. Maybe a little mussed up around the edges so that he’d think twice about threatening people just out to make an honest living, but nothing more.

She looked back up to find Zane watching her. He didn’t blink, those un-nerving eyes fixed on her. Her throat rasped, dry as sandpaper when she tried to swallow. Crap, what did she do now?

“Errr, sit?” One of the cops sniggered and she shot him a look of hate. What the fuck was she supposed to say to a locked and loaded werewolf? Down boy?

Zane threw back his head and howled, sending half a dozen skittish cops into cover behind the broken tables. But he didn’t charge anyone. Instead, as she watched, he started to shrink. The heavy muscles receded back into his body. His limbs changed shape with a wet slide and cracking that set her teeth on edge. The long fur grew shorter until it was swallowed up by his skin and finally, Zane stood in front of her in human form.

He blinked and shook his head as if to clear his thoughts, then looked back at her.

“You couldn’t come up with anything better than ‘sit’?”

Epilogue

“So, you go furry and you lose the clothes?” Ashlee asked much later that evening.

The cops had cleared out with Roth and the pixies in custody. The customers had all been interviewed, treated if necessary and allowed to leave. She and Zane’s team had cleaned up the bar as best they could.

Fortunately the spell Roth had cast had shattered as soon as Zane had gotten claws into him, so Destiny had recovered from her wooden prison without a scratch. The broken doors and windows had been boarded up, courtesy of Trent—Ashlee had a new appreciation of what a gargoyle and a hammer could achieve—and Destiny had ‘healed’ the damage to the floors and the bar.