Harlequin Nocturne May 2015 Box Set: Wolf Hunter\Possessed by a Wolf (2 page)

Chapter 2

A
bby stared in shocked silence as the Were in his human incarnation advanced in a balanced combination of hard angles and mounds of lean muscle.

He stood tall enough to tower over her, and was twice as broad. A first glance proved him to be brutally handsome. His energy was electrifying. Looking at him kicked the scalding Miami summer temperature up several notches and turned her shudders seismic. Her heartbeats thundered in a way that any Were worthy of its species would be attracted to.

Searching, she saw nothing wolfish in his outline, though an aura of Otherness radiated from him like visible radio waves. His casual, almost nonchalant stride screamed of combustible energy tightly contained in a human casing. His long limbs and wide shoulders were topped by a tanned sculpted face and thick chin-length hair that fell somewhere on the color spectrum between gold and bronze.

Oh yes.
This guy was a breed unto himself, and completely unlike anything she had come across before. He was a magnetic combination of rugged and elegant.

Too gorgeous to be human.

He wore a blue long-sleeved shirt rolled at the cuffs to expose sun-kissed forearms. An open collar showed off more skin. His jeans were faded, and she caught a flash of heavy black boots, though he advanced soundlessly with his gaze riveted to her.

Abby felt color drain from her face.
Mesmerizing
wasn't the word to best describe him.
Magnificent
seemed a better choice. Also
deadly
. This beast, with his incredibly honed body outlined by the tight, fitted shirt, moved toward her little circle of light with the grace of an animal...because he was an animal, at least in part. And the overtly masculine, almost hypnotic physical details that described him were likely some kind of built-in bait for reeling in prey.

The devil always lay in the details. Her father had warned her about this many times.

Never get close to the enemy.

Hell, she'd just smashed that golden rule to smithereens through no fault of her own.

Beneath her outward quakes, Abby's insides trembled with a mixture of fear and defiance and something else she didn't dare address—that new thing that had no business showing up alongside this large golden wolf.

Hunger.

That's what she felt. Hunger. For knowledge of him. For the chance to get closer to him.

Either she'd gone insane, or this guy had the ability to hypnotize her with his wolf power, because she grappled with a spectacularly idiotic, completely suicidal compulsion to have the itch forming down deep inside her scratched by a razor-sharp claw.

The breath she exhaled after holding it for so long was steamy. Aside from her need for self-preservation, and against her better judgment, this werewolf in his human form affected her in ways that were totally wrong. The highly erotic vibrations he gave off were the epitome of a perilous death trap.

She got that. She knew better. So why did her body want to meet the animal in him? What possible explanation could account for her absurd desire to fold herself into his heat?

“What do you want?” she demanded in frustration.

He replied in a voice like soft, sifted gravel. “I was wondering if perhaps you have a death wish.”

The world went white-hot beneath this Were's unwavering gaze. Moonlight seemed to amplify every sensation rippling through Abby, all of those sensations pointing to him. No doubt about it, her sexually suggestive reactions were as dangerous as the Were himself.

She'd never been an out-and-out rebel, really, she thought now, though she had lived on the edge, more or less fending for herself since her mother died of a prolonged illness when she was a kid. In the past, she'd had no reason to flaunt her father's strict authority, since he had provided, if not earnest affection, a roof over her head.

So, was there an actual rule about people having to do the right thing at the right time, or only what was good for them?

Breathlessness made her light-headed, a symptom of anticipating more trouble to come. Needing air, unable to stand the silence, Abby spoke in a voice shakier than she would have liked, given that werewolves, as with other predators, could ferret out fear.

“Death wish?”

He nodded. “Everyone in Miami is familiar with this park's unfavorable mortality statistics.”

Inner warning signals went off again. Red flags waved. If she couldn't outrun this sucker and he wished her harm, she'd have to fight.

Keep him talking. Gauge his intent.

Was he a member of the pack killing people out here? The way he rolled his shoulders reminded Abby of how much muscle lay under that cool blue cotton, and how that muscle would soon adapt to a new shape. If not an organic werewolf, known from Sam's lectures as a Lycan, he'd have to have been bitten by another werewolf, and that bite had injected the wolf virus into his bloodstream. Human and wolf particles had fused to form a freakish new entity.

Did this guy's raw, undulating maleness stem from the kick of some mystical ancient virus in his bloodstream, or had he always been a heartthrob?

“I know about the park,” she said.

She hadn't really looked closely at his face. It was bad enough that the bronzed skin beneath his chin, exposed between open buttons, beckoned to her with the lure of the forbidden.

Would his flesh be smooth, so close to becoming a wolf? Abby cursed the urge to press her fingers there to find out—an action that would probably add one more body count to those unfavorable statistics he'd just mentioned.

Keep strong.

Resist the craziness.

Never get close.

“Then you do know this park is probably the last place a woman should visit, alone and at night,” he said quietly.

“Only women?”

“Anyone.”

“Am I alone?”

“That seems to be the case.”

Abby gestured at him with a wave of one hand. “You don't count?”

Sarcasm didn't make her feel better about her predicament. The Were's eyes remained on her in an uncomfortably intense way, giving Abby the impression that he could see through her clothes and down through her skin to the place where the sparks of her crazy curiosity about him glittered.

She hoped to God he couldn't see that.

Stomach tightening into a ball of uncertainty, and with her body temp soaring to a disgusting degree, she waited for what might come next, facing the Were, whose specialized internal furnace would soon fuel a werewolf's shape-shift.

“You do know that bad things sometimes hide in the night?” he cautioned with no threatening move in her direction.

“Are you one of those bad things?”

“I could be. How would you know?”

“Well, then, I guess I'd better go before you have a chance to provide the answer.”

“That might be a good idea,” he agreed.

Movement, though, was impossible. Turning her back to this guy would be a bad idea, no matter how friendly his approach had been. Big reminder: though he looked like a human, and talked like one, he wasn't.

Feeling the weight of the cell phone in her pocket, Abby tried to remember that Weres weren't the only treacherous faction in town. Her father, Sam Stark, was as deadly as any werewolf and quite possibly twice as lethal, since Sam had no tolerance for anomalies like this one, and his hatred was usually backed by an element of surprise.

She wondered what color this guy's pelt would be. Bronze, like his hair? Golden, like the rest of him? With moonlight reflected in each strand of his sleek, slightly mussed mane, whatever color of wolf he turned out to be would amount to tons of cash for the Stark accounts if the team found him. He'd bring a small fortune and it shouldn't be any concern of hers. This wolf and others like him hurt people when the moon was full.

How close to the surface is your wolf tonight?
she wanted to ask.
Are you a killer?

Any of those things spoken aloud would let him know she had pegged him for a hybrid, taking things from bad to worse in a hurry. The team's plan had always been to drive Weres like this one into the open, into the moonlight that betrayed what they were, and strike fast, strike hard. No mercy.

But this wasn't a killing night. Tonight her job had been only to locate some Weres. See who was around.

“And I found you,” she whispered as her interest in the gorgeous Were reached broiling status internally, as if her mind and body were engaged in a war of ethics, while the big fellow on the edge of the light continued to prove how good his acting skills were.

It was a standoff.
Checkmate.

Who would make the first move?

Daringly, Abby let her gaze drift upward to his face before immediately wishing she hadn't. His features were chiseled, with high cheekbones and a full mouth. He had a strong jaw and arched brows. She refused to meet his wide-set eyes.

Daring to speak again in a voice husky with strain, she said, “What are you waiting for?”

After a long pause, he replied, “Why don't I walk you home?”

Abby shook her head. “Don't think so, but thanks all the same.”

“There could be others out here, much worse than me.”

“Really? Much worse?”

“I can assure you of that.”

“Then why are you out here?” she asked.

“I like to walk and think.”

“In the dark?”

“Yes.”

“Here?”

He shrugged.

“Maybe you're some kind of danger junkie,” she suggested.

“It's a possibility. What about you? Is danger your drug of choice, or were you trying to get somewhere and got lost?”

Unclenching her hands, Abby then fisted them again, rattled by the stilted repartee. The heat, both hers and his, had become suffocating. He had a gaze like a frigging laser beam that wouldn't let up or miss much. The sixty-four-thousand-dollar question was whether this guy would try to hurt her, or not.

Why don't you make your move?

“Danger isn't really my thing,” she said.

“Yet here you are, in a place that attracts it.”

“Not for long.”

Listening hard, Abby separated the layers of city noises. Cars paraded down the boulevards in the distance. The faint buzz of insects reached her from the trees to her right.

The air was filled with the smells of dry, sun-drenched pavement and the bitter odor of crushed grass and leaves. Above those things something else, some other scent, surfed the night air. She tagged it as the not-so-sweet odor of the unseen.

Her scalp pricked. Her racing heart gave an extra thump. This Were's wolf was close to the surface and getting stronger. Whatever lay inside him that she had easily connected to wasn't going to go away with a bit of conversation.

Something else bothered her, needled at her. If this guy was an Alpha, he'd have a pack close by.

Her odds in favorably dealing with the situation plummeted. At the same time, her morbid fascination for the wolfman kept Abby focused. She wanted to know so much more about him, and about what went on here. Her appetite for those things grew by the second.

Abby held herself tightly to keep from squirming. If Weres like this one possessed animalistic superpowers, he'd have already noticed that she had become a heat-sensing Geiger counter for the very thing that should have had her screaming. Her fevered flesh and skin-ruffling gyrations were the equivalent of inviting the fiery hand of death to slide between her legs.

Hell with that.
Due to his looks and masculine vibe, this Were probably had a harem of women willing to take him in. He didn't need one more willing supplicant. Besides, wolves and humans did not mix, except when those things in an anomalistic fashion resided within one being.

The situation sucked. All outcomes seemed dire. Whatever outlandish thing was taking place between this werewolf and herself had gummed up logic. He was seducing her without any effort on his part at all. He didn't have to be blatant about it because the seduction worked. All he had to do was stand there, looking like a sexy hunk.

Stupid girl. Stupid, stupid girl. Get out. Get away.

You
, she wanted to shout to the creature across from her,
are the very thing my father and his teams despise
.
There has to be a reason for that.

Lifting her chin defiantly, Abby backed up a step.
This is the final test. Will you pounce?

As it turned out, he didn't do anything of the sort. Instead, he calmly asked her a question.

“Why do you hate the moon, if you don't mind me asking?”

The question was as unexpected as the earnest ring of curiosity in his voice.

“You said you hate it,” he reminded her.

“I hate what the moon does to people,” Abby said.

Her companion glanced up at the light. “You don't find the moon beautiful?”

“Its beauty is deceitful, as beauty often is.”

If he got the point and the allusion to himself, he didn't show it. He took a step toward her, closing some of the distance separating them and setting off another round of sparks that burrowed well below Abby's waistline. He continued to study her face as if whatever he sought there might be important.

What did he want? An apology for the atrocities her father and his team had inflicted upon his species? Did he want revenge, when he had to know how many humans Weres had killed in Miami in the past year alone?

In hindsight, she should have covered up the logo on her T-shirt that advertised a bar that just happened to also be a field office for Sam Stark's hunters. She hadn't taken the time to change, in a hurry to get outside, away from the crowd. Maybe this guy had already made note of it, which would be bad news.

Move, Abby. Hesitation is no longer an option.

No wolf could be allowed to discover where the team kept court, or seek to uncover the source of her own unusual connection to their breed. Those were secrets for keeping behind closed doors, under lock and key, especially when facing a Were male of this caliber.