McQuade: The Lone Wolf Takes A Mate (4 page)

What
disconcerted him most was the way his body had reacted when he’d held her close. Not the flaming arousal that had his cock rock hard, not even the overwhelming drive to come as he tasted her creamy shoulder. No, what had his wolf tugging at its restraints was the urge–no, the overwhelming
need
–that had welled up inside him to protect this woman. Suddenly he was aware of his fucking wolf as he’d never been before. Sure, it was a part of him. But that was just it, now it felt distinctly separate—and incredibly defensive where this woman’s safety was concerned.

He threw some bills on the counter, frowning when he
realized the bartender had given Rose another coffee. The first cup was empty and the second had only a small amount of liquid remaining in the bottom. When the hell had that happened? Damn it, he needed to get control of himself and fast.

“Come on, i
t’s time to leave.”

“But I need to wait for Alice.”

“No, you need to stand up, and walk out of this bar while you still can.” The threat was now coming from him, but he didn’t know if the woman recognized the shift. He cursed his wolf’s reaction, her shyness, and the whole situation. As soon as she’d stepped through the bar’s door, she’d known she was in over her head. But had she left? No, she’d barreled right in determined to find her wayward sister.

When s
he slid from the barstool, her skirt hiked up as she moved. The top of her thigh was bare. Sweet heaven, did she have on stockings? He jerked her down, taking her elbow and pulling her from the bar.

Outside, the rain had stopped
and the night had cooled even more. The chill managed to center him, taking his focus off his rock hard cock. His bike was parked at the edge of the lot, a black and chrome machine that carried him almost as swiftly as his wolf. The two lone wolves followed him out. He didn’t know if they were there to support him if the lions decided to attack or try and take Rose for themselves.

Mine.
His wolf growled, a low warning sound in the back of McQuade’s throat. “Where do you live?”

“On Willow Street.
By the all night diner.” Oh great, Rose thought, he’d probably think she was trying to weasel a meal out of him.

“I know where it
is.” He zipped up his jacket and looked at her as if he was attempting to solve a particularly difficult puzzle.

“
What?”

“You’re going to get wet.”

“Like I’m not already.” She didn’t know what was causing it, but she suddenly felt a little saucy. Maybe she shouldn’t have indulged in that second cup of coffee while McQuade had been texting her sister. The first one had tasted so good she hadn’t been able to resist. Besides, she’d been cold and the drink had warmed her up nicely.

“Yeah, but you’ll be
traveling at seventy miles an hour.” McQuade shook his head. “Shit, you’re going to freeze to death.”

She stepped closer. How could she possible be cold if she got to press her front
against his back? All that yummy, warm muscle to snuggle against.

She was so
busy imagining the possibilities of having her arms around him she didn’t hear the footsteps behind her.

“Here,
friend, use this. It might help a little.”

From the corner of her eye she saw a
blur as one of the men from the bar threw a large black package at McQuade.

“Thanks.
I appreciate the help.”

The man chuckled. “I think you’re going to ne
ed all the help you can get with this one.”

Rose was
vaguely aware of the other men standing back even though her thought process was screwed up by the Irish coffees she’d consumed and the magnetism of the man beside her. “Do you think we’re okay now?”

McQuade didn’t answer. He snapped the string around the bundle the man h
ad tossed him. A piece of plastic unfolded.

“Here. This might manage to keep you
fairly dry.” His tone more than suggested he was tired of taking care of her. It was almost angry. She knew she’d screwed up walking into the bar. As soon as she’d determined Alice was nowhere to be seen, the smart thing would have been to turn around and run as fast as she could back to her car.

Even though both humans and shifters had been inside, Rose knew she
could never have counted on any help from the human males. It had been her experience that males, whether shifter or human, had all been cut from the same cloth–self-centered and unwilling to step out of their comfort zone unless it benefited them.

Barely
managing to catch the large square of plastic, she shook it out and slipped it over her head. Somehow she didn’t think this was exactly what Dr. Brothers had in mind when she’d encouraged women to wrap themselves in Saran Wrap and greet their husbands after a long, hard day.

“I look like a—
well, I don’t really know what I look like.” She held her arms up, the long sleeves hanging off the ends of her hands. The hemline was no better. What would have been a short rain cover-up for a man, brushed the asphalt on her.

McQuade
smiled at the picture she made. The first true smile she’d seen from him tonight. He pulled the plastic hood over her head and wedged the helmet over it. “There, all set.”

He swung his leg over the seat of the bike and ordered her on behind him. “Come on Rose, let’s go.”

“And how exactly do you propose I get on that thing?”

His lips curved up.
“Haven’t you ever straddled anything, darling?”

“Um, n
o.”

Do not think about straddling him. Do not think about it.

But his tone was so…suggestive.

Okay, it was dark and
he couldn’t see her blush. Could he?

Her
rescuer sighed.

Rose
knew that male sound so well–exasperation at what they considered the weaker sex.

“Put your hand on my shoulder
, then swing your right leg over the seat.”

“Right,
I’ll just swing my short, chubby leg higher than my waist while I’m wearing a skirt and enough plastic to cover a swimming pool.” She gritted her teeth and prayed her knees would stop knocking together as she contemplated her predicament. This was so embarrassing. She opened her mouth, ready to tell him just to forget about taking her home, when the man who had provided the plastic poncho walked over, lifted her as though she weighed next to nothing, and plopped her behind McQuade.

“All set
, sweetheart.”

The deep voice rumbled in Rose’s ear.
If she wasn’t already so taken with McQuade’s extremely handsome, though rough-around-the-edges, appearance, this man could have made her pant. Blonde and blue-eyed, with just enough mischievousness in his smile to make a woman forget her first name. And her last.

“Hang on, babe,” McQuade shouted over his shoulder as he
saluted the other man and started the bike.

“As if I ha
ve a choice,” she yelled, grabbing him around the waist and holding on for all she was worth.

Rose’s fingers and toes were numb by the time they pulled o
nto her street. She thought she’d been cold when she’d walked to the bar, but now she was just a shivering ball of misery. Her small apartment had never looked so good. When their parents died, Alice had already been living away from home, supporting herself with a string of temporary jobs. Rose had just started college. There’d been no savings or life insurance and the sale of the family home had barely covered the mortgage and funeral expenses. Rose had been left homeless with little more than the clothes on her back.

She’d moved in with her sister thinking it would be the ideal solution. Two incomes, one set of bills.
Hence, why the phone was in her name. She couldn’t have been more wrong. Alice not only resented the intrusion on her privacy, but expected Rose to pay all the bills–rent, water, utilities. Unable to make her sister see reason, Rose had moved out as soon as possible. She loved her sister, but they were very different individuals.

Even though Alice was older
by two years, Rose had always been the responsible one. Her sister had taken advantage of the fact time and time again. Even so, Rose couldn’t stop helping her. Alice’s call this afternoon had sounded more than a little desperate when she’d asked Rose to meet her in the bar. Being at a bar was bad enough, but one that catered to both humans and shifters…What had she been thinking? That was the problem. Alice never thought anything through, never worried about the consequences of her actions.

She left that to Rose.

When McQuade stopped the bike, Rose still felt the sensation of moving. It was almost more than she could manage to undo the icy grip she had around his waist as he put down the kickstand and got off.

Her
tiny apartment sat above a garage that provided twenty-four-hour towing and was often noisy, waking her at all hours. But it was all Rose could afford on her nurse’s salary just yet. Even though she had worked while attending school, she had major student loans and wanted to make a dent in them before committing to higher rent on a larger apartment or even financing a mortgage for a small house. She had no one to depend on but herself. Alice had made that perfectly clear on more than one occasion.

“Y
ou need to get warm.”

As the other man
had at the bar, McQuade lifted her from the seat. He half dragged, half carried her up the stairs. She wanted to lean in, to let the heat radiating from his big body warm her, to close her eyes and breathe deeply of the purely male scent. Her keys were in her sweater pocket, which was beneath the oversized plastic raincoat. It took her several attempts to dig them out. He stood behind her, blocking out the night breeze. Amazingly, he didn’t growl or grow impatient at her clumsiness.

“I know you’re tired. And
hungry.” His voice held a note of concern. It had been so long since anyone thought about her wellbeing, tears threatened. Maybe thinking about her parents had made her sad and weepy. Or maybe it had been the whole damn night.

“I’m fine.” She was indebted enough to the man. Her statement would have been more believable if her stomach hadn’t chose
n that moment to growl.

She finally managed to get the key in the lock. The door squeaked as she pushed it open—it always had.
Rose had never complained to her landlord. She figured it was a cheap burglar alarm. Flipping on the light, she braced herself for the sarcastic comments that would no doubt be forthcoming. Every time Alice came by, she spent the first twenty minutes telling Rose how horrible her apartment looked. She tried to see it through this stranger’s eyes. The open area held a beat up leather sofa, a scratched and scarred coffee table, an upholstered chair, and a lamp some previous owner had covered in seashells to hide the peeling paint. Every piece in this room and her small bedroom had been purchased for next to nothing at the thrift shop down the street. Everything but the queen-sized mattress and boxed springs on her bed. She’d refused to sleep on a used mattress. That had been another month of eating almost nothing but noodles

Thankfully
, one of the nurse’s brothers had offered to move the whole lot in his pickup truck. All it had cost her was one of the chocolate cakes she was fond of making for the other nurses during the holidays—a whole lot cheaper than renting a truck herself. Besides, there’d been no way she could have gotten the couch up those stairs on her own. She’d paid the store extra to have the mattress set delivered.

When he didn’t say anything, she looked over at him, h
er eyes tracing the muscles in his arms as he removed his jacket and slung it carelessly across her chair.

Maybe she
should thank McQuade by offering to bake a cake for him.

Or you could offer something else.
Like a few more kisses or even a night in her queen-sized bed. Doing whatever he wanted.

He picked up one of the
framed photographs from the fake mantel above the small electric heater that was her only heat source during the winter while she took off the plastic poncho and hung it by the door. Somehow she didn’t think the man who gave it to her would ever want it back. The picture was one Alice had posted on the internet while on vacation in Mexico. Her sister would never have thought to send it to Rose, so she’d downloaded it and made a copy for herself. Her sister would never have thought to invite her on vacation either. She frowned, worry for her sister settling in once again. No matter what Alice had done or hadn’t done in the past, she was still Rose’s sister.

“She’s
very beautiful.”

And she was.
Straight blonde hair, killer bod, and a smile that made most men open up their wallets and say how much do you need? Rose was shocked at the wave of jealousy and anger sweeping over her. She wanted him to say those words about her, Rose Spencer. Not her sister.

“Ye
s, she is. She looks just like our mother. Too bad those genes didn’t come together for me.”

His forehead
creased. “Who told you that?”