"There are many…beings out there like Colin," Emily told her. "They’re the Other and they walk right beside humans in this world."
Smith shook her head, but Colin didn’t think she was denying Emily’s words.
"You can’t tell anyone about them, Smith. You can’t say what you saw…what Colin is…what Jake was." Sirens echoed in the distance. The cops had been stationed close by. Not too close to alert the killer, but close enough for backup. "I’ll explain everything to you later, but please, promise me you won’t say anything to the other officers. Th-they wouldn’t understand." Emily cast a quick, desperate look in Colin’s direction, but she kept her voice calm and easy.
A flash of blue lights lit up the warehouse.
"Smith, I need you to give me your word," Colin said. "Don’t tell anyone what you saw here."
Brakes squealed. Doors slammed. Voices rumbled.
Smith’s shoulders straightened and she looked at him with a touch of her old confidence. "D-don’t worry, Gyth…n-no one would b-believe me anyway…"
McNeal burst into the building. "Smith!"
She didn’t take her eyes off Colin. "B-but now I know…m-monsters-"
"Smith, thank God!" McNeal grabbed her, pulled her tight against his chest. "Woman, I thought I’d lost you." His face was tormented.
Colin glanced over at Emily. She was staring at Donnelley’s body. He pushed to her side, needing to touch her.
His fingers found hers. Locked.
Jesus. He felt like he’d just lost a good ten years of his life. Emily had come so close to death…by his hand.
"You aren’t anything like him, you know," she whispered, her words barely a breath of sound. "People think all wolf shifters are the same."
Psychotic. Homicidal. Uncontrollable.
"But you’re different."
He wasn’t so sure. Donnelley lay before him, throat almost completely gone. He’d killed him, just as easily as Donnelley had killed his victims. And given the same set of circumstances, he wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
"You’re not like him," she repeated softly, glancing up at him. "You could never be."
If something happened to her, he could be. The knowledge was there. Uncomfortable. Painful. But true. If anything ever happened to the doc, his beast would break his cage.
She is mine. Every instinct in his body screamed of the possession. He didn’t understand how it had happened, but the doc…she was his mate.
A human, mated to a wolf shifter.
The Monster Doctor bound to a monster.
Fate could be a twisted bitch.
Emily stared up at him. Blood trickled down her throat.
Mine.
A circle of uniformed cops gaped down at Donnelley’s body. "Another one?" a young female officer exclaimed. "But I thought the Night Butcher was taken down-"
"He was." Colin took Emily’s arm. Led her away from the body. He wanted to get her home. Naked. Under him. Not necessarily in that order. "That’s him." McNeal could bullshit his way through an explanation of the killer’s torn throat. He was getting out of there and taking his mate with him.
She awoke to the feel of a man’s hand slowly stroking her thigh. It was a soft touch. Light.
Colin.
Emily stretched slowly and opened her eyes. It was still dark in the bedroom, but the faint light from the hallway trickled into the room. Colin was crouched between her thighs, naked.
And aroused.
The paramedics had grabbed her when they’d left the crime scene. They’d patched her up, bandaged her stomach-luckily, the cuts hadn’t been deep enough to require stitches.
They’d finally escaped from the EMTs, and Colin had taken her home.
They made love as soon as the front door closed behind them. Fast. Hard. He’d had her naked in less than a minute, and she’d been coming thirty seconds later.
For all of his strength, he’d taken care not to jar her injuries. He’d held her immobile against the wall, and thrust into her, deep, so deep.
They’d fallen asleep in his bed. His arms had been around her. His right hand lying on her heart.
And now…
His finger trailed up her thigh, eased between the folds of her legs.
"I want to taste you." His voice was a growl in the darkness.
Oh yes. Sounded like a fabulous plan to her. Emily arched her hips.
Then felt the warm stroke of his tongue on the center of her desire. She closed her eyes, sighing with pleasure. Oh, that is good. So-
His tongue swirled over her clitoris, sucked lightly.
Her heels dug into the mattress.
His breath blew across her flesh, and one finger slid into her hungry sex. Another slow swirl of his tongue.
Her entire body tightened. "C–Colin!"
He kept licking her, moving that tongue over every inch of her sex in long, maddening swipes that had her twisting, moaning, then-
Colin drove his tongue deep inside of her.
Her fingers locked in his hair. Not to push him away, but to hold him closer. Tighter.
"More!" She was close, so close.
His thumb pushed the button of her need and his tongue drove deep again, licking inside her core with just the perfect touch.
Her hips bucked and her orgasm rolled over her in a tide of red-hot pleasure. And as her sex clenched, he kept lapping her, licking and sucking on her tender flesh until the waves of her release finally ended.
Emily sagged against the bed. Wow.
Colin stretched out beside her. Curled his body around hers. She could feel his aroused flesh pressing into her buttocks, but he made no move to take her. "Colin, aren’t you-"
"It was for you. Just you." He pressed a kiss to her neck, to the faint bruise on her skin. The mark not made by Jake’s claws, but by Colin’s mouth.
"But why don’t-"
"I don’t want to take this time. I just wanted to give."
And he’d sure as hell done that. Given her so much pleasure that her body still tingled. Emily rolled to face him. Found his expression tense, guarded. "I’m not sure I understand you, shifter." Just when she thought she’d figured him out, he managed to surprise her.
"You don’t have to understand me." A pause. "But…" He stopped, jaw tightening.
Emily pushed out of his arms, sat up, uncaring of her nudity and the bandages that covered her stomach. "What?" Something was happening here. Something important. She could feel his tension. His…fear?
Why would Colin be afraid? Donnelley was dead. No more homicidal monsters were wandering the streets. The city was safe…for the moment. "What is it?"
"Do you think…you could ever love me?" Stark words. And she saw the fear then. In his eyes, in the unguarded expression on his face.
She touched his cheek. Smoothed her fingers down the side of his face.
Not a human. Not the simple, easygoing partner she would have chosen.
He carried a beast with him. A creature of enormous power.
Man and beast. Strength and danger.
Do you think…you could ever love me?
Being moments from death had made her realize a damn important fact. Her hand lifted, stroked his cheek. "I already do, Colin. I already do." She kissed him, brushing her lips lightly across his. His hands curled around her and he pulled her close, holding her right against his pounding heart.
Just where she wanted to be.
Safe…with her monster.
Epilogue
"Jake Donnelley, the perpetrator known as the Night Butcher, was killed last night when the woman he’d kidnapped, Chief Medical Examiner Natalhia Smith, shot him in the throat."
A chorus of questions erupted at this news.
But McNeal just kept talking. "Evidence links Jake Donnelley to the murders of Gillian Nemont, Preston Myers, and Darla Mitchell. We also have reason to suspect that he was behind the recent killing of four John Does…"
The watch on Emily’s arm vibrated. Glancing down, she saw that it was nearly time for her to meet up with her last appointment of the day. Marvin was scheduled to come in, and she was eager to see how the vampire fared.