Wolf Instinct

by Paige Tyler

  “It is.” Zane was trying to get her to change the subject and she wasn’t falling for it for a second. “And I’m willing to tell you about it. After we talk about you a little more.”

  “What do you want to talk about?” he asked, though she was pretty sure he already knew.

  She motioned at his left arm. “Why don’t we talk about exactly how you were injured, and more importantly, why you’re working so hard to hide it behind a leather jacket?”

  Zane snorted, like he’d been expecting something like that. “Maybe it would be easier if I showed you. One picture being worth a thousand words and all that.”

  Alyssa was a little surprised by the offer but nodded. “If you’re comfortable with that…okay.”

  He locked eyes with her, a slight smile tugging at his lips. “I have to admit, normally I wouldn’t be, but with you, I am.”

  * * *

  Zane had no idea why he was shrugging out of his jacket so he could show Alyssa the god-awful injury he’d gotten from those hunters. But what she’d said about being alone with his scars because he wouldn’t let people in made a lot of sense to him. His friend Brooks had said something similar to him back in Dallas about needing to stop using his injured arm as an excuse to push people away. He’d been pushing people away for so long, it seemed like all he knew how to do.

  But he didn’t feel like pushing Alyssa away. When he was alone with her like this, surrounded by her scent and mesmerized by the sound of her voice, he found himself having a difficult time remembering why he’d been fighting the connection they so clearly had. The idea that she was his soul mate still scared the hell out of him—especially since she was FBI—but at the same time, there was something about her that gave him the courage to take risks he thought were beyond him.

  He got his leather jacket off his left shoulder, making sure not to move that arm any more than he had to. Contracting his triceps could cause anywhere from a slight twinge to a burning firebrand of pain. Since he never knew which he was going to get, he tried his best to avoid aggravating the shredded muscles as much as he could.

  Alyssa stood and came around the table, her expression curious as he carefully pushed the sleeve of his T-shirt up higher. Something as simple as skimming his fingers over the scar tissue along the back of his arm could trigger a stinger of pain, so he definitely avoided doing that.

  “It’s difficult to explain,” he said as Alyssa studied the long, ragged scar that ran along the back of his arm from an inch below his left shoulder all the way down to his elbow. Several places along it, horizontal slices had been made so the skin could be folded back, exposing the damaged tissue underneath. “But basically, the bullet I got shot with was filled with…well…poison, for lack of a better word. It destroyed most of the muscle and it had to be taken it out. That’s why my arm looks so messed up.”

  He glanced at Alyssa out of the corner of his eye, waiting for her to look away from the ugly scar in disgust, but she didn’t. He waited for her to ask the inevitable question about whether it hurt or not. That’s what the few people who’d seen the wound usually started with. But instead, she reached up and gently rested the palm of her hand on the vertical scar. He instinctively held his breath, waiting for the wretched pain to come.

  But it didn’t.

  In fact, as he slowly let the air ease out of his lungs, he realized Alyssa’s touch felt unbelievably nice. It was hard to describe, but the contact was both soothing and exciting, calming the tremors that had been a near constant companion since the shooting, but also creating a pleasant tingle everywhere her fingers traced. He was once again thankful she didn’t have a werewolf’s hearing, or she would have picked up on the fact that his heart was racing.

  Alyssa moved her fingers along the wide suture line of the main scar and the smaller lines radiating out from it, pressing and examining the injury, her expression curious and a little confused. “These cuts don’t look like something a doctor would do with a scalpel. I don’t mean to make this sound like a joke, but it looks like someone took a steak knife to you.”

  Zane snorted. “You’re actually closer to being right than you might think. The poison in the bullet was fast acting, and there was no possibility of me making it to the nearest hospital alive if it spread. So one of the SWAT team medics had to remove the infected tissue with a pocket knife while transporting me in the back of an SUV.”

  Alyssa stood there with her hand resting on his damaged arm, staring up at him with a look that suggested she hoped he was messing with her. “That sounds extremely painful.”

  It had been. The mere mention of the shooting brought back memories that he tried to always keep tucked away. The pain of the wolfsbane poison spreading through his bloodstream had been unreal. Worse even than the feel of his teammate’s knife cutting through his flesh. He vividly remembered asking one of his pack mates to cut off his arm and be done with it—or kill him.

  That probably wasn’t something he should tell Alyssa. So he shrugged with his right shoulder—he’d gotten good at doing that—and smiled. “It was bad, but I survived.”

  Now that Alyssa had heard the story and seen the scar, he expected her to pull her hand away and walk back over to her side of the table. There were still more fries to be devoured after all. But instead, she slid her hand farther up his left arm. Then she lifted the other and casually placed it on his chest.

  Maybe the move was casual to her, but as her fingers slid under the edge of the sleeve of his T-shirt, lightly massaging the scar tissue as if trying to soothe it, his heart beat even faster. With her hand on his chest like that, there was no way she couldn’t feel it thumping like mad.

  His fangs slowly extended.

  Bloody hell. He’d never lost control so much since he’d first gone through his change. And it was all from a simple touch.

  “Does it hurt when I do this?” she murmured, interrupting the thoughts spinning through his head as she ran the tips of her fingers above the top of the scar, testing the muscles along his shoulder.

  He tried to speak, wanting to tell her how amazing her fingers felt on his skin, how the hand on his chest was as warm as the sun right then. But there was no way he could open his mouth and say a thing, not without letting the growl bubbling up in his throat escape. So instead, he shook his head, hoping she’d get the message and keep going.

  It was crazy. He’d slept with women over the years since everything had fallen apart with Sienna. But not a single kiss or touch from any of them had felt as intimate as the simple contact of Alyssa’s hand on the bare skin of his arm. It felt like the first time a woman had touched him in nearly forever. Hell, who was he kidding? He’d never been touched like this. It made him want things he’d been telling himself he shouldn’t want. Things he couldn’t have.

  “Is there anything the doctors can do?” she asked, running her fingers tenderly from his shoulder and along his triceps. “Some kind of surgery maybe?”

  He shook his head but felt he needed to answer. “The doctor has me on a few different experimental drug protocols trying to encourage new muscle growth. So far, it’s not working. Truthfully, I think he’s running out of options.”

  Alyssa gazed up at him, eyes filled with concern as she gently pressed the palm of her hand against the scar. Her heart was racing as fast as his. “You can’t give up, okay? Something is going to work. You have to keep trying until it does.”

  He opened his mouth to reply when a scent so overwhelming and intoxicating surrounded him that he didn’t even stop to think before bending his head to softly brush his lips against hers. Even that slight touch was electric, but he forced himself to hesitate, wanting to give Alyssa a chance to pull back.

  But it didn’t seem like pulling back was something Alyssa was interested in. Instead, she wrapped her hand around the back of his neck and tugged him down farther, her mouth urgent and demanding on his. Zane was more than willing to meet those demands, slipping his tongue between her lips, tangling and
teasing as a growl rumbled out. She tasted even better than she smelled.

  He moved a hand down to her waist, intending to tug her closer, when the sound of squawking tires from the direction of the garage caught his attention. His inner wolf told him to ignore the noise and keep snogging, but his human side got in the way, forcing him to lift his head and glance at the window.

  Alyssa stepped back a bit, looking slightly embarrassed. His inner wolf, on the other hand, was pissed off—and turned on.

  Shoving his arousal to a small, dark corner of his mind, Zane leaned over to look out the window. He immediately caught sight of a vehicle spiraling up one level of the garage to the next, moving fast enough to squeal the tires.

  “They’re heading up, not down to the lower levels,” Alyssa pointed out, moving up beside him, her delicious scent almost making him drool. “That probably means they’re not involved with Stefan.”

  Zane would have agreed if he had been capable of forming coherent words at the moment. But he wasn’t, because he’d finally recognized what it was about Alyssa’s scent that was so mesmerizing.

  She was aroused, too.

  He curled his fingers in as he felt his claws partially extend…then his fangs…then his cock. Bloody hell, it was like a werewolf hard-on trifecta. He fought for control, but it was nearly impossible. She smelled like chocolate buttercream frosting. And damn, did he want to lick her off a spoon right then.

  “They stopped on the fifth level and turned off their lights, but they’re not getting out of the car,” she added. “What the hell are they up to?”

  Zane forced his gaze away from Alyssa and looked across the street, finding the car easily in the darkness. Yeah, werewolves had excellent night vision.

  He saw movement inside the front seat of the car, then even more movement as the two occupants of the vehicle climbed into the back seats. It didn’t take too long after that to figure out what they were up to.

  He chuckled. “They’re shagging.”

  Alyssa laughed as she moved around the table and sat down on her side. “Sex in a parking garage. O-kay. But I guess we should take that as a sign and pay attention to what’s going on across the street. If those two hadn’t been in such a hurry for a quickie, we never would have heard them pull in. We could miss Stefan just as easily.”

  He sighed with disappointment and dropped into his own chair. “You’re right. It wasn’t very professional of us to let ourselves get distracted.”

  “No, it wasn’t.” She picked up the last few fries she’d spilled out on her burger wrapper earlier. “But it sure was fun.”

  Alyssa said that last part so softly she probably thought he wouldn’t hear. But he’d heard all right. That’s when his inner werewolf told his human side to get lost. The animal inside him wanted her, risk be damned.

  Chapter 7

  “I don’t have any tea, but do you want to come in for coffee?” Alyssa asked when they pulled into the parking lot of her hotel the next morning. Zane had admitted he preferred Earl Grey over java, but they’d both consumed copious amounts of Starbucks dark roast during their late-night shift, so she knew he drank it sometimes. All that coffee was probably the reason she wasn’t aching to crawl straight into bed even though she’d been awake for well over twenty-four hours. “I have a couple of boxes of Pop-Tarts I’d be willing to share, too. I know it’s not much, but I feel badly I still haven’t bought you breakfast. And since you paid for dinner last night, that’s two meals I owe you.”

  Zane gave her an appraising look as he parked the SUV. She’d caught him doing that several times last night. Like she was a puzzle he was trying to figure out. Then again, he might simply be wondering if she had an ulterior motive for asking him in. She didn’t. She’d had a good time last night and was hoping the fun didn’t have to end just because their shift was over.

  It was sad to admit, but that stakeout had been the most fun she’d had with a guy in years. That pretty much defined her love life, didn’t it? A twelve-hour stakeout on the graveyard shift with a guy who might not be totally human was the best date she’d been on in years. Christine had been right—her love life was pathetic.

  “What kind of Pop-Tarts are we talking about here?” Zane asked, clearly intrigued by the offer, but not shutting off the engine yet. “Please tell me you don’t eat those unfrosted fruit-filled things? If so, forget it. You couldn’t pay me enough.”

  She laughed. “Nope, I’m old-school. Chocolate fudge and brown sugar cinnamon.”

  He flashed her a grin. “You had me at chocolate. But I won’t turn up my nose at the brown sugar cinnamon, either.”

  Killing the engine, Zane climbed out and fell into step beside her as they walked into her hotel. As they rode up in the elevator, Alyssa knew she’d be lying if she said the possibility of getting another kiss out of him didn’t make her giddy with anticipation. They’d only kissed once, but damn, it had been a doozy. She was seriously hoping for another one, even if it meant bribing him with toaster pastries.

  “Do you always drag your own coffeemaker with you when you stay in a hotel?” he asked as Alyssa made a fresh pot at the counter in her room’s kitchenette. “What’s wrong with the one they have?”

  Alyssa made an ick face as she dumped fresh grounds in the filter of her eight-cup machine. “Are you kidding? Those things are nasty. It’s a known fact that most hotels never clean them. I shudder to think about the freaky crap people probably pour in there. And if that’s not enough, the coffee that comes out of those contraptions tastes like pond scum. With all the time I spend in hotels, it makes more sense to bring my own.”

  While the coffee dripped, she dug through the cabinet above the sink and pulled out two boxes of Pop-Tarts, one of each flavor. The chocolate felt a little light and she could foresee a scenario where she might have to fight Zane for the last one in the box. If so, she wasn’t sure if she could take him. It would be worth the tussle, though. She couldn’t imagine anyone she’d rather wrestle with more than Zane.

  “Speaking of hotels,” he murmured, following her over to the small table, “are you ever going to tell me what the FBI has you running all around the country doing? And before you answer, I noticed the way you avoided talking about yourself the entire night.”

  Alyssa sighed. Even though they’d talked the whole night, she’d managed to avoid telling him almost anything personal. Instead, they’d spent the time talking about what it was like growing up in London, his family, his time in the British SAS, and especially his SWAT teammates. Zane had told her so many crazy stories about his friends back in Dallas she almost felt like she knew them.

  Was it really fair of her not to give him a look inside her own life? As long as she made sure not to say anything she shouldn’t.

  She pulled the single silver package of the chocolate flavor out of the box and shook it in his direction, “Only two left. You okay with sharing?”

  Zane seemed to consider that. “Normally, I’d say Sauron does not share. But in this case, I think I can be persuaded.”

  Alyssa snorted at the Lord of the Rings reference, tearing open the foil package and handing one of the frosted toaster treats across the table to him.

  “When I first joined the FBI, I worked in the Sacramento field office for four years,” she said in answer to his earlier question. “But for the past year and a half, the FBI has been paying me to fly around the country and investigate cases that either haven’t shown up on anyone’s radar yet—like the kidnappings here in LA—or ones that seem destined for the cold-case stack. They run the gamut from murders and kidnappings to missing persons, assaults, and rapes.”

  That was a shockingly good synopsis of her job—if you left out the weird, supernatural stuff and the fact that none of her cases ever made it to a trial. Well, a normal trial at least.

  Zane didn’t say anything as he walked over to get their coffee. He fixed her cup exactly the way she liked it, then came back over to the table with mugs in hand, sat down,
and picked up his Pop-Tart.

  She liked a man who ate his Pop-Tarts cold. It was damn sexy in her opinion.

  “The FBI sends you out on all these cases by yourself?” He eyed her. “Isn’t that kind of crazy?”

  She shrugged and sipped her coffee, wondering why it tasted better when Zane made it than when she did even though they both added the same amount of cream and sugar. “I work better on my own.”

  That earned her another look that was hard to interpret. “Everyone needs backup now and then, no matter how good they are.”

  “I call in backup when I need it. Admittedly, it can take a little while since the rest of my team is spread out all across the country, but if it’s important, my boss in DC will get people to me.”

  Alyssa realized how horrible that arrangement sounded the moment the words were out of her mouth. But it was the truth, and at least in this particular area, she didn’t feel the need to make up a lie.

  Zane regarded her silently, his expression still unreadable. “I won’t bother to point out how incredibly stupid that scheme is. In the past year or so that you’ve been part of this team, how many times have you called and asked for backup?”

  Alyssa knew Zane wasn’t going to like the answer. “Technically, I’ve called for backup twice. But in both of those situations, I only needed them for cleanup. I’d already handled the situation.”

  He only grunted and swigged his coffee. He took his with cream, no sugar.

  In reality, she handled all her cases on her own even though Nathan told her time and again to pull back and wait for help. But she simply wasn’t wired that way. Charging ahead and doing what was right regardless of if it meant going it alone had always been her thing.

  “Why did you become an FBI agent?” Zane asked.

  The question caught her off guard. She’d expected him to keep pushing on the subject of working alone, especially when the rest of the Bureau was a team-focused, rule-obsessed bureaucracy.