by Alisa Woods
“Whoa! Hang on!” He chuckled and put up his hands as if to fend her off. “It’s just a sandwich. But if you’ve been giving Lucas half that big-blue-eyed treatment, I can understand why he’s smitten.”
Her hand froze half-way in the bag. “Smitten?” Suddenly the jitters in her stomach went into overdrive. “What do you mean?”
He looked at her like she was crazy, then lowered his chin. “I thought you two were…” Then his eyebrows hiked up. “Oh boy.” He laughed nervously. “You know, I really do have a big mouth. You need to just ignore whatever I say.”
Mia frowned. “Does everyone think…? I mean, does the whole office believe…?”
Lev held up a hand to stop her. “Nobody thinks anything, Mia. We’re all happy to have you here. Hey, if you and Lucas are just friends, all the better. Whatever your magic is, new girl, you just keep doing it. He hasn’t been this productive since…” His face morphed again into a stricken panic, like he wanted to pull the words back in.
“Since what?” Mia’s eyes went wide. There was something in Lucas’s past. Something everyone was tiptoeing around.
Lev slipped off the desk. “And… that’s my cue to go.”
“Lev!” she chastised him, rising from her seat. How could she get him to spill what he knew?
“Eat your lunch, new girl!” he called over his shoulder on his way out the door. “You need to keep up your energy!”
And then he was gone.
Mia slowly sat down, then carefully laid out the lunch Lev had so thoughtfully brought to her. Something had happened to Lucas. Something that his family—including Lev and probably his father, who she had yet to meet—all wanted to help him get over. Or maybe recover from? She didn’t know, but as she bit into her sandwich, she vowed to find out what it was and help Lucas in any way she could. If Lev was right—if she was having some positive effect on him—she wanted to do more of that. It was the least she could do for all he’d already done for her.
Her inner wolf yipped in agreement. Probably a little too enthusiastically. And she was likely just looking for a reason to spend more time with Lucas. But she had a hard time thinking there was anything wrong with that, either.
Refueled by Lev’s lunch, Mia dove back into the reports, and the rest of the day slipped past. Before she knew it, the cool white carpet of her office was turning a dusky orange from the setting sun. She had finished reading most of the reports and had some initial thoughts, but she hadn’t really had time to process all of it yet. Just as she was wondering if she could take them home or if they were confidential to SparkTech, someone knocked on her door.
Lucas stepped inside without waiting for her answer and closed the door behind him.
Mia stared at him as he slowly approached her desk, cautious, like she might spring out at him at any second. “Hi,” she said trying to break the awkward silence that had already fallen.
“Hey.” He gestured to the reports, but remained on the other side of the desk from her. “How’s it going?”
“Pretty good,” she said. “I think the market might be ready for LoopSource, but I’m not really sure. I need more time to fully digest the reports. Is it possible to take them home?”
He smiled and seemed to relax a little. “Sorry, they have to stay in the office. I’ve been looking them over, too, and I think your intuition is right. But I’ll be working the weekend to make sure before I take my recommendation in on Monday.”
She smiled. “Maybe I could come in this weekend and help?”
His smile faded away. “That’s not necessary.” He dropped his gaze to the reports, drumming his fingers on the desk, looking uncomfortable again. “Look, Mia, about last night—”
She rose up from her seat, effectively cutting him off, and then quickly came around her desk. She did not want him apologizing for their kiss… especially if no one else in the office cared if they were together or not. He looked startled by her coming closer.
She stared up into his eyes. “I don’t have a problem with last night.”
He frowned. “Mia, it’s not a good idea—”
“Why not?”
“You don’t understand—”
“No, I don’t understand.” She took a breath and tried to rein in her frustration. “Lucas, tell me.”
He stepped back, and she could tell she had pushed him too far. “Look, what’s most important is your safety. And I came here to talk to you about that.”
“Well, the driver thing is pretty cool. I think I can hang with that.”
He didn’t smile at her weak attempt to lighten things up. “You need to move out of your dorm.”
“What?” Her eyes went round, and it was her turn to take a step back. “Move out of my… I can’t just move out, Lucas!”
“Yes, you can.” He had that resolute look that she was beginning to recognize as the no negotiations look. But this was totally ridiculous.
“I’m locked into the dorm payments for the summer!” she said, stating the obvious. “And where would I go? All the good summer leases are gone by now.” The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced he had to be joking. She hoped he was joking.
“We’ll take care of all that,” he said, his voice uncompromising. “You don’t have to worry about the money. We’ll find a place for you. Starting this weekend. We can move you into a hotel tonight, then get you an apartment in the morning. You have to do this, Mia.”
“I… what in the world, Lucas!” She couldn’t believe he was serious, but her blood pressure was creeping up. He was ordering her to move out? And what if she didn’t? Would he fire her? This was getting more and more… crazy. There was no other word for it.
“I’m just trying to keep you safe,” he said, but his voice was more strained now.
She shook her head and crossed her arms. “You know what? You can work by yourself this weekend. I’m going home. To my dorm.”
She stomped around her desk, yanked open the drawer that held her purse, pulled it out, then brushed past him, headed for the door. “We can discuss this on Monday!” she called back over her shoulder. She only hoped she actually had a job on Monday. But she was not letting him order her around and move her out of her dorm and just… gah! What was he thinking? The whole thing frustrated her beyond measure.
He was following right behind her. “Mia, stop.”
“No,” she said, without slowing down. “I am tired of this keeping Mia safe thing all the time.” She wasn’t really, but the idea that he wouldn’t even discuss what happened between them but felt like he could order her around… even her inner wolf was growling about that.
He kept tailing her all the way out to the front of the office. “Mia, I’m just trying to…” He dropped his voice as they reached the elevator. A bunch of other people were already waiting for their chance to flee the office for the weekend. “Mia, stop,” he said under his breath. “Listen to me.”
Luck was on her side, because the elevator dinged at just that moment. The other people filed in, and she followed right after. Mia glared at Lucas to keep him from following, and he stayed back, strung tight, watching as the elevator doors closed.
She left him behind on the 32nd floor.
The ride down was just a little awkward, but Mia ignored the stares.
At the parking garage level, she got off the elevator with everyone else, but as they dispersed to their cars, she remembered she hadn’t called the driver. He had left her with a card for when she was ready, but she had left in such a hurry, she’d forgotten about it. She briefly debated taking public transportation just to make Lucas angry, but decided that was childish. Instead, she fished out her phone and the card and started dialing. Before she could finish, a limo entered the far gate from the street level. It was the same one that had picked her up that morning—at least it had the same stretched length and tinted windows—and she wondered how they knew, but then a glance at the waning light outside reminded her it was already late. Most people wer
e leaving for the weekend, and surely the limo company had other customers to pick up. They didn’t just sit around all day waiting for her call.
Only she didn’t see anyone else to be picked up—everyone had already disappeared into their cars. She put away her phone and flagged down the limo as it slowly rolled between the parked cars of the half-full parking garage. It came to a stop in front of her, but she couldn’t see if the driver was stopping for her or not. She edged forward, looking around to double check if there was anyone else waiting. She was alone, so she crossed the rest of the space and reached the passenger side just as the driver’s door swung open.
“You guys have great timing!” she said cheerily, returning the driver’s smile. Then a chill swept through her. She recognized him—but he wasn’t the driver she had this morning.
He was the red wolf from The Deviation.
She froze. He leered as he came around the front of the limo toward her, but just as she unlocked her legs, the passenger side door swung open, and a second man, another of the red wolves, scrambled out of the car after her. She didn’t get two steps before he was on her. Her wolf roared as he grabbed her roughly from behind. Her arms and legs flailed, trying to wrench loose from him, but his arm was locked around her waist, and she couldn’t get hold of anything. He was dragging her toward the car. In moments, they would have her. Her wolf raged underneath her skin, wanting loose so she could tear into him with her teeth and claws, but the first one grabbed her failing arms and held her fast.
Two against one. Both wolves. Both bigger than her.
She took a fast breath and started to scream, but a beefy hand clamped over her mouth, and her shriek died in the echoing chamber of the parking garage. She prayed someone would hear her one muted attempt at a cry for help before she was stuffed in the open door of the car.
Suddenly Lucas was there, his own roar reaching them just before his fists. He hadn’t shifted, but even in his human form, he was able to clock the guy holding her arms. He went down on the pavement in a heap, and she renewed her struggle against the man holding her, slamming her heels back, trying to catch a piece of him. He grunted, so she must have hit something. As his hold on her loosened, Lucas yanked her free. When Lucas released her to go after him, she stumbled, falling over the body of the first wolf, who was still in his human form. Why weren’t they shifting? She didn’t understand, but she scurried away from the fallen wolf, putting distance between them and her before looking back.
Lucas was beating the shit out of her second abductor, the one who was still conscious. He had fallen to the ground, and still Lucas was pounding on him. She smelled blood in the air, and there was more on the car… she rushed forward.
“Lucas!” she shrieked. “Stop! You’ll kill him!” She flailed for his arm as it pulled back for another strike, just barely catching hold of it. But her touch seemed to break through his rage. His chest heaved, and there was blood on his hand. She couldn’t be sure if it was his or not, but he took a step back. The man was down, moaning, cowering on the parking garage floor.
Lucas blinked several times, still looking at her attacker, then he turned to her. For a moment, his face was blank, but then he slipped his hand around her waist and hauled her away from the limo.
“My purse!” she said, tugging against him to stop so she could retrieve it from the floor. She didn’t want them having anything of hers. He bent quickly to scoop it up, then locked his hand around hers and towed her away. They ran down one ramp of the parking garage and then another, down to the next level. Her legs were unsteady with the adrenaline of the fight, and her heels clicked a jittery echo throughout the garage, but the sound was mostly drowned out by Lucas’s heavy, pounding heels. They reached his car—it was some kind of Audi, red and black and sleek, but she would have preferred something less like a race car and more like a tank. Lucas practically yanked off the door getting it open for her, and she dropped into the low passenger seat as fast as she could. He raced around to the driver’s side, and within moments, they were screeching out of the parking garage. She caught a final glimpse of the two kidnappers by their limo.
They were still human lumps on the ground. Only one was moving.
It wasn’t until Mia and Lucas were well away from the parking garage that he slowed to a speed that would keep them out of jail. Even then, neither of them spoke. Lucas’s grip on the steering wheel was the same white-knuckled one she had on her purse. She clutched it to her chest as if that would somehow help. She didn’t ask where they were going. She didn’t care, as long as it was away from them. She could still feel their hands on her, grabbing her, hauling her away.
“Why didn’t they shift?” was all she could manage to say. Her voice was strangely mechanical.
“They couldn’t fight me in wolf form,” he said, just as stiffly.
She supposed that made sense, given they had already submitted to him once before, although her brain still wasn’t working well enough to put all the pieces together. They must have found out where she lived. They must have tracked the limo service that picked her up that morning. A chill seeped into her stomach, wondering what had happened to the original driver. Maybe they killed him. Maybe they stole the limo.
All so they could come after her.
She blinked and looked at Lucas. He had known she wouldn’t be safe at the dorm. He knew more about this than he was telling her. But at that moment, all she could see was the blood that still covered his knuckles. The fury on his face.
He had saved her. Again.
They pulled into another parking garage, a high rise near the outskirts of downtown. She wasn’t sure exactly where they were going until they were inside the building, and a gray-uniformed doorman greeted Lucas with, “Good evening, Mr. Sparks.” By the time she and Lucas reached the 15th floor, she figured he must be taking her to his apartment. He still hadn’t spoken a word, just held her hand in an iron grip the entire way, not letting go for a single moment since they left the car.
His electronic key opened the door. He closed and locked it behind them.
She barely had a glimpse of his glass-and-black-leather décor, before he grabbed hold of her face and consumed her with a kiss. They stumbled two steps back until she was flush up against the front door, his body pressing her into it, hard in every possible way: his fingers pushing insistently into her hair, his tongue invading her mouth, his erection pressing into her side. She dropped her purse and grabbed at his shoulders, trying to bring him closer, even though he had already welded her body to the door with his.
His hands left her hair and slid down her sides, feeling every curve until he reached the hem of her sweater. He leaned back and pulled her slightly away from the door, enough to quickly lift her sweater over her head.
Her breath caught, suddenly half naked in front of him. He paused for a moment, looking at her, and she had that sensation again, like his gaze was a hot stroke over her exposed skin.
“I thought this wasn’t a good idea,” she said, breathless, hoping he wasn’t suddenly changing his mind.
“I’m tired of trying to resist you.”
His words were another sweep of heat across her, this one running straight down between her legs. He ripped off his jacket and lifted his shirt over his head in one fast swipe. Then he pinned her to the door again, this time his bare chest open to her hands. They roamed across it and ran up his shoulders. His mouth, hungry for her again, devoured her neck in small nips. His touch was electrifying her, every nerve sending hot races of pleasure to the parts that yearned for more contact with him.
He growled, tasting her more aggressively as he worked down to her chest. He gripped her bra with both hands, and she felt his claws come out and shred the fabric away from her body. The pieces of it dangled to her sides as her breasts fell free. Lucas dropped to one knee, and his face nuzzled in between them. One hand rolled her hardened nipple between his fingers, wringing shocks of pleasure from it, while the other cupped her breast to his m
outh. He sucked and nipped all over her heated flesh, each small, circling bite causing more wetness to pool between her legs.
Her wolf whined with pleasure, and she dug her fingers into his hair while she watched him feast upon her. Then he slid his hands down her body again, feeling every inch as he went. When he reached the bottom of her skirt, he slipped his hands underneath and shoved up the fabric. Her underwear was torn from her body before she could suck in a gasp. With her skirt up to her waist and her underwear gone, she was bared to him. Another growl rumbled in his chest, and he dropped further, lifting her knee over his shoulder and burying his face between her legs.
Her head fell back against the door as his tongue slipped into her folds. She called out his name and some other unintelligible word, as a haze of pleasure washed over her. The tip of his tongue worked her, and she held on as he brought her wave upon wave of pleasure. It built a pressure deep inside that felt like it might make her burst. Just as she thought she might come, he pulled away. She panted and clung to the door, weak with pleasure, watching as he kicked off his shoes and unzipped his pants. When he freed his erection, it was even larger than she remembered, shining in the moonlight, the embodiment of everything masculine. It made her even more weak in the knees.
He cradled her against the door. She had never seen such pure desire in a man’s eyes before—such animal lust combined with an eagerness that was pure wolf. He claimed her mouth again, plunging inside and sharing the taste of her own flesh. He slid his hands down to her legs, behind her hips, then quickly lifted her from the floor. She held on tight to his broad shoulders, his muscles flexing under her hands, and quickly wrapped her legs around his back. She could feel his cock hard and ready against her and could hardly catch her breath. Hardly believe this was happening.
His hands gripped the flesh of her bottom, and he thrust into her. He was so large and ground so deep that what breath she had escaped her. The hard muscles of his chest pressed into the deep softness of hers and held there for a moment. Joined deeply, his face buried in her hair, he moaned, Mine, so softly, with so much growl, that she almost didn’t hear it. Then he thrust again and again, each time rocking harder against her and sending waves of pleasure shooting through her. His grip on her tightened, and each thrust brought a noise of pleasure from him that pushed her closer and closer. As he took her, owned her body against the door, she could feel his claws coming out, grasping onto her, holding her tight to him. Her wolf whimpered in response, whining for more, and her own claws raked across his back, holding on for the ride.