Were her cheeks red? Her heartbeat drummed so fast it shook her chest. He stared down at her, claws still in the bed, and wondered what the hell he was supposed to do with her.
Take her.
Protect her.
Both were instincts from the beast. The same instincts he’d had from the beginning. Those instincts made him nervous. Humans were supposed to be prey to him. Easy pickings. He wasn’t supposed to care what happened to them.
But he cared about her.
Protect her.
Even from himself?
Lucas sucked in a deep breath. He caught her scent—wanted more. Not now. Can’t. Time was running out.
He shoved away from her and managed to rise to his feet. Her breath came too fast, making her chest heave as she stared up at him. “I told you we’d have sex,” he said because they needed to be clear about this.
Her chin lifted. “And I told you sex wasn’t part of our deal.” Her lips were red, swollen from his mouth.
“No, it’s not.” His c**k was so heavy and hard that the damn thing ached. For her. “But you want me, I want you, and even the monsters at the gate aren’t going to stop me from taking you soon.”
“Lust is fleeting.” Her gaze seemed to look far away. Not even seeing him. “It’s just a need, just a—”
“Sarah.”
She blinked. Her gaze sharpened on him. Good. He spoke deliberately, wanting her to know what would come. “I don’t know what sex was like for you before, but I can tell you this . . . it won’t be fleeting with me. The need will be so strong it will feel like it’s ripping you apart, and when you think you can’t stand it anymore . . . that’s when the pleasure will come, and it’ll make your whole body burn.”
The rasp of her breath seemed loud in the room. Or, shit, maybe that was his breath. What was she doing to him?
Take her. The beast was growling in his head again. But Sarah rose from the bed. She crossed her arms over her chest, staring at him a bit nervously. Did she think he was about to pounce? Again? Tempting.
“Next time, you come to me,” he said. “Come to me, and I’ll give you all the pleasure you can handle. And it won’t have a damn thing to do with our deal.” The attraction between them was a bonus, or maybe a deadly temptation. He really wasn’t sure which yet. Time would tell.
He turned away from her and headed for the door.
“I don’t sleep with every wolf I meet.”
That froze him. He looked back at her, aware that his jaw had tightened. “Good to know.”
“I’ve only been with one wolf. Just Rafe.”
And me, babe. You’ll be with me, but we’ll get to that soon enough.
“That didn’t end so well,” she murmured and he saw her blink quickly. Wait—was she blinking back tears? Tears?
His gut clenched.
But she spun toward the window, her shoulders straight and tense. “What kind of deal did you work out with the coyotes?”
Not the question he’d expected right then. Lucas didn’t answer because, really, there wasn’t an easy way to put this.
“Lucas?” She waited a moment, then, when he didn’t answer, she turned back to him. No tears were in her eyes. Just determination. “I know they didn’t just bow their heads and leave. They knew I was here—”
“Yes.”
“So what deal did you make with them? How did you get them to walk away?”
He exhaled on a hard sigh. “You’re worth a lot of money, lady.”
Her lips curled in a humorless smile. “Too much for them to walk away.”
True. So why lie? “We reached a deal.” How would she take this?
A faint line appeared between her brows. “What did you promise?”
Not much, just . . . “To kill you.”
The scent of death surrounded her. Sarah stood in the medical examiner’s office, eyeing the closed metal lockers. Bodies were in there. A body was on the table next to her, the toe tagged and a sheet tossed over the victim’s face and chest.
“I don’t think we should be here,” she managed quietly, but what she really wanted to say was This is stupid! The cops are close! We need to get the hell out of here!
But after telling her that he was planning to kill her—um, what?—Lucas had pulled her down the stairs, shoved her into an SUV, and driven her back to the city. One of his shifters had been waiting for them at the door. Michael, the tall, dark shifter who seemed to follow Lucas’s orders so very well.
“No one will be back here for another hour.” Michael went to the metal locker on the right and jerked it open. Cold air wafted to them, and he yanked out a slab. “Kelly gave me the schedule and the key—we’re clear.”
Lucas stalked to that slab and the dead body on it.
“That’s John, isn’t it?” Sarah forced herself to speak and was rather impressed by the even tone of her voice. Sure, her nails were digging so hard into her palms that she was pretty sure she’d draw blood soon, but she sounded normal.
Michael grunted and pulled back the sheet.
Sarah stumbled and her elbow slammed into an instrument tray. Scalpels and tweezers and she didn’t even want to know what else clattered to the floor.
“First dead body?” Michael drawled.
No. About the twentieth. Was she supposed to get numb to them? “A dead friend,” she snapped back and whirled away from him. She hadn’t realized the attack had been so . . . brutal. John’s throat had been ripped wide open. No, not ripped. Clawed.
And Michael was going to mock her? Asshole. How would he react if he were looking at one of his shifter buddies? Oh, wait, if he was anything like the coyotes, he’d be the one doing the killing, so he probably wouldn’t give a shit if a packmate died.
Her shoe kicked against the scalpel. She bent and began picking up the surgical instruments. She crouched low, and slid the scalpel up her sleeve, securing it with the band of her watch.
“Sarah?” Lucas’s quiet whisper.
She rose quickly, and dumped the other items back on the tray.
His fingers wrapped around her shoulder. “You okay?”
“No, I’m not.” She faced him. “I don’t like seeing my friend sliced open, okay? It’s not one of the highlights of my night.”
“While the coyotes are in the city, you go where I go.” His lips tightened. “And I need to check this body, so I know it sucks, but you have to stay here.”
She inclined her head in a brief nod. She understood all this, it just didn’t mean she had to like the situation. And that thick smell of disinfectant was making her sick.