Page 80 of The Pucking Wrong Man

Anastasia’s scream tore through the night air.

Guilt lurched through me. The only screaming I wanted her to do was in my arms.

That didn’t sound much better.

Screaming in my arms as she orgasmed.

There. That was normal.

Perfectly normal.

No psychopaths anywhere.

I rushed toward the alley, coming to a halt when I saw Anastasia hiding behind the dumpster.

“Anastasia?” I cried, pretending to be shocked that I was seeing her there.

She was curled up, tears streaming down her face as she rocked back and forth. Her fists were clenched in front of her as she stared horrified at Midas as he tore into a piece of meat, Fluffy snapping at him to try and steal it away.

I winced.

“Hey!” I growled, hoping that Geraldine was right that the dogs wouldn’t actually eat me. Taking a step out of Anastasia’s sight line, I rolled the tennis ball with meat juice and peanut butter down the street, right past their noses. They’d just finished the meat and immediately ran after the tennis ball, disappearing from view.

My eyebrows raised. I couldn’t believe that worked.

Now they were Lincoln and Ari’s problem.

Another loud cry snapped my attention back to Anastasia.

“Anastasia,” I called again, softer this time, my hands up as I approached her slowly. She was plastered against the dirty brick wall, her eyes wide and terrified as she stared at me unseeingly.

“Anastasia, it’s fine. Everything’s fine, baby girl. They’re gone.”

She shook her head, pulling her faded gray blanket up to her chin as she whimpered.

“They went after something else. There aren’t any more dogs out here.”

I was literally holding my breath as she shakily stood up and carefully looked around, searching for the animals. I had to clench my hands into fists to stop myself from holding her.

That would come.

I followed her gaze, relieved that the dogs hadn’t circled back. Hopefully Linc and Ari had caught them by now.

Hopefully neither of them had been mauled while doing it.

I’d never hear the end of it from Ari, and Linc...yeah, I wasn’t going to think about that.

“Come here, baby girl,” I said, proud of how sane my voice sounded.

A second later, she flung herself at me, her whole body trembling as she buried her face into my chest.

“How diiidddd you find me?” she gasped, her words shaking from the cold as they left her pretty mouth.

“Out for a run and I heard those dogs going crazy. We’re only about a mile away from my place. A better question is though...what are you doing in this alley? Were you trying to sleep here?”

She lifted her head and met my gaze, shame coating her features. “I…I got kicked out of the shelter. It was a misunderstanding...but I didn’t have anywhere else to go.” Her eyes filled with tears, and she pressed her face back into my chest.

I closed my eyes, memorizing the feel of her against me, even as I willed my dick to stay down.

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