Page 34 of The Wolf Professor

Charlie flinched a couple of times, her breathing ragged as those big sensitive hands explored her body with such gentle finesse, all the while checking in with her in a low, gravelly voice.

He didn’t need to worry about hurting her—his touch was doing something altogether different. Something delicious.

“Nothing serious,” he husked finally. “I’ve put a gentle antiseptic in the bath water. Go and wallow in there for as long as you need, okay?”

“Thank you, Max,” she murmured. As she twisted around to face him, she sensed her torn dress falling away from her shoulder. His gaze slid down, and his pupils dilated. His nostrils quivered and Charlie knew he was scenting her.

She heard the harsh rasp of his indrawn breath.

Glancing down, she saw that her left breast had popped clear out of the confines of her dress, her nipple dark and swollen, as if begging for his mouth.

And there was no mistaking the look on his face. Like he wanted to eat her all up.

Her body responded at once, her pussy clenching with need.

“Max… I—” She gulped, making no attempt to cover herself. “What’s happening… between us?”

A muscle in his jaw jumped; she saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed.

“I don’t know, Charlie,” he said through tight lips. “Some kind of full moon madness, I guess.”

Charlie was certain he was going to lean down and fasten his mouth on her nipple. And if he did, there was no hope in hell of her stopping him.

But instead, he got up and strode to the door

“We’ll talk about all this tomorrow, Charlie,” he gritted out, his back to her. “You stay here and sleep after your bath. I’m going to spend the night on the sofa downstairs.”

CHAPTER 13

In the icy morning air, around the deserted streets of the old city, Max ran.

He was grateful for the freezing temperature, for the uneven cobbled streets that kept him focused, and the fact that the high stone buildings and narrow thoroughfares barely let him glimpse the sky as it lightened.

Because up there somewhere, the pale moon still shone.

The full moon.

Max jogged faster, until his breath was like a sharp knife in his chest. He kept checking in on his body, kept glancing down to confirm that he was still reassuringly human. Two legs, two arms, two feet in his Badedas runners. The bandage was still on his ankle, but he’d checked it before he left, and the wound was almost completely healed.

Miraculous.

In fact, the last twenty-four hours had been miraculous on so many levels. He had a lot to process.

And frankly, he could do that better when he ran.

After fleeing from Charlie last night, he’d tried to get some rest on the couch in the snug, tossing and turning under a musty old blanket. Of course, he knew sleep would likely evade him(it did), but at least he’d found some clean running gear in the laundry, his runners on the doorstep, so he could pound out the confusion, try to make sense of what was happening to him.

Not just the rampant desire to mark her as his, but the raft of other emotions she inspired in him. The longing to be in her presence, to just sit and talk to her for hours, the protectiveness he felt toward her, and the sense that she cared about his welfare too…

A part of him wanted to fall into it, to just stop fighting these feelings, but the other, sensible, logical part of him had no explanation for any of it.

He kept asking himself how the hell last night could have happened. Okay, so it was a full moon—fuck, what a cliché that was—but he’d never behaved remotely like this during a full moon before.

The words that had blasted through his head that she was in danger, the scent of her terror on the wind.

Surely that was why his wolf had manifested?

He’d never got close to shifting into his wolf before. Admittedly, there had been moments in adolescence when he’d gotten horny and he’d noticed more hair—okay, fur—in certain places. And he’d sometimes had the sense that claws were flexing inside his hands when he got angry or anxious.

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