Page 43 of Wolf Claimed
“Stubborn female.”
“Get used to it.”
He turned to her, brows raised.
She stepped into his personal space, locking his dark eyes to her. “I don’t give up easily. On anything, and that includes you.”
“You’re to blood-bond Tiernan,” he said, as if it was a fact. It wasn’t, but it was something she would have to figure out, assuming Tiernan was still alive. God, she hoped he was. The thought of losing him. . . She shuddered.
“You okay?” Maddox asked, his brows pinched together.
“Just worried about Tiernan and Rafe. Let’s get this over with.” She walked into the clearing, in plain view.
“Are you crazy?” he said as he caught up to her.
“If there are any shifters here, they’ve already smelled me, right?”
“Yes.”
“And if Gallagher’s men are here, well, I’m betting they don’t want me dead. In fact, he very much wants me to walk around in the open. It’s the only reason he released me to Rafe.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’ll explain when we have the entire team together.”
“Fine, but no more making decisions on your own. If we’re going to be a team, then we work together, Alyssa, understood?”
She sidled up to him and batted her eyes. “Why, Maddox, I thought you’d never ask.”
“I should smack your ass. Maybe that would get your attention.”
“Oh, you have my attention. More than you realize.” Just the thought of him smacking her backside made her clench her pussy. She could see him sniffing the air close to her. Damn, that turned her on. She needed to get her hormones under control. Trying to hide her feelings, her desire, was getting harder and harder around him. “And you may smack my ass whenever you want,” she added, this time licking her lips.
“Are you sure you’re an agent, angel?”
“I have the badge, the gun, and the scars to prove it.”
He frowned again. “Scars? What fucking scars? Give me the name of the asshole who touched you.”
She loved how he was ready to jump to her defense, even though she didn’t need it. “There was a bad accident my third week of training. My car hit a patch of black ice and skidded off the road on my way back from a day off in town. I got some pretty bad cuts, but nothing life-threatening.” Except nothing accounted for all the blood she’d been sitting in when the first responders pulled her from the car. The one firefighter even said with all the blood on her he had expected to see a severed artery, not a bunch of surface cuts on her legs. It was more evidence that never made sense, details she had ignored because she wasn’t ready to face the truth back then.
“Rafe is nearby,” Maddox said.
“You smell him?”
“Scent, angel. We don’t smell one another, though for you I will make an exception.”
Damn, he got her heated so easily.
Rafe approached from the far woods. Naked. He had three claw marks down his left side, starting on his biceps and jumping to his ribs and hip. Alyssa ran to him and reached to touch near the wound, but he caught her wrist, stopping her.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Tiernan lost control to his wolf.”
“No. Tiernan wouldn’t do this to you,” she said, shaking her head. “He respects you too much.”
Rafe’s fingers dug through her hair until he held her by the back of her head, forcing her to look him in the eyes. “Tiernan didn’t attack me. My wounds are from fighting the other shifters. But Tiernan lost control, Artemis. He gave in to his wolf.”
