Page 35 of So I Won a Werelion

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and grinned. “What would you say about taking the long way back to your place and checking out that construction site? See if we can find any more pieces of the Scepter.”

That terrible idea had only crossed my mind a hundred times tonight.

“Kinda sounds like trespassing to me.”

He shrugged. It was hot.

But it didn’t make his idea any less bad.

“It’s a pretty high-profile site. They have a public relations company.” And those public relations people and everyone else involved in the job should be at some stuffy dinner that I would have been dragged to if I hadn’t found that relic.

He laughed, and I had to agree, my reasoning sounded weak. There would probably never be a better time to trespass on the site.

He stepped closer, that heat was doingthingsto my body. “Wendy, I’m a lion. They’re not gonna be able to catch me.”

He headed over to the bike. End of conversation.

I followed after him as quickly as I could in these heels. “And I’m human. Middle-aged, and the most serious exercise I get is chasing around Cindy’s kids.”

“Nothing will happen to you as long as you’re with me,” he growled, and handed me my helmet.

“Hey.” I caught him before he put his helmet on. “What really happened when you were holding the Scepter? Was it just ancestors that you saw, or something else?”

He sat on the bike and his eyes darkened, like he was going back to that place.“You were there. Or I thought it was you. You were naked. We all were.” He ran his teeth over his bottom lip. “And you turned to signal that you wanted me to claim you. Mark you. All the shifters at the ceremony were doing the same thing.”

My mouth went dry as I imagined it. “Wow.”

“Whatever that is, it’s powerful. We need to find the rest of it. You’re the expert on this.”

“Not sure I’d call myself an expert.”

My chin was in his hand. “You know more about this than any human or shifter alive. Sounds like an expert to me.”

“Maybe you can help me access some documents meant for shifter eyes only?”

“I’d do everything I can.” He revved the engine. “Are we going artifact hunting or what?”

“It’s still a horrible idea.”

“They’re really building at Wolf Rock?”

“Yeah. Don’t know how humans got their hands on that land, but no big surprise my sister is involved.”

“Maybe they aren’t humans,” he growled, and maneuvered the bike out of the parking lot.

It didn’t take us long to get to the construction site. A chain link fence was meant to keep trespassers out. Gabe drove right up to it, kicking up a little dirt when we came to a stop.

He sized me up when I got off the bike. “Ready to go over that fence?”

“If by ready you mean, probably land on my ass, then sure, I’m ready.”

He rumbled. “I could tear the links apart, if you prefer.”

“Don’t you dare.”

“Where’s your sense of adventure?” he teased.

“My sister would go nuts if we ripped down the fence at her precious housing development.” I hooked my boot into a low link. “But maybe this way, we’ll rip it right out of the ground.”

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