Page 38 of Monster Mate

Her eyes popped open, all signs of unconsciousness banished by what was probably a Ceti eel crawling straight out of her worst The Wrath of Khan nightmare into her brain.

She breathed a huge sigh of relief when she realized it was Waldo at her side, not a space creature, and that he’d stuck his tongue in her ear to wake her.

Roxie tried to gather his fat little body into her arms for a hug, only to discover she couldn’t. Because she was lying on her side on a cold concrete floor with her hands tied behind her back with plastic zip ties.

So this was what it felt like to be kidnapped.

Fucking awesome.

“About time you woke up.”

Roxie groaned as she rolled to her knees and found Neil gazing down at her with an expression she could only describe as fevered.

He’d always been a little average looking—average height, average build, average bone structure, nondescript dark eyes. But he normally wore nice clothes and styled his short blond hair expertly. Today, he looked like he’d just crawled out of a dumpster, and he smelled worse.

Yikes.

Waldo let out a growl the likes of which Roxie had never heard from her sweet pup, and wedged his body between hers and Neil’s, baring his teeth the whole time. Neil took a very gratifying step backward, clutching his right hand—a hand that was wrapped in gauze that was soaked through in spots with blood—protectively.

Waldo had apparently ripped into him when Neil grabbed him. Good.

That’s what you get for kidnapping me and my dog, asshole.

“You should’ve put that worthless mutt down,” Neil muttered.

She should keep her mouth shut. Try to reason with him. Wait for a clear opportunity to attack or get away. That’s what her self-defense classes had taught her, anyway.

“I’d put you down before him. Still might.”

Yeah, that hadn’t entirely been a planned statement, she thought as he took an angry step in her direction, only to be driven back by Waldo baying at him angrily, spit flying from his jowls.

Neil shook his head, having the nerve to look like she’d hurt his feelings. His feelings! Like she wasn’t in—she glanced around—a fucking storage container, trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey. “I don’t understand why you did this to me,” he said. “All I ever wanted to do was make you happy. To take care of you.”

If she was being honest with herself—which wasn’t very appealing given her current circumstances—his use of the past tense was making her a little edgy. “So, it was your desire to take care of me that made you hit me? Stalk me? Try to burn my fucking house down? Hell, you’re probably the one who flattened my tire too, weren’t you?”

A muscle in his jaw jumped. “I lost my temper. You made me lose my temper. I saw you with that, that…thing. How did you expect me to react?”

She figured telling him she expected him to keep his distance per the current restraining order wouldn’t help him see reason. He was too far gone for that. “I thought you’d move on. With someone else,” she said as gently but firmly as possible.

The slap across the face caught her and Waldo off guard. It took the use of all her core muscles to keep from falling over, and Waldo lunged at him, but was a second too late. His snapping jaws only caught air as Neil danced out of reach.

“There’s no moving on,” he hissed at her. “For you or for me.”

He moved away from her towards a small table that held…wait…what the hell was that? It looked like a…

“Neil…is that a…bomb?”

“If I can’t have you, no one will,” he muttered.

Oh, Jesus. What a complete clusterfuck. This idiot was going to blow her—and Waldo!—up and probably take out half the county with them. And it all could’ve been prevented if she hadn’t been too chickenshit to just accept Riordan as her mate.

Out loud, that is. She’d already accepted it in her heart. She’d just never said it.

Well, better late than never.

“He’s not just some demon I’m fucking, you know,” she said, licking a drop of blood off her split lip. “He’s my mate. And when he gets here, you better hope God has mercy on your soul, because he sure as hell won’t.”

Neil whirled on her so fast that when Waldo jumped in front of her again, he knocked her down. And as her horrific stalker of an ex stood over her, she closed her eyes.

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