Page 70 of Savage Hunter

I count to thirty before I ease the hotel door open. I look down either direction.

Empty.

I step out of the room and take the stairs down ten floors to the lobby instead of the elevator. I don’t need him finding me going down as he comes up.

At the bottom, I check through the slit of glass to see if Wolfe is nearby. All the sofas in the lobby are free and from this angle I don’t see anyone in the lobby bar. Only the receptionist is behind the desk. It’s as clear as it will get. I slide out of the door and hoof it to the front of the hotel lobby unnoticed. Luckily new guests with four cranky kids arrive just as I step out of the revolving doors.

I pull the cash in my pocket out and mentally tally what I have in my small savings account after buying my ticket to Seattle. Forty bucks between the two isn’t great, but should be enough to get me to Chicago. Another six hours in the car with Wolfe and one of two things will happen. I’ll end up begging him to take me or…I will reveal all my dirty secrets. I don’t want to think of the look on his face if he were to find out how fucked up I am.

I turn for the head office and barely have time to throw my hands up before I go nose first into a brick wall made of taut muscle.

“Going someplace without me?”

God, his voice is sex personified and then dipped in caramel.

The steady beat of his beat thumps against my palms. Adrenaline spills into my veins. Chills erupt all over my body. I feel trapped in the Bermuda triangle of one Wolfe Carter. I was tired back in the hotel but now I am one hundred percent wide awake and ready for whatever he wants to dish out.

I look up and then up some more to see a cigarette hanging from his lips.

Why is that so sexy? The cherry glows in the fading darkness. Sunrise is my favorite time of day. It means a new chance to take back control over my life.

He takes a long drag, holds the smoke and then slowly releases it like a dragon considering how to eat the maiden.

Hell. Yes. I’m running.

I lift a shoulder like he doesn’t scare the shit out of me with the raw hunger in his eyes, like I am some treasure he gets to capture and keep. “What makes you think that? Can’t a girl get some fresh air?"

Another drag on the cigarette, but this time he’s peering down at me through slitted eyes that sends me back a step. And another. For every one I take, he follows.

“The look of determination on your face and the tears in your eyes tells me you are on a mission and it’s not to get fresh air. Where are you going, Harmonia?”

He moves so fast that I don't have a chance to step out of his reach. Horns blare around us. People yell at each other and yet none of the people driving by care about the girl getting kidnapped.

Shit.

“Time to go.” He bends, hooks an arm around the back of my legs and lifts. I easily fall over the hunter’s shoulder. The pavement zooms away when he stretches to his full height. I guess he found clothes in the car because he has another black shirt on and this one isn’t wet.

I fist my hands in the material.

I raise a fist and start pounding on his back. “Wolfe Carter!” I don’t bother keeping my voice down. “Put me down you beast! Now! Or so help YOU, and God as my witness, I will bury a blade in your neck.”

His laugh hits my core and sends a blanket of warmth to drape over me.

What the hell?

“I want to see you try my sweet girl. It’ll be fun. I’ll even hand you the blade.” A large hand comes down hard on my ass. Once. Twice. The third time is the hardest.

“Oh, damn you!”

Heat blooms over the fleshy part of my ass and I feel it in places I don't want to ever let a man touch me again.

Except Wolfe.

That nagging voice goes off again and I smother the bitch in denial.

“Now stop fighting me and kicking. You’ll hurt yourself.” He wraps his thick arms around my flailing legs when we step back into the lobby. A mom in tight jeans and four-inch heels takes one look at us and reaches to cover her daughter’s eyes.

Scarlet heat floods my face, neck, arms, legs. I basically turn into a glowing neon stick of red.

---