A Highland Werewolf Wedding by Terry Spear Read Free Book Online Page B

heater was going full blast, but the air still felt cold as it hit
     her wet dress.
    He reached down and took her cold hand in his and squeezed. “Why did you really come
     between Vardon and me? Did you think you could stop that Neanderthal?”
    “I suppose I did. Just like you might have believed you could change Calla’s mind
     about marrying Baird McKinley if you showed up for the wedding. I didn’t give it much
     thought. I just instinctively stepped into his path.”
    “Do you often risk your neck for someone you barely know?”
    She shrugged, not willing to tell him she’d always been that way—protective. She was
     used to being an alpha, not someone who melted into the background. Not like when
     her uncles had been hanged for pirating, making her fear for her life, and she had
     had to find her way back to America alone. That had been the hardest for her—tucking
     tail and running away.
    “Have you ever risked getting hurt for someone who was well equipped to handle the
     likes of Vardon McKinley?” Cearnach asked, still trying to get her to reveal the truth.
    “No,” she finally said. Then she gave him an impish smile. “Not usually.”
    “Which means it wasn’t just instinct that propelled you into action,” he said, sounding
     smugly satisfied, as though he knew she had feelings for him and hadn’t wanted to
     see him hurt.
    She reached up to touch her throbbing face where the infuriated Highlander had struck
     her, her fingers shying away at the last minute. She hadn’t expected to get a fist
     in the face, having hoped to stop the man from throwing the punch in the first place.
    “If I hadn’t confined you, and you had managed to grab Vardon’s dirk, would you have
     known how to use it?”
    She envisioned Vardon’s dagger poking out of the top of his hose. If she’d been able
     to pull free, she would have grabbed that dagger and threatened Vardon with it—just
     to get him to back off.
    She had been serious about that. “ Or I might have gone for yours.”
    Silence.
    She smiled.
    Cearnach cleared his throat. “ My dagger…”
    “Aye,” she said, borrowing his brogue. The way she said the word still sounded American
     to her ear.
    He chuckled. “You would not have been successful.”
    “We’ll never know, will we?” she asked in a tone meant to challenge. “But, yes, I
     know how to use a dirk. A lightweight sword also.” Being from a family of pirates
     ensured that.
    Thankfully, Vardon had seemed to come to his senses somewhat once he’d struck her.
     She had ignored him calling her a whore in Gaelic, figuring he was trying to make
     himself feel that what he had done wasn’t wrong. Besides, he’d said it to infuriate
     Cearnach, not to slander her. At least that’s the way she was going to view it.
    She sighed, touching her lips. They were deliciously swollen from Cearnach’s kisses.
     No wolf had ever taken charge of her to such an extent. She’d always remained detached,
     unaffected by men’s kisses, knowing getting stuck on a human could only mean disaster.
     And a wolf?
    She barely refrained from snorting. A wolf was even worse. At least based on her experience.
    Her whole body heated again as she recalled the force of his kiss, the passion behind
     it, the raw need they’d both exhibited while sharing it. She sensed something unspoken
     between them. That he had felt something more for her than he had felt for women in
     the past.
    She smothered another snort at the notion before she caught Cearnach’s curiosity.
     The kiss had thoroughly shaken her, making her want much more than was safe. For Cearnach,
     such a kiss was probably nothing more than what he was used to. Practiced, eliciting
     the same kind of response in any woman.
    Attempting to get her mind off the way he’d made her feel, Elaine continued to pull
     the fabric of her dress away from her skin, trying to dry it in front of the heater.
    If she had been alone, she would have slipped into the