Dark Wolf Rising (Bloodrunners) by Rhyannon Byrd Read Free Book Online Page B

terrified most men, but she simply glared right back at him. “So I should just be a good little girl and take your advice?”
    “You will take it, if you know what’s good for you.”
    “And if I don’t?”
    “You probably won’t be around long enough for me to say I told you so. The best thing you can do is leave.”
    Her fingers tightened around the strap of her bag until her knuckles turned white. “How is that the best thing, when it means leaving my sister in the hands of this stranger and not caring about what happens to her?”
    In a slightly gentler tone, he said, “I didn’t say it was easy.”
    She blinked up at him, staring into his eyes with a sharp, intense focus, as if she knew there was more...something important he wasn’t telling her. Taking a receipt from his pocket, Eric reached around her, into the truck, and grabbed a pen from the center console, then handed them to her. “Give me your mobile number.”
    “What for?” she asked with a heavy dose of suspicion.
    “I’ll look into some things, and if I do happen to run across your sister, I’ll call you.”
    She hesitated for a moment, then quickly wrote down her number. With a slow shake of her head, she handed the slip of paper back to him. “You’re so sure I’m going to do what you say, aren’t you?”
    “You’d be an idiot not to,” he muttered, shoving the receipt back in his pocket. “And I have a feeling you’re anything but.”
    She absorbed his words with a small nod, studying him for a moment longer, then shook her head again and held out her hand. Eric took it, closing his hard, roughened fingers around the tender softness of hers. It was a small, endlessly feminine hand, not bony, just cushioned and lovely and sweet. He wanted to pull it to his body and press it against his skin. Feel it hold him where he was hard...feel it grip him...the unwanted need making him restless, angry. With another scowl pulling between his brows, he released her chilled hand and took a hasty step back, hating the urgent feeling prickling beneath his skin. She was like a rash that he needed to shake, before the damn thing spread.
    “Well, goodbye, Eric Drake,” she said huskily, hitching the backpack higher on her shoulder. “It was certainly...interesting.”
    Eric gave her a jerky nod and clenched his jaw as she turned toward the hotel, walking away from him with a tired, but proud, confident stride. When he realized his gaze had snagged on the way those low-rise jeans hugged her ass, he muttered a blistering curse. Heading around to the driver-side of the truck, he quickly climbed behind the wheel and made his way back onto the road, gunning the engine.
    He might not like it, but the truth couldn’t be ignored.
    No matter what demons she faced on her own, Chelsea Smart was a hell of a lot better off without him.

Chapter Four
    C helsea Smart needed to have her little backside blistered. And Eric was tempted to do it himself, just as soon as he managed to find her.
    As he pulled into the parking lot of the Heaven and Hellstrip club late the following afternoon, he didn’t think he’d ever been so furious. There’d been an odd ache in his chest just moments before, when he’d driven past the Travelodge without spotting Chelsea’s bus—which had been delivered to the hotel early that morning—in the parking lot. Though he’d known it was for the best, the idea of never seeing her again had been uncomfortably disturbing, a strange sense of loss weighing heavily in his gut. But instead of easing when he’d caught sight of that ridiculous bus parked in the club’s lot, he was suddenly in a world of hurt. One much darker and deeper than before. One that was angry and hard and violent.
    She’d blatantly disregarded his orders, and now the headstrong little idiot was chin-deep in the kind of danger he’d tried to warn her about. Son of a bitch.
    He’d mistakenly assumed that with her being a woman and him being a big, intimidating,