Scratch by Mel Teshco Read Free Book Online Page A

half-smile at her dry
sarcasm. “It’s been a rough couple of days.”
    “You could say that.”
    He bent then, his mouth covering hers in a quick, hard kiss
that stamped his possession. When he pulled back, his eyes searched hers as if
he could read all her thoughts, all her emotions. Apparently satisfied, he
said, “Just give me a minute.”
    “I won’t be going anywhere,” she said drily. Only, all irony
was forgotten when she watched him stride toward the motorcycle in his loose,
easy gait. She drank in the flex and shift of his smooth ass cheeks, the
extension of muscles at the back of his long hard thighs and calves.
    He bent and lifted the Ducati back onto its wheels, giving
her a splendid display of his maleness.
    Oh dear lord, give me strength!
    She swallowed past her too-dry throat, all pain temporarily
forgotten.
    He straightened with a crooked grin and a devilish glint in
his stare.
    The bastard. He knew!
    He wheeled her battered Ducati toward her, expelling a
whistle of chagrin at the damage. A side fairing and mirror had torn free, the
windshield badly cracked, the frame scratched and seat torn.
    He stopped beside her. “The clutch and brake levers look
fine, seems to be just cosmetic damage. The engine should still run without a
problem.”
    She forced her stare on the bike and not his towering
Michelangelo nudity. “Yeah, insurance will just love me.” She grimaced, making
a move to get up, but failing.
    He flicked the Ducati’s stand down. “Here, let me help.”
When he stepped in front of her, his hands out and his legs apart with his cock
stirring into abundant life, she couldn’t even swallow. It seemed almost
irreverent, the lust that stirred hot in her blood when every part of her felt
bruised and sore.
    She placed her hands in his. “Thank you.”
    Blake pulled her upright. “I saw what you did. Jumping from
the stallion and tackling those men. Very brave.”
    Wow. Evidently cat vision really was much sharper than human
sight.
    She disengaged her hands from his. “Or foolhardy. Take your
pick.”
    His eyes flared with overprotectiveness and another emotion
she didn’t care right then to define. “Since they wouldn’t have hesitated to
take the shot, most definitely brave,” he rasped.
    She shivered, the chill that skittered up and down her spine
more from his stark tone of helpless rage and less her near stroke with death.
She managed a smile, averting her eyes yet again when they strayed down, past
the light ripple of his abs and strip of hair that arrowed toward his
thickening cock.
    She cleared her throat and waved a hand at the two men still
lying on the ground. “These two aren’t going anywhere in a hurry. But what
about the three who went after you?”
    “Taken care of.” His smile didn’t reach his eyes, it was a
cold and glacial smirk that set off another round of shivers, this time in a
whirlpool through her belly. Blake had seen and done many bad things in his
long life. But why did that make her feel as though he could more than take
care of her, if she let him?
    “What do you mean?” she managed.
    “The fools seemed to have forgotten that cats can climb
trees, and attack from a great height.”
    “You killed them?” she breathed.
    “There wasn’t time for that, and even if there had been,
shifter law deeply opposes the murder of humans.” He examined her again, a slow
perusal that apparently double-checked she really was okay. “Let’s just say I
enjoyed slowing the humans down for a bit.”
    Movement caught her peripheral vision. The conscious man was
dragging himself along the ground, his rifle just a few yards away.
    In three strides Blake was over him, pressing a foot onto
his arm. “I could kill you now,” he said softly, “but I choose not to.” His lip
curled. “Yet you try to kill a woman and call yourself civilized—human.”
    The younger man groaned, his rifle glinting in the setting
sun, so close yet so far away. “So you’re letting me