Ruthless love

3

The bare ceiling that greeted Blue Storm when she blinked open her eyes was quite different from what she had expected. Constantly on edge, she’d expected to find her father’s men crowded around her, boots at the ready to beat her again if she tried to escape. Instead, she found herself staring at a dove gray ceiling with the scent of lavender and chamomile in her nostrils and the feel of silken sheets on her skin.

Her first thought was, This is fancy for a motel. That was the only place Malcolm would take her before dragging her back to her father’s pack. Stiffly, she pushed herself up into a sitting position, her stomach clenching at the realization that she could feel the silken sheets all over her body. She was naked!

That pervert! she thought, a growl rumbling in her throat. Instinct made her cut off quickly. She listened hard, straining her ears past the walls of the room to listen for Malcolm and the others. All she heard was one heartbeat.

Malcolm wouldn’t be stupid enough to leave anyone alone with me, she thought. Or would he? Questioning it from the bed wouldn’t do her any good. The quicker she got up to assess the situation, the quicker she could escape.

Clambering from the bed, she glanced around the dimly lit room. The only light was being cast by the single lamp on the bedside table, but her keen wolf eyes had no trouble seeing. It didn’t take her long to realize that her clothes were nowhere to be seen. Draped over the end of the bed was a plain black t-shirt and some shorts that were tied with a cord around the waist. From the looks of them, they were a man’s. Part of Blue Storm wanted to leave them right where they were and risk being seen in the nude by whoever was on the other side of the bedroom door. That would be better than wearing anything that Malcolm or one of the others had ever worn.

But when she stepped up to the end of the bed, took hold of the clothes, and gave them a good sniff, she realized that the scent on them definitely didn’t belong to anyone in her father’s pack. Other than the smell of freshly laundered clothes, they held a strange and intoxicating wolf scent that made her own wolf instantly stand to attention.

Down, girl, Blue Storm warned herself. Until she had assessed the direness of her situation, she couldn’t allow herself to let her guard down. Sniffing at the scent again, trying to pinpoint it where its owner had carried the clothes, she realized it was a scent she had smelled before, though she couldn’t picture where. Closing her eyes, she sniffed again and tried to think harder. The knowledge just wouldn’t come to her.

It probably belongs to whoever is out there, she realized, giving up on the scent entirely. She was certain it wouldn’t be long before she found out who the owner was. Broadening her senses, she realized that the wolf’s scent was all over the room and all over her.

In a brief moment of recollection, she remembered being carried. Whoever’s scent was all over her and these clothes was the man who had carried her into this place. One glance out of the window told her she was high above New York, maybe twenty-five stories. How the hell does Malcolm afford a penthouse? she thought even as she decided to pull on the t-shirt and shorts.

Having done so, she cautiously made her way toward the bedroom door. With every step, she took a moment to listen for movement on the other side. The sound of the heartbeat was calm and distant. Whoever was out there, they weren’t exactly close.

Holding her breath, she reached for the doorknob and twisted it. Pulling it open, she tried desperately not to be taken in by the sheer beauty of the penthouse. A long corridor stretched out ahead of her, opening out to what appeared to be a living area at the far end. Whoever was in the penthouse was down there, at the far end of the corridor. She could smell him now, the scent fresh and wafting toward her, welcoming and curious.

The sound of glass clinking on granite or maybe even marble made Blue Storm jump and pause in her journey down the hallway. She gritted her teeth, cursing herself for the surprised whimper that had left her lips. She expected the werewolf to come right to her, expected him to make it clear that there was no way she was going to escape and that she might as well just head right back down the hallway to the bedroom.

Instead, there was only silence and stillness. Blue Storm inhaled sharply. The scent of the other werewolf was growing with every step forward. When she reached the end of the hallway and looked out across the white and chrome living room, she found him sitting on the other side of an archway, just visible in the kitchen area of the penthouse. He was sitting at a black marble breakfast bar, his back to her. Though his broad shoulders were hunched, Blue Storm could still get a pretty good measure of him. Her keen eyes examined him quickly, closely, judging that he had to stand at six feet. The skin on the back of his neck was a dark shade of mocha, his hair was black, cut short and looked as if it was just growing out from a buzzcut. As though he heard her, he turned his head just slightly, enough for her to see the well-groomed line of his dark facial hair.