Gone with the Wolf - By Kristin Miller Page 0,15

mean? Why couldn’t she talk like a normal person so he could understand her? What was with all the damn Skippys, stapling antlers, and sleeping temptation talk?

“You really need to get out of the office a little more often.” She blew rogue strands of blond hair out of her face, giving Drake a glimpse of something feral churning in her sapphire eyes. “I meant that I won’t be tempted to invite you inside my place for a nightcap if I don’t allow you to drive me home.”

Emelia disappeared around the corner, handling the trays like a pro.

As Drake finished off the remnants of his drink and left the bar, he couldn’t help but smile. No matter how much Emelia wanted to hate him, he’d somehow gotten under her skin.

Chapter Five

Emelia locked up the bar twenty minutes after closing and stepped out onto Porter Street as light plumes of rain drifted down from the sky. She always loved the rain, the way it washed away dirt and grime from the city streets, leaving behind the crisp, curt smell of wet asphalt. Taking a deep breath, she flipped her hood over her head and trudged toward the parking lot across the street.

She fished her keys out of her bag before she approached her green Civic and unlocked it. Years of working in this neighborhood had taught her that one could never be too prepared; she always unlocked her car before she reached it, and she always carried mace. In the month Emelia had worked at Wilder Financial, she’d never had to worry about her safety. Not like this. The place was run like a fort—tight security at the front, mazes of halls to get lost in, and cameras trained on every bustling street corner.

The streets in this part of town were quiet tonight, Emelia realized, scanning one way, then the other. Usually she could hear the hum of the city, the occasional bum collecting bottles out of waste bins. Tonight, there was nothing but the soft pitter-patter of rain against the ground.

And suddenly, footsteps pounding over pavement. Behind her.

Emelia spun, digging a hand into her bag to search out the mace.

Breath froze in her lungs as the biggest, most rugged man she’d ever seen charged across the street and set haunting yellow eyes upon her. His bald head glistened with rain, and the leather coat tightening over his chest shone oil-slick black. He was six-foot-six, three hundred pounds of menacing biker.

Holy Son of Anarchy.

Emelia ran around the back of her car to the driver’s-side door, heart pounding double-time. She opened the door and glanced up before sliding inside. Once the biker was over the curb and in the parking lot, he slowed to a stop and threw up his hands. Strange tattoos were etched into his palms, swirling out toward his fingers. He bent low, peering beneath the doorframe from a solid thirty feet away. Fumbling with her keys, Emelia shoved the right one into the ignition…and paused, when he smiled.

“I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said, inching closer. “My bike broke down around the corner and my phone’s dead.” He held up his cell phone, shaking it side to side like a dead mouse strangled in his fat fingers. “Could I use yours?”

Why was she hesitating? Because her green heap of metal had broken down more times than she could count, leaving her stranded in strange places, too? He might be in genuine need of help. It was raining and the streets were unusually empty tonight…

She glanced through the window at the hard lines of his face, the severe cut of his jaw, and the sheer size of his hands. If he clenched his fists, they’d be the size of melons! A man like that should’ve been fully capable of taking care of himself. She followed her instincts.

“No, sorry!” Emelia yelled through the window, then started the car.

At the sound of the engine sputtering to life, the man sprinted and leaped like a damned gazelle, landing with a deafening thud on the roof of her car.

What the hell?

Screaming, Emelia ducked from the bend and groan of the Civic’s roof. She threw the car into reverse. Hit the gas hard and backed over a parking block. The car jolted and rocked, and a deafening growl vibrated the air like thunder.

Thoughts tangled in Emelia’s head, sticky and incomprehensible. She had to get out of here. What was happening? What was that noise? Who the hell was that guy and why did he