Savage Craving - Cecilia Lane Page 0,12

Another creak pulled her attention to the sliding glass door leading to her balcony.

“Lilah?” Seth asked.

She took cautious steps toward the sliders and pulled back the curtain. She squinted into the darkness, but couldn’t see anything beyond the puddle of light spilling from the inside. Slowly, hands shaking, she reached for the switch to turn on the porch light.

And screamed.

On the other side of the glass, a man stood with a sinister grin on his face.

Lilah jumped back as he crashed through the door. Glass ripped at him, but he didn’t seem to notice or care. Murder was on his mind and in the bright, glowing eyes he directed her way.

Chapter 5

“Lilah?” Seth asked.

He scrubbed a hand down his face at her silence. Fuck, he hoped she wouldn’t be one of those troublesome assignments. He wanted to keep her safe, not fight her at every turn.

At least her apartment wasn’t the fancy, princess-needs-a-doorman type. The complex wasn’t anything special. Quiet, which was a bonus. Not many cars parked in the spaces reserved for residents. Two other buildings of the same size flanked his assignment’s in that particular loop of the complex. How anyone could tell one building apart from another or handle the cramped quarters was beyond him, but whatever. Not his life. He was there to do a job, then get back to Bearden.

Or not.

He grimaced at his reflection in the rearview mirror, then let off a frustrated growl. He still looked like death warmed over. Not exactly the most confident of looks to bring to a job. “Lilah?” he asked more forcefully.

A scream and the crash of glass was his only answer.

Seth jumped out of his truck and sprinted for her building. Taking the stairs two at a time, he hurtled toward Lilah’s door. More crashes and whimpers met his ears as his hand closed around the knob. Locked. Fuck. No one inside was setting aside the fight for their lives to let him in, so he slammed a shoulder against the door. The second busted the locks. The third staggered him into the fray.

His eyes immediately locked on the woman he’d been assigned to protect. With hands around her throat, he was doing a shit job of keeping her breathing.

Seth crossed the space between him and Lilah’s attacker. He grabbed the fucker’s shoulder and spun him around. The sound of Lilah’s ragged breaths let him know she still lived as he blasted the asshole across the chin. “Run,” he growled.

He threw another punch at the bastard before he could clear the shock of the first. Something stroked against his mind. Sweet scents pressed in at him, a thin thread underneath the baked earth scent of the shifter just now raising his fists to fight back. Seth lifted a lip in a snarl. Lion. Of course. Who the fuck else would attack the witness to a mass escape orchestrated by the biggest asshole of them all?

But she was his charge, not beating the guy bloody. And she was already out the door.

Seth swung two more punches, catching the lion on the sides. He kept him moving, stumbling, back the way he’d entered the apartment. One final blow caught the side of the lion’s head and snapped him around to fall limply to the ground.

He didn’t wait around to see if the guy moved. Seth raced out the front door and to the railing. One quick scan of the parking lot put Lilah back on his radar. She moved between cars, not once looking over her shoulder. Panic reeked in the scent trail she left behind. Agony laced through him. He didn’t want to see her freeze like a deer caught in the headlights if a car barreled toward her.

Or a stalking big cat.

Seth jumped over the railing and bolted after her. He caught her halfway across the parking lot. Another sharp scream pierced the night when he grabbed her shoulders and forced her to a stop.

That barely-there brush of sensation roared to the front of his mind.

Seth nearly lost his grip on the wiggling woman in his shock, then pulled her close and covered her scream with his hand. Never, ever, had the sensation been so strong. Not when he fought, never when he brought a woman to bed, not even in his dreams. His gums ached with the press of fangs that had never descended; his entire body tensed and throbbed with a primal need to strip her down one item of clothing at a time and