No sense in lifting him onto the bed; I’d barely gotten him out of the car without breaking my back. Too much solid muscle for me to attempt such a feat.
What an impressive creature, I thought.
I retrieved an old blanket from the closet and spread it out on the floor. Tucking one edge beneath his back, I held his hind legs and twisted his body toward the blanket, doing the same with his front legs until he rolled over on top of it.
“There,” I breathed, collapsing on the floor. My arms and back were as sore as the dickens. I pinched one of the fat pads on his paw. “You need to wake up and shift. I can’t have a wolf in my house.”
When he didn’t respond, I decided on another tactic. It didn’t seem right to keep pinching and prodding him, so I crawled up behind the wolf and ran my fingers up his soft belly. Sometimes alphas responded to the sound of a woman’s voice, and I hoped he was lucid enough to hear me. My face brushed against his soft fur until my lips reached his pointy ears.
“Are you awake in there, alpha male?Shift.”
His wolf eloquently transformed to a human so fast that I didn’t have time to move away. I lay against his back, my arm wrapped around him, fingers splayed across his strong chest. My lips were touching the shell of his ear, my body pressed tight against his.
Tak remained unconscious, so I breathed a sigh of relief and sat up. Checking to see if his skull fracture had healed, I touched his temple and pushed all around his head. His eyes didn’t flutter once. Moonlight poured through the window, and up close, the details of his tattoo came to life. It didn’t mark his nose, but the sharp design began along his left jaw and went from his chin to his hairline, some of it crossing over his eyelid. I traced my finger over the lines, following the patterns before stroking his thick eyebrows, which arched in the center. Some men’s eyebrows went straight across or sat heavy on their eyelids, but not Tak’s. It gave him a mischievous look even when sleeping.
He wasn’t so scary in this tranquil state.
When his eye blinked open and he seized my wrist, I shrank back in surprise. Tak’s grip was iron, but I managed to twist my hand free and scamper away. My heart thudded against my ribs as my back met the wall, and I drew up my knees. I knew better than to trust strangers—especially wolves.
He turned over until his shoulder blades touched the floor, leg bent and concealing his manhood. Tak blinked in confusion at me, then let his gaze travel up to the ceiling. “What happened?”
“You don’t remember?”
He touched his crown, his eyes dulled from the trauma. “Did you slap me on the ass?”
“Did you break my store window?”
Tak reached up for my bed and crawled onto it. I swallowed hard, trying to avert my eyes from his backside, and he had a spectacular one. When he collapsed facedown on my green bedspread, I thought about how all his man bits were rubbing against my favorite blanket. It was too late to worry about such silly things, so I collected the one from the floor and used it to cover him up.
“My head,” he groaned into the pillow. Then he turned his head to face the window.
“You need to shift again. I can’t really assess if you have brain damage or not.”
“Were you petting me a minute ago?”
I felt the heat of embarrassment rise in my cheeks. “I’m locking you in here until morning. Then you have to leave.” I neared the door and peered over my shoulder at him. “And don’t touch anything.”
Tak wearily raised his arm and touched the windowsill.
Once in the hall, I shut the door and leaned my back against it. Groans filled the quiet space, but they were the sounds of a man in pain. I didn’t like that sound coming from my bedroom, as if it might somehow soak into the walls and live here forever. He could have asked me for an aspirin, but everything about Tak struck me as stubborn. Shifting to heal required a lot of energy, so hopefully he’d be zonked out for the rest of the night. My mind drifted back to that secret moment when I’d held him—what it felt like to have someone that strong in my arms. A secret part of me wondered if that was what life was like for mated couples.
Lakota would kill me if he knew what I was up to, but he’d have to stand in line behind my father, who would probably kill the wolf first. No matter.
What’s done is done.
A few minutes later, I grabbed two slices of pizza and devoured them. Hauling a wolf around by the hind legs had given me a voracious appetite. I could have eaten more, but my eyelids grew heavy as if weights were pulling them down. The Tak dilemma would have to wait until morning. I still had the store to worry about. The last thing I remembered was grabbing my phone and collapsing on the couch, my thoughts drifting to the wolf in my bed.
* * *
Tak struggledto open his eyes, but his lashes were stuck together. He rubbed his face against a soft pillow and drew in a deep breath, instantly growing hard. Hope’s scent was all around him. In the sheets, on the blanket that covered him, and all over the pillowcase. He lay there for a minute just soaking it all in.
Soakingherin.
How the hell had she managed to carry him all the way up to her apartment alone? She must have had muscles like a horse. The thought made him grin as he rolled onto his back and stared up at the ceiling.
On top of all that, she had brought him into her bedroom.
Not the hall, not the doorstep, and definitely not the bathroom.
