LITMIR.BIZ

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a crooked smile. “Okay.”

      “Okay? What does okay mean?” she snapped, the words as brittle as autumn leaves as she grabbed the shirt out of his big, rugged hand and quickly pulled it on over her tattered dress.

      “It means I’m not going to argue with you about it when you’re upset,” he said affably.

      She lifted her brows. “But you’ll...what? Argue with me about it later?”

      His lips curled with the barest fraction of a smile. “Depends on whether you keep telling me not to call you sweetheart.”

      Elise tried to storm past him then, too overwhelmed to deal with his crazy brand of charm, but her stupid knees buckled with her first step and the room spun. Before she could tell him to go to hell, he had her swept up in his strong arms, clutched against his broad, muscular chest as he carried her over to the bed. But instead of setting her down and moving away, he sat down on the edge of the mattress, then carefully deposited her beside him.

      “How did he get the jump on you?” he asked as she quickly scooted over, needing to put more distance between them.

      “I didn’t know he was behind me.”

      Damn it. The instant the words left her mouth, Elise realized her mistake, her heart lurching into her throat. Turning her head away from him, she tried to hide behind her hair, which had long since fallen from its twist, but he lifted his hand, pushing it behind her ear. Then he caught her chin, bringing her face back around. “They had their scents masked, but why couldn’t you hear him? Or sense him?”

      It took considerable effort, but she forced a smirk onto her face to hide her shame as she jerked her chin free, then met his dark gaze with her own. “That’s none of your damn business, Runner.”

      He opened his mouth, no doubt ready to argue that point, when Jeremy’s deep voice called out from the living room. “Hey, Pall, where are you guys? We let ourselves in through the kitchen door. Me and Cian need to talk to you.”

      The corner of his mouth twitched with a wry, fleeting grin. They both knew that Jeremy and Cian, two of the most highly trained hunters the pack had ever known, could use their acute sense of smell to pinpoint their exact location in the house. Which meant they weren’t so much asking where they were, as they were inquiring as to whether or not they were decent enough for company. Idiots! She never should have danced with Wyatt at the reception. Now these jackasses were never going to let them live it down.

      “We’re back here!” Wyatt shouted, and Elise quickly wrapped the flannel shirt even tighter around her body. In the next moment, a rain-soaked Jeremy and Cian came into her bedroom, followed closely by Carla and Mason, who were equally waterlogged. She could only be thankful that Eric hadn’t come prowling in with them because she was too on edge to deal with her brother at the moment. She hoped to God he’d stayed at the Alley, enjoying his wedding night. These four were bad enough!

      Whipping her head to the side, she scowled at the gorgeous jerk sitting beside her on the bed. “Did you have to call everyone?” she seethed, hoping he could tell just how furious she was with him.

      He gave an innocent shake of his head. “Hey, I didn’t make the call. I asked that Browning guy to do it when I was rushing inside.”

      “Your neighbor called Mason, but we were already on our way up to check out something else,” Jeremy offered as an explanation, before shooting a frowning glance at the puddle of water he was leaving on her floor.

      Before she could fire off another sharp-edged remark, Cian crossed his arms over his chest, propped his broad shoulders against the wall and cut his piercing gray gaze from her to Wyatt. “So what happened?” the Irishman asked them, lifting his brows. “The neighbor was waiting out front when we got here, but he didn’t know anything. Just said that he heard screams and fighting. We searched the woods back there but couldn’t pick anything up to follow. And the rain is coming down hard now. It hasn’t left anything on the ground to track.”

      Keeping it short and succinct, Wyatt gave them the rundown. “I think whoever the scouts spotted on our land tonight paid Elise a visit. I was searching the woods behind the house when I heard her scream. There were two Lycans inside her house, wearing masks that covered everything but their lips and their eyes, which were brown in their human forms. I fought them, and they took off when they heard the rest of you show up.”

      She could tell by the look on the Runners’ faces that they knew he’d left out a portion of the story. And though she understood why he would have to fill them in later about what had happened in her room—that she’d very nearly been the victim of another sexual assault—Elise was thankful that he didn’t make her sit there and listen to a recounting of the horrific event.

      Looking at the others, Wyatt asked, “Can you guys give us a second?”

      “Sure,” Mason murmured, clapping his hand on Jeremy’s damp shoulder as he steered his partner toward the door, motioning for the others to go before them. Without looking back, the handsome, rugged Runner said, “We’ll take another look outside and see what we can find. Maybe we’ll get lucky and pick up a scent.”

      “Yeah, about that,” Wyatt grunted, sounding kind of shocked and embarrassed. “I forgot to mention that they had their scents masked.”

      A few stifled curses could be heard out in the hallway, as well as a low laugh that sounded as if it was coming from Cian, who probably thought that important lapse had something to do with her. Mason was at the back of the group, and he stopped and turned in the doorway with a scowl that would have scared the hell out of most people. “No scent at all—same as the ones who attacked us in the Alley?”

      Wyatt nodded. “Yeah. Just like those assholes. They were also stronger than they should have been.”

      “Shit,” Mason growled, scrubbing a hand down his face. “Did they say anything that might reveal their identity? Or what they were doing here?”

      They both shook their heads, but Elise wasn’t sure Mason believed her. “We’ll take that look outside,” he told them, “but I want you both at my cabin for a meeting in the morning.”

      She frowned as the Runner left the room. She didn’t want to go to the Alley tomorrow morning. After tonight, all she wanted was to...to... Hell, she didn’t know what she wanted.

      “How long will it take you to pack?” Wyatt asked, his deep voice pulling her from her troubled thoughts as he moved to his feet.

      She tilted her head back, staring up at him in confusion. “Pack what?”

      “A bag. You can’t stay here by yourself. You’re coming home with me.”

      Her jaw dropped as she blinked. “Is that some kind of sick joke?”

      “Naw,” Carla drawled, popping her head back into the room from the hallway. She’d obviously decided to ignore Wyatt’s request for privacy. “I know what Pall’s joke face looks like, and that isn’t it. He’s dead serious.”

      Gritting her teeth, she said, “I’m not going anywhere with you, Pallaton.”

      He pushed his hands into his front pockets, his eyes hooded as he watched her stand up, grab a couple of clean towels from the basket of folded laundry that was sitting on her dresser and start laying them out over the puddles that’d been left on her floor. “Don’t let pride make you stupid, El. You know this is the smartest thing you can do.”

      “Wow. Do you have any idea how arrogant you sound right now?” She clenched her teeth as she tossed a towel to Carla, then snapped the last one open, laying it over the water that had dripped off of Cian. “What is it with you guys always bundling up us little women and dragging us off to the Alley? Where in God’s name did you all get the idea that we can’t survive without you around to protect us with your big bad selves?”

      He didn’t say anything in his defense when she turned back to him with a blistering glare. But he didn’t need to. He simply shifted his gaze to the

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