Seduced by the Moon

“Nothing personal,” he said to her.

“If you say so.”

Lights appeared around them too quickly. Gavin drove the car into the motel parking lot at the edge of town and switched off the engine. They got out of the car without speaking.

She slammed the door.

“Just give them my name.” He pointed to the office.

“Ranger Harris has carte blanche here?”

“It’ll do unless you run up a tab.”

She tilted her head. “You actually have a tab in this place?”

Gavin nodded. “I sometimes need to crash before the long drive home.”

“Then you don’t live close by.”

“Close enough when I haven’t been up for several nights in a row. Way too far away otherwise.”

Skylar Donovan walked around the car and right up to where he stood. “You’re going back out there, aren’t you?”

“I’m on duty for another hour or so.”

He worked hard to keep his hands to himself, unsure of why he was so attracted to Skylar that he’d want to push the limits of his self-control, or delay his highly charged personal vendetta.

This leggy blonde was just so blessed tempting, the choice seemed tough. It was as if she’d gotten under his skin and nestled there alongside the wolf.

“Does that mean you have to be alone?” she asked.

“Tonight it does.”

“Why? Why would you take that chance and go back out there when you know we were followed?”

“It’s what I do, Skylar. It’s something I have to face and take care of without risking harm to others.”

Skylar. He liked her unusual name and liked saying it. Outside of her evident ornery streak, he liked everything about Skylar Donovan that he’d seen so far. Maybe he even liked that stubborn streak.

She might be small, yet she was no shy flower. She was too courageous for her own good, though. She had walked up that mountain alone tonight without being sure of finding him.

Somehow, at that moment, she seemed a lot more than just temptation in tight blue jeans. The delicious scent that had lured him to her in the first place wafted around her like a corona. Golden hair caressed her shoulders in uncombed waves highlighted by shafts of moonlight escaping the cloud cover. The same moonlight that made his forehead dampen with the strain of withholding his wild side.

“So you admit we were followed and have no idea who it might have been?” she asked.

He shrugged to hide the evidence of another unruly spike in his heart rate that pulsed upward and into his jaw. Hell, he wanted to get under her skin, seize the moment and take some long-overdue R&R while he could. Surely that was fair after what he’d been through?

When she’d left the cabin, after what had almost taken place in her bedroom, Skylar had tugged on her shirt—the same shirt he’d removed in a fit of passion—without properly stretching it into place. Narrow sections of bare skin showed above the waistband of her jeans—smooth, pale and terribly seductive.

No way.

Can’t have you.

I’ve got to go back out there.

All true warnings, but Gavin’s body argued adamantly against them, and against reason. Having sampled her, tasted her, felt her beneath his hands, his body repeatedly returned to those sensations as though she’d been imprinted on him. After looking into her big green eyes and finding a shared connection, Skylar Donovan truly did feel like part of his future.

This wasn’t right, of course, or normal. She was just a woman he had stumbled upon who’d ended up striking his fancy. Her open-mindedness in terms of sex and lust and freely meeting her own needs had sealed the deal. That was all. He hadn’t met anyone like her in a long time.

“Will I see you tomorrow?” She ran her hands over the warm hood of the Jeep the way he imagined her running them over him, and his body responded with a ripple of lustful tension.

With his pulse erratic and a new pressure in his chest, Gavin said, “In the morning I’ll be back to take you home.”

“Okay. Until then.”

When she turned from him, Gavin briefly shut his eyes to block the sight, attempting to keep his distance, keep himself from pulling her back and making a complete fool of himself.

He watched her walk away. Her hips swayed in the fitted jeans he hadn’t been lucky enough to get off her. The taut, slender back that had arched passionately during their kiss emphasized a small waist he’d like to encircle with his hands.

Rebuking himself for staring at her like this, Gavin didn’t stop looking. He’d sent her away, and she’d obliged. Her allure might be strong, but he couldn’t let it rival the moon’s—the moon at that same moment sending out signals that he intercepted as clearly as if the giant orb contained a telepathic intelligence.

Tomorrow night he’d change into something that would scare Skylar to death. All thoughts of closeness and intimacy would be a thing of the past if she were to witness his transformation.

In this new reality, however, Skylar had become as potentially dangerous to him as the moon that ruled his shape. She’d become both a distraction and a necessity in no time flat. He had to let her go and didn’t want to.

Really didn’t want to.

“Definitely no kissing,” Gavin said aloud to bolster his willpower.

Over her shoulder, Skylar Donovan smiled. “Don’t be too sure about that, Harris. I’m here for a few more days.”

Gavin took two steps backward, and then two more, his heart beating out a protest about getting into the car. His fingers curled against his palms. His muscles rippled and twitched. As absurd as it seemed given that he had known this woman for only one day...leaving Skylar Donovan was just about the hardest thing he had ever done.

* * *

Skylar heard the car drive out of the parking lot, and her determination to remain independent faltered. In spite of everything she’d been through, she felt forlorn and alone.

Still, she had to admit that Harris’s behavior bordered on chivalrous. He was willing to foot the bill tonight at this motel in order to see to her safety, which meant he did believe there might be trouble out there in the dark.

“A civilized ending to a strange night?”

Resigned to her current fate, Skylar gave the motel a wary once-over. It was a standard two-story, U-shaped design from the fifties. The building wrapped around the parking lot on three sides, with all the rooms and doors front-facing, and two sets of stairs leading to the second-floor balcony. Most of the windows were dark. A small blue neon sign pointed to the reception area.

Skylar went inside.

A middle-aged woman with short blond hair, wearing a red fleece vest, greeted her from behind a counter and raised an eyebrow when Skylar mentioned Harris’s name. Gratefully, that woman kept what she might have been thinking about a woman showing up in this place on his dime, to herself.

Handing over a key, this receptionist said, “Room twenty-one. That’s his favorite,” as if being in his favorite room mattered. She then produced an ice bucket and a glass, and looked past Skylar for the missing luggage.

“Will you need anything else?”

“A toothbrush would be nice.”

Skylar smiled as though nothing were out of the ordinary about not having a purse or a toothbrush, omitting the explanation of not being able to stop at the cabin for some of life’s conveniences because a madman might show up there.

Or a wolf that knew how to open a door.

“Emergency amenities are on the bathroom counter,” the woman said, returning the smile with less enthusiasm and leaving Skylar to assume that Ranger Harris had more than one female fan in the area. “The room is on the second floor.”

“Thanks.”

Skylar climbed the stairs and waited for several minutes before attempting to go inside room twenty-one, which, like the rest of the rooms, overlooked the mostly empty parking lot. Summer was over, so tourists would be scarce. Since no lights were on, she guessed she might have this floor to herself, and dreaded that.

She wished the ice bucket came with a bottle of wine. Suddenly ravenous, she wanted a salad and a steak. This wasn’t the kind of motel with room service, though, and since she had no wallet, dinner wasn’t in the cards. Her growling stomach would just have to suck it up and deal.

Staring out at the lot, and up at the nearly full moon emerging from the clouds, she felt lost and slightly out of sorts. The cozy cabin stuffed with her father’s things made her feel more at home and part of something. Here, in a strange motel without her credit cards or her cell phone, she was cut off and isolated.

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