Dire Needs: A Novel of the Eternal Wolf Clan Read Free

when she’d hit twenty-one, they exploded, and four years later they were daily occurrences. She’d been so good—slept as much as she could, ate well, exercised.
    Being good was so overrated. No one ever looked back on their lives and thought,
Well, at least I was good.
    She’dbet even Mother Teresa had regrets about that.
    And so, when she’d gone to the bar tonight, she’d been looking to feed those long-buried instincts, her nerve endings tingling as she’d downed the tequila, as if her body was thanking her for finally allowing it some enjoyment.
    How long had it been for her? Felt like forever since she’d had to choose between medicine and men. She couldn’t believe she was still a goddamned virgin.
    She’d made her bed and now she was so ready to undo it and experience it all.
    Funny thing—she didn’t feel like a virgin. It was like her body knew what it needed, and now that she was finally giving in to that baser set of pleasures, it would guide her with touchstones every step of the way, starting with the man she’d brought home.
    And so she went back out to Rifter. “Can I get you anything?”
    “You.” He tugged her to him without further preamble. She liked that—having spent her life dealing with logic and science, and with her disease these last years, it was wonderful simply to give in.
    Tonight she’d worn black leather pants, boots and a tight black top and had felt more like herself than she had in a long time. But now she just wanted skin to skin—needed to strip all the clothes off and roll around with this man. She reached up to twine her hands in his hair, pulling his face to hers for a kiss.
    He tasted better than any drug or drink—instant intoxication.
    His hands skimmed her body, cupped her breasts and then lifted her shirt and broke the kiss to pull it off her. It flew over her head with a soft breeze as his hands cupped her ass, his arousal thick against her belly.
    “Beautiful.” His voice was husky, and for a minute she was sure she couldn’t breathe, because he looked at herwith such hunger… she’d never felt more wanted in her entire life.
    She tilted her head up, sure he would kiss her again, or touch her breasts, take her pants off before she got more frantic, but he didn’t.
    Instead, he tilted his head, but only to look at her strangely. Narrowed his eyes and moved his hands from her ass to her waist, as if holding her up.
    “I understand if you’re freaked. But I’m not going to die in bed with you. At least I don’t think so,” she muttered.
    “Death doesn’t scare me.”
    “I suspect not much does.”
    He nodded his agreement but he still didn’t move.
    It took her another thirty seconds to understand why, and by then it was far too late to stop anything.
    Brother Wolf caught the scent first—the bitter, cloying tang of trouble—and then Rifter smelled it as well. It was the odor of a shift from human to wolf form. But the shift wasn’t his, and Rifter went on full alert, a low growl rumbling up from his chest. He tensed, prepared to bolt outside to find whatever stray wolf was prowling nearby, but a heartbeat later, Gwen collapsed in his arms and the scent dissipated.
    Brother Wolf howled, wanted to pace restlessly, and it was then that Rifter understood.
    Seizure. Shit, in all his years, had he really never been around a seizing human before to notice that a seizure smelled like a wolf shift? Quickly, he lowered her to the bed, kept her on her side facing him and watched her body struggle, fighting with itself for control. Gwen would hate him for witnessing this, but he couldn’t leave her. And goddamn, that bothered the shit out of him, since he’d known this human for less than an hour.
    He looked toward the night table, checked the drawer as he kept a hand on her and rifled through the pill bottles, wondering if any of these might help. But Brother Wolf was calming down a little now, and Rifter hoped that was a good sign.
    She was still