Pleasure Me Read Free Page A

biceps bruising, his tee hugging his sculpted abs. He smelled of clean skin and male musk. Pleasant yet decadent, downright intoxicating.
    When she’d first seen him at the window, sin had sparkled in his gray, lushly lashed eyes. The prize between his legs had thickened, pressing against his jeans. He was what every straight woman wanted…a guy who was hung, his cock meaty, hard, ready for trouble.
    Crap.
    She pressed one hand to her aching side, the other to her face to keep her hair from blowing back, revealing what a mess she’d made of her life. From the time she’d started noticing boys, she’d wanted Wylder to mark her, claim her as his own for eternity and all that other romantic crap.
    Kade, her ex-lover, had claimed her instead, threatening to kill her if she even thought of leaving him. She had, finally, prepared to die in order to escape. After the horror he’d put her through, closing her eyes forever would have been blessed relief.
    Right now, she simply wanted to be alone, nothing more. She didn’t want Wylder’s concern or continuing attraction to her if those were his actual feelings. Could be he felt guilty for leaving the way he had. When those emotions faded and he got over her being back in town, where would that leave her? Aching for him again while he found someone else or took off once more without warning?
    No damn way. Love was for the foolish young and masochists. Count her out. Being a shifter was bad enough. Not belonging fully in the animal or human world totally sucked at times, while having to keep their powers a secret was no picnic either. One wrong word and every human with a gun might swoop down on the town and shoot all the residents dead. Worse, the government could haul them off for an experiment to see what made them tick, how they’d come to be.
    Too many times she’d listened to trust fund babies, starlets, models, and the money people whine about how awful their lives were. Taxes were going up. Their yacht had a scratch on the deck. Their help were too stupid to live.
    Ha. Try living with what everyone here went through.
    She rounded the corner and shuffled the rest of the way to her mom’s house, a cute one-story frame, blindingly white and clean, built with the help of Ross Luparell. Her mom had certainly needed his help, like many of the poorer pack members. Starr’s dad had died when she was still a baby. He’d been in Wyoming, helping a pack of shifters there, when a rancher had gunned him down. Her mother never mated again. For years, she’d scrambled to find jobs, working at the bar, in the convenience store, and anywhere else she could within the confines of Los Lobos. After her mate’s death, she wasn’t one to roam.
    Finally, she’d discovered her talent for making metal knickknacks and artwork. Tourists couldn’t buy enough of her designs with her creations selling in gift shops throughout South Dakota. The other pack members made deliveries for her.
    She’d survived without a mate or Starr’s help. From her first gig on, Starr had tried to make up for running away by depositing three-fourths of her earnings into an account she’d set up for her mother. Her mom always returned the funds, telling her she didn’t want the money, she needed her baby home. Not doable. Starr couldn’t stand the pain of Wylder being gone. At least in the human world, she’d stopped thinking of him so much. She’d invested her money and set up a trust fund for her mother. The one thing she had done right.
    Her only continual mistake was asking about Wylder each time she’d talked to her mom. When Starr learned of the risks he faced during his tours, she was too worried to be angry. Once he’d returned and she mentioned him then, her mother had always answered the same way. “Come back and see for yourself.”
    She hadn’t been brave enough, still wasn’t, but Kade had changed everything. If not for him, she wouldn’t be hiding out here and running into Wylder,