Fever (Blood Moon Rising, #1) (3 page)

That is, if this wasn’t some cosmic
mistake.

Once they got to his Audi, he tucked
her into the backseat, and he slid in beside her. She didn’t go in
easily; she kicked and shoved the whole time. It was
cute.

When they were inside, he locked the
doors right as she was reaching for the handle. She pulled, but
nothing happened. “Is this the part where you break out the
knife?”

If he rolled his eyes one more time,
they were going to roll right out of his head. “For the last time,
I’m not a serial killer.”

“
Then you’re a
rapist.”

“
No.”

“
Drug lord?”

“
Really? We’re going to
play this game?”

“
This isn’t a game. This is
serious! Why are you laughing?”

Lord help him. Maybe he should have
let Onyx knock her out to save his sanity. He wasn’t even sure
mating was worth this.

She crossed her arms, pouting and
looking all the more adorable for it. The fact she looked adorable
while being such a pain in the ass only irked him more. “I’m not
laughing at you,” Gage said with all the care of speaking to a
temperamental child. “You’re just overreacting.”

“
Overreacting? Are you
kidding me? I’ve been drugged and I’m having kidnapping
fantasies!”

“
Just keep telling yourself
that, sweetheart,” he muttered, growing impatient. He pulled out
his phone and pressed 1 on his speed dial.

Nik picked up on the first ring. “Hey,
there, Master. Need me to bail you out of trouble with the little
lady?”

“
Onyx was here.”

“
What?” Nik growled. Gage
heard footsteps - the wolf was probably on his way out now. “What
the hell is a Nightshade wolf doing here?”

“
That’s exactly what I’d
like to know. We’re in the car. Hurry.”

“
We?”

“…
the girl and I. I’ve
Marked her.”

There was a moment of stunned silence.
Nik swore, then the line went dead. A few seconds later, Nik
climbed in the driver’s seat and revved the engine. “Crescent
Manor, my liege?”

“
Yes,” Gage clipped. His
thoughts were too overrun by the girl to reprimand Nik’s use of a
royal title.

Tires spun as Nik gunned the gas
pedal. The woman toppled over, and Gage steadied her. She looked up
at him through her dark lashes. Her eyes were green, the color of
summer grass. Staring up at him, she looked so vulnerable. He
resisted the urge to pull her closer when she cleared her throat
and blinked, then moved back over into her seat.

Nik pressed a button on the dash, and
a wall of tinted glass rose up, separating the front from the
back.

Gage almost begged him to keep it
down, to not leave him back here with this crazy woman whom he was
starting to doubt more and more was his mate. Too late, the glass
closed shut. Gage looked at the woman, who sat staring straight
forward with a blank look on her face and her arms crossed over her
chest. “You’re oddly silent.”

“
That’s because I’ve
decided I’m dreaming. And nothing can happen to you in a dream,
right?”

Gage felt pressure start to build
between his brows. What he wouldn’t give for some aspirin right
about now - or a very stout drink.

He caught movement from his eye. Her
hands, which were piled in her lap, were trembling.

His eyes softened. Of course she was
scared. The poor woman had been viciously attacked, and now she
thought she was drugged. Given the situation, he would probably
overreact too if he were in her shoes. The strange sense to chase
her fears away and make things better overcame him. With too many
other things on his mind to think about it, he reached over and
grabbed her hands, taking them into his own. Her hands were so
delicate compared to his, so soft. “Don’t be afraid,” he said
gently. “I will not harm you.”

“
Why else would you take
me, if not to have your way with me?” she said simply, though he
caught a quaver in her voice.

He winced. “I promise you, my lady, I
have no intention of hurting you.”

She stilled somewhat, closing her eyes
and taking a deep breath. “I need water, to help flush this stuff
out of my system.”

“
You’re not drugged,” he
insisted, “but I shall have Mary give you some ice water once we
get to my house. I’ll have her draw a hot bubble bath for you, as
well.”

She stared at him, mouth
open in shock. “You have
servants
?”

He looked away. “Yes. It comes with
the title.”

“
Are you like a CEO or
something?”

He snorted. If she was pretending not
to know anything about the Underworld, she was doing a good job.
Then again, most humans weren’t aware of the supernatural creatures
that walked the earth alongside them. “Something like that,” he
said.

She seemed to be calming down, her
curiosity taking over. “If you’re such a big shot, what was a guy
like you doing in a bar like that? It didn’t exactly scream
opulence.”

“
That was the beauty of
it,” Gage said, letting go of her hands now that they’d stopped
shaking. He leaned back in his seat and stared pensively out the
window. “I came from a normal family. I had to fight my way to
riches and power. I guess I wanted to be reminded of
home.”

She cocked her head at him, blinking
as if surprised. The way her blonde hair shone in the moonlight
coming through the window… was she aware how beautiful she
was?

He blinked. First, he thought she was
crazy, now he was getting all sentimental over a little moonlight?
The fever sure did behave in strange ways.

“
What’s your name?” he
asked, trying to distract himself.

She swallowed, staring back at him
unblinkingly. “Danica. Danica Williams.”

“
Gage Johnson,” he said,
offering her his hand. She stared at it, then reluctantly took it.
At the last minute, almost as an afterthought, he brought it to his
lips and kissed it. “A pleasure, Danica.”

She shivered. Her coat had been nearly
ripped off during the assault, as had her sheer blouse. The lace
bra was see-through, showing a tight cherry nub begging for Gage to
suck it. He watched it round and harden to a point, her breasts
rising and falling as her breath quickened.

Without meaning to, he found himself
leaning in to her, his hand reaching for her waist.

Her pupils dilated. He could smell the
lust coming off her, as surely as his own suddenly saturated the
car. She licked her lips as his mouth hovered closer to hers.
“Might as well enjoy the fantasy right?” she whispered, closing her
eyes.

He stalled. Oh, he could give her a
fantasy, all right, as he had many she-wolves. Fantasies were what
he specialized in. Except for tonight.

Squeezing his eyes shut while he
composed himself, he leaned back against the seat.

She opened her eyes and blushed when
she realized he wasn’t about to kiss her. Falling back with a
“hmph,” she crossed her arms and said, “Weird. What type of fantasy
doesn’t allow you to control it?”

He groaned. This was going to be a
long night.

Chapter 4

An uncomfortable - albeit,
lust-charged - silence stretched between them for the rest of the
drive. Danica had no idea what to believe right now. Part of her
thought, “Break the windows, stupid! Get the hell away from this
guy!” and the other part of her was content believing this was some
kind of half-baked fantasy her drug-addled brain had cooked up.
After all, there weren’t such things as men with glowing eyes,
claws for hands, or razor-sharp teeth. It had to be drugs. In a few
hours, she’d probably wake up to the sound of her alarm, press
snooze a half dozen times like she usually did, and finally drag
her ass out of bed to barely make it to her day job from
hell.

She sighed, leaning her head against
the cool glass. In a way, the fantasy was fun, if not confusing. It
was the most excitement she’d had in a long time, like something
out of a movie or one of the romance novels she read where the
handsome knight showed up to save the beautiful princess. If only
someone would save her from her loneliness. She didn’t like to
admit it, but she missed Seth. No, not Seth necessarily, as a
boyfriend. She missed the friendship she’d had with him before they
decided to try dating and things went to hell.

That weird prickling sensation went
off inside her head, and she looked over to find Gage staring at
her. He looked away at the last moment. She crossed her arms,
smiling smugly. “I caught you.”

“
What?” he said, trying to
sound bored.

“
I caught you
staring.”

“
I was looking out your
window.”

“
Because yours wasn’t good
enough?”

He gave her a bland look, at which she
smiled wider. She stared at her hand. What kind of guy kissed a
girl’s hand? She thought that kind of stuff only happened in
movies. Her loins tightened as a shiver of desire rolled through
her, and she decided to do what she did best when she was nervous:
ramble. “So, were you, um, raised around here?”

“
Up north, in
Kentucky.”

“
Oh. I’ve never been
there.”

He smiled, casting her a sideways
glance. “You’ll have to go there someday.”

“
With you?”
she wanted to ask, but kept her mouth shut. The
thought of going off alone somewhere with her
knight-in-shining-armor made her sex tingle with anticipation. Her
shoulders started to relax. This dream was kind of fun, like a
date. Typical she could only get a date with a dream
guy.

How sad is
that?

“
Are you from Arkansas?”
Gage asked in that deep, silky voice. Lounged in the seat with the
top few buttons of his shirt open and his elbow propped up under
his chin, he looked like he was posing for a magazine
cover.

Her mouth began to water. “Um, yeah.
Born and bred,” she said lamely. She felt stupid for admitting it.
He seemed like such a worldly man. If he didn’t think of her as a
country bumpkin before, he surely did now.

To her surprise, he responded,
“Nothing wrong with that. I would have stayed put myself if I could
have.”

It was an almost imperceptible shift,
but still something she picked up on from judging people’s moods
her whole life. His expression became guarded, and his jaw tensed,
like he was erecting an invisible barrier between them. She had the
sense that whatever had caused him to leave hadn’t been
good.

Wetting her lips, she was scratching
her brain for another “safe” topic when something white shone from
her peripheral vision, and she turned her head.

She blinked. “Holy shit.”

It sat on a hill in the distance - and
they were heading right toward it. It was the biggest house Danica
had ever seen. No, scratch “house” - this was a
“mansion.”

Greek sculptures lined the drive,
alternating with tall, perfectly primed bushes. A huge fountain
stood in the center of the wraparound driveway, and spotlights
shone on the Greek columns holding up the balcony that stretched
across the front of the manor. A marble sign out front said
“Crescent Manor” in elegant script. The driveway was made up of
that expensive pea gravel she always saw on the TV at rich people’s
homes.

“
Wow,” Danica breathed
again as they pulled up to the staircase leading to the sweeping
porch. “This is where you live?”

“
Do you like it?” Gage
asked, sounding hopeful.

“
It’s beautiful,” Danica
said, still taking it all in. It beat the hell out of the
roach-infested shack she called home.

The driver, a wild-looking man with
tats all over his arms, opened the door for her and offered her his
hand. “My lady?”

What was with the formal talk? “Er,
thanks.” She took his hand and let him help her out. His eyes
darted to her chest. With a blush, she realized her blouse was
still hanging off her shoulder. Covering herself up quickly, she
stepped aside as Gage got out and growled at the other
man.

He grinned and held up his hands.
“Easy, there. You know I wouldn’t dare.”

“
Then keep your eyes to
yourself.”

Gage put a hand on the small of her
back and guided her up the stairs and across the porch.

And he took the princess
back to his castle….

The door opened before they’d even
gotten close. A middle-aged man clad in solid black with a red tie
stood there, bowing as they passed. “Welcome home, sire. I trust
your trip was pleasant?”

“
As always, Malcolm.” Gage
smiled warmly at the butler, clapping a hand on his shoulder.
“Would you mind telling Mary to prepare the Crystal Room and to
draw our guest a bath?”

“
Certainly.” Malcolm’s eyes
fell to Danica’s hand, and he stilled. “I don’t believe it. You
found her.”

She looked at her hand, at the
shimmery blue moon. “Oh, this? Yeah, I must have gotten drunk and
tattooed myself or something. Pretty crazy, huh?”