Beast Behaving Badly (41 page)

“I wasn't going to ask that.”

“Oh.” She un-hugged him. “Sorry.”

“I was going to ask you that on Sunday. At three forty-five p.m. Before the surprise romantic dinner but after my Sunday laps in the pool.
It was on my schedule!
” he finished on a bellow.

“I know!”
she bellowed back. “I saw it. You left it right out on the kitchen table! Was I supposed to ignore it?”

“Since you never look at the schedules you've been writing for yourself, much less mine—yes!” He scowled at her. “You know I hate when you mess with my schedule Blayne!”

“You're rude,” she accused.
“Rude!”

“Yeah. But you're going to marry me anyway, aren't you?”

That thousand-watt smile made Bo feel warm from the inside out. “Of course I am! Then again, I can't officially tell you that until three forty-six, p.m., Sunday. Mostly because you're a freaky hybrid with a schedule fetish.”

Skating over to the rest of the group to take the picture, Blayne in his arms, Bo laughed and said, “Yeah, and I love you, too, Blaynie.”

Can't get enough Shelly Laurenston? Try getting to know her arrogantly sexy dragon shapeshifters, which she writes as G. A. Aiken. An excerpt of her newest release,
How to Drive a Dragon Crazy
, follows

“I
z!”

Izzy heard her dragon cousin's screamed warning and was able to move her body out of the way in time to avoid the ogre attacking from behind, but the blade of his flint axe cut across her arm. The wound began to bleed almost immediately and she knew she'd have to get it sewn up. But she refused to worry about that now. Not with the ogre leader in her sights at last. She could see him about thirty feet away. So very close.

Izzy spun, swung the club, and slammed it into the neck of the bastard behind her as he tried to run away. He went down face first and Izzy pulled out her sword and rammed it into the back of the beast's head.

“Izzy.”

She heard her name called again, this time by a much different voice than her cousin Branwen, but she had to ignore it as she was being attacked again.
Gods, the ogres just keep coming.

She blocked the flint mace aimed for her face by using the club she still held in her left hand and cut the thick arteries inside the orgre's thighs with her sword. She spun and slashed her sword again, cutting a throat, spun again and swung, but her blade was stopped by an obscenely large battle axe. She knew the weapon was not an ogre's. They only used flint weapons and although deadly were often crudely made. This was a well-made weapon forged by a true blacksmith.

So Izzy struck at the knees with the club she still held. The heavy flint made contact and there was an angry snarl from beneath the heavy fur cape that covered the face and body of the axe wielder.

“Izzy! Stop!”

She ignored the command and swung the blade again. A big gloved hand reached out and shoved her back.

“Gods-dammit, Izzy! It's me!” He yanked the hood of his cape back, revealing his handsome face and dark blue hair. Some of it in braids with leather strips, feathers, and small animal bones tied throughout. “It's Éibhear.”

“Yeah,” Izzy answered honestly, “I know.”

Then she pulled back her arm and threw the sword she held directly at his head.

 

 

Éibhear knew that because of his size, it was believed he was quite slow. Lumbering was a word he'd often heard used from those seeing him doing nothing more than standing. Yet at that moment when he saw the short sword coming right at him, thrown by a woman who clearly knew what she was doing, Éibhear would say he'd never been so grateful that everyone was wrong. He was fast. Very fast. And it was that speed, being able to drop to the ground in seconds, that really saved his life.

Once he hit the ground, he looked up and saw that Izzy was running right at him. He wasn't sure if she was coming to finish him off or just kick the shit from him, but the thought of batting her away or blasting her with his flame—stupidly—never entered his head.

He would never know why.

When Izzy reached him, she snatched his short sword from his belt and leaped up, one foot landing on his shoulder. She used that foot to launch herself, lifting her body, and spinning in the air. Éibhear turned over and watched as Izzy raised the sword most human males couldn't lift and shove it into the nine-foot ogre that stood behind Éibhear. He'd been so focused on Izzy, he hadn't even been aware of the big bastard wearing a human skull on a chain around his neck.

But even with the sword buried in the top of his head, the ogre wasn't dead yet. He was snarling and snapping at Izzy as she hung there, and that's when she spoke to the green bastard. Éibhear had no idea what she said, but he was positive the ogre did. And the words were so guttural, so vile-sounding that he knew she was speaking the ancient language of the ogres.

When Izzy finished, she released her hold on the sword and dropped to the ground. With one good kick to the ogre's stomach, she knocked him on his back and walked around until she was able to look him in the eye. Gripping in both hands the club she still held, she raised it above her head and brought it down once, smashing the ogre's face in.

It was then that Éibhear realized this must be the ogre leader because all the surviving ogres stopped fighting and began to turn and run back toward the mountains in the distance, probably to choose another leader and regroup. Izzy seemed to know that as she yanked Éibhear's blade from the dead leader's head.

“All of you!” Izzy called out while walking back toward Éibhear. “Don't let them reach the caves. Kill them all!
Now move!
”

Izzy stopped by Éibhear's side, looked him over. “Why are you here?” she asked.

“To bring you home.”

“Can't.” She dropped the blade on his stomach, Éibhear barely catching it before the blade possibly cut something vital. “Not done.”

She turned away from him, dismissing him without a backward glance. “Lieutenant Alistair.” A full-human male rode up to her.

“General!”

“Rally the men. Pull several to get the wounded to healers. We'll deal with the dead later. I want those ogres meeting their green-skinned ancestors before the moon's high in the sky. Do you understand?”

“Aye, General.”

“Go.”

He rode off and another female rode to Izzy's side.

“Fionn. How are we looking?”

“Good, Iz. But there's still some fight left in the South Valley.”

“Take a contingent and strike them down.”

“Your arm, General,” the woman Fionn pushed.

“Yeah, yeah. I know, Colonel. I'll deal with it.” She laughed, waved the woman away.

Then, without even looking at him again, Izzy walked off, leaving him lying there.

“I don't know why you look so shocked,” a voice said from beside him and he looked up into the face of his cousin Branwen. “What did you expect from her? To drop to her knees and suck your cock right here?”

Well . . . it had crossed his mind.

Don't miss the newest release in Shelly Laurenston's Pride series,
Wolf with Benefits.

T
oni had been waiting forty-five minutes for her interview, but she didn't mind. She had a book. As long as she had something to read, Toni could self-entertain for hours. It was a gift she had.

Still, she did wonder if there really was some sort of problem going on that kept Ulrich Van Holtz and the hockey team's coach too busy to meet with her. Or were they just trying to find a way to break it to her nicely that they didn't even think she could manage the office copier? Not that she blamed them. Except for the occasional volunteer position, she'd never had a real job. Not anything she could put on a résumé.

Then again, she was probably just being paranoid and insecure. They couldn't all be away trying to figure out what to do with her, and even the snooty bobcat receptionist wasn't around.

She glanced over to her right.

The wolf, though, was still sitting there. Quietly. Staring at the wall across from them. He didn't look bored. Or annoyed. Or angry. Just…calm.

She hadn't said a word to him. Not because she was upset with him but because she was curious to see how long he could go without talking to her. She thought he'd have gotten fed up by now and found a very nice way to leave. She couldn't see him storming out in a huff. That didn't seem to be his way. But politely finding an exit strategy? Yeah. That seemed more his style.

She finally had to ask, “You're not bored?”

“Not at all.”

“Really?”

“I've found that if you wait long enough…the entertainment often comes to you. You just have to be patient.”

“Okay, but it may be awhile. I don't know when—”

“That's fine. I'll just keep on sittin' here…lookin' pretty.” He grinned at her, showing her his perfect white teeth. “Enticing you with my charm.”

At that point, all Toni could do was cross her eyes and go to her book. But just as she'd settled back in, the bobcat receptionist returned. He charged in through the glass door, barely glancing at her or the wolf as he passed.

Toni sat up straight, not knowing if the receptionist would be part of the hiring process, and said, “Hi. I'm here to see—”

“Yeah, yeah—” He dismissed her with a shake of his head, while he grabbed a messenger bag from under his desk. He had it in his fist and was just moving around the desk when the glass door was thrown open and the hockey player from the day before, Novikov, stood there. And even though she didn't know the man very well, Toni could say with great confidence that he was definitely seething.

“What,” Novikov began, spitting out the words through clenched teeth, “do you not understand about a schedule?”

Uh-oh.
Toni remembered her brother Troy beginning a conversation with his one-time babysitter in a similar manner. Afterward, the babysitter sued for medical bills and pain and suffering, plus got a restraining order against her brother. In the end the family settled with her out of court.

Denny was only four at the time of that incident and about thirty pounds. Novikov was thirty something and at least four hundred plus pounds…so this situation could easily end up much worse.

Trying to defend himself, the bobcat began, “I did what you ask—”

“No!” Novikov cut the cat off. “You didn't do what I asked. Because if you'd done what I asked, I'd be surprising my fiancée in Chicago with the wonder that is me. And later tonight, I'd be watching a bout with her and a bunch of other hot girls racing around a banked track in tight shorts and tank tops and pretending it's a sport. Instead, since last night I've ended up in Iowa. Then Kentucky. Then Minnesota. None of which had my fiancée, but they did have grizzlies. Lots and lots of really pissy grizzlies! Who aren't fans of polar bears
or
lion males!
And I'm both!
”

In the face of that roar, the bobcat backed up against the wall behind him, his messenger bag held against his chest. “I just got your schedule confused with Markowitz's. It was an accident.”

“Wait a minute…you're telling me that Markowitz is in Chicago? With
my
fiancée?”

“I doubt he's
with
Blayne.”

“Does Blayne know you got the schedules mixed up?”

“Well, she called—”

“Which means,” the hybrid growled, “she probably felt bad for Markowitz and now she's making sure he's doing okay. You know how she doesn't like anyone to be sad. And we all know how Markowitz is a scumbag leopard who'll take advantage of any do-gooder idiot that comes along. Especially when they have legs as long as my Blayne's!” The player stalked over to the bobcat's desk and slammed really big hands onto it, making the thing nearly buckle. “But you know what's the worst part of this? What
really
sets my teeth on edge and makes me want to just twist your head around until it pops off your body? The worst part is that because of
you
I haven't had my workout today. I haven't had my swim. I haven't had my practice. Because of
you
I've missed an entire day of
my
schedule.”

The bobcat blinked. “That's really more important than your girlfriend?”

Running on years of unplanned training, Toni dropped her book, charged across the room and cut in front of the bobcat, her one free arm stretched out in front of her. She knew her skinny jackal arm and battered shoulder would never stop the player from getting those big hands on the idiot cat but she felt the need to at least try because she above everyone else understood what was going on.

Toni understood drive. The drive that one had to have in order to be the best. Some people were born gifted. But unless you had the drive to make that gift work for you, you'd end up no better than the kid in class with the solid B grades and the good job in real estate.

So while the bobcat didn't “get” Novikov's schedule issues, Toni did. She also knew that she didn't want to spend the rest of the day in a police precinct giving a statement on a tragic shifter-on-shifter murder case.

“When's your fiancée's thing tonight?” she asked loudly in an attempt to get Novikov's attention and keep him on the other side of that very flimsy looking desk. “Eight? Nine?”

Novikov yanked his hand back and, since it had been dangerously close to her face, she appreciated that he had enough self-control to do that.

“Eight-thirty,” he snarled, blue eyes still locked on the bobcat behind her.

“Great. I know a carrier that I use for my family all the time. There's eleven of us not counting my parents, and regular planes and full-human run airports are not always the friends of jackals with pups. So I can easily get you on a direct flight to Chicago, have a car meet you at the airport to take you right to wherever she's playing her game tonight.”

“It's called a bout.”

“Okay. Her bout. I can get you to her bout.”

“You can do that?” he asked, looking a bit calmer.

“Just need a phone and a computer.”

The player pointed at the bobcat. “You. Out.”

“This is my desk.”

Toni rammed her free hand against Novikov's shoulder before he could finish climbing over the bobcat's desk and strangling the feline to death. She had no delusion that she was somehow physically holding him back. Instead she was trusting his desire not to hurt the one person who might be able to help him.