mate?”
“Actually, neither of us saw the initial attack. Gavin was the first one on the scene. He’s an ex-Navy SEAL so he should be able to describe what he saw in detail. I doubt the guy misses a thing.”
The alpha nodded, glanced at the possessive arm Gavin still had around Kade’s waist and smiled slightly. “How’s Maggie doing?”
“Pretty good, considering what she’s been through. The wolf tore a huge gash in her throat but thankfully only nicked the jugular vein. The outcome could have been a lot worse.” Hensen closed his eyes and concentrated on their link. He was still new to this, but he was fairly certain she’d fallen back to sleep. The thing he did know for sure was that Gavin was in the bed with her. The contentment coming through his link with Maggie was quite strong. It seemed a surefire sign that she felt safe and protected, perhaps even loved.
He’d been both grateful and slightly disappointed that she and Gavin hadn’t made love in the shower, but realized it was his own sense of impatience that was trying to rush things along. After seven months of working to convince himself he didn’t want or need a mate for at least another fifty years it was quite humbling to realize just how much he wanted all three of them in his arms and in his bed.
“I’ll let you get back to your mates,” the alpha said. “Do you think Gavin would mind answering a few questions about the wolf that attacked Maggie? It would help if we knew which wolf pack we were looking for.”
“Of course,” Hensen replied, feeling very relieved that the alpha wasn’t trying to pull rank on this one. If Maggie and Gavin had been pack members, he probably would have demanded their presence at this meeting. But with them both being human—well, for Maggie, recently human—it was a good idea for the pack to be friendly. Probably none of them would feel safe until Gavin was a werewolf himself, but since Hensen had no plan to change the man against his will, it could be a good long while before that happened. Gavin definitely struck him as the stubborn type.
He felt Maggie’s panic a moment before they heard the gunshot.
* * * *
Maggie did exactly what Gavin ordered. She got down.
So far down that she ended up half under the bed. Gavin was crouched beside her, his legs pressed against her as he aimed the gun at the creature currently writhing in pain from a single gunshot wound.
“We’re almost there, Maggie.”
She glanced around wondering if this was another side effect of being made into a werewolf. She could have sworn that Hensen was right beside her when he said those words.
“We’re coming in the front door. Tell Gavin not to shoot us.”
“Gavin,” she said urgently as she heard the front door open, “it’s Hensen. Don’t shoot.”
Gavin reached a hand behind him and squeezed her lower leg in a comforting sort of way. “I know,” he said, his gaze never wavering from the creature still lying on the floor. She couldn’t see it from her position behind the bed but her first glimpse of it had been terrifying enough. The fact that it had come straight for them both, its intentions to kill them very clear, had made the whole thing feel like something out of a horror movie.
She didn’t even realize she was shivering with shock until Hensen, Kade, and several other men came into the room to subdue the injured creature. Gavin turned then and lifted her to her feet, holding her in the circle of his arms. She clung to him, crying like a baby as the events of the past several hours all caught up with her. Waking up a werewolf had seemed like a bit of an adventure in her otherwise directionless life, but the fact that within hours something had tried to kill her again was just a little too much to deal with.
“Hey, sweetheart,” Kade said as he came closer. “It’s okay. Everything’s going to be okay.”
She shook her head, not really disagreeing with him, but unable to agree with him
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