How Nina Got Her Fang Back: Accidental Quickie (Accidentally Paranormal Series Book 13) by Dakota Cassidy Page B

was human at the time she did it. She knew going into that mess they had with a mob of Russian bears that she’d take a literal hit, and she jumped into the fray anyway. It took four months of physical therapy for her to heal, and I get the feeling she’d do it all again because she’s selfless, even without her powers. Selfless and fearless and intensely loyal to those women and her family—not to mention the countless others she’s helped along the way. They all love her despite her surly nature.”
    “She can’t be easy to love.” He’d never seen a woman as abrasive, forthright, downright in-your-face as this Nina. But he had to admire her willingness to threaten him—even when he was cloaked in a spell that made him look like he was eighty. She was a human, he was a mean vampire, and still she hadn’t backed down.
    She was unafraid, and that was a trait necessary if they were going to try to stop Artem. But he didn’t want anyone hurt because of them. He didn’t want anyone hurt period.
    “Nope. She doesn’t make it easy to love her, that’s true. That’s her shield. Her armor to keep the world around her at bay. It’s a test she gives—a game she plays with herself to ensure she won’t end up hurt. But when you do love her, when you can’t help but love her, that’s when she shines. She’s all or nothing. How many people can you say that about? I have to find a way to help her discover she’s just as valuable to her friends, vampire or not.”
    “You really do want to help her,” he murmured, his admiration for her never-ending.
    January didn’t just do her job. She was her job. Honest, straightforward, nurturing. She had it all and then some, and even in the midst of this disaster, even when she could simply use Nina and her friends as a means to her own end, she wanted to fix the ex-vampire.
    “Of course I do, Galen. She’s suffering. The fear of her mortality is huge. Her daughter’s half vampire, for goodness sake. Charlie—that’s her daughter’s name—has eternal life. So do all her friends, her husband, the people she’s surrounded herself and created a family of her own with; they’ll all live eternally. She’s petrified to leave them, but she’ll have to. She’ll age. She’ll suffer all the things aging brings. Her friends won’t. I want her to acknowledge that—learn to move forward despite that. Find a way to live out her humanity with a different outlook now that her landscape’s changed.”
    “Your passion for your work is one of the things I love most about you, January Malone. It’s what attracted me to you from the start.”
    Kissing his jaw, January nipped at the skin, making his body harden to an almost unbearable need for her—even still cloaked as an old man. It had been a long time since they’d been able to be intimate and it was killing him slowly, day by day.
    “You know what I want to know? Why’d they put such a cute guy in the office right next door to me? Didn’t your crazy clan think about the temptation you’d create, Dr. Marcus? All tall, dark, and blood-drinking? It was just too much for me to resist.”
    Galen tipped her chin up and stared down into the eyes of the woman he’d been head over heels for since day one. From the second she’d poked her head out of her swanky office door the day he’d moved into her medical building in Manhattan, he’d known she was the woman for him.
    From her chestnut-brown hair in a thick braid, falling over her shoulder while stray strands floated about her heart-shaped face, to her petite but curvy frame and wide blue eyes, hidden behind black-framed glasses and peering at him intently, she was perfection.
    And he’d known it was against his clan’s laws to even engage in polite conversation with her. He’d known the rules. He’d known the risks. He’d tried to look the other way, ignore her subtle hints, avoid brushing up against her in the elevator, shut his nose off so he wouldn’t smell her