Read Online Highland Shapeshifter by Clover Autrey - Free Book Online Page A

sitting covered in monster innards and the idiot was grinning like a loon. “The guy turned into a bear. A freaking twelve-foot Kodiak! It was amazing. He was beautiful. He shredded into the Morlocks like paper mache.”
    The shapeshifter shifting into a bear, she got, but Morlock-type monsters? That didn’t make any sense. Unless Starch had sent creepers or something after them.   Which meant the ogre knew about Gabe when all this time she thought she’d kept him safely out of it. That was a disturbing thought.
    Except ghouls or anything she knew about didn’t bleed gray.
    “Okay, okay.” She had to set Gabe’s leg. “Where did the shifter go?”
    “He turned into a bird.” Gabe’s eyes darted wildly about the gore-slickened kitchen. “He went anywhere he wanted, taking every last monster with him.” Awe floated across his tone. “I didn’t think half the Morlocks were still moving. Half of them I thought were disemboweled, but they all got up and went after him. Some limping after him. I doubt they’ll get very far, but who knows. They’re tough smelly bastards.”
    Lenore’s brows rose. He was really taken with the shifter. Using the distraction while he was relaxed, she quickly pulled his leg into place.
    Yelping, his hands knuckled the floor. “A little warning. I swear, you have no bedside manner, anyone tell you that? What happened to your healer’s touch, huh?”
    “Sorry, I don’t have time.” She softened. “Want me to jumpstart the bones knitting?”
    He frowned, thinking about it. “Is it going to hurt as much as what you just did?”
    She crinkled her eyes in a wince.
    “Think I’ll go with nature for now, thank you so much.” Which was completely unlike him. In the past, he got all jazzed anytime she’d eased a headache for him or anything minor.   Her gaze narrowed. He didn’t want her expending energy on him right now. He really was concerned about the shapeshifter.
    “Okay,” she agreed. “Hang on.” Spinning, she ran into the bathroom and grabbed the first aid kit from beneath the sink and dragged out an ace bandage roll to stabilize his leg. “I need to know why the shifter is looking for Charity. And why everyone and everything is after him? Did he say anything?”
    Gabe’s lips pulled down into the equivalent of a facial shrug.
    “What?”
    “He asked if I knew Charity. Insistently. Said it was life or death.”
    “Life or death?” Lenore’s steam deflated. Whose life and whose death? “This…this is all just a mess. I have no idea what is going on.”
    “You’ll figure it out.”
      She smiled. “Thanks, Gabe. I hope so, which is why I’ve got to go. I’m sorry.”
    “Wait.” Gabe pressed his hands on the chair to shift up. “I’m coming.”
    She pressed him back down. “No. You’ll slow me.”
    “I’ll sit in the car.”
    “This isn’t your fight. I shouldn’t have involved you in the first place.”
    “Are you kidding? Best night of my life.” He closed one eye, thinking it over. “Well, close second. There was that time in New Hampshire…”
    “I don’t want to hear it.” Only Gabe could find that good of a time in New Hampshire. Lenore peered down at Gabe and realized he wasn’t joking. His features shone. Clearly she’d underestimated just how much he was enamored by everything otherworldly.
    “He shapeshifted in front of me, Nory. I’ll never forget that.”
    Lenore clicked her mouth closed and drew back, thinking. “I can’t. Sorry.” She had to straighten this out with Starch, whether it was him who sent monsters after the shapeshifter or not. She softened her tone. “Trust me, Gabe, you do not want to be part of this world. It’s not as cool as you think it is.”
    “What I saw was pretty damn cool.”
    “And it almost got you killed.”
    “Believe it or not, I was holding my own.”
    She glanced pointedly at his bandaged leg.
    “Twenty against two, Nory, and this is all I took.”
    “Which makes you the walking