Read Online Rosko, Mandy - Mate of the Wolf (Siren Publishing Classic) by Mandy Rosko - Free Book Online Page A

direction of the door, mohawk raised high again.
    Fear chilled Shelley’s blood. Was there something out there she couldn’t see? An animal?
    She sighed as the thought came to her. Yes, of course. There was an animal outside. It was dark now, so it made sense that all the critters would come out. Maybe another wolf, or even—she shivered—a bear. Maybe it sniffed the crumbs of food still on the table.
    Shelley stepped around Michael. “Don’t worry, I’ll shut the—hey!”
    Michael charged for the door before she could take a step. His nails skidding against the floor didn’t hinder his strength as he crashed his shoulder into the doorframe, taking it with him as he charged into the night.
    “Michael!” Shelley ran outside after him, the night air cool against her skin and bare feet. She stopped when the chain pulled her back.
    Then her stomach dropped, and for once, she was glad for the shackle around her ankle. Without it, she would have run into the dark trees with him, right where whatever creature it was that he’d run after in the first place lurked.
    Michael’s barking in the distance sounded farther and farther away. Shelley had to force herself back in the cabin, reminding herself that, as a werewolf, he could take care of himself.
    Unlike her, as a chained-up woman, she couldn’t defend herself at all should something come for her.
    She stopped at the splintered wood of the doorframe, reached out, and touched it.
    Such strength. It was nuts. Some of his fur had been pulled out by the splinters.
    Shelley squinted at the silver tuft of hair and pulled it free. Up close, turning it this way and that in the artificial light, it was so…shiny. Like real silver. But that could be a normal color for werewolves for all she knew.
    Smiling secretively, she rolled her fingers and balled the bit of hair, opened her heart locket, and placed it inside.
    She doubted the door would close on its own now. She’d have to put a chair under the knob. She grabbed one and did so. She tested it, and it held.
    Shelley sighed. She turned back to the bed, deciding to read until he came back, hoping the paperback would take her mind off the worry she felt, until a banging knock sounded against the door.
    Shelley jumped three feet in the air and turned.
    Back? Already?
    The knocking pounded like a hammer on the door. No bear could make that sound. She rushed to take the chair away as the knob started to jiggle.
    “I’m coming! Just a sec!”
    She shoved the chair aside, grin on her face as she readied to tell Michael why she needed to put it there to begin with.
    She threw open the door, and her grin melted away.
    Not Michael. A woman stood there. She was as tall as Shelley, but thinner. Way thinner. So much so that her chest was flat, she had no hips to speak of, and her cheeks were hollow. She was almost sickly looking.
    Probably was. Shelley knew all about eating disorders, and this chick definitely had one.
    Despite the lack of a shapely body, and the out-of-the-way location, she wore a dark blue miniskirt and matching tank with a skull sewn into the fabric, black platform shoes, and she had…purple hair?
    Wondering if she was lost, Shelley opened the door wider but kept her body half hidden behind it, wishing she’d taken the time to at least put her bra back on under Michael’s T-shirt. “Um, can I help you?”
    Eerily mismatched eyes stared at her, then around her, then toward the bed. The woman said nothing. She just…studied the inside of the cabin. One of her eyes was a pale blue. The other was gray, and it shone just as bright as the moon would have if it had been out.
    Shelley shivered. What was this woman doing out here in the dark? Was she running from whatever Michael was chasing? Her clothes didn’t give any hint of that, though. She looked like she just finished prepping for a party. Her hair was perfectly straight, not a strand out of place, and her clothes were neat. Not at all like what they should