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always kill them.”

Chapter Six
    Gray jumped off the bed and backed away from Louis. Oh God. She was so screwed. Louis remained seated on the bed. That had to be good, right? If he were going to kill her, he would have done it already, wouldn’t he?
    “You’re safe with me, Gray.”
    She tried not to melt into a puddle at the sound of his voice. It was pure liquid heat as it slid over her skin.
    She swallowed hard and tried to gauge his sincerity. He held his hands out in front of him as if trying to reassure her that he meant no harm. They were big hands, capable of snapping her neck quite easily. He couldn’t look harmless no matter what he did. There was a feral aura about him, an animal magnetism that was always present. There were also bloodstains on several of his fingers.
    “If I were going to kill you, you’d already be dead,” he added.
    Okay, not what she needed to hear even if it was the truth. He’d had plenty of time to get rid of her if that was his plan. He wouldn’t even have had to shift to human form to do it.
    What had possessed her to bring a wounded wolf home from the woods? Oh yeah, compassion. See what that had gotten her—a werewolf in her bedroom, a confrontation with local hunters and a visit from the local law. And, by the way, she was also partly werewolf. Her day was off to a stellar start.
    As always, Shadow was by her side. She could depend on him. He was the one constant in her life.
    “Why?” she asked. “Why do the packs kill half-breeds?”
    Louis sighed and scrubbed his hand over his face before raking his fingers through his shiny brown hair. “Ignorance. Just pure meanness. They don’t want to dilute the bloodlines.”
    Her stomach knotted. Well, she’d wanted to know. It wasn’t pretty, but she had to remember that a werewolf wasn’t a human. And humans had done plenty of killing over the course of civilization to preserve bloodlines. It wasn’t limited to werewolf culture.
    “Who raised you?” He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his thighs.
    The man was as naked as the day he was born, and he was talking with her as if they were having coffee at a local restaurant rather than him sitting nude on her bed. She motioned with her hand in the direction of his lap and his impressive erection. “Do you mind?”
    He glanced down and then back up at her. A smile twitched at the corners of his mouth. “I don’t mind at all, chère , but I can see you do.” He tugged a corner of the blanket over his lap and she breathed a sigh of relief. His massive shoulders and rock-hard chest were still exposed, but it was better than it had been.
    Not that it was a hardship to look at him. Quite the opposite, in fact. He was the perfect male specimen. She itched to sketch him. Ultimately, she wanted to paint him.
    He patted the bed next to him, but she shook her head. “I think I’ll stay here.” She was just as afraid of herself as she was of him. She was attracted to him in a way she’d never been to a man before. She wanted to bury her nose in the curve of his neck and inhale his masculine earthy scent.
    Most men smelled wrong to her. It wasn’t just their cologne, which sometimes could be overpowering to her better-than-normal sense of smell. There was something about their natural scent that repelled her. She’d only had a few short-term relationships in her life and she hadn’t been overly upset when they’d ended.
    Now, she wondered if it was because she was a half-breed werewolf. And wasn’t it weird to be thinking such a thing?
    “Gray?”
    His voice brought her attention back to their conversation. What had he asked her about? Oh, yes, now she remembered. “My grandmother raised me after my mother was killed.”
    “What happened to her?” There was pity in his eyes. For her.
    She squared her shoulders. She didn’t need anyone feeling sorry for her. Things could have been much worse, but she’d had her grandmother to depend on. “Car accident. The