Wild Wolf Claiming. Rhyannon Byrd

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      Sliding out of the booth and to his feet, Elliot held up his hands as he took a step toward the pale, twitchy male whose angular face had probably been handsome before it’d been ravaged by drug abuse and hard living. “You don’t want to do this,” he said as calmly as possible. “Trust me. Your best option is to just turn around and get the hell out of here.”

      “Not a step closer,” the robber snarled, suddenly reaching out and snagging Skye’s upper arm. She cried out as he yanked her against him, while keeping the gun pointed at Elliot.

      “Skye, look at me,” Elliot demanded, his low voice vibrating with rage. It took everything within him not to release his fangs and claws in front of the frightened humans and tear this dude’s throat out. But one of the founding tenets of his pack was that their species never be revealed to the masses—ever—under any circumstances.

      “Shut up!” the guy yelled, but Elliot ignored him.

      “Will you trust me and do what I say?” he asked her, flicking his attention back and forth between the junkie’s wild gaze and her frightened one.

      “Why?” she mouthed, and he knew she was asking him why she should give him her trust. Why he was helping her.

      “Because I know how to handle these types of situations.”

      “Are you a cop?” the robber shouted, wrapping his arm around Skye’s throat. She reflexively reached up and curled her hands around the guy’s forearm, the panicked look on her face making Elliot ache.

      He shook his head in response to the asshole’s question, but kept his sharp gaze locked tight on Skye. Then, for the second time, he asked, “Will you trust me and do what I say, baby?”

      Her eyes went wide at the husky endearment, and he kept his focus on her as he directed his next words to the bastard trying to use her as a human shield. “You so much as cause her even one second of pain, man, and you’re going to be dealing with me,” he warned. “And you really don’t want that.”

      “Fuck you!” the guy spat.

      Elliot felt his wolf seething just beneath his surface, and knew he needed to end this quickly. Any hope he’d had that the idiot would rethink his plan and run was gone, and now his time was up. “Wrong answer,” he scraped out in a voice that was more animal than man, his hard gaze still locked tight with Skye’s. “The instant I get my hands on him,” he told her, “you drop and crawl away.”

      “Are you fucking crazy? I swear I’ll shoot you, you stup—” was all the robber got out, before Elliot went into action. He was not only stronger than a human male, he was faster than one. It took him no more than a second to charge the asshole, knocking the gun out of his shaking hand and squeezing the wrist of the arm he’d wrapped around Skye so strongly he felt the bones crack. The asshole screamed as Elliot jerked his arm up with enough power that it dislocated his shoulder, allowing Skye to drop away from him and quickly crawl across the floor, exactly like Elliot had told her to do. Then he pulled back his free arm and knocked the bastard out with a single punch.

      “Yes!” the older woman working the hostess’s station shouted, coming around the podium and kicking the junkie in his ribs with the pointed toe of her shoe. “And you stay down, you slimy jerk!”

      All of a sudden, a great roar of cheers exploded across the diner, and Elliot found himself being hugged by one human after another. The mother of the family Skye had been waiting on even planted a kiss on his cheek before bursting into tears of relief that her children and husband were safe. It was a surreal moment, and all he wanted was to find Skye and get the hell out of there before someone called the cops and he ended up having to deal with the local PD.

      He searched the crowd for her, worried when he couldn’t spot her, a raw sound on his lips when he finally caught sight of her coming through the swinging door that led to the kitchen. For a brief moment, he wondered what she’d been doing back there. Then he forgot all about the question as their gazes locked, the grateful look on her face making him feel like he’d just saved the friggin’ world.

      He began making his way through the crush toward her, and she did the same. “Are you all right?” he asked, the moment they reached each other. The question felt heavy on his tongue, his arms aching with the need to pull her close and wrap her up tight against him. But he hadn’t earned the right to touch her yet, and he didn’t want to frighten her.

      “I’m fine, thanks to you,” she said with a soft smile. “That...what you did...it was amazing.”

      “You don’t need to thank me.” Not for protecting you, baby. It’s what I was born for. “You sure you’re okay?”

      “Yeah, I’m good.” She stepped a little closer to him, the difference in their heights making her have to tilt her head back a bit to see his face. “I just... I can’t believe you came at him like that when he had a gun.”

      “He wasn’t going to shoot anyone.” And if he had, Elliot would have survived the shot. As a Lycan, it was damn difficult to kill him with a bullet. “I was more worried about you. There was no way I was letting him keep his hands on you a second longer.”

      She blinked up at him, and he thought, Because you’re mine, doing his best to appear like a normal guy so he didn’t scare the hell out of her. But inside, his wolf was seething with fury, prowling like a caged beast, with only one thought churning through its mind:

       No matter what it takes, we protect what’s ours...

       Chapter 3

      Skye Hewitt stared up at the gorgeous, dark-eyed stranger standing in front of her, and couldn’t help but remember how he’d called her “baby” when the robber had been using her as a human shield. She’d been so stunned by how hearing that word on his lips—in reference to her—had made her feel, she hadn’t been able to find the words to answer him to save her life. Literally. Lucky for her, though, he’d trusted her to do as he’d said anyway.

      Now, with another one of those sexy, kind of crooked smiles that he’d given her earlier curving his lips, he shook off the visceral tension that seemed to be coiling around him, and said, “I guess we haven’t really been introduced yet, have we? I’m Elliot Connors.”

      Elliot...mmm. The sexy name fit him, because...like, seriously. This guy was by far the sexiest freaking thing she’d ever seen. Tall and lean and muscled in that way that didn’t come from being a gym rat. No, this guy looked like a soldier. Someone who did brave, dangerous things for a living, and he had the body of a god to show for it.

      It no doubt made her a hussy, but she couldn’t stop herself from imagining what he would look like without the black Henley, worn jeans and kick-ass black boots. Just thinking about him in the buff, with all that dark golden skin on display, stretched tight over rippling slabs of muscle and masculine cords of sinew, had her pulse roaring in her ears, while lust poured so thickly through her veins it was probably written all over her face.

      Heck, from the way he was looking at her, it had to be. Because he definitely looked like he was trying to figure out what she was thinking.

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