The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance

have led him to the murderer’s front door.
    He frowned. Bringing a werewolf in was going to be tricky, regardless.
    It was just past two when Emma returned to the Blazer, her breath billowing in the freezing air. Nathan leaned over, opened the passenger door. She leaped onto the bench seat, and lay down with a heavy sigh.
    “Done for the night?” That sense of unreality hit him again. Knowing this wolf was Emma was one thing, talking to her in this shape was another.
    She looked up at him, turned onto her side. The whine that escaped her sent chills down his spine. Her jaw cracked and bulged.
    Oh, Jesus. He cut the Blazer’s headlights and pulled off to the deserted roadside. He slid towards her on the seat, but didn’t touch her for fear that his hands would add to the pain of the transformation. The change took less than a minute but felt like for ever; an eternity filled with her whimpers, the groans of her flesh and his murmurs that he prayed were helping, soothing. Finally she lay naked on the seat, her short hair and skin glistening with sweat.
    “It’s not so bad,” she panted. “Once the pain starts, you just ride with it.”
    Speechless, Nathan shook his head. He reached into the back seat for a blanket, tucked it around her shoulders.
    “Thanks.” She gratefully accepted the coffee he offered, raised it to her lips with shaking hands. “I just need another second.”
    She wasn’t exaggerating; by the time she’d swallowed the lukewarm drink, her shivers had stopped. She stared unblink-mgly out of the front windshield, her fingers tapping against the mug. “I get a whiff here and there, but it wasn’t concentrated anywhere. I think he must move around the town. Maybe he does repairs, or some kind of work on call.”
    Work was a reality Nathan could get a grip on. “We covered most of the town tonight. It might be he’s on one of the farms or rural properties outside of town, and just comes in ... for whatever it is he does.”
    “I can start running those properties tomorrow night.” Her lips curved. “I’d go during the day, but someone would probably shoot at me.”
    “It might be over by tomorrow anyway, if the state comes back with a name on that print.”
    Emma’s nod wasn’t too convincing. She was thinking, he imagined, exactly what he had been earlier: arresting a werewolf wasn’t going to be easy.
    She tilted her head back and finished off the coffee, then placed the mug carefully in the cup holder. “Did it help - to see me change? Or make it worse?”
    He didn’t even ask how she’d known he was having trouble reconciling his Emma with the wolf. “Helps. I’m not saying I’ve got my head around it yet. But it helps.”
    “The transformation is grotesque.”
    His gaze ran up her pale, perfectly human legs. “Maybe for a few seconds. What you’ve got on either end isn’t.”
    Her eyes locked with his. “You were afraid to touch me.”
    “I didn’t know if it would hurt you.”
    “Oh.” Her mouth softened. Her fingers, which had been clutching the blanket at her neck, loosened. “I thought we’d established that it only hurts when you don’t.”
    The slice of skin and the pale curves of her breasts showing between the edges of the blanket undid him. Nathan pulled her towards him; she came eagerly, straddling his lap. Her mouth found his, then moved to his jaw, his neck. Her skin was hot beneath his hands. Her fingers worked frantically down the buttons of his shirt.
    He thought about putting a stop to it. Thought that he’d always intended a bed for her, roses and wine — not the front seat of his truck. But thought that he’d never heard anything sweeter than her soft gasps and moans, nothing sexier than her growl when he slid his fingers down her stomach.
    Her hips rocked, her back arched, her hands gripping his shoulders. She cried out his name when he pushed inside her. He offered himself to her just as he was, and took her just as she was.
    Running a hundred miles couldn’t have wrung her out as completely. Emma hadn’t moved since she’d collapsed against Nathan’s chest, her body limp. Didn’t want to move.
    But knew she needed to. With a soft groan, she slid from his lap. Nathan smiled, but he looked as shaken as she felt. Emma reached over the back of the seat for the bag she’d stuffed there before they’d left his house, not even trying to suppress the swelling emotion that constricted her chest, her throat. It was a sweet pain,