Big City Wolf Read Online Free PDF Page A

protectively behind him.
    “Ember, you’ve been a bad outcast. You know the rules. Outcasts don’t contact any member of the pack.” Kobe clucked his tongue as he opened his jacket, the silver of a linked chain gleaming under the streetlights.
    He knew about the chain. Kobe had been present at her beating. North growled, clenching his fingers into fists, thirsting for vengeance. Ember’s father hadn’t acted alone.
    Ember trembled against his back, the poignant scent of her fear aggravating his already hostile wolf. “He’s dead.” Her voice shook. “The alpha’s dead.”
    “But his laws don’t die with him.” Kobe wrapped the silver chain around his gloved fingers. “I’ll have to kill you now, slowly.” He smiled menacingly, saliva dripping off his huge white canines.
    “Over my dead body.” North straightened his shoulders, shielding his little mate. No one touches my mate. This time, I will protect her .
    “I was hoping you’d say that, stray.” Kobe’s eyes gleamed with blood thirst, a madness treatable only by pain and death.
    “No.” Ember pushed against North, smacking her palms on his back. He didn’t move, determined to guard her. “This fight is between you and me, Kobe. Leave North out of it.”
    She’d sacrifice herself for me. Again. I’ll prove myself worthy of her devotion . Kobe had been the cruelest of his boyhood tormenters. “This is my fight, mate.” It had been a long time coming. “I’ll protect you.” North cracked his scarred knuckles. He’d learned to fight on the streets. This was his turf.
    “Like you protected her fifty-three years ago?” Kobe laughed, the sound holding no humor. “You were no match for our alpha then, and you’re no match for me now.” He flicked his wrist, the chain snapping toward them.
    North reached out and caught it with his arm, the length biting into his leather coat. As the tail wrapped around his bicep, he yanked and pulled the weapon out of Kobe’s grasp. The chain slithered along the pavement. Killer yipped and chased it, pouncing on the links. Ember gasped and danced out of its reach, her heels skidding on the road.
    “I hadn’t known you’d harmed her.” North stalked toward the shifter. His voice deepened. “If I had, nothing and no one would have stopped me from killing you.” He partially shifted, his claws extending from his hands, his body increasing in size, shredding his clothes, and his jaws contorting. “As nothing stops me now.”
    “Except for me.” Kobe’s already ugly face sprouted ink-black hair, bare spots appearing where his scars had been. He crouched lower and lower. North mirrored his action, watching his flat black eyes. “Time to put you out of your misery, mutt.” The enforcer sprang toward him.
    North leaped up to meet him, and their bodies collided in midair, muscle slapping against muscle, claws swiping fur. Kobe bit down on North’s shoulder, his canines piercing fur and skin, and North grimaced at the jagged pain.
    He landed on his hands and feet, the pavement damp and dirty, Kobe clinging to his back, ripping at his flesh. North turned and smacked the wolf against the side of a brick building, dislodging him. Kobe rolled out of reach and they both retreated, breathing heavily. North stood between Kobe and Ember, the scent of blood, his and Kobe’s, filling his nostrils.
    “North, we’re a pack.” Ember shuffled behind him, her presence comfortingly close. “We’ll fight him together.”
    “No. My fight, Ember.” North eyed Kobe. The big wolf paced in front of him, looking for weakness. Kobe’s right arm bled, blood dripping off his claws. They were equally injured, equally matched, except Kobe had no one, nothing to protect, no thought in his brutish mind except defeating his opponent.
    North could even his odds… or try to. “Leave me,” he barked at Ember. “Go back to the club, where my wolves can protect you.”
    “Your wolves, yes.” She turned and ran away from them,