Wild Things: A Chicagolands Vampire Novel (Chicagoland Vampires) Read Online Free PDF

smile, relieved that they’d thought of it.
    Of course, I was still standing half naked in the doorway of a shifter’s carriage house, my hair undoubtedly ruffled by sleep and sex. Throw in a college math class I’d somehow forgotten to attend, and I was revisiting my recurring nightmare.
    “And what are you doing here?” I asked Mallory, smoothing a hand down the front of Ethan’s shirt to ensure no important parts were leaked to the public.
    “I’m here to practice,” Mallory said.
    Part of Mal’s rehab was figuring out how she could use magic productively. A little more Luke, a little less Anakin. She’d made progress during our anti-McKetrick brigade, and it looked like the Pack was giving her another opportunity to try.
    “She’s expanding her understanding of magic,” Gabriel added. “What it is, what it isn’t, what it can be.”
    Mallory smiled prettily and held up two bottles of Blood4You, the bottled blood that most vampires drank for convenience, and a bag from Dirigible Donuts, one of my favorite Chicago foodstuffs. (To be fair, it was a long and distinguished list.) “I have a consolation prize for your humiliation.” She gave me an up-and-down look. “I’d say two to three raspberry-filled donuts should do it.”
    I stood there for a moment, cheeks flushed in embarrassment, toes freezing from exposure to the cold, my friends confident I’d be mollified with nothing more than a bag of jelly donuts.
    “Just give me the damn thing,” I said, bowing to their expectations and snatching breakfast. But I gave them all a deadly look before stalking back to the bedroom.
    “And now that we’ve satisfied your bodyguard,” Gabe said to Ethan behind me, “we’ll just come in and make ourselves comfortable.”
    •   •   •
    As it turned out, raspberry-filled donuts were an exceptional way to soothe humiliation.
    I’d emptied a bottle of blood and devoured two of the donuts before Ethan came back inside, a bundle of red fabric in hand.
    “I don’t suppose you saved one of those for me?” he asked.
    “I better have,” I said. “She bought a dozen.”
    “I stand by what I said.”
    “You won’t get any with that attitude. What’s that?” I asked, gesturing toward the fabric.
    “Apparently someone in the Pack decided they wanted swag,” Ethan said, unrolling two T-shirts, cardinal red with what looked like a retro ad for a bar called Lupercalia, the name in old-fashioned letters above two wolves toasting with beer steins at a pub table.
    “They actually made T-shirts,” I said. “Gabriel okayed that? It seems very . . . public.” The public knew shape-shifters existed, but the Packs still tended to keep to themselves.
    “I’d guess this was a do-it-and-apologize-after-the-fact scenario,” Ethan said. “These are for us to wear. Gifts from the Pack.”
    “Chilly for February.”
    “I’m sure they’ll allow you to layer, Sentinel.” He held out a hand for the bag of donuts, but I didn’t budge.
    “Were you going to tell me we had to pay the Brecks?”
    His gaze flattened. “I’m perfectly capable of managing the House’s financial affairs, Sentinel.”
    “I didn’t suggest you weren’t. But I also don’t like being blindsided.”
    “It was a business transaction.”
    “It was protection money,” I insisted, and from the flash in his eyes, he knew it, too.
    “And I don’t care to advertise that fact, Sentinel. But I’d have told you.”
    He must have seen the doubt in my eyes, because he stepped forward. “I’d have told you,” he said again. “When we had a moment to discuss it. As you’ll recall”—he tugged gently at the first button on the shirt I wore—“you were very distracting last night.”
    Ethan was still shirtless, and he stood at the edge of the bed, washboard abs and a trail of blond fuzz peeking above his jeans’ top button. Heat rushed me as he moved in for a kiss, and my eyes drifted shut.
    But he sidestepped me, grabbed the