Wild Wolf Read Online Free PDF

groupies only watched him from afar, too scared to approach him.
    Misty, though, couldn’t bring herself to be afraid of Graham—or at least, not terrified of him. She remembered the first night she’d met him, in a Shifter bar called Coolers. She’d found herself sitting on a barstool next to him, Graham all banged up from a bout at the Shifter fight club. He’d looked disgruntled, angry, and very lonely. She couldn’t ever forget what she’d seen in his eyes that night, a man searching for something, though he didn’t know what.
    Not that Graham had ever showed Misty his softer side. But he’d let her see a hint that maybe he
had
a softer side—deep, deep, deep down.
    Graham turned from her, and Misty’s fingers slid away from him. “Dougal!” Graham bellowed as he banged out of the shack. “Stop whining. You need to take this bullet out of me.”
    â€œNo, you need a hospital,” Misty said, following him. “Maybe we can make it to the road, or at least close enough to find a cell signal.”
    â€œI’m not walking anywhere, sweetie. I have a bullet stuck in my side, and it could lodge in a bad place if it doesn’t come out now.”
    â€œCan’t you shift . . . ?”
    â€œSure. Then I’ll be a wolf with a bullet stuck in my side that could lodge in a bad place. Dougal can take it out. He knows how.”
    Misty didn’t know much about Graham’s nephew, Dougal Callaghan, who lived with Graham. Graham had said that Dougal’s mom died giving birth to him—
bringing him in,
Graham had called it. Dougal’s dad had deserted him a long time ago, back before Shifters had been rounded up and put into Shiftertowns. Graham had never been able to find the dad, who’d probably gone feral, whatever that meant. Graham had raised Dougal himself, and apparently, Dougal had been a handful.
    Dougal came running to them, in his human form now and stark naked. Misty’s face went hot, and she spun around and faced the shack’s sun-bleached wall.
    â€œShe’s human,” Graham growled at Dougal. “She expects pants.”
    â€œGoddess,” Dougal said in disgust then ran off again.
    Graham said nothing, making no apology. He leaned against the shack’s doorframe and closed his eyes, his face losing a little color. Misty turned and laid her hand on his arm again, wishing she could do more.
    But she wasn’t an ER nurse, or a doctor, or anything useful like that. She ran a flower shop. She knew everything about flowers—their names, types, and popularity; how they were cultivated; traditional meanings of each flower; which ones were appropriate for what occasion; how to arrange them; and which ones sold the best. Great information for running her business, nothing that would save a Shifter who’d been shot.
    Dougal returned, jeans on and belted. The morning had turned hotter—August days generally reached the triple digits. Clouds were forming over the mountains as well, signaling a monsoon storm that would be ready to come in during the afternoon. If the three of them were out here then . . . Storms had deadly lightning, high winds, and hail, not to mention the flash floods that tore along the washes and overflowed their banks. The three of them could be cut off until the washes ran dry again.
    Dougal ducked under Graham’s arm and helped him around the tiny shack to its shady side, where Graham stretched himself out on the ground. There wasn’t enough room for him to lie inside the shack’s small interior, especially when its floor was covered in rusty bits of metal.
    Dougal peeled Graham’s shirt from him, Graham grunting as the cloth came unglued from his skin. Graham’s six-pack abs were covered with blood, which continued to seep from the slash in his abdomen. Dougal used Graham’s shirt to wipe off excess blood then he stretched