Come Out Swinging (Reach for the Moon Book 2), Sam Hall [leveled readers .TXT] 📗

all the devilry had leached out of him. He stared at the man with a look of pure resignation, his jaw tightening, something that only softened when I took his hand. For some reason, he looked a little haunted when I did so, something I needed to chase away when we were out of here.

“So what do you want for this information? We need to know where that place is. We need to get inside it and take a look around. Someone gave my father medicine he shouldn’t have had, which is what killed him,” I said with a boldness I didn’t feel.

“Go to the police. Get a warrant,” Aidan said, almost pleading with me, tucking his dick back into his pants and sitting down. “But that’s not what you want, is it?”

“He died, Aidan, before I got a chance to…” The lump that always threatened to close off my throat but I managed to keep back rose, Micah’s hand tightening around mine. “I need to know. I need to pursue this, and I need to bring whoever the fuck did this to justice. If I’ve gotta get down on my knees—”

“Don’t. Fuck, please do not finish that sentence,” Aidan said, taking a long, shuddering breath. “My wolf wants all of it, every single thing you’re thinking right now, because he thinks that’s the only way he’s gonna get next to his mate. I can feel it, your mouth, your fingers… You kneeling down on the carpet—”

“You don’t want her this way. It’d be a death sentence to any hope you’ve got,” Micah said in a deadly tone. “She’ll hate you, and I won’t let you do that to her.”

“I don’t,” Aidan agreed finally, forcing one long breath, then another. “I won’t even push for a date or anything out of this.”

“What a gentleman,” Micah muttered.

“I hope you fucking realise what you’ve got,” Aidan shot back, his amber eyes spearing into my packmate’s. “You sleep with her, smell her, see her in the morning.”

Micah lifted our hands, pressing his mouth to the back of my hand, then just held it there, breathing me in. My eyes slid sideways, catching him staring at me over the top of them.

“And I thank the goddess for every damn moment. I’m not a religious man. Always thought the Mother Moon stuff was just some superstitious crap brought over from the old country, but now? Every breath I take is for her. I want her so much, my hands cramp from holding myself back, but the need, the desire you feel?” He shook his head. “That’s just the tip of the iceberg. If you ever get beyond that initial pull, if she decides to consider your suit…” Micah’s short bark of laughter sounded more desperate than amused. “It gets worse, so much worse. You stop wanting, and you start…” Micah’s eyes returned to me, blazing so bright a silver as to appear molten. “It stops being about her sweet little cunt and that fucking banging body, and it just becomes her.”

I saw the moment when he drew back, packed everything back behind his hot eyed façade. Micah let my hand go, straightened in his chair, and looked at Aidan head-on.

“Someone tried to kill her for this information,” Micah said, tapping the photos. “They tried to beat her fucking brains out and left her for dead. When we woke up, when I saw her lying there, still, in a pool of her own blood? I’ve been in some tough fucking fights before, faced down blokes three times my size, but nothing scared the shit out of me like that did. She nearly slipped away, the woman who you knot for.”

“Fuck it…” Aidan cursed, ripping open a drawer and dragging a massive bunch of keys out. “I have to take you there, just you two. I can’t have the street seeing your whole pack going into this property.” He watched us stiffen. “Micah’s known in town as a damn fine fighter, he could put me on my arse if I tried anything untoward.”

“So could I,” I replied.

“Yeah?” Aidan’s grin was shocking in its immediacy. “I think I’d like to see that.” Then he nodded and said, “I’ll take you and Micah to Selma’s place. There’s an empty place next to it that we’re looking to rent out, so it’ll look like we’re showing that to you. If we go in through the backdoor, no one should see us.”

“Thanks, Aidan,” I said, feeling a pang of guilt now. Nothing I’d said wasn’t true, but the way we were getting what we needed was now not sitting so well with me.

We got to our feet anyway and followed him out into the office, letting the guys know what was gonna happen, listened to their grumbled complaints, then followed Aidan out to his car. He watched us when we got in the back, taking in every little gesture, every bit of contact, until finally, we had our seatbelts clipped on.

“Your cousin is renting half of the old dance studio,” Aidan said. “That’s where the shots were taken. It’s under a false name. She pays for it using an offshore account she set up. I told her she would’ve been smarter to rent a place out of town, but she was adamant it needed to be here. I checked with her, and she said I was fine to bring clients through to take a look at the other side during the day when she’s at work, but if it gets rented, she’d be moving out. Couldn’t persuade her to take on the lease to the other side.” Aidan snorted. “Anyway, let’s go and take a look.”

Chapter 9

It was when we got inside that I started to feel ill at ease. The space was still beautiful, but where we’d been herded in as little girls, wearing dancing costumes for Madam and practising the moves she taught us in front of the wall of mirrors, now the studio was bisected by a