Skipping out on my protection was something I first did by accident when I was six. I had run off after a ball or something while my bodyguard was looking the other way. When I got the ball, I found I was on my own. I liked it. It didn’t last long, of course, but that brief period of freedom made a definite mark and I determined that free was the way to be. From then on, I ditched my bodyguards whenever I could, which was not very often at the age of six, but as I got older, I got better at it and found more fun things to do with my freedom. By the time of my mother’s death when I was twelve, I had perfected the art, and the loss of a parent pushed me off the rails a little, especially as my father, in his grief, lost interest in me for a few years. It was during these all important formative years when I discovered boys and associated activities that I became the person I am today, for better and worse.

I may have drifted from the subject a little there – point is; I knew how to skip out on my protection. For all that I understood that I needed more protection and was grateful to my dad for arranging it and coming up with this clever plan of using the human Wolf Takers, I had also meant what I said earlier about not changing my life for these people.

“I’m going to take a shower,” I called back into my apartment to the three guys, closing the bathroom door behind me. Once I was inside and the shower was going, I shed the bathrobe that hid my partying clothes and fished my heels out of the airing cupboard. Wolf Takers may be strong and quick and great at fighting werewolves, but they are not bred to be bodyguards, and the brain of a 20-year-old party girl is more than a match for them if they try to stand between her and a good time. I opened the window and climbed down the drainpipe like I’d been doing since I was fifteen. Sooner or later they would notice how long I had been in the shower, but by then I would be in a bar. It was a big city with a lot of bars and they couldn’t search them all. If they had been werewolves they could have picked up my scent, but they were just humans.

Naturally, I wound up in a human bar, chatting to a group of guys who had no idea what I was – maybe I would tell them in the morning.

“Can I buy you a drink?” the second hottest one asked.

I pulled a face. “If I let you buy me a drink then all your friends will want to and it’d be like you’re all competing for me. So yeah, JD and Coke.”

The third hottest guy put up his hand. “I’ve got next.”

I grinned. “Keep up that attitude and this is going to be a great night for me.”

Usually, when you play guys off each other like this then they start to drop out one by one, the secret is to pick one - at least - before all the ones you want have lost interest. It’s a good way of getting to know which one you might want without picking, and, frankly, it’s a lot of fun. Also a cheap way to get blasted.

It was a fun evening, I danced, I drank, I made out with the guys a little and I narrowed my field of interest to the tall handsome Mark, who had clearly spent some time in the gym polishing his guns. He might even have given my bodyguards a run for their money. Not wanting to get too drunk to enjoy myself – and definitely not wanting Mark to get too drunk for me to enjoy myself – I dragged his handsome head down to my level and whispered in his ear, “Take me home.”

Mark grinned and I saw him give a smug look at his friends; he had won and they had lost.

We headed out of the heat and crowd of the bar into the cool night air, arms about each other, kissing as we went. In all honesty, Mark had seemed pretty dumb to me in the bar, but tonight I wasn’t looking for intellectual conversation. As we turned into a side-street, our kissing became more intense and it began to seem like we wouldn’t make it back to Mark’s bed. He pushed me back against the wall and I ran my hands through his hair as our tongues danced in each other’s mouths.

Then, suddenly, Mark was gone, ripped away from me by an unseen hand and flung to the ground. For a split-second, I thought my bodyguards had somehow caught up with me but then that same hand shot forwards out of the darkness, grabbing me by the throat and pinning me against the wall. Three men stood in front of me, deep hoods covering their heads and masking their features. From their scent, I knew they were werewolves, though in human form, for now. One of them turned to Mark, still on the ground.

“Run away, little man.”

Mark didn’t even hesitate, didn’t even stop to look at me, he sprang to his feet and ran away as fast as his cowardly legs would carry him. I guess I couldn’t blame him. This had never been anything but a casual hook up; why should he die for me? But I liked to think that if our roles had been reversed, I would have had more balls.

“You escaped us once, man-bitch,” the leader of the hoodies now addressed me. “This time you die.”

I changed into wolf form on the instant, my skirt splitting, my top stretching wide, my shoes bursting from my feet. But my attackers had had the same thought, and as I roared my lupine defiance, I found I was facing down three hulking werewolves. I struggled against the leader but he backhanded me viciously across my snout and I tasted blood in my mouth.

One of the others produced an axe – I was going to be executed.

Then, everything seemed to happen at once. There was a dark blur in front of my eyes, as something dropped from the building behind me, landing on the outstretched arm that held me about the throat. The lead wolf screamed in pain as his arm snapped and he let me go. The other two wolves seemed temporarily stunned by what had happened, giving the dark blur, which I now recognized as a man, time to throw a left like a sledgehammer into the face of the one with the axe. The force of the blow nearly took the wolf off his feet and the axe went up in the air to be deftly caught by the man. It was a human man – no question – and as shock receded and I could see clearly again, I realized it was Jackson. As he caught the axe, he brought it around in a sinuous wheel, burying it in the skull of the third wolf, then brought it sharply back into the chest of the one from whom he had taken the weapon.

The broken armed leader had regained his feet and decided he no longer liked these odds. Nursing his fractured arm, he took off, still in wolf form, leaving the carnage of the side-street behind him.

The whole fight had unfurled in a matter of seconds. Whatever else I thought about Jackson and his kind, he fought like a wolf and moved like a panther. I couldn’t help admiring the strength and speed. I’d never known a human like that. A human who could take on a wolf? That could really be something. For a wicked moment, my brain trespassed into areas I was not comfortable with.

As the final wolf’s echoing footsteps died away, Jackson cast aside the bloody axe and turned to look at me.

“You stupid little kid!”

He could have called me a bitch – although, as I said, that’s not really a big deal to a wolf. He could have called me any number of far more offensive names, but I don’t think any of them would have stung or angered me like ‘little kid’. Who the hell did he think he was?

I roared my rage into his face before remembering to change back so I could berate him in a way he would understand.

“What do you mean ‘little kid’?”

“I mean, that no grown up – by which, I mean, no one over the age of eighteen – would have done something as self-indulgent, as stupid and as dangerous as what you did tonight.” Jackson wasn’t bothered by my roaring as a wolf or shouting as a human, to him I remained a little kid, and I was to be told off as such. “You knew that there were people trying to kill you and you still sneaked out. You knew they were trying to kill you because you hook up with humans and what’s the first thing you do? You hook up with a human. Do you have a death wish or something? Or are you just so self-involved that you genuinely think you can’t be killed?”

“I’m not letting these bastards change who I am or what I do,” I snapped back at him, finally able to get a word in.

“They’ll change you from a living person to a dead one, and you won’t get any say in that,” Jackson replied. “Just to be clear; as a person, I don’t care if you live or die. I don’t imagine the world is going to be any the worse off for the loss of you. But if you die then I don’t get paid. Also, I have a feeling your dad is not the forgiving type.”

I’d had enough of this. “If you’re quite done being a jerk, I’m going home.”

I started to walk away but Jackson grabbed my arm, hauling me back. “This way.”

“Home is this way.”

“My car is this way.”

“I’m walking.”

“The hell you are.”

He began to pull me along by the arm in the direction of his car and, for some reason, I found myself allowing him to take me.

“You know I could pull off your arm, right?”

“That’s what those wolves back there thought and you saw how that worked out for them.”

“You took them by surprise. You might want to start being nicer to me if you don’t want me to kill you where you stand.”

“Go ahead and do it then,” spat Jackson.

“How did you find me?”

Jackson snorted in derision. “You’re not that big of a mystery, Miss Hokkai. Once we found you were gone and realized you were dead set on doing the dumbest thing imaginable, then we knew you’d have gone to the most dangerous place you could. There’re a few bars in Hokkai territory that you’d have to be a complete moron to go near, so we split up to check them.”

Yanking on my arm, he threw me against the side of his car then opened the back door.

“Get in.”

“No.” I was just disobeying for the hell of it now. I was actually kind of grateful for the lift back, but I didn’t want there to be any misunderstanding about who was in charge here.

“Get in the damn car.”

“Make me, if you’re so all that.”

Jackson glared. “Look, tomorrow, when I tell your father about what you did tonight, he’s going to tear you a new one. Don’t make things worse on yourself.”

“You’re not going to tell my father anything,” I replied.

“Oh yes I…”

“If you tell him I went out,” I interrupted, “then you’ve got to tell him that I gave you the slip. Very easily, as it happens. You’ve got to tell him that it took you so long to find me I was able to pick up a dude and get attacked. You’ve got to tell him how close I came to getting my head cut off. How do you think he’s going to react to that, smart guy?”

From the look on Jackson’s face, these were not factors that he had considered. Frustration tussled with anger across his features.

“Get in the car.”

“Why don’t you get in the car and I’ll drive.”

Jackson scoffed. “This is a nice car. It’s European. I don’t think you can handle the stick.”

“I never met a stick I couldn’t handle.”

“Or one that you didn’t, I bet. But even so, you’re not getting your hands on my stick. Get in the car.”

I stood right up to him, my head not much higher than his chest. “Make me.”

I didn’t actually expect him to, so I was caught unawares when Jackson grabbed my arms and tossed me onto the back seat, squealing in anger as I went. But as I went, I caught hold of a handful of his shirt and pulled, dragging him with me and ripping the stretched T-shirt he wore.

Jackson looked at the tear. “You little bitch, that’s my favorite T-shirt.”

“You should get one that fits.” On a whim, I grabbed at the rip and tore in further, revealing the sculpted abs of Jackson’s stomach – damn, he was fine.

“You little…” Jackson stared as if he could not quite believe what I had just done. “If I’d done that to someone, my dad would have taken his belt to me. It’s a shame your daddy never put you across his knee and gave you the whupping you deserve. I’ve half a mind to do it myself.”

“Just you try it,” I growled. If he laid a finger on me, I really would hurt him – I didn’t care how they raised their children in Wolf Taker communities, but if anyone tried that shit with me, they were going home without their intestines.

“I don’t hurt women.” The way he said it made me wonder if I had touched a chord, but I had no brain space now to examine the statement further.

“I’m walking home.” I grabbed for the door handle behind me but Jackson’s hand was on the lock before I could pull it, and his other swiftly encircled my wrist. I grabbed for the lock and he took possession of my other hand. In the limited confines of the car, we struggled, him on top of me, trying to control someone he knew could turn wolf and tear him limb from limb in an instant. I had to give him that – the guy had balls. In the heat of the struggle, our bodies moved closer and I felt a tightness in my stomach that I normally associated with a very different physical activity.

Much as I like human males, much as Jackson was the most impressive example of a human male I had ever seen, and however viscerally attractive I reluctantly found him, I wasn’t comfortable feeling these hot, tight feelings about a Wolf Taker. I wrenched my hands free, which I guess I could have done at any point, and pushed Jackson back. He hovered over me, and in his eyes I thought I saw some of the heated confusion that must have been in my own.

I needed to do something to break the moment, something stupid, something childish, something to remind him that I was a ‘little kid’ and restore our relationship to antagonism. Because God alone knew what would happen if things went the other way. My eyes lit on the rip in his shirt and, without even thinking, I grabbed it and pulled again, tearing the T-shirt wide open into a tattered waistcoat, framing his superb torso. I hadn’t really considered that. Yes, I had done something childish and stupid, but I had also made more of his strong body visible to me.

Jackson looked down at his torn clothes in shock. “What the hell is wrong with you? Let’s see how you like it!”

I don’t think he was thinking clearly either. When I had turned wolf earlier, my denim skirt had split up one thigh. Now, Jackson grabbed the skirt and yanked the tear wide, his powerful muscles busting the waistband so the skirt lay in tattered halves across my hips. From the look on Jackson’s face, he had not thought out the consequences any more than I had. The look of confusion I had noted in his eyes had been replaced by one of fierce heat as he stared at my bared loins. The sapphire blue triangle of my panties, fringed in black lace, was at the center of his vision, and seemed to palpitate under the intensity of his gaze. It seemed to me it might have burst into flames any second, either from the heat of Jackson’s stare from above, or the heat of my core below. That fragile garment was all that stood between us and a really bad idea, and right now, it was doing a lousy job, seeming to accentuate the heat rather than quench it.

Jackson swallowed, trying to get control of himself, but a growing bulge in the front of his jeans told me that control was proving hard to find.

“Will you be good now, and stay in the car?” I could hear the ragged strain in Jackson’s voice as he fought his own desire.

“I’ll be good wherever you want me to be,” I answered. I knew it was a bad idea but flirting is second nature to me and… damn it all, I really wanted him.

Jackson’s breathing was getting heavier and more noticeable. “You’re making this a lot harder.”

My eyes flicked to the constrained lump in his pants. “I can tell.”

“Damn it.” Jackson shook his head clear and pulled back away from me, sucking in air as if it was cooling his system. “I’ll drive us back.”

I nodded, using the tattered remains of my skirt to cover my near nakedness. The danger had passed, thank God Jackson had had the self-control to pull back from something we would have both regretted. Enjoyed, but regretted. Really fucking enjoyed, but regretted. Just because you want something so badly you can taste desire like aluminum in your mouth, like the tang of adrenalin, just because your whole body is crying out for something, screaming with the need to be satisfied, just because it would feel so incredibly good to give way to that desperate need; doesn’t mean it’s right.

Jackson stepped back out of the car door and I breathed in with a slight sigh of disappointment that I could not suppress, a little keening noise of thwarted desire. He almost managed to get the door closed. But not quite.

In the next instant, Jackson was back in the car on top of me and I dragged him to me, tasting his lips and feeling a relief that burned hotter than desire flowing through me.

“Yes, yes, yes,” I whined through gritted teeth. Jackson’s weight pressed me into the seat of the car and I felt him against me; hot, hard and so very big. I tugged at his clothes, unwilling to wait another second for a moment that I had thought was not to come.

Just because something isn’t right, just because it’s a dumb idea, just because you’ll regret it and it will have consequences you are ill-prepared to deal with; doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it.