The Werewolf Meets His Match

“Prints didn’t come back yet, huh?” She studied her zebra-striped nails. Hank wondered what they’d feel like raking down his back.

The thought caught him so off guard, he shook his head.

“Not yet then.” She nodded.

So she knew a little bit about the system. Repeat offender most likely. Really not anyone he needed to know outside of these walls. He’d keep the fact that they were checking her prints against the national database to himself for the moment. “You want to tell me what happened?”

“I’m sure you read the report. I hit him.”

“Why?”

She flicked her gaze to him. Her big brown eyes held no remorse. “You really care?”

“Humor me.”

She swung her long legs down, planted her feet on the floor and leaned back, her hands on the edge of the cot. “He got handsy with his girlfriend. Knocked her down. I told him not to do it again. He didn’t listen.” She shrugged. “I decided to teach him a lesson since no one else in his life had.”

Hank frowned. He probably would have done the same thing. And left the same amount of bruising. She had to be shifter. Or some kind of supernatural. He inhaled, but the smell of shifter was everywhere in the station with himself, Deputy Cruz and Birdie being here all the time. “What did you say your name was?”

“I didn’t.” With a smirk, she lay down on the cot and returned to inspecting her nails.

Hank went back to his office to start the paperwork on her charges. His inbox chimed as he sat down. He pulled up the message from Clemens Kincaid with the subject line, Your new wife, and opened it, scrolling down to the attached picture. He stared in disbelief, a growl building in his throat. “Hell no. This is the woman I’m supposed to marry?”

“What was that, Hank?” Birdie called out.

“Nothing. And you can cancel the IAFIS search. I already know who she is.” He ran a quick background search, printed out the info and tucked it into a file, then marched back to cell number three and glared at the woman inside it. Flirting with bad girls was one thing.

Marrying one was another.

Anger made his jaw tight. “You’re Ivy Kincaid.”

Her smile dropped and the slightest hint of fear played through her smoky eyes before she dropped her gaze and straightened upright on the cot. “And you’re Hank Merrow.”

Was she afraid of him? He hadn’t expected that. But then, their packs had been enemies since well before either of them was born. Afraid was probably an understatement.

She must be terrified of him. Of what he might do to her. She was being offered to him like a piece of property, all to firm up a deal. Knowing her father, she’d probably had less say about this than he did.

That took the sizzle out of his shock. She had no more to do with this than the man in the moon. With a heavy sigh, he lifted the keys from his belt and unlocked the cell. “Let’s go to my office.”

Hank Merrow was gorgeous. Not average good-looking, not handsome at the right angle, not all right with dim lighting. Gorgeous. Which was both a blessing and a curse. He was the kind of hot that gave a woman wicked thoughts and sucked the sense out of her head. Ivy tried not to fidget in the wooden chair across from his desk, but parts of her were getting uncomfortably warm.

She tried to remind herself that Hank Merrow, while still the enemy and a complete question mark, might also turn out to be her salvation. It was a helluva shot, but once her father had told her she’d be marrying a Merrow to seal the new treaty, she’d decided to think positively. To make the most of this new situation. To believe that life really could get better.

Because the alternative was unthinkable. And this certainly couldn’t be worse.

Hank’s lips were moving.

She leaned forward. “What?”

“I said how long have you been in town?”

“Oh, uh, just since last night.”

“First night in town and you get drunk, start a fight and end up arrested? What do you plan on doing for an encore?”

She crossed her arms. So he was a hard ass. She’d had a lot of practice dealing with those. “I wasn’t drunk. I’d had two beers. And I didn’t really start that fight—”

“You already told me you hit him.” He opened a file and read. “And I quote, ‘Then I punched him.’”

“Look, I know what I said, but the guy was a creep and he deserved it. I told you what happened. He was roughing up his girlfriend.”

Hank stared at her, his blue eyes stupidly mesmerizing. He must really be something in full wolf form. Finally he blew out a breath. “I’ll talk him into dropping the charges.”

“You will? Thank you. I guess you don’t want your fiancée to have an arrest record, huh?” She smiled hopefully.

“Did you think I wouldn’t check up on you?” He flipped to a new page in the file. “You already have one. And don’t use that word.”

“What word?” She knew perfectly well what word he meant. She just wanted him to say it so he’d get used to the idea.

“Fiancée.”

The way he grimaced when he said it almost made her snort. “Don’t worry. You only have to call me that for three more days.”

He frowned. “Why’s that?”

“Because after that I’ll be your wife.”

His frown deepened.

She settled into the chair a little more then pointed at the file. “That arrest was for protesting the use of a rather controversial pesticide in Smoky Mountains National Park.”