Taken by Midnight (Midnight Breed 8)

He carried her out of the refrigerated room like she was nothing but feathers in his arms. At five foot eight and fit, a tomboy from the time she took her first steps, Jenna had never been the type to be toted around like some kind of fragile fairy princess. As a former cop, she'd never expected that from a man, nor wanted it.

She had always been the protector, the first one into danger. She hated that she was so vulnerable now, but Brock's solid arms felt so good underneath her, she couldn't muster the will to be offended. She held on tight as he strode through the small plant, past the grisly meat hangers and more than one broken, lifeless person lying on the floor.

Jenna turned her head away and buried her face in Brock's muscular chest as they cleared the last room of the plant and exited to the outside. It was dusk on the street, the snow-packed alleyway and crouching buildings bathed in the darkening blue of evening.

As Brock stepped off the stoop, a sleek black SUV rolled up from a cross street. It came to a stop at the curb and Kade jumped out of the backseat.

"Ah, fuck," Alex's mate growled. "I smell blood."

"She's been shot," Brock said, his deep voice grave.

Kade stepped closer. "You okay?" he asked her, his light gray eyes taking on a faint yellow light in the gathering darkness. Jenna nodded her reply, watching as the points of his lengthening fangs glinted behind his upper lip. "Niko and Renata are with me," he told Brock. "What's the situation inside?"

Brock grunted, dark humor beneath the dangerous tone of his voice.

"Messy."

"Figures," Kade said, quirking a wry look at him. "You don't look so good yourself, my man. Nice hit to the shoulder. We need to get Jenna back to the compound before she loses any more blood. Renata's behind the wheel of the Rover. She can take her in while the rest of us clean up inside."

"The human is my responsibility," Brock said, his chest vibrating against Jenna's ear. "She stays with me. I will bring her to the compound."

Jenna caught the look of curiosity that flashed across Kade's face at Brock's statement. He narrowed his eyes but said nothing as Brock strode past him to the idling SUV, Jenna carried lightly in his arms.

Chapter Six

How we doing?" Renata asked Brock from behind the wheel of the black Rover as the vehicle sped out of South Boston on a course for the Order's compound. Her green eyes flicked to the rearview mirror, slender dark brows knit in a frown. "Our ETA's about fifteen minutes out.

Everything okay back there?"

"Yeah," Brock replied, glancing down to where Jenna lay, resting quietly across his lap in the backseat. He had sliced off one of the seatbelts and tied it around her thigh as a tourniquet, hoping it would help stanch the blood loss. "She's hanging in."

Her eyes were closed, her lips slightly parted and tinged with blue from the cold she'd been subjected to inside the meat chiller. Her body still trembled under the cover of his leather duster, though he guessed her shuddering was more in reaction to shock than any amount of discomfort.

His Breed talent was making sure of that. With one palm cupped around her nape, the other stroking her temple, he drew Jenna's pain into himself.

Renata cleared her throat pointedly as she watched him in the mirror.

"What about you, big guy? Hell of a lot of blood back there. You sure you wouldn't rather drive and I'll look after her until we get to the compound?

Say the word and I'll pull over. Won't take but a minute."

"Keep driving. Situation's under control back here," Brock said, although he wondered if Niko's shrewd Breedmate would buy it, given that his growled reply was spoken through gritted teeth and fully extended fangs.

It had been hard to contain his reaction to Jenna bleeding when he first found her inside the building. Now that he was trapped in close confines with her, feeling the heat of her spilling blood through the leather of his duster, smelling its coppery fragrance, and hearing the low thud of each heartbeat that pushed still more blood from her wound, Brock was living a private hell in the back of the SUV.

He was Breed, and there was none among his kind who could resist the pull of fresh human blood. It didn't help him any that the last time he'd fed had been ... hell, he wasn't even sure. Probably pushing a week, which would have been bad even in the best of circumstances. And these were hardly the best of circumstances.

Brock focused all his effort on pulling Jenna's pain. Easier to keep his mind off his hunger that way. It also helped keep him from noticing how soft her skin was, and how the curves of her body fit so nicely against him.

The absorbed pain of her injury--and the slighter irritation of his own--was the only thing that kept his body from having yet another sort of reaction to her, as well. Even then, he couldn't totally ignore the uncomfortable tightness of his fatigues, or the way the light flutter of her pulse against his fingertips where they rested against her nape made him yearn to put his mouth against her instead.

To taste her, in all the ways a man could crave a woman.

It took a great deal of effort to shake the thought from his mind. Jenna was a mission, that's all. And she was human, with the fragility and short shelf life to go along with it. Although if he was being honest with himself, he'd be the first to admit that he had long preferred mortal females over their sisters who were born Breedmates.

When it came to romantic entanglements, he tried to keep things casual. Nothing too permanent. Nothing that might last long enough for him to let down a woman who had grown to trust him.

Yeah, he'd already been there, done that. And he damn well had the guilt and self-loathing to prove it. No desire to go down that particular stretch of road ever again.