Feral Instincts (The Feral Series) by Erin Ashley

laugh.
He was surprised to find that he actually enjoyed spending time with the little
female. Even before he had joined Victor’s guardians he had rarely spent much
time with the fairer sex. The more respectable women always seemed nervous
around him and the other kind of women only wanted him for one thing. Not that
he was complaining.
    “What
is this room for?” Ava asked peering through the glass window in the door.
    “This
is our training room.” Joseph looked in to make sure no one was inside yet. “Do
you want to see it?”
    “Sure.”
Ava was curious to see what a vampire training room was all about and slipped
through the door that Joseph held open for her. She walked into a huge room
with mirrors on one wall and several pieces of training equipment. One entire
wall was covered in various weapons, several that Ava didn’t even recognize.
Another section of the room had a padded floor.
    Ava
looked around with her hands on the curve of her hips. “So if you are all big
bad vampire men, why do you have to train? I mean, you are all already
naturally bigger, faster, stronger right?” Ava looked at Joseph out of the
corner of her eye, curious to see how he would react to her teasing.
    Joseph
grinned at her, liking the wicked little gleam that he saw in her eyes. “Well
yes we are bigger, faster, stronger… thank you for noticing…” Ava choked on her
laugh. “… but just because you have the speed and strength doesn’t mean you
know what to do with it. Control is something that must be learned and
continuously honed.”
    “So
what do you do to practice this control ?” Do you practice kah rah tae ?”
Ava joked while striking a fierce karate pose. All of the trauma from the past
few days had caught up to her and she was feeling a little slap happy. She
needed a break from her brooding and self-pity. She needed to play.
    Joseph
laughed out loud this time. “Something like that.”
    Ava
still held her awesome karate pose and turned her karate hands, wiggling the
tips of her fingers as though to say “bring it on”.
    Joseph
raised an eyebrow and began to advance on Ava with a determined look in his
eye. Oh dam! Did he think I was serious! What was I thinking! Ava
squeaked in alarm and only managed to take one step in retreat before Joseph
was on her. He had her spun around with both of her hands contained in one of
his larger ones while his muscled arms trapped her with her back pressed
against his chest.
    Joseph
inhaled Ava’s warm feminine scent, enjoying her small curves pressed against
his larger body for a moment. Ava had frozen in his arms, not sure what her
next move should be. Abruptly Joseph released her, causing her to take a quick
step to catch herself. He was still chuckling and muttered something about
kittens with claw. Ava huffed and blew a strand of hair out of her eyes and ran
her fingers through her curls in a nervous gesture.
    “Would
you like to learn?”
    “What?”
    “Would
you like to learn to be bigger, faster, and stronger?” Joseph used her own
words to tease her.
    “Me?!”
Ava’s voice cracked in a squeak again. “Ah-hem. Me?”
    “Why
not you? You are now a vampire. Your body is going to be changing and you are
going to have speed and strength that you have never had as a human. You are
going to need to learn how to use your new abilities. You will need to learn
control.”
    Ava
looked at Joseph wide eyed. Comically visualizing herself with enormous biceps
like Joseph had. “Will I be strong like you?”
    Joseph
smiled at her. “No, having been a human that has been turned you are a halfbreed.
Most of the guardians are Breed. Breed vampires are purebloods and are the
strongest of the vampires. They are vampires born from pureblood vampire
parents.”
    “So
you are a pureblood?”
    “Yes.”
    “…
and I’m like… some kind of mutt?!” For some reason Ava found this hysterically
funny and started laughing. “Oh my god, that’s terrible!”
    Joseph
smiled at