Taming the Night (Creatures of the Night Book 1) by Tisha Wilson Page A

hand.
    “Where you going to stand there and let it bite you!? Don’t you have any sense of self preservation? Obviously not if you think hanging around me is a good idea.”
    She turned and stalked to her saddle bags. She started tossing guns and ammo inside. He went to sit up but a pain bit into his side and he winced. She came back to him immediately. When she tried to pick him up he gave her a sharp look. He wiped away the blood that had trickled from his nose with his already ruined shirt. After she helped him sit with his back up against the wall she backed away.
    “You probably have a broken rib and…” she stopped when she saw the blood oozing from his leg. Her face went ashen.
    “Did it bite you?” she asked kneeling down and pulling up the pants leg.
    “No. It just scratched me.”
    She sighed in relief when she saw that he hadn’t been bitten. “Mon Due! You idiot! You know what I would have had to do if…”
    She shook her head and went back to loading her satchel. “That’s why it’s not safe. You should never have been around me, especially not at night.”
    “You didn’t make that thing come here. This isn’t your fault,” he argued as he clutched at his calf. It was burning like fire where the thing had scratched him.
    “Don’t you see? That’s exactly what I do. I draw them. They come to ole Al like a moth to a flame , cher. I was never safe for you to be around so I’ll just-“
    The sirens pulled into the motel parking lot suddenly. She cursed as she looked out the window. “I should have heard them comin’ fr om a mile away. Why are they so on the spot?” she grouched.
    “They were probably over at the dinner all ready. It’s the only all night dinner in town.”
    She cursed again. She went to the back window and tossed her guns far into the trees. It would do her no good if her guns were taken away for the remainder of the night. She shouldn’t have needed them again. She wouldn’t have let her guard down so thoroughly with Officer Cayman if she’d thought she’d be facing another beast so soon. Where were they all coming from?
    There shouldn’t have been another creature in a hundred mile radius of here she had killed so many a few nights ago. “Bears,” she said as she kept one gun tucked in her waistband and stood square to the door.
    “Bears?” he asked, still a little in shock.
    “A bear got in looking for food, we caught him and shot at him, he ran out the back window after he clawed your leg,” she said as she dumped her ash tray on the floor where the creature had burned. He gave her a questioning look.
    “To make it look like the ashes are from my ash tray. You know what. Why don’t you just say you took a hit to the head and don’t remember anything at all.”
    The police entered the room, guns drawn, and Al could do nothing but put her hands up in surrender.

Chapter Five
     
    “I’m just saying she seems to be around when a lot of strange things are going on. First you’re pulling her over for speeding, she sees your cruiser take a hit, then fixes you up and drives off into the night. Then Russ gets attacked by a bear and he’s still out cold and where was she? There. Then you all just happen to come across a bear in her room and you get ripped to shreds yet again and where was she?” his Uncle railed at him.
    Jerry let his head fall back as the pain killers began wearing off. He’d needed five more stitches on his calf. There were some scratches that were just the depth that they couldn’t be stitched, but needed butterfly bandages to hold them together. The scratches still burned like fire, though the pain was dulled a bit by the drugs. Jerry saw his uncle continue to pace from the corner of his eye. He raked a hand through his salt and pepper hair. If it weren’t for the gray in Victor’s hair, people would probably mistake them for brothers.
    “So you want to haul her in for… trai ning bears to attack people?” Jerry asked as he lifted