Night Embrace

Whatever was she going to do now?

 

The illegal biker-looking alien dressed all in black was huge. She didn't dare leave him on the street unattended. What if their attackers came back? Or some street punk rolled him?

 

 

 

This wasNew Orleans where most anything could happen to a person while conscious.

 

Unconscious…

 

Create PDF files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer (http://www.novapdf.com) Well, there was no telling what the unsavory ones might do to him, so leaving him alone was not an option.

 

Just as her panic was getting the better of her, she heard someone call her name.

 

She looked around until she saw Wayne Santana's beat-up blue Dodge Ram pulling up to the curb. At thirty-three,Wayne had a ruggedly handsome face that looked a lot older. His black hair was laced liberally with gray.

 

She breathed a sigh of relief at seeing him there.

 

He rolled his window the rest of the way down and leaned out. "Hey, Sunshine, what's going on?"

 

"Wayne, could you help me get this guy into your truck?"

 

He looked really skeptical about that. "Is he drunk?"

 

"No, he's hurt."

 

"Then you should call an ambulance."

 

"I can't." She gave him a pleading look. "Please,Wayne ? I need to get him back to my place."

 

"Is he a friend of yours?" he asked even more skeptically.

 

"Well, no. We just kind of collided out here.

 

"

 

"Then leave him. The last thing you need is to get involved with another biker. It's none of our business what happens to him.

 

"

 

 

 

"Wayne!

 

"

 

"He could be a criminal, Sunshine.

 

"

 

"How could you say such a thing?

 

"

 

 

 

Waynehad been convicted of involuntary manslaughter seventeen years ago. After he'd served his time, he'd spent several months trying to find a job. With no money, no place to live, and no one willing to hire an ex-con to do anything, he was on the brink of committing another crime to return to jail when he'd applied for a job at her father's club.

 

Against her father's protests, Sunshine had hired him.

 

Five years later,Wayne had never missed a day of work or been late. He was her father's best employee.

 

"Please,Wayne ?" she asked, giving him the puppy-dog look that never failed to bend the men in her life to her will.

 

As he left the truck to help her,Wayne made a series of irritated noises. "One day, that big heart of yours is going to get you into trouble. Do you knowanything about this man?"

 

 

 

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"No." All she knew was that he had saved her life when no one else would have bothered. Surely such a man wouldn't hurt her.

 

She and Wayne struggled to get the unknown man upright, but it wasn't easy.

 

"Jeez,"Wayne muttered as they staggered with him between them. "He's huge and he weighs a friggin'

 

ton."

 

Sunshine concurred. The man was at least six feet five inches of lean, solid muscle. Even with the thick leather motorcycle jacket concealing his upper torso, there was no doubt just how well toned and muscular he was.

 

She'd never felt such a hard, steely body in her life.

 

After some doing, they finally got him into the truck.

 

As they headed toward her father's club, Sunshine held the stranger's head on her shoulder and brushed his wavy blond hair back from the chiseled features of his face.

 

There was a wild, untamed look about him that reminded her of some ancient warrior. His golden hair brushed against his shoulders in a loose style that said he was attentive to his appearance, but not obsessive about it.

 

Dark brown eyebrows arched over his closed eyes. His face was ruggedly scrumptious with a full day's growth of beard. Even unconscious, he was compelling and drop-dead gorgeous, and his nearness stirred something needful deep inside her.

 

But what she liked most about this stranger was the warm masculine and leather scent of him. It made her want to nuzzle his neck and inhale the heady mixture until she was drunk with it.

 

"So,"Wayne said as he drove. "What happened to him? Do you know?"

 

"He got hit by a Mardi Gras float."

 

Even in the dim light of the truck's cab, she could tellWayne was giving her the are-you-nuts? stare.

 

 

 

"There's no parade tonight. Where did it come from?"

 

"I don't know. I guess he must have ticked off the gods or something."

 

"Huh?"

 

She brushed her hand through the man's tousled blond hair and toyed with the two thin braids that hung from his left temple as she answeredWayne 's question. "It was a big Bacchus float. I was just thinking this poor guy must have offended our patron god of excess to have been run over by him."

 

Waynemuttered under his breath. "Must be another frat-boy prank. Seems like every year one of them

 

Create PDF files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer (http://www.novapdf.com) is stealing a float and taking a joy ride in it. I wonder where they'll leave it parked this time?"

 

"Well, they tried to park it on my friend here. I'm just glad they didn't kill him.

 

"

 

"I'm sure he will be too, when he wakes up.