The Way You Bite

By Zoe Forward

When King Werewolf shows up in veterinarian Vee Scarpa’s ER, she’s livid. Her father, North American head honcho vampire, has threatened a chilling or else if she “ accidentally” helped a wolf again, especially since they’re at war. But she’s tempted by the sexy wolf. And his deadly blood calls to her in a way that should set off warning bells...

A promise to his brother in arms obliges Lexan Dimitrov to rescue the aristocrat vampire before her family discovers her secret—a secret Vee herself isn’t even aware of. What he didn’t expect was to find her sexy-as-hell. He’s not into vamps, yet the inescapable heat building between them is a delicious temptation guaranteed to end in total disaster.

Each book in the Blood Wars series is STANDALONE:
* The Way You Bite
* Nightshade's Bite

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Jul 3, 2017
• ISBN: 9781640631328

Zoe Forward

Award winning author, Zoe Forward is a hopeless romantic who can’t decide between paranormal and contemporary romance. So, she writes both. Her novels have won numerous awards including the Readers’ Choice Heart of Excellence, Golden Quill, Carolyn Readers Choice Award, and the Booksellers’ Best Award. When she’s not typing at her laptop, she’s tying on a karate belt for her son or cleaning up the newest pet mess from the menagerie that occupies her house. She’s a small animal veterinarian caring for a wide range of furry creatures, although there has been the occasional hermit crab. She’s madly in love with her globe trotting conservation ecologist husband who plans to save all the big cats on the planet, and she’s happiest when he returns to their home.

Book preview

To H, whose middle name should be Trouble.

Chapter One

Fifty-five minutes until wedding kickoff. She was going to be late.

Wait up, Dr. Scarpa. The request came from across the veterinary hospital’s main treatment room.

Vee Scarpa whirled, one step shy of exiting.

One of the day doctors, moonlighting as an overnight fill-in, flipped her blonde, frizzy braid over her shoulder and stomped Vee’s way. The doctor had to dodge the techs triaging a Labrador with a bleeding paw. She huffed to a parking spot in Vee’s personal space, close enough to rain spittle.

"Room One kicked me out. Says he’ll only see you. Actually, he said the Dr. Scarpa. Funny, ’cause he’s a new client. It’s a stat, but he won’t let the dog out of his sight for us to triage it. The owner also wouldn’t let anyone touch it even though the thing is bleeding a river. She paused with a dramatic eye-roll and snort. Fine with me if you see it. Looks like it’s a biter." She held out the chart.

It’s five after nine. I should’ve left over a half hour ago. Vee eyed the chart as if it was toxic.

I hate after-hours emergency. If I wasn’t getting paid extra, I wouldn’t be here. I’ve got no idea why you choose to do this long term. The doctor shrugged and threw the chart on the counter. She snatched a new chart from the ever-dutiful tech, Crystal, who grimaced.

Vee flashed Crystal a supportive smile as the temperamental veterinarian strode away. She stared at the discarded chart for a few seconds before her give-a-shit meter spat out a maybe-I-should.

Don’t do it. Seeing this patient would make her late. Her appearance in one hour was mandatory. Tonight would’ve been a good night to take off, but she needed the shift. Only another three months on vet ER pay and she’d have enough money saved to leave this life behind and disappear.

Shepherd mix. Fight wounds, she read. At least it wasn’t another heatstroke emergency. The record-breaking heat wave in Charlotte was atypical for October in North Carolina. A dog fight, however, meant at least an hour between the sedation, wound care, and recovery. If this required general anesthesia, then it might take even longer. If the dog required surgery, then she’d have to punt it to another doctor. Maybe it wouldn’t be severe. An antibiotic, some pain relief, and see-ya-later.

Want me to go in with you? Crystal materialized at her left elbow.

Sure. Get any history from—she glanced at the name on the chart—Mr. Vorste?

What you see is it. He wouldn’t even put his monster dog on the scale. The guy may be hot in a dark, Goth sort of way, but he’s really odd. I didn’t get the feeling he speaks English well. He’s Eastern European or Russian or something. I’m pretty sure that dog isn’t a shepherd. If so, it’s mixed with Wolfhound or Newfie. Be careful. It lunged when I tried to take its temperature.

Dread twisted her stomach. Please let it be just a Newfie mix, not something else. Is it up to date on rabies?

Nope. Crystal’s eyebrows shot up in judgment. She’d profiled and condemned this client as one of those who viewed rabies vaccines and any level of preventive care as unimportant. Those people considered a pet to be a right, not a responsibility, an attitude that permeated certain populations around town.

Vee glanced at the unhelpful chart again. She took a deep breath to attempt a mental scan to see if she could pick up any nonhumans in the vicinity. Between exhaustion and blood hunger, focusing to do an effective scan was difficult.

Crystal interrupted her scan by touching her arm. She flinched while the tech said, You going to see it?

I suppose so. Don’t get bitten. The last thing we need is the nightmare of phoning Animal Control and rabies quarantining a dog tonight. Let’s wrap this up quickly. I should’ve been on my way to an event twenty minutes ago, and I’ve still got to change out of scrubs. Grab a muzzle.

A thirtyish guy slouching on the client bench greeted her in the exam room. His odd golden eyes tracked her entry. With an abrupt movement, he pushed at his dark hair and sat up straight. The short, choppy strands were too heavily pomaded into stylish disarray to dare alter direction. At his feet, a supersized black shepherd mix scrutinized her with eyes a shade too pale blue for natural dog irises.

One sniff and her pulse skyrocketed. Werewolf.

What were they doing here?

Only the king was rumored to have eyes as light in color as this animal. This couldn’t be him. Not in her ER.

Her client unfolded his over-six-foot muscular frame to stand, forcing her to look up. She wasn’t a shrimp at five-six, but he had many inches on her. His move to an onlooker may appear respectful, but he meant to intimidate her.

He extended a strong hand. Eric Vorste.

She glared at his hand. A public handshake was a symbolic truce. Doing so during this time of war was treason. Crystal might not be a vampire, but under a vamp’s persuasion she’d tell. Her father’s minions checked up on Vee on a regular basis. They mind-wiped whomever they spoke with, but he’d find out about this.

Crystal sucked in a loud breath, clearly astonished at her rude reluctance.

Crap.

Eric’s mouth curled into a smile at her dilemma.

Vee lifted her lip, exposing her half-mast elongated canine. They both might be the product of centuries of evolution, but fundamentally, vamps and werewolves remained primal species. Everything about both of them was engineered to make them effective predators who valued strength.

I’m Dr. Scarpa, she said for Crystal’s benefit. The wolves had known her identity well before they stepped into the building. She gripped Eric’s hand in the briefest of clasps.

She and Mr. Vorste shared a moment of unspoken understanding. Nothing in front of the human.

Her father’s threat from years ago echoed in her brain. Never get involved with them. The penalty for violating the edict had been a chilling, Or else. Those two words implied death by something guaranteed to be prolonged and painful. Although, she did have a Get Out of Jail Free card, not that she’d ever put her powerful fiancé between herself and her father. She’d come out on the crap end of that plea for help.

"Mr. Vorste, tell me what happened to your…dog." Vee gazed at the useless piece of paper that was the dog’s chart. She pushed aside unease to draw on professionalism.

Let us speak alone, Dr. Scarpa. He spoke with a thick Eastern European accent.

Vee glanced skyward as if a deity would swoop down and save her. Crystal, would you excuse us, please?

Okay, Dr. Scarpa, but I’ll be right outside if you need help. She placed the blue nylon muzzle on the counter by the exam room’s sink on her way out.

The second the door swung shut Vee backed away from the wolves, putting as much air as possible between her and them. She looked at her watch. Her stomach lurched.

What does Ambrose DiFalco think of you still working and not preparing for a life of subservience and reproduction? Eric’s gaze fell to her ring-free left hand.

Ambrose had presented her with an engagement ring, but she refused to wear the ostentatious emerald at work. The complicated land mine of her relationship with her fiancé was none of Eric’s business.

She addressed the bleeding wolf on the floor. Why are you here? This is not protocol. If you need help, you go through your own channels. Like Roman, the werewolves’ regional primary care doctor.

Eric frowned. Protocol?

Crap. They didn’t know she’d helped others in an organized effort.

I’m not treating him. She pointed at the wolf, although guilt speared her vicious claws into her brain. He looked to be in a lot of pain.

As if resuming a prepared script, Eric said, You did a good job on the kid last month.

He breached protocol, too, and showed up here. It’s not safe for you to be here. She rubbed her forehead. You guys have to leave. I’m sorry. I stay out of the war as best I can, and it needs to stay away from me, at least for right now. For another three months.

The North American vampire leader’s daughter helping a wolf? I’m sure when Dominic found out about that incident last month he was thrilled. Eric’s lips twisted upward into a sarcastic smile.

She checked the time again. I got off shift over a half hour ago. The two of you need to see a different doctor and make whoever is assigned his case think he’s a dog. No shifting. I’ll send in someone else. Anyone else. She reached for the door.

Do Dominic and Ambrose know about the incident in California?

California? she repeated dully, caught off-guard. How could this guy possibly know about what happened a decade ago? As a vampire, she shouldn’t have laid one finger of aid on the werewolves. But they were prepubescent kids who’d been filled with holes by a Squad ambush in her front yard, and no one understood the physiology of werewolves better than her, a trained medical doctor and veterinarian. This war was what it was, but moments like that disgusted her. The only wolf who’d survived couldn’t have been more than fourteen.

I’m pretty sure neither is aware of your charitable work. How do you think they would feel about you being a werewolf sympathizer?

She marched toward Eric. What is this about? Ambrose remains neutral in this war. Is this about Dominic?

Eric didn’t answer. His expression didn’t give any clue of his intention, and his mind was closed to her ability to read his thoughts.

Who put the word out I was a safe bet for a quick patch-up? What little I’ve done over the past few years is on a case-by-case basis as a favor for Roman. I work on a referral basis only. The incident in California? I believe murdering kids, regardless of species, is wrong. I can’t help you. She gripped the Sharpie inside her lab coat pocket tight in her left fist. The smartest play was to walk away. She tensed to leave.

Why do you help wolves when one supposedly murdered your mother? And inspired Dominic to start this war?

Did a wolf murder my mother? Seems to me the details are a bit unclear. With Roman’s help and expertise in human medicine, she’d exhumed her mother’s remains in secret years ago and examined what was left. Most dead vamps were sun dusted, their own version of natural cremation, but the aristocratic class liked to save their remains in crypts, as if some secret would emerge in the future to reincarnate them. She’d been a wreck during the exam process, but the lesions she’d found weren’t caused by a wolf. Roman had agreed. Someone wanted this war between the species and had used her mother to start it. Someone powerful. It wasn’t her job to end it, but since it’d crossed paths with her life one too many times, she’d decided to do what she could for those she felt were unfairly targeted. Did that make her a sympathizer? Perhaps, it did. Do you plan to fight past Dominic’s Termination Squad to tell him about me?

Email. And we’ve got pictures of you helping wolves.

Dominic doesn’t use email. He considered computers evil.

His secretary does.

True. Where could they have possibly gotten pictures? They had to be bluffing. She hated being on the butt end of blackmail. Did she dare call their bluff?

No. Damn it. No.

If they sent the pictures, she could appeal to Ambrose and his line of neutrality, but she wanted no part of a showdown between Ambrose and Dominic. As the North American territory liaison for the ruling DiFalco family, Ambrose never muddied his hands in the Stateside war. The arrogant jerk would probably grant her one of his patented gorgeous, condescending smiles and let Dominic exact punishment in the name of war neutrality. He might not allow Dominic to kill her, but the sadist would probably enjoy watching whatever humiliation Dominic doled out.

Three more months and she could fake her death and ghost out of existence to a remote island in Southeast Asia. Property already purchased. No vamps. No wolves. No forced marriage. Just her and a buttload of technology to alert her whenever a nonhuman entered into her domain. Then she could reinvent her life, maybe as a vet again. Maybe something new. She’d never be a broodmare or a political wife. All she had to do was keep her head low and avoid conflicts…like this.

Eric’s superior gotcha smirk tempted her to flip him off and leave, but he had her checkmated. Eric turned away from her. He touched his ear. A communication device? The bleeding wolf was someone who required protection. Someone important.

Eric’s cell phone dinged. He scrolled through a few screens and started typing. God, she hated being ignored for a cell phone.

She resumed her previously interrupted mental scan, this time picking up at least six wolves hovering outside the building. How could she have been so oblivious as to miss eight werewolves in the immediate area? Seven to guard the bleeding one? She and the bleeding wolf locked gazes while she wondered about his identity.

The oversized mutt might just be the king himself. Aleksander Dimitrov. She broke the staring competition to glance at Eric, who was still typing on his phone. He could be one of the king’s super warrior protectors, which would account for the eerie way the guy tracked her every move. The communicator then made sense. Supposedly, King Werewolf was more secured than the queen of England.

The wolf couldn’t be the king. This was her imagination kicking into overdrive. She rolled her wrist. I don’t have time for this.

Eric shoved his cell phone into his cargo pants’ side pocket. You’ll still make the wedding party if we get this done now.

Of course they knew her destination tonight. Everyone in the wolf and vamp world knew her sister was getting married.

What do you want from me? She eyed the wolf while faking outward calm. Her pulse pounded loudly in her ears.

Let’s start with you examining his injuries. Then we’ll go from there. Eric resumed his slouch on the bench.

Her mind catalogued everything she’d ever heard about the wolf leader, which added up to a jumble of fear-based speculations and rumors. Except for one fact: the wolf king was the only being on the planet who both Ambrose and Dominic feared. Actually, the whole vampire race feared Aleksander Dimitrov.

The bleeding wolf wavered on its feet, igniting her instinct to help. Given the blood pooling beneath him, he might be borderline shocky. She didn’t want a defibrillator incident tonight. Plus, when he died on the table in central treatment in wolf form, there would be an awkward human transformation. That could become an instant YouTube sensation, given the whole clinic was on closed circuit video surveillance. She didn’t want to be the cause of the human holy-crap-another-species moment. At least the exam rooms were camera free.

I’ve got three conditions.

Eric didn’t budge from his slouch. Both he and the wolf watched her.

"First, no biting anyone. You bite and I’ll be forced to call Animal Control. Then your dog gets six months of quarantine since he’s not up to date on rabies. That’s lockup at Animal Control." She bit back a smile at Eric’s wide-eyed surprise. A bite couldn’t transform a human like legend claimed. The wolf or vamp status was genetic. She lost her war against a grin and could’ve sworn the wolf on the floor rolled its eyes.

Second, no transformation in this building. Most places in here are on candid camera. I know he’ll heal faster in human form once I’m done, but he stays wolf until you guys leave.

And third? Eric asked.

You behave like clients. You’ll treat the staff nice and check out up front like a normal client.

Eric nodded. Okay, but definite no on the muzzle over there. Let’s get started. He’s not leaving the room or my sight.

Vee folded her arms over her chest. I’m charging you extra for keeping me overtime.

Fine.

Does he want anesthesia for this? At least a local block?

He glanced at the injured wolf. Just get the bullets out of him so he can transform.

Now they’re bullets and not dog attack bites like you checked him in as having?

This is ridiculous, he muttered. The wolf growled and bared his teeth at Eric, who cleared his throat. Checking him in with bullet wounds garners too much attention.

Let’s take a look at the damage. She pulled on latex gloves and approached. The wolf maintained a less than trusting glower, but, to his credit, showed no teeth.

Addressing the furry beast, she said, So long as we have a clear understanding of shut-lip on all issues that pertain to my helping your kind in the past and right now, I’ll do this. This is the last time I help one of you, though. I can’t promise this won’t hurt, since you declined anesthesia.

Vee detected the mental vibrations of communication between Eric and the wolf. She detected words passing between them, but it was a foreign language she didn’t recognize. No pictures.

He agrees. No injections. Don’t try to take his temperature. Eric chuckled.

The wolf growled.

Telepathy. Cool trick. She pulled her thermometer from her lab coat and placed it on the metal exam table. Got it. No temp. As she knelt next to the wolf, she asked, "I didn’t see a name on the chart. Does your dog have a name, or do I call him Wolfie?"

Wolfie works.

On her knees, the wolf towered above her and threw her the hairy eye. Sweat broke out across her forehead. One neck-grab and she’d be toast. Power rolled from the beast, but not a run-of-the-mill preternatural buzz. The wolf radiated something ancient and deadly. Looking between Eric and the injured wolf was like comparing a copperhead snake to a black mamba.

Survival instinct flared. She rocked back on her knees away from the beast. Her pulse thudded between her ears. If you intend to use me as a pawn to end this war, then be warned Dominic won’t care if you kill me. He’d gladly use it as ammunition to fire up his people. Or if you want to draw out the Italian DiFalcos as a way to end the war, it won’t work. They don’t care. Well, that assumes you’re here to end it.

We won’t hurt you today, Eric promised.

Gee, that’s comforting. She sucked in a deep breath and touched the wolf. Dealing with injured, fearful, aggressive dogs was second nature to her. She put aside apprehension to focus on the clinical. Her fingers parted the soft sable fur on his shoulder to expose the skin beneath. She used her ability to connect with other beings mentally in order to soothe the animal. Within seconds, the wolf relaxed.

What happened to him? I mean, how did he get shot? Her exam found a wound in his shoulder. His blood wafted the aroma of a rich chocolate dessert. Her canines elongated, and her stomach grumbled. Weird. Either she was far hungrier than she thought, or she was losing it. Werewolf blood was toxic. She clamped her mouth closed. Her teeth dug into her inner lips.

A snippet of the wolf’s thoughts flashed in her head. First, a blurry, but familiar vamp face…her brother, Trace. Then automatic gunfire and a chase. A memory. It’d been a Squad fight, which meant silver bullets to ensure a wolf died when shot. The secondary allergic reaction was the killer. The animal couldn’t transform back to human until the metal was removed. If he changed, then the silver would merge with the wolf’s cells, making it virtually impossible to extract. To prevent the reaction, any bullet had to be removed within a few hours of entry. The new bullets Trace was playing with these days exploded into liquefied silver upon impact, making it tricky to completely extract.

Eric still hadn’t responded to her question on what happened.

She asked, At least tell me how many times he was shot.

Twice. Left shoulder and left thigh.

Were they normal silver bullets or the new exploding liquid silver? Vee found the source of the blood on the ground to be a jagged laceration near the wolf’s left knee. That had to be painful.

Eric paused long enough for what Vee suspected was more metal discussion. Finally, he said, Not sure. Suspect normal bullets.

She nodded. Blood hunger rose to the fore in her brain as the wolf’s blood continued to torture her. She stood up fast and stepped away from the wolf. Vertigo sent the world into an eerie shift, a worsening problem over the past few weeks. She hadn’t found time to seek out a vamp doctor. The only one she trusted was several states away. She blew off the dizziness as the product of low quality REM sleep. She couldn’t remember the last time sleep had been peaceful. She gripped the exam table to hide her weakness.

In a well-practiced, steady tone she said, "Were he a real dog, his left leg would be toast. He’s lucky you guys have bones like titanium. He needs Benadryl