Free Forged: The World of Nightwalkers by Jacquelyn Frank Page A

the bed by force of will alone and by the time they got there he was covered in a sheen of perspiration. He grunted as he hit the bed and she grabbed some 5-×-5s and pressed them hard against his wounds, once again disregarding universal precautions, even though a box of gloves was just across the room. She couldn’t afford the time it would take to glove up and neither could he. He had lost too much blood to risk losing much more.
    “Eat your food if you still can,” she ordered him, nodding toward his neglected tray. “And try to keep it down. You need the nutrition.”
    “Aye,” he said, but it was a weak reply compared to the powerful boom she knew his voice normally worked at. She would bet it bruised his virile male ego to have to depend on a woman, but that was just too bad.
    He was stuck with her and she was going to be in charge, whether he liked it or not.

CHAPTER SEVEN

     
    Isabella Russ rolled over in her sleep. Though barely conscious, she recognized the scent that filled her nostrils immediately.
    Man. Her man. Her husband. She sniffed a little then took a long slow breath in because he smelled so divine, as usual. It was a nice distraction from the fact that she was still tired even though she had slept the day through.
    “Are you sniffing me?” came the deep-throated rumble of amusement near her ear.
    “You smell good,” she mumbled against his skin, snuggling up against him more tightly. It was chilly outside of the blankets and she had no interest in joining the cold waking world just yet.
    And right on cue, the toddler cried.
    “Ohhh nooo!” she ground out, ducking her head under the covers as if she could hide from the demands of her son. But unlike her daughter, her son had proved to be everything a demanding child could possibly be. Jason, for instance and much to her dismay, had refused to breast-feed. Bottle-feeding made twice as much work and she hadn’t quite got over her pique at not being able to feed him “from her heart.” Of course he was beyond breast-feeding by now anyway, but she still wasn’t quiteover it. And it was only one of the dozens of ways this particular child was determined to use to exhaust her.
    For instance, waking up at the crack of dusk. The child had an internal clock that told him dusk was imminent, as did most of the Nightwalker breeds, but rarely was it so highly developed in one so young.
    Bella was just lucky that way.
    “I’ll get him,” her husband said with a low chuckle.
    “No!” she said when he went to move all of his virile warmth out of the bed and from under the covers. “I want you to stay.”
    “Well, one of us has to get him or he’ll start to scream,” Jacob pointed out to her needlessly.
    “Let Leah do it,” she sighed.
    “Leah is nine. She is a little young to be taking care of our rambunctious three-year-old.”
    “Well, I know that!” She huffed and rolled onto her back. “Fine. Go. I’ll be up in a second.”
    “Bella.” Jacob reached out with a long-fingered, strong hand and ringed her around her throat with it. “What is this all about? If you are tired, we will do fine without you while you nap further.” He reached to run his hand from her throat down the length of her body in a comforting caress. Comforting. Not sexy or sizzling or any of the things they had once felt every single morning right after setting eyes on each other. There was never any time for that now. Now there was just a toddler to tend to.
    “More sleep won’t help,” she said, ejecting another sigh of frustration. “I’ll just have exhausting dreams.”
    “Exhausting dreams?” he echoed. “What kind of exhausting dreams? Do you mean dreams or premonitions?”
    Bella was a Druid, a half-breed of Nightwalker and human. Once upon a time she had been all human, or so it had seemed, until Jacob came along and touched her. HisDemon DNA had interacted with her Druid DNA and turned her “on” to her rapidly growing abilities. One of which