Free Miri: A Paranormal Romance (Plenty of Shift Book 1) by Carina Wilder Page A

said, more visions of her naked body moving through his mind. “It’ll be nice to see her.”
    “Pfft,” said Jenn. “Nice to see her. You’re so freaking polite.”
    “I am. I’m a nice boy,” he said, grinning. “Here, have your drink and stop teasing me.”
    Jenn gratefully took the gin and tonic and headed back to the table, where Kor joined her a moment later.
    Malcolm was torn between watching the door and eyeing the Kefir Pack members, who seemed to be growing more animated as the minutes went on. Their eyes moved about the room on occasion as though they were sizing up the other inhabitants of the bar. Malcolm recognized this behaviour; they were assessing threats. And he didn’t like it one bit.
    One of them rose after a time, approaching the bar with an unsteady gait.
    “Another bottle,” he said.
    “You sure?” said Malcolm. “You guys are looking about eighteen sheets to the wind, to borrow an old expression of my mother’s.”
    “Well, we want to be at least thirty sheets to the…whatever you said,” retorted the man.
    “All right.” Malcolm knew that at least if they were drunk, they wouldn’t be able to do so much harm. There would be one sober grizzly shifter in this place until it closed, and he’d defend it with his life.
    As he handed the bottle over, though, the man took it, examined its label, and smiled.
    “You know what?” he said. “This stuff is shit.”
    “So give it back. What do you want?”
    The wolf shifter took the bottle by its neck and in one swift motion dropped it on the hard floor, shattering the glass and sending streams of tequila flying in every direction.
    “What the hell?” said Malcolm. “You’re paying for that.”
    The man shot him a look that said, “Make me,” and headed back to his table.
    “Everything okay?” said Kor, approaching the bar once again.
    “Nothing I can’t handle,” said Malcolm, wiping down the bar with a towel. A moment later he stepped out from behind it to gather up the broken glass that lay strewn on the floor.
    His eyes shot to someone moving across the room: in that instant, Jenn, who seemed unconcerned with what had just occurred, was making her way to the ladies’ room, beyond the table of wolves.
    “Kor, stop her,” said Malcolm. “She shouldn’t go near those assholes.”
    Kor turned to look for his girlfriend, but too late. One wolf had already grabbed her arm and was pulling her down on top of his lap, the expression on his face lascivious as he leered at her. There was no doubt that he was intentionally attempting to antagonize the grizzly shifters. Jenn was fighting him off, too weak to do anything other than worsen her situation as he pinned her arms to her sides, speaking into her ear.
    Kor and Malcolm were on the men in a flash, Kor pulling his girlfriend away with strong human hands. When she was safely behind him, Malcolm said, “Get her out of here. Now.” Without protest, Kor guided her outside. Everything inside him wanted to fight, except for the strong instinct to protect the woman he loved. There was no way he’d let her so close to a potentially bloody altercation.
    Malcolm, alone now, shifted into his impressively enormous grizzly form. His clothing fell to the floor, torn to shreds as the large, dark brown beast advanced.
    And then four wolves faced him: large, arched grey backs and heads the size of a small horse’s. Each of them snarled at him, readying itself for the attack.
    But he was far larger than any of them. And so when he lunged, the wolves cowered. Malcolm fully expected them to retaliate with aggression, but each in turn simply recoiled from him as though terrified.
    And for a moment he felt manly, strong, powerful . Yes, he thought. That’s right. You should be scared. But then he thought of Miri. She would hate this—the machismo of fighting, of hurting one another. And she would be right. It was animalistic, vicious. It was everything that he’d grown to hate in their