Malek heard her humming a soft melody and tightened his jaw. A few moments later, he heard a splash. She was in the water—naked.

Damnation. He was supposed to be protecting her, not entertaining thoughts of ravishing her. He heard her moan and his gut tightened. The wolf in him was going wild. It wanted to join her, touch her, and caress her.

The man in him, however, was frustrated.

In two hundred years, he’d discreetly bedded hundreds upon hundreds of wenches, but he’d never felt this uncontrollable hunger coursing through his veins for any one of them.

The splashing stopped and Malek tensed. He couldn’t hear her. Moving his head to the direction of the lake bed, he gritted his teeth and tried listening for any signs of movement from her. Then, he heard a sharp yelp.

Growling, he ran toward the lake, snapping branches and breaking twigs as he charged through the thick shrub, his heart pounding with fear. Privacy be damned! He should not have left her alone!

The woods thinned and he vaulted through the air into the clearing, nearly falling over Katya. Shocked, Malek reached out his hands and stopped her from stumbling back. Instantly, his shock evaporated as he felt her soft skin beneath his hands, her curved hip, her small waist. Dazed by the sudden heat assaulting his senses, Malek stared at her breasts, full and supple, their rosy nubs his control completely crashing down.

His inner wolf howled with primal need and he grimaced as fire coursed through his veins. He looked down at her face. She looked terrified. Without warning, she clawed at his face and screamed, her eyes turning amber.

Damnation, Katya was shifting!

“Be still,” Malek roared as he gripped her shoulders. “It is I, Malek. I heard you scream.”

She ignored him as she kept clawing and growling, pounded on his chest. Grimacing, he watched her face shift, brows meeting at the bridge of her nose, jowls appearing, ferocious fangs snapping in rage. Slowly, she grew in height, towering over him. If he didn’t shift, her Lycan form would rip him to shreds.

Without another thought, Malek called on his inner beast and shifted in his eight-foot Lycan form, his clothes ripping and shredding from his body as he expanded. She had already shifted in her seven feet tall She-Lycan and wrestled him to the ground.

“Katya! Stop,” he growled in his eerie voice, rolling over, imprisoning her body beneath his.

Malek grabbed her hands and gripped them tightly over her head as he gazed down at her face. He tried to ignore the treacherous wave of desire making his heart pound where their naked loins met. She was breathing hard, squirming under his weight, and he sucked in a harsh breath. Even in her Lycan form, he found her desirable.

Her stare connected with his and he caught a flash of recognition in them, then fear, and finally shame. “Oh no,” Katya whispered. “I’m…I’m sorry. You can release me.”

“Not until you shift back to your human.”