Night Play (A Dark-Hunter Novel) by Sherrilyn Kenyon

Author:Sherrilyn Kenyon
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Fiction, Romance fiction, Werewolves, New Orleans (La.), Contemporary, General, Romance, Fantasy, Supernatural, Adult, Epic
ISBN: 9780312992422
Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks
Published: 2004-07-29T03:26:32+00:00

Chapter 7

Bride pushed the salad around on her plate as she tried not to stare at Vane. There was something so compelling about him. It was also disconcerting to be around someone so lean and muscular. At least with Taylor, he'd been skinnier than her, but he didn't work out, and had love handles of his own. There wasn't an ounce of excess on Vane's entire body. Her face flamed as she remembered just how great that man looked naked.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Fine."

"Why aren't you eating?"

She shrugged. "I guess I'm not hungry after all."

He took the fork from her hand and twirled the spaghetti around the tines, then held it up for her. "I'm not a baby, Vane."

"I know." His hot look scorched her. "Eat for me, Bride," he said in a low, commanding tone. "I don't want you to go hungry. There's nothing good about starving."

From the tone of his voice, she could tell he spoke from experience. "You've been hungry?"

"Take a bite and I'll answer."

"I'm not a child."

"Believe me, I know." He wagged the fork for her. She shook her head at his serious play, then opened her mouth. He carefully placed the fork inside so that she could close her mouth around it before he slid the fork back out.

Bride chewed while he twirled the fork in her pasta.

"Yes, I've gone hungry. My parents weren't nurturing or caring like yours. As soon as a male is old enough, they throw him out and he either learns to survive or he dies." Vane's heart twisted as he remembered his youth. The pain and constant hunger.

He'd almost died more times than he could count that first year on his own. Until he hit puberty, he'd been a wolf cub. Virtually overnight, he had become human. His magical powers had been new to him and he'd been stuck in human form when he needed to be a wolf.

Unused to being human, he couldn't track or kill prey. He'd been blitzed with unfamiliar feelings and emotions that wolves didn't have. Worst of all, his senses were dulled in human form. Humans might see better in daylight, but they couldn't hear as clearly, move as quickly, or smell their enemies around them. They didn't have the physical strength to fight bare-handed against other predators and animals for food and protection.

Nor could they kill as easily. They were consumed by guilt, horrified by bloodshed.

But like Darwin had written, it was survival of the fittest, and so Vane had learned how to survive. Eventually. He'd learned to take his blows and bites without surrendering to the agony of his wounds.

At the end of the first year of his adulthood, he had returned to his pack angry and controlled. A human who knew what it meant to be a wolf. A human who was determined to control the part of himself that he loathed. He'd also returned home with more power than any of them had dared dream.

Still, he wouldn't have made it had Fang not saved him.

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