Paranormal Romance and Romantic Suspense Author Caridad Pineiro

Undead Uprising Chapter 12

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This week’s Wicked Wednesday brings you another installment of my urban fantasy involving a twist to the werewolf mythology, battles with vampires and a struggle for control in a werewolf pack. The tentative title is UNDEAD UPRISING and I hope you like this next free chapter that I’m offering you.

This is the morning after Catalina has become the wolf she hates. Ramon has been resting at her side, armed and ready to protect her if necessary. Tortured by his love for her because he knows that what they both want can never be since Catalina is destined to lead the Villalobos pack.

For those of you who may have missed the first chapters, you can read them here:

• Chapter 1
• Chapter 2
• Chapter 3
• Chapter 4
• Chapter 5
• Chapter 6
• Chapter 7
• Chapter 8
• Chapter 9
• Chapter 10
• Chapter 11

Chapter 12

His gentle touch woke her as he undid the leather straps confining her to the bed.

“Buenos dias,” she said, her voice husky. Her throat sore, as it almost always was the day after. Most of her body ached from the transformation of the night before.

Ramon stood beside the bed, fully clothed in battle gear. “Buenos dias,” he replied and soothed a hand over her hair.

She reached up, which made her wince from the stiffness in her arms, and ran a hand across her dishevelled hair. “I must look a fright.”

He smiled tenderly. “Not so bad.”

“I imagine you’ve seen me looking worse,” she replied, thinking about how she must appear during the change. Gazing back up at him, she motioned to his clothes and asked, “Why are you ready to fight?”

Ramon shrugged. “I felt . . . uneasy with what’s happening. I wanted to be prepared.”

To protect her, she realized and worried about his safety if they were attacked. But she wouldn’t let him know her fear. Fear brought hesitation. Hesitation brought death.

She stood and touched his cheek. “Gracias.”

Turning his head, he placed a kiss in the middle of her palm. “For you, I would . . .” He stopped, almost uncertain, but when he met her gaze, she knew they had both been thinking the same thing.

He’d die for her just as she would die for him.

Trying to lighten the mood since she was tired of always being gloomy lately, she slipped her hand around his neck and said, “For me you would run my bath. Scrub my back. Massage fragrant oils into my skin.”

Ramon smiled as she had intended, leaned close and cradled her face. He dropped a quick kiss on her lips before placing his hands on her shoulders where he slowly kneaded the sore muscles there.

Her skin was soft, but beneath it were faint bruises attesting to the trauma her body had suffered the night before. Ramon had seen them before and yet, he didn’t think he could ever get accustomed to them. To seeing her hurt as she had been the other night and before. On those nights when her patrol had not gone smoothly.

But physical hurt would mend quickly unlike the pain in her heart which would take longer to heal. “It’s late. I need to be at the hospital shortly.”

When he moved away, she laid a hand on his arm to stop him. “I don’t want to lose you.”

He shook his head and grabbed hold of her hands. “You won’t. Ever.”

“I won’t allow the Gauntlet,” she said and embraced him.

He wrapped his arms around her tightly, buried his face in the crook between her neck and shoulder and kissed the lingering remnants of his bite from the night before. “You can’t avoid your destiny. As much as we may want to be — ”

“My destiny, Ramon?”

Catalina suddenly couldn’t bear being with him any longer. She shoved him away and strode to where her sword rested against the wall. In one smooth move, she grabbed it and brought it to his throat.