Claiming Her Mate Read Online Free Page B

well.”
    She’d say she had come out pretty damn well, if Evan was touching her like that.
    Something wasn’t right. The Evan she knew wouldn’t even think to be affectionate with her, let alone sit at her bedside waiting for her to wake up.
    “Evan. What’s going on? How did I end up here?” Summer didn’t like the way he visibly paled. “Evan?”
    “Do you remember the party?” he asked, reaching for her hand.
    “Kind of. Not much.” Evan’s avoidance of the question was worrying her. “I’m really starting to freak out here, so I just need you to be straight with me. Please.”
    She watched his face crumble. “It was my fault,” Evan whispered.
    She lay there momentarily stunned. His fault? If there was one thing Summer knew for sure, it was that Evan would never physically harm her. Emotionally she had never received more blows from one person, but physically...no.
    Feeling brave, Summer flipped her hand over to twine their fingers. “What happened, Evan? I know it couldn’t be your fault.”
    Evan shook his head in utter dissolution. “But it was. If I hadn’t acted like such an arse, then you wouldn’t have left with Brad. And if you hadn’t left with him, then—”
    The poor man was struggling, but Summer didn’t know how to make it easier for him. Obviously something had happened between them, an argument of some sort and she had chosen to leave with Brad. Maybe they had been in an accident. Was the other man okay? She hadn’t been a fan of the guy, but she hardly wished him harm.
    “Is Brad all right?” Summer was amazed when Evan’s eyes darkened, a fierce expression playing on his face.
    “Nothing happened to him. However, when I get my hands on that bastard, it will be a whole other story.”
    Okay, wow. “Want to tell me why?”
    He pressed his lips together, seeming to visibly calm himself. “We had a fight. I was an arse. You ran outside and he must have followed and offered you a lift home from the party.” His eyes slide closed, a deep, shaky breath slipping past his lips. “Somehow he was able to get a drug into your system, one designed for shifters.”
    She blinked up at him. “He drugged me? Why?”
    “Why do you think?” he bit out and she flinched at the aggression pouring off him. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I just...it’s my fault, sunshine. If I hadn’t upset you then you wouldn’t have left the way you did with him, and he never would have gotten a chance to hurt you.”
    Her heart skipped a beat as she registered the nickname he had given her a long time ago. A play on her name, which she had no doubt had been meant to annoy her, but it had always left her smiling. She'd been hurt when Evan had stopped calling her that around her eighteenth birthday.
    “Evan. I don’t remember being upset with you, but either way, you couldn’t have stopped me from getting a lift home with him. He was my date for the evening.”
    Evan growled. “Still...”
    “Still nothing. You had no way of knowing what he had planned. So stop, Evan.” She squeezed his hand, trying to comfort him.
    He stared at her, confusion marring his handsome face. “How can you be so calm after what he tried to do? You know what his end game had been, right?”
    She gave him a small smile. He looked so fierce, so strong. It was as if he was ready to fight all battles for her. “I know. However, nothing happened.”
    “How do you know? I thought you couldn’t remember?”
    “Because you wouldn’t just be sitting around waiting for me to wake up if he had,” she responded, her conviction clear in her voice.
    Evan’s eyes remained fixed on her as she slowly sat up, her body already feeling better since waking. Maybe it had something to do with having her mate so close. Or maybe it was because she could finally see something like recognition in Evan’s gray eyes.
    “You’re so sure?” he asked.
    “Yes.” She bit her lip, hesitating for only a moment before she asked him, “You know, don’t