by Angela Foxxe
The weather stayed nice and sunny for the drive home. The higher the road climbed into the mountains, the more attention it required. The pavement ended at the old Ranger station, it was only marked with a monument now, the new station—courtesy of a donation by Carver—stood a few miles higher up, on the other side of the ravine. She rolled her windows down for the last few miles; the smell of the forest, and the clean air of the mountains put a smile on her face.
*
“I swear to god, Johan, give me a reason not to tear your fucking throat out right now,” roared Carver. His shoulders bulged and he heaved himself up from behind his desk. Johan shrunk before his rage.
“I can’t help myself,” he squeaked. “She’s… every time I look at her, my heart aches.” Genuine tears rolled down his cheeks, his skin flushed red with shame. Carver backed off his presence, his anger only a façade to get the truth from the man. If he were a would-be rapist, Carver would know. In this case though, his instincts told him different.
“Sit down, son.” Carver pointed at the chair. He came around and sat one haunch on the immense oak desk.
“I see it now: you do love her, but what you have to understand is she doesn’t love you back.” Carver put a hand on Johan’s shoulder. The man dissolved into sobs. Carver called him a man, but he was barely twenty-three. Most of the wolves, including Krystal, the object of his affection, were older and wiser. Johan came to them two winters before, half-starved, and desperate. Carver took him in, but trouble followed the young man. Carver would have to have words with Krystal; her willingness to fuck anyone wasn’t an issue as long as she acted responsibly. Any half-blind idiot could see how much pain Johan felt with each beat of his heart; Carver even more so than most. His position as Alpha wasn’t just ceremonious, it came with power and responsibility, something he took solemnly.
Since he met Monique, things changed. Almost immediately. He had always cared for their physical well-being, but now he cared for their mentality as well. The resort stood as a beacon of brilliance on her part. A place where they could mingle with humans on their own territory, as themselves, and not draw unwanted attention. At least, until now. He glanced at the envelope on his desk, the seal of the United States Senate emblazoned on the front.
“What do I do? What can I do?” Johan said.
Carver shook his head, grateful for the question; a hopeless man would look for blame without himself, Johan wanted to fix things.
“I think the first thing we need to do is get you away from her.” He held up his hand to forestall any argument. “This isn’t punishment, Johan, and you’re not being banished.” Johan’s shoulder sunk with obvious relief.
“I don’t want to hurt her, or anyone, Alpha, honest.”
“I know, and if I thought you did, you would already be dead. No, Johan, this whole thing is unfortunate. You’re a good worker, son: you show up on time, you’ve got great instincts. I think I can help you sort this out. You know about the hunting lodge we maintain in the winter?”
Johan nodded. Usually they left the lodge vacant during the winter. Last year, some poachers used it as a base, and left it vandalized. Short of hiring someone to live on the mountain in isolation for the winter, Carver didn’t have many options. Until now.
“I want you to pack a good kit, make a list, and have Monique sign off on it.” Johan blinked with confusion. “She knows more about survival on this mountain than any natural-born wolf ever will. Have her sign off on it, and the store will outfit you. I want that cabin ship-shape, make any repairs you need to, any improvements. too. I’ll come up in the spring and inspect. Six months on your own will do you a world of good, especially knowing you have a home to come back to, deal?” They shook. Johan left the office with a spring in his step Carver hadn’t seen since he met the man.
He completely lost track of time after Johan left. Paperwork, bills, complaints, booking problems, they were enough to overwhelm him. The resort brought in tremendous capital, especially since their overhead remained low. They did need to hire a few employees here and there, but not many. Most of the work could be carried out by the pack.
The letter on the side of the desk caught his attention again. He glanced at the clock. Monique would be back soon. He needed to tell her. As if on cue, the door opened. Framed in the setting sun of his office window, Monique paused to smile at him. His breath caught in his throat. A thin, white tank top clung to her melon sized breasts. Her hard nipples strained the fabric. His eyes roamed down to her bare, taught stomach, then to her white thong covered by a lacy garter belt. Stockings went down to her high-heeled shoes.
“If you don’t fuck me right now, I’m going over to the bungalow and starting an orgy,” she said, her voice thick with passion. Carver leaped over the table, pinned her against the wall, and pressed his body to hers.
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” he breathed into her ear. Her hands unbuckled his pants as his pulled her wet thong aside.
“Who said I wouldn’t?” Her voice sounded almost sincere. Carver luxuriated in the feel of her hands on his member as she guided it to her pussy. He pulled her top off, found one of her hard nipples, and grazed it with his teeth. Her hot snatch invited him in; he moaned with her tit in his mouth as the head of his cock penetrated her. She grunted, wrapped one leg around his waist, and opened herself to him.
“Fuck me hard, Carver,” she moaned. He obliged. His cock slid a few inches into her. Then out, and back in. With each thrust he sunk deeper into her. She screamed when he got six inches in. Her body shuddered and her pussy clamped on him like a vice when he bottomed out at ten inches. Her eyes rolled up in her head as she screamed. Her orgasm shook her whole body. Carver grunted with her, his heart pounded as he slammed into her. Each thrust brought him immeasurable pleasure. More so though, he loved what it did for her. He clamped down on his own growing orgasm; he wanted her pleasure to last the night.
The sun sunk behind the western mountains to the sound of Monique’s orgasms.
*
Monique awoke to light kisses on her face. No, not kisses, she brushed a cold snout away from her. “Kirk,” she snarled playfully. The pup’s ability to sneak into any room as quiet as a mouse continued to amaze her.
“Okay, boy, I’m up.” He stopped his attempts at licking her and lay beside her. She responded by rubbing his ears. He wasn’t really a pup any more, she mused. Not after five years. He wasn’t quite full grown, but he wasn’t a boy anymore either.
“Are you going to shift today, huh?”
His eyes met hers, and he didn’t respond.
“Well, it’s okay, when you’re ready. Where’s your dad?” The wolf looked to the door. The sound of a shower drifted from the closed bathroom. Monique stretched, letting the blanket fall down her curves. Her breasts ached from the mauling Carver gave them. She sighed at the sight of her clothes. Once they got going… She would need new lingerie. Kirk averted his gaze as she stood up. Somehow, it never occurred to her to cover up around him. Ever since she met the pup, that day on the mountain five years before, her life changed. More than her mental shift, or her ability as his guardian, but something she still didn’t fully understand. She looked at her body in the mirror. Not for a second did she look thirty-one. More like twenty-one.
“I admire it too, probably as much as you,” Carver said from the bathroom door.
She smiled at the compliment. Steam drifted into the room refreshing the perpetually dry air. Carver padded over to his son, ran a hand through his thick mane. “Is today the day, boy?” The wolf gave him the same blank stare.
“He will when he’s ready,” Monique said as she slipped on her yoga pants. The stretchy fabric only enhanced her sex-appeal. She followed it up with a long tank top, a sports bra, and another tank top.
“I always wondered how you keep those monsters in check when you run.”
“You get to wear pants around yours, I have no such luck, so layers it is.” She slipped on her shoes, gra
bbed her sunglasses, and headed for the door.
“Monique, there’s something we need to talk about.” She didn’t like the sound in his voice. She closed the door, and waited.
“We’re getting a visitor. You know the Fish and Wildlife people have been up here all summer ‘evaluating us’?”
Monique suppressed a shiver. Since the beginning of spring, she’d been dealing with mid-level bureaucrats concerned about a forest they never even stepped foot in. She couldn’t tell them that the wolves were better equipped to preserve the balance of nature than some paper pusher in D.C.
“What now?” she said with exasperation.
“A US Senator is visiting us tomorrow. His name is Paul Rogers; have you heard of him?”
The name sounded familiar to her, but she couldn’t place it. “Is he the senator from Vermont?” she guessed.
“No, Montana. He’s the head of the Wildlife preserve committee, and they are preparing a brief for the President that would name this part of Vermont a National Monument.”
Monique’s fist clenched involuntary. That’s ridiculous. If they made the area a monument, Carver would have to close up shop. No resort, no buildings, they could still act as guides but they couldn’t live there. The wolves would of course, but Monique couldn’t shift into a wolf. And she couldn’t spend a long time in any of her three forms. Not like the wolves who could live out their lives in one form or the other. She couldn’t go back to living in a cave either. Half the reason they bought the resort was to try and live a normal life.
“Do you think he’ll do it?”
“There’s more, and you’re not going to like it.” He rubbed his face. “He’s a wolf, and not just any, he heads up the North American council. He’s the single most powerful Alpha in the country.”
She sighed. Of course. They just didn’t interact with other packs. The nearest one was in the Appalachians three hundred miles away. The only new wolves Monique saw were the occasional lone wolves that came looking for a place to call home.
“What’s this mean for us? Will he be favorable to us? Or will he want your power?”
“I would like to think, in a perfect world,” Carver said, “that he would do what’s best for the land. But with Kirk, and you, in the equation, I just don’t know.” Monique sat next to him, leaned into his shoulder, rubbed his back, and squeezed.
“We don’t talk much about Kirk. What is he?” It was something Monique always wanted to ask, but the time never felt right.
“Honestly, he may be nothing more than a normal wolf.” She raised an eyebrow at that. “There’s an old legend, old even for my people, that a single wolf will be born once every thousand years, to defend his people, to lead them to greatness. It’s been a long time since that’s happened. The last one, a man of great strength and charisma, united Europe in a way no person ever had. Part of his power was his guardian. A ferocious creature capable of great violence.”
Monique giggled, “I guess I’m pretty ferocious.” She gently punched him in the ribs.
“Well, like I said, it’s just a legend. Kirk’s birth fell on the full moon, and he was born as a wolf, neither of those events are unusual. His mother though, my darling Sienna, she was convinced that the signs were all in place. It fell on the seventh full moon of the year, which also happened to be the seventh super moon of the year. It wasn’t until they killed her that I believed her.”
Monique sensed the sorrow in him, his longing for his dead wife, and even a little guilt from his pairing with her.
“She would be proud of you. Look how you’ve taken care of your pack, of your son. She would be proud,” she whispered to him. Carver squeezed her leg.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
He wasn’t ready. Six months alone, up in the mountains, and he had to leave her behind. But he trusted Carver, trusted his Alpha’s instincts. His little room in the bungalow, with its bare shelves, and empty drawers, was his home. Before he joined Carver’s pack, he had nothing. Now, he at least had hope. He slung his pack over his shoulder, gave the room one last look, and closed the door behind him. List in hand, he left to find Monique.
She wasn’t too hard to find, for a human she worked as hard as any wolf. If it wasn’t overseeing the chef to make sure the staff and guests ate on time, it was on the grounds looking for things to improve, or in the buildings inspecting them for cleanliness. The staff admired her, and they were afraid of her. Johan wasn’t sure why they skirted around her in the hall, or avoided looking directly at her when she spoke. The male wolves whispered about her, about her obvious prowess, and how she killed several invading wolves years back. The girls seemed less impressed, and more jealous than anything. Krystal never mentioned her. But then, he barely spoke to her. Oh, how he wished he could make her see that his love for her was real, they she could be satisfied with him. No. You can’t, Carver’s right, you need to get some distance.
He found Monique at the pro shop; she walked through each aisle, checking each piece of ammo, firearm, and hunting equipment. Her black hair fell in waves down her back, contrasting with her white tank top. Even though she dressed in layers, the outline of her body had an immediate effect on him. He felt his member stir to life, and his face flushed with heat. He coughed politely to let her know he was there.
“Yes?” she said without looking up from her clipboard.
“Carver sent me to have you check off my list. I’m going up to watch the cabin for the winter.”
She turned to him, her green eyes lit up on contact with his face. He couldn’t help but smile.
“Excellent, it was such a disappointment to have it vandalized, and honestly, who’s going to want to spend the winter up there that doesn’t already live here? Thank you so much.” Her honesty and sincerity struck Johan, he found himself instantly liking her.
“Carver thinks it’s a good idea.,” he said lamely. Not sure how to respond, he stood there, playing with an item on the shelf.
“The list?”
“Right!” He fumbled in his pocket for the paper. She took it from his shaking hand with a strange look. He wiped his brow as she scanned the list. His mouth went dry. Johan stumbled over to the counter to get away from her. What’s wrong with me? That's the Alpha’s girl, and she’s not even a shifter. He grabbed a bottle of water from the counter and downed it in one go. From the corner of his eye, he watched her scan the list. Her lips pouted as she thought, the skin over her brow furrowed. She placed a hand on her curvy hips and jutted it out to the side. Johan’s heart threatened to break out of his chest. He clenched his fist around the water.
“Everything looks good. I would suggest you take more ammo than you think you need, though, you never know.” She held the paper out to him, her head cocked sideways with a little smile.
“Thanks.” He snatched the paper and tried not to run out of the store. He made it to the bathroom, splashed cold water on his face, and took in a few deep breaths.
*
Monique leaned against the old pickup she used to get to town. Kirk sat on his haunches at her side; his head reached to her side now and she absently rubbed his ears with one hand. They’d been waiting an hour for the senator’s arrival. All the staff that could be excused from duties waited with them, twenty-five in total, all wolves. The humans were left on their jobs; while a visiting senator ranked as a big deal, the wolf politics of the situation demanded more from the pack.
Carver smiled at her from across the drive. His suit and tie looked out of place to her. He belonged in something far more casual. Or nothing at all. Visions of him on his knees in front of her colored her cheeks. Whoa girl, it’s not like we didn’t have sex an hour ago. What is wrong with me? Four years we’ve been together, and yeah we have a lot of sex but this… Until a few days ago, Monique thought she was just being horny. Now, though, she wondered if there wasn’t something else going on. Her own body had strange powers and presented itself as a bit of a mystery. She couldn’t ask anyone how a guardian's body worked,
since no one lived who could answer the question. Not only that, she had the wolves to worry about. Carver told her on a number of occasions that their pheromones were dangerous. She blushed at her indiscretion in town.
Kirk’s ears picked up, his whole body stiffened.
“You okay?” she asked as she knelt beside him. He growled, and ran. He’s not a baby anymore, wolves mature much faster than people. The fact that’s he’s never changed means he’s probably at least a teenager in there.
Still, it struck her as odd as she watched him high tail it to the resort. Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of gears changing and tires on gravel. She stood back up, walked over to Carver, and took his hand in hers. They squeezed each other for support.
The first truck screamed government with its black paint and tinted windows. All four doors opened at once and men in black suits got out and proceeded to secure the area. The passenger side revealed an Asian women with sharp features and short black hair. She snarled as she walked around the front of the truck.
“Collins, get that building over there checked out. Roberts, down to the forest line,” she barked as she approached Carver and Monique.
“Special Agent Nah, I’m the head of the senator's security detail.”
“Carver…,” he started to say when she cut him off.
“That building is new.” She pointed to the western bungalow.
Monique spoke up, not liking her tone, or the way she spoke to Carver. “Define new? We put it in last year. It’s for our year-round staff,” she said defensively. The women brought out her edge, she had to keep herself from growling.
