His Curvy Mate (Alpha Prime Book 2)

by Georgette St. Clair

  “Well, Brandon apparently had to follow up on it, because he’s now in charge of security. Apparently it’s true. Hephzibah lied – she never went to that university.”

  “There is no way that Hephzibah is a spy,” Miranda insisted. “I’m sure there must be some rational explanation.”

  Rory, who had just set several dozen honey-scented candles on a shelf, hurried over to her. “Hephzibah is not a spy,” he said quietly.

  Miranda rushed out of the shop and ran over to Creel, who was starting to work on the frame of the expanded room of her business, now that the concrete foundation had cured.

  “We need to run to town to rescue Hephzibah – I’ll explain on the way,” she said quickly. Creel, who was the best mate ever, took one look at the expression on her face and headed over to his car.

  Rory came running up and opened the back door. “I’m coming too,” he said, with a surprising amount of firmness, for him.

  “Whatever,” Miranda said impatiently as she slid into the passenger seat.

  She was honestly sick of whatever Rory’s weird deal was, where he obviously liked Hephzibah but didn’t have the cojones to say so.

  “Why are you even with us?” she asked as Creel came to a screeching halt in front of the Grubstake. “You won’t even talk to Hephzibah. She thinks you can’t stand her.”

  “Hephzibah thinks I can’t stand her?” Rory said in dismay. “That’s not at all true.”

  Miranda and Creel jumped out of the car and ran into the restaurant, with Rory scrambling to catch up.

  Brandon and a group of his pack members, including Percy, were standing in the restaurant, facing down Sophia, who was blocking the door to the kitchen and brandishing a frying pan.

  “I seriously love you,” Miranda said to Sophia. “You are so badass with that frying pan.”

  Then she turned to glare at Brandon. “Brandon, with all due respect, what the hell?”she said to him as Rory joined Sophia in blocking the entrance to the kitchen door. “There is absolutely no way that Hephzibah is a spy.”

  “That doesn’t exactly sound respectful,” Brandon said, with a hint of growl in his voice.

  Miranda refused to be intimidated. She stood there, hands on her hips, glaring at him. “Hephzibah is my friend, I’ve known her for months, and she is not a spy for the humans.”

  Creel stepped in front of Miranda and waved at her to hush up. “Brandon, if she’s a spy, then of course she will be arrested and tried. But I have to agree with my mate – I’ve seen absolutely no indication of that from her.”

  “Well, if she was a spy, she wouldn’t exactly tell you she was, would she?” Brandon snorted. “That’s the thing with spies. They lie for a living.”

  “Hephzibah is no liar,” Rory said indignantly. He drew himself up to his full height, which wasn’t very tall, and glared at Brandon with an amazing amount of courage for a scrawny little fox shifter.

  Brandon glanced at Rory, then at Creel. “Please remind me who this idiot is and why I shouldn’t eat him for a snack.”

  Creel shrugged. “Well, for the immediate moment, you shouldn’t eat this shrimpy little idiot because he’s under my protection. Also doesn’t have a lot of meat on his bones. But hold that thought; the day is young and he might go well with some hot sauce.”

  “First, can you please tell us why you think Hephzibah is a spy?” Miranda said. “Are you seriously taking Angrim’s word for it?”

  “Well, the fact that she lied about being a student, and came to the Greenlands territory and worked for you for free right around the time that we were setting up the Alpha Prime meeting is pretty suspicious in itself. And she’s always walking around town staring at people and taking notes. And if she’s innocent, why did she run and hide in the back of the restaurant when we came to talk to you?” Brandon demanded.

  “She ran and hid because you are terrifying,” Miranda said indignantly.

  “Thank you,” Brandon said, looking pleased with himself.

  “Hey, I’m terrifying too,” Creel said to her.

  “Absolutely petrifying,” Miranda assured him. “Way more terrifying than Brandon. People practically wet themselves when you walk by.”

  “Fine. Just so we’re clear.” Creel looked slightly mollified.

  Miranda felt uneasiness ripple through her. She was sure that Hephzibah was not a spy, although she had to admit that what Brandon was saying was true. It did look odd and suspicious. Why had her owl friend lied about being a student? And if she wasn’t a student, why was she always taking notes?

  Rory stepped forward, swallowed hard and looked Brandon straight in the eye. “Hephzibah is not the spy for the humans. I am the spy.”

  “Nice try.” Brandon snorted, looking at the skinny little shifter with scorn. “You, a spy?”

  “Yes, I am. And I’m obviously pretty good, given that you never suspected me. You never noticed how I’m always walking around taking pictures?”

  Brandon’s eyes narrowed, and he scowled at Rory and let out a rumbling, threatening snarl.

  “You said you were a freelance photographer,” Miranda said, staring at Rory in confusion.

  “I lied.” He sniffed. “I work for the Council for Interspecies Relations. I’m mostly human. I’m only one eighth fox. I have to spray myself with a scent enhancer to even pass as a shifter, and I can’t actually shift into fox form.” He hung his head in shame. “That’s why I never pursued Hephzibah, the most perfect woman I’ve ever met. Why would she want to be with someone who’s not even a real shifter? That, and I knew she would hate me if she found out I was a spy.”

  Hephzibah walked out of the kitchen, stepped around Sophia, and came to stand next to Rory, wide-eyed. Sophia lowered her frying pan but kept glaring at Brandon and his packmates.

  “I’m the most perfect woman you’ve ever met?” Hephzibah said in amazement. “Nobody has ever thought I was perfect before. My own mother kicked me out of the nest before I could fly. If I hadn’t landed on a pile of moss, I would have died.”

  “Clearly she was jealous of you. You are absolute perfection,” Rory said to her. “If I were to design the perfect mate for me, the schematics that I would use to create her would match you exactly.”

  “Gross,” Creel muttered.

  Hephzibah’s eyes grew so wide that they seemed to take up the top third of her face, and her mouth made a perfect O of amazement as she gazed at Rory adoringly.

  “Excuse me, can we deal with the fact that you lied about being a student and Rory is a spy who is trying to sabotage the Alpha prime meeting?” Miranda said with exasperation.

  “No, I’m here to try to save the Alpha prime meeting,” Rory protested. “There is a plan to sabotage it, but it comes from that Human Defense Militia group. I have been up here trying to identify their members and figure out what their plan is, but so far I have had no luck.”

  “Why would you want to help us?” Brandon demanded, moving towards Rory.

  Rory cringed but stood his ground. “Because we want the territory to be a success. It benefits humans as well as shifters if Greenlands succeeds. Yes, there are some humans who have tried to sabotage your territory in the past, but the majority of us recognize that shifters must have their own lands where they can live free from human interference. If shifters are forced to live too close to human cities, there are clashes that escalate and could lead to all-out war.”

  “And why should we believe you?” Creel growled.

  “You can contact the council and they will verify everything that I just told you.”

  “Or we could just kill you first and ask questions later,” Brandon growled.

  Hephzibah went pale and put her tiny hand on Rory’s arm. “You’d have to kill me too,” she said, her voice coming out in a frightened squeak.

  Brandon snorted in contempt. “Like that would be hard.”

  “Creel!” Miranda pleaded. “Don’t let him kill them! They’re my friends!”

  Creel sighed.
“You are being a buzzkill right now, but since I love you…” He looked at Brandon. “I will take Rory and Hephzibah back to my house and place them under guard while you confirm what Rory said. And even if Rory is telling the truth, he will remain under guard until after the Alpha Prime meeting is concluded.”

  “Excuse me,” Brandon said. “We still don’t know why Hephzibah is here.”

  Hephzibah stared at the floor, and her cheeks turned a rosy red. “It is actually quite embarrassing…”

  She glanced up at Brandon, who was looking at her impatiently, and sighed. “Where I lived, I did not have any friends and no males of any species had ever displayed any interest in me as a prospective mate. I thought that if I came up here and studied social interaction, I could, through successful analysis, ascertain the most effective way to develop interpersonal relationships and—”

  Brandon held up his hand. “Please stop,” he growled. “I get it. I think.”

  “But I also suspected that if I simply informed people that I was studying them, without providing a socially acceptable rationale such as my attending a recognized university and—” Hephzibah continued, but Brandon and his pack were already walking out of the room.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  That afternoon, Thomas, the hyena shifter, and his pack guarded Hephzibah and Rory at Creel’s house. Creel went back to work at the shop, and Miranda went to help Sophia cater the food for the Alpha Primes.

  There were at least a hundred shifters surrounding the building, including Benjamin. Although Benjamin wasn’t planning on settling in Greenlands, he wanted to help ensure that the meeting went off as planned.

  The building was rock solid. Nobody was breaking in there. There were no booby traps. Maybe everything would go smoothly after all.

  Despite all the Human Defense Militia’s threats, there had been no attack. The Primes had been meeting for hours, drawing out plans, making alliances, figuring out where their packs would live. They came into the banquet hall in small groups to eat, and went outside for breaks when they started to get too growly.

  So far, there had been half a dozen scuffles and a couple of vicious fights where blood had been drawn and a couple of Primes had to be physically hauled away from each other. They seemed to be growing increasingly hostile as the day went on.

  “So much testosterone in here,” Miranda complained to Sophia as they carried empty dishes into the kitchen and set them down on stainless steel rolling carts.

  “I know, it’s giving me a headache. They’re talking about calling it a night soon and starting again in the morning, maybe with half the guys coming in the morning and the other half coming after 2 p.m.”

  “Good. My head’s starting to pound too.” Miranda pressed her fingers against her temples. “I don’t know how much more of this I can deal with. I’m going to go to the bathroom and splash some cold water on my face.”

  As she was standing by the bathroom sink washing up, a voice boomed over the loudspeaker. A familiar-sounding voice. “All Alpha Primes need to report to the banquet hall immediately. This is an emergency. Report to the banquet hall immediately.”

  “All of them in the same room at once?” she muttered. “That’s a terrible idea.”

  Then she realized whose voice she’d just heard. It was Joseph.

  She hurried out of the bathroom just as the Alpha Primes finished streaming into the banquet hall.

  She ran into the banquet room after them. “It’s a trap!” she cried. “Everyone get out! It’s a trap!”

  The doors slammed shut with a thunderous boom, and she heard locks clicking into place.

  Several of the men rushed over and tried to open the door. The door didn’t budge. Alphas began kicking and pounding on the door, and yelling. The room was so solid…would their cries for help even be heard?

  “Miranda. Here.” Sophia grabbed her by the arm and the two of them hurried over to a corner, crouching down to keep out of the way.

  “That was Joseph on the loudspeaker. My cousin,” she said to Sophia. “He set this whole thing up somehow. We’re all trapped in here.”

  “All the Alpha Primes trapped in one room?” Sophia gasped. “We won’t last an hour.”

  There were shouts of rage as half a dozen Alpha Primes began brawling. The hostility in the air was so thick that it hurt.

  A chair flew through the air and crashed on the floor just next to them. Sophia flinched. “Why would your cousin want this?” she whimpered.

  Miranda shook her head, trying to clear it. “Well…if all the Alpha Primes in this room kill each other…the humans won’t do anything about it, because it didn’t happen in human territory. Think about all the power grabs Joseph could undertake. Think of all the packs he could forcibly take over. He’s probably got deals going with other Alphas who weren’t strong enough to take over a pack on their own…”

  “I’ll kill you!” a man named Alfonso screamed, and shifted. The object of his wrath shifted too, and soon a dozen wolves joined in, in a huge, furious pile of fur. Howls of rage and yelps of pain rang through the air. Miranda could smell blood.

  Sophia and Miranda huddled together, trying to be invisible. A waiter was hit by a flying chair, and collapsed in a heap.

  Joseph’s plans were becoming all too clear now. He’d used his pursuit of Miranda as a cover, an excuse to get his pack up there. They’d gone to work on the construction crew so they could set up this secret trap in the banquet room – easy to do, because they were the ones who’d built it.

  This would be a nationwide disaster. Joseph, and probably a group of his cronies, taking over multiple packs? It would be a horror show. Joseph was an abusive, evil brute, and if he had control over too many packs, he might end up starting a war with the humans.

  There was no way out of this room. They were locked in tight.

  “Nobody’s ever going to know this was all Joseph’s fault,” Miranda groaned. “There never was a Human Defense Militia.”

  “They’ll know, because I’m going to tell them,” Grammy Edith’s voice sounded right behind her ear and Miranda let out a startled shriek.

  “Grammy! Son of a— Damn it, you nearly gave me a heart attack! Where the bloody hell have you been?”

  “Is that any way to great your old gram-grams? I swear, I did such a lousy job raising you.” Her grandmother shook her head chidingly.

  Sophia was staring at Miranda in bewilderment.

  “Grammy. Go get Hank. See if there’s anything they can— Ouch!” A cup bounced off Miranda’s face and gashed her forehead.

  “I’m on it,” her grandmother said, and vanished.

  Miranda almost cried with relief. Her grandmother wasn’t gone after all.

  But her relief was short-lived, as a huge Alpha Prime who’d just shifted, face contorted with rage, laid eyes on her and let out a howl of fury. He began storming across the room towards her, fangs bared, saliva running down his jaw.

  * * * * *

  Creel was trying really hard to get some work done, but a rogue gust of wind kept knocking over his box of nails. It was the damnedest thing. The wind was only blowing right where he was standing. The trees and bushes around him were perfectly still, the grass wasn’t rippling. It was a completely localized puff of air that kept sending the box flying off the folding ladder that he had set it on.

  He glanced over at Douglas, who was hammering nails into the new room’s wooden frame. He wasn’t having any problems. There was no wind near him.

  He bent down to pick the box up, for the fifth time – and when he stood up, he was faced with a see-through woman who looked to be in her sixties, wearing a green dress. She stood there with her hands on her hips, glaring at him.

  “I said, Miranda needs help right now, dumbass!” she yelled.

  “Who the hell… Grammy Edith?”

  “No time! Get in your car!”

  “Douglas, here, now!” Creel bellowed, and ran for his car. Douglas ran after him.

  “
What?” Douglas asked as he scrambled into the driver’s seat. Creel leaped in, and Grammy Edith slid through the back door and settled into the back seat. He took off with a spray of gravel as Douglas struggled to shut the door.

  “Hey!” Douglas yelled in protest.

  Creel ignored him. “Where am I going?” he asked Grammy Edith.

  “How would I know where we’re going? Did someone hit you in the head with a two-by-four?” Douglas sounded bewildered.

  “Not you. Miranda’s dead grandmother. Shut up, don’t ask questions right now.” Creel careened around a sharp curve.

  “You’re going to the meeting house. Joseph from the Coldwater pack sabotaged it. All the Alpha Primes are locked in the banquet room together, and Miranda and Sophia are trapped in there with them, and it’s turning into a bloody riot. You’ve got to get that room open. You’re probably going to need dynamite or something.”

  “Miranda’s dead grandmother says that all the Alpha Primes and Miranda and Sophia are trapped in the banquet room,” Creel said, tearing down the road and sending up clouds of dust in his wake.

  Douglas shot him a suspicious look. “How can you hear Miranda’s dead grandmother talking to you, if I can’t?”

  Grammy Edith answered. “You and Miranda are attuned now. You’re on the same emotional wavelength. And if your dumb ass doesn’t save her, I will haunt you for the rest of your life, so help me.”

  “You won’t need to haunt me,” Creel muttered. “If Miranda is gone, my life is over.”

  “Consider it a freebie,” Edith growled at him.

  “So…you can really hear her and she’s really talking to you?” Douglas’ voice had an edge of panic. “And she says Sophia is in that room? Wait, where are you going?”

  “Public works building. They’ll have dynamite.” Creel pulled in to the parking lot of the squat, ugly building and ran in.

  The dynamite was in a room guarded by two male wolf shifters, who took one look at Creel and ran for their lives.

  Creel and Douglas quickly grabbed a box of dynamite sticks, a box of blasting caps, and a coil of cable.