by Vivi Andrews
He arched an eyebrow toward the broken-down jeep. Damn supercilious bastard.
Zoe glared. “Just because I can’t repair a busted radiator doesn’t mean I’m a damsel in distress. I could kick your ass any day of the week, Tyler Minor.” She put a rumble of a growl into the words, a challenge for supremacy and dominance. Just try to take me on, big boy.
The challenge caught something primitive and instinctive inside him. He stepped forward, looming over her, trying to use his size to intimidate her. At five ten in her bare feet, Zoe wasn’t the kind of girl who was easy to loom over, but when a man could manage it, it never failed to make her toes curl.
Tyler didn’t just manage it. Tyler loomed like an angry Greek god. Mouthwatering and imposing all at once.
His eyes held hers and her heart began to pound. Do it. Push back. Touch me. Zoe swayed forward.
And Tyler shut off.
Just like that. Between one heartbeat and the next, Tyler went from looming Greek god to aloof and disinterested. His gaze slid away from her, focusing on some vague point behind her left shoulder for a moment before he turned away.
“Wait over there until I have the jeep on the hitch.” He pointed to a dusty patch of grass off the side of the road without looking back at her or breaking stride as he walked back to the tow truck.
Frustration built in her throat, but she managed to keep from screaming. Or roaring her rage. She’d had a lot of practice.
Running away again. In the last year, Zoe had seen Tyler in retreat more than any other sight. Her gaze rolled over the tense muscles in his wide shoulders down to the lean hips and that God-almighty-gorgeous ass. She couldn’t seem to stop scaring him off, which sucked a little more every day.
But at least the view was nice.
Chapter Two
Tyler beat a strategic retreat back to his truck. Backing down wasn’t in his nature, but it was becoming a habit around Zoe. It was either that or pin her against the jeep and show her who was boss. Kiss her until she couldn’t remember her own name, screw her until all she could say was his—which was completely out of the question. The Alpha’s only sister was not someone you fucked around with, and the absolute last thing Tyler needed right now was another commitment, another goddamn responsibility.
So he walked away. Every. Single. Fucking. Time.
Because it was the smart choice. The responsible choice. The only choice that wouldn’t completely fuck up the rest of his life.
He just had to remind himself of that whenever she was standing there in front of him with her eyes flashing with equal parts lust and anger. She looked like a walking invitation to all his best fantasies, but she might as well have had a neon flashing Hands Off sign on her forehead.
So Tyler kept his hands off and focused on the parts of his life he could get a grip on. Cars. Engines never made him feel like he’d jumped off a cliff without a parachute.
He drove the tow truck in front of the dead jeep and jumped out to winch it up onto the flatbed. He could feel Zoe watching him. No surprise there. He could never be around her without being excruciatingly aware of her presence. He couldn’t control that, but he could control his response to her. So he didn’t respond. He ignored her—as much as anyone could ignore someone who smelled like heaven on a stick—and put his back into cranking the old-fashioned flatbed down at an angle so he could drag the jeep up onto it.
But Zoe, being Zoe, couldn’t let herself be ignored for long.
“You know, they have these new handy-dandy mechanical thingies. You just hit a button and zip.” She snapped her fingers. “It tilts like magic.”
“This one works fine.” He grunted, leaning his weight into it.
She muttered something that sounded a lot like “ornery son of a bitch” and scuffed her boot in the dirt, kicking up a mini-tornado.
He didn’t bother to explain that he would rather put in the effort to keep up something with some history behind it working than buy a brand-new piece of crap that was just going to be outdated in a few weeks anyway. Too many things worth keeping got discarded when something bright and shiny and new came along. He enjoyed babying the old jeeps on the ranch until they purred for him.
But if Zoe thought he was a contrary SOB, that was simpler for both of them, so he let her think it. She paced restlessly at his side and he pretended not to notice the way the tip of her long blonde ponytail flicked against the small of her back with each step, guiding his eye down to the twitch of her ass.
“You really aren’t pissed at Michael? Not even a little?”
Tyler forced himself not to react visibly. Pissed couldn’t hold a candle to what he’d felt when Michael told him about going half-furry in public.
After twenty years of being the responsible older brother, raising his siblings, living his life for their happiness and their safety, avoiding unnecessary chances and sacrificing his own opportunities so they would have more…after twenty goddamn years, Tyler had been a heartbeat away from seeing all four of them settled—happy and safe. A whisper away from leaving the pride and taking off on his own—who knew for how long, but any time he had would be his and his alone. No responsibilities. No obligations. Responsible for no one’s happiness but his own.
Then Michael half-shifted in front of a bar full of witnesses.
Tyler had tried rationalization. Everyone was drunk on a Friday night—they wouldn’t know what they’d seen. He hadn’t fully shifted—lots of special-effects guys could make claws and fur seem to sprout on people’s hands, and who didn’t have a pair of fake fangs these days?
But no matter how he tried to rationalize it, the truth remained. The pride was at risk. And Tyler couldn’t leave his siblings—the only family he had left—until he knew they would all be safe.
So he was trapped. Again.
To say he’d been pissed at Michael… It was more accurate to say he’d wanted to shred his baby brother’s hide.
But there was no way in hell he was telling Zoe that.
Trust her to ask what everyone else was too tactful to say. Trust Zoe to shove her nose in where it had no business. The woman had no goddamn sense of boundaries whatsoever.
His anger with Michael was none of her business. It didn’t affect her or the pride or anyone other than himself. The pointless frustration boiled in his gut, but he refused to give it an outlet. He was a lion, not a goddamn dog. He didn’t howl at the moon over what might have been.
Life was one shitstorm after another, but there was no changing it, so you sucked it up and played the hand you got dealt with a fucking smile on your face.
Tyler kept his hands working steadily and didn’t so much as flinch when her question prodded the embers of frustration burning in his gut. “No,” he said flatly, working the winch up higher.
She inched closer, hovering right over his shoulder. “It was gonna come out eventually anyway, right?” She swayed from foot to foot, the constant motion tugging at his peripheral vision as he locked the jeep in place and cranked the flatbed level. “If not Michael, someone else would have been seen. And it’s not like he could help it. And who knows, it might be a good thing in the long run, right? If we weren’t trying to hide what we are from doctors and scientists, they might be able to help fix whatever imbalance keeps Michael from being able to control his shifting. Landon needs to get his head out of his ass and treat this like the opportunity it is.”
Tyler grunted and steered her toward the cab of the truck, careful not to touch her. Platonic touch was traded casually in the pride, but he always avoided putting his hands on Zoe, never entirely certain he would be able to get them off her again if he gave in to the temptation of her smooth, golden skin.
“He picked a hell of a time to go all barbarian traditional Alpha,” Zoe grumbled. “Right now is when we need to be taking action, framing the way our debut into the world is going to go. Not hiding out and bracing for the worst.”
She bounced into the cab, so caught up in her complaints she didn
’t seem aware of what her body was doing. Tyler was aware enough for the both of them. He watched her ass in the tight jeans, the movement of her full breasts beneath the too-thin T-shirt. His mouth watered and his palms itched, but he just slammed the passenger door and rounded the hood.
As soon as he opened the driver’s door, Zoe started in again. “You could talk to him. He listens to you. If you told him—”
“Not my call,” he said shortly, cutting her off before she could get going. “Alpha’s decision.”
Zoe snorted. “Oh please. That isn’t you.”
Tyler ignored her, cranking the key until the truck’s engine sprang to life with a jagged roar. He shoved the truck into gear and pulled out onto the deserted country road, headed back toward the ranch.
“Caleb is the soldier in your family,” Zoe continued. “You’re the thinker.”
“I’m the mechanic.”
Zoe twisted toward him and he tried not to notice the way her legs draped over the bench seat between them, her knee brushing the outside of his thigh through two layers of denim. “You analyze everything,” Zoe insisted.
He couldn’t argue that. Right now he was analyzing exactly how long it would take him to get her jeans down around her ankles and her knees over his shoulders if he pulled the truck off to the side of the road. Twenty, maybe thirty seconds. That big-ass silver belt buckle she’d taken to wearing lately might slow him down some.
“You have opinions about everything. Typical alpha I-know-best-and-you-must-obey bullshit, even if you shove it all down and try to pretend it isn’t there. I bet you always get your way, right?”
Only rigid control kept Tyler from laughing out loud at that. He always got his own way, did he? Whoever Zoe thought she was talking about, it sure as hell wasn’t him. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d done anything just for himself.
“You’re more manipulative than the other he-man lions in the pride though. I bet you’re the one who taught Ava everything she knows about diplomacy.”
“Something you never learned, apparently.”
Zoe’s soft laughter rippled out to fill the cab. Not the reaction he’d expected, but Zoe rarely conformed to expectations. The brim of her cowboy hat knocked against the window, tipping it back so he had a better view of her face and the easy warmth of her smile. A knot tightened low in his gut.
“I never did see much point in tact.” She linked her fingers over the knee wedged against his thigh, the backs of her fingers pressing into his leg. His jeans suddenly felt tight, but he couldn’t remove her hand without acknowledging her touch affected him, so he tightened his hands on the steering wheel, keeping his eyes locked on the road ahead.
“What I don’t get is why you need to be Mr. Diplomacy. Ava, I get. She’s tiny and that’s like tattooing kick me on your forehead in the prides. But you’re one of the biggest shifters I’ve ever seen. Why weren’t you the Alpha before Landon and I showed up? Are you just a really crappy fighter or something?”
His lion sent a growl rumbling out of his throat at the insult before he could swallow it down.
Zoe chuckled and her fingers uncurled to pet his thigh. “Down, boy.”
He wanted her hands on him, petting, stroking. Just a little higher. Her skin would be soft, her hands firm and capable. Stroking him from base to tip, wringing need from him in juicy drops…
Tyler grabbed her hand off his leg and flicked it away from him before he gave in to the urge to grind himself against her. “Not everyone wants to rule the world.” His voice sounded odd—too rough and low.
She folded her arms across her stomach, tucking her knees in so they no longer pressed against him. He didn’t suspect for a second he’d hurt her feelings with the rebuff. With Zoe, a strategic retreat was much more likely. Feint and parry. Retreat and advance. A constant campaign to test for weaknesses in his defenses.
She tipped her head and the cowboy hat slid back farther. “I get that you aren’t power crazy, but my impression is that pride life was pretty much hell under Leonus. I’m surprised you wouldn’t take him out just to improve living conditions. Seems like that kind of noble shit would be right up your alley.”
He could have explained. He could have told her that he was Alpha of his own pride: Caleb, Kane, Michael and Ava. Protecting his younger siblings had been his top priority since his father left. Being Alpha of Three Rocks would have made him responsible for ten times as many lions. He couldn’t care for that many and still look after his four the way he needed to, so he had ruthlessly suppressed his frustration at the way the pride was run under Leonus. His family came first. Always.
“I never claimed to be noble.”
Zoe hummed her agreement. “Tricky thing, nobility. The more claims you make to it, the less you have.”
“So I must be noble because I told you I’m not?”
She shook her head and the cowboy hat gave up the fight, tumbling down over her shoulder. She caught it one-handed and tucked it into her lap, running her long, slim fingers over the brim. “It doesn’t work in reverse,” she explained. “But if you’d said you were noble, I’d have known you were full of shit. Denial is a good sign.”
He flicked her a glance out of the corner of his eye and had trouble looking away. They were on the ranch drive now, so he didn’t really need to pay much attention to the road, but looking at it was safer than watching her. Zoe King was a hazard to his senses.
Curled in the passenger seat like the cat she was, her green-gold eyes never wavered from him as her fingers stroked patterns in the hat, teasing him with thoughts of those same fingers branding patterns into his skin with a touch.
God, she was gorgeous. Tall and strong like a Viking goddess, with curves just where he wanted them. Her face was so actively expressive it was easy to miss the sheer beauty of it—the high cheekbones and lush, inviting fullness of her mouth. Tyler often found himself captivated by her constantly changing expressions. He could sit and watch her for hours, sucked in by the way each thought and emotion tracked across her face.
He yanked his gaze away and locked it back on the road.
She was quicksand. She’d suck him in and trap him here so he’d never be free. He just needed to keep reminding himself of that.
“Don’t worry. I don’t expect you to be gallant and noble.” Her voice was low and smooth, a purring invitation to sin. “Virtue is so overrated. I like my knights rough with their armor a little tarnished around the edges.”
The scent of her twined around him in the cab, the tang of ginger mixed with something dark and rich. Tyler rolled down the window, taking a deep breath of the dry, dusty air in an attempt to get some more blood flowing to his brain instead of diverting to his crotch.
Her knees inched closer again, brushing against the side of his leg. With every bounce along the rutted dirt drive, she edged toward him. If not for the seat belt keeping her back, she probably would have crawled onto his lap. Tyler’s brain began to melt at the thought of her straddling his lap, her lush curves rising above him.
Zoe’d never made any secret of the fact that she wanted him—she wasn’t exactly the coy type—but he’d ignored every hint and passed up every not-so-subtle invitation. If he acknowledged that she wanted him, if he gave her any clue that it was the thought of her he jacked off to in the shower every night, she would never give up.
And he needed her to give up. He couldn’t take much more temptation from Zoe King.
He didn’t need another rock tying him to the ranch. He’d played Atlas too long to want to shoulder any more responsibilities. And Zoe would be a massive weight on his life if he let her in.
You didn’t jilt the Alpha’s sister. Especially when the Alpha was married to your own sister. If Zoe got her hooks into him, Tyler would stay here, trapped on the ranch. Forever.
Shit, if Zoe got her hooks in him, he might not even mind the life sentence.
“Tyler?” Her voice was a throaty rasp that did nothing for his calm.
The ranch had gone through several incarnations before it had ended up as the headquarters for the largest shape-shifter pride in West Texas. Since its first life as a summer bible camp, it had undergone substantial changes, but the clusters of cabins surrounding the communal dining hall had suited the lions perfectly. Another previous owner had added the requisite outbuildings and fencing to turn it into a cattle ranch—though the Three Rocks pride owned just enough cattle to provide their own game on the traditional semi-annual hunts.
With the addition of their own schoolhouse, medical clinic, his garage and a massive greenhouse, they’d done what they could to become their own community, independent of the outside world. Everyone contributed in the pride. Many of their members had telecommuted or worked in town to bring in additional cash, but most of those with jobs in town had lost them in the last month.
In spite of the unwritten rule that everyone work for the good of the pride, the pace of life was slower here. Like their feline cousins, the lion-shifters were sensualists who valued their indulgences and relaxation with a European appreciation. They felt safe enough to reveal their true natures here—in spite of the concerns about the town.
This afternoon was no exception, perfect for a hammock and a cold beer. Shifters basked in the sun in both lion form and human.
And Tyler didn’t see any of it. Zoe consumed every one of his senses as he threaded the tow truck along the service road that twisted through the maintenance buildings, toward his garage.
The cab had begun to feel like a cage. His lion chafed at the restriction, pressing against the inside of his skin.
God, the scent of her. It was killing him. How could she tease him to a frenzy with just a brush of her leg and the heady intoxication of her scent?
“Are you in heat?” His voice lashed across the cab, whip-crack sharp.
