by Mandy Rosko
Shelley couldn’t take it anymore. “What are they so mad about? It’s not like we didn’t know they were coming.”
Deena’s green eyes flickered to her, then back down to her coffee. She pulled her spoon out of the mug and dropped it onto the bar with a clatter.
“It can’t be that bad,” Shelley said.
“No…I…” She ran her pink nails through equally pink hair. “I don’t really know, I mean, if it’s my place to say anything.”
Shelley still didn’t get it. “You’ve been here for a while now, and I’m all but married to Michael. Can’t you—”
The side door opened, and Chris, completely, gorgeously naked, entered the house.
Deena scrambled to the cupboard under the sink where more clothes had been hidden, her beaded bracelets and necklaces clattering as she did, and she came back with some jeans for him.
Clothes were kept all over the house for just this reason.
“Didn’t see anything while I was out running. Smelled them, though. Changed into the wolf when I caught the scent, so I don’t really know anything else. I think they’re gone, baby, the scent was weak when I changed back,” he said as Deena handed him the jeans with a kiss.
Shelley kept her hands over her eyes until the rustle of fabric told her that Chris was covered in the places that mattered. When she pulled her hands away, he wore the jeans, button undone, and a grin.
“You’re so shy,” he said.
“Quit teasing her. Go tell Michael what you saw,” Deena said, pointing toward the office.
“I was just playing around, and they’re gone.”
When Deena continued to stare hard at him, he put his hands up and stepped cautiously around her. “All right, all right.” He headed for Michael’s office.
Deena hesitated a half second before catching up to him, grabbing his muscled arm in her small hands. “Wait.”
He turned, and she pulled him into a kiss. Shelley turned away from the show of affection. The men in the house walked around naked, a lot, a product of their conditions. It was something she had yet to get entirely used to, but while she had nothing against Deena and her husband kissing each other, all things considered, the moment called for some privacy.
That, and she didn’t want to acknowledge the ache of jealousy. How long had it been since she and Michael kissed like that?
They finally pulled apart, whispering to each other before Chris released her and went toward the office.
“Sorry about that,” Deena said, ducking her pink head sheepishly.
“I’m scared too,” Shelley said.
The door opened about two minutes later, the voices became clearer, and their steps closer as they came into view from the dark hall. Michael in front, barking orders to Alex beside him, Chris trailing behind, shrugging into a borrowed plaid button-down shirt. “E-mail everybody, too, regardless of whether or not they’ve answered their phones. Take no chances. For the ones who didn’t answer, use every number and every address we have on them and leave messages for them all, then keep calling until a real person answers. This was a message”—Michael’s silver eyes landed on Shelley —“and we got it loud and clear.”
She was on her feet in an instant. The look in his eyes made her insides shift. “What’s going on?”
Michael’s muscles rippled beneath his cotton T-shirt as he struggled for calm. “We just got off the phone with the local vampire regiment. They don’t know anything, or they say they don’t, about the king’s men entering our territory.” He put his large hands on her bare shoulders.. “I know I asked you not to leave the land, but now—”
“Wait.” She shrugged away. “You can’t ask me to leave. I won’t leave.”
Michael shook his head, hands finding her arms and clenching tight. “No, nothing like that, but”—he looked to Alex before turning his eyes back to her—“because I’m not entirely sure whether or not Pearl was targeting you, or just letting me know she’s back in fighting condition, I don’t want you leaving the house, even with escorts.”
Shelley inhaled sharply then bit her lips together to keep the shocked yell from escaping. Well, at least he’d told her himself this time instead of getting Alex to do it. She released her pent-up breath, imagining her anger escaping her body with it. It helped. A little. Then she nodded. “All right.”
Michael waited a beat. “All right? You’re fine with this?”
“Not really,” she said. “I hate it on every level I can imagine, but I know this is for my safety, and if I don’t want that psycho chick’s teeth in my neck again, then I’ll stay put.”
Michael heaved a sigh, his lips turning up a little at her words. Shelley hadn’t even thought about how concerned he might’ve been just over her reaction. He kissed her, long and languidly, and this time, the anger inside her really did melt away to nothingness.
It was going to be temporary, until everything could get settled with the vampire king, she told herself. She put her hands into Michael’s sand-colored hair. He wore it loose today, and it fell to his shoulders, just the way she liked it.
A shifting of feet and a cough had them pulling apart. Michael cleared his throat, going back into alpha mode. “Deena, this goes for you too. I don’t want either of you becoming targets for Pearl or her men.”
She nodded, and Chris went to stand next to her, taking her hand into his and squeezing. “Understood,” she said.
“What about the others?” Shelley asked. “You just came out of your office talking about sending messages and calling the others until everyone was spoken to. Are they coming?”
“Yes,” Alex answered, “an alpha’s summons can’t be ignored, and I’m making sure that everyone gets the message. There’s enough of us here to keep Pearl from outright attacking the property, but by tomorrow, we’ll have enough wolf power to go to war with them, if that’s what they want.”
“Will Cal be coming?”
Her question seemed to echo off the walls with the force of a wrecking ball in the silence she got.
“Yes,” Michael answered, then cracked his knuckles. “He’ll be here, the same as everyone else, and when he comes, we’ll have it out.”
Terrific. Shelley took in another breath, and this one made her chest shake. She couldn’t help it. Up until now, whenever one of the men here fought over something, it had only been over what to eat, what to watch on TV, and once, which car to drive. But Cal wanted Michael out of the pack. Whatever fight they had wasn’t going to be some friendly wrestling match where the only blood came from a busted lip or a long scratch. They were going to be tearing each other’s heads off.
Michael’s hand caressing her cheek pulled her out of her fast and furious thoughts. She looked into his eyes and knew he heard everything going through her head. “I’m not going to fight him.”
That caught her attention.
Everyone else’s, too.
Chris and Deena went rigid, and Alex was at his side in an instant, hand on his shoulder. “Sir, you have to fight him.”
“I should’ve stepped down the second I got back. This way I can work out a deal to stay in the pack and keep Shelley safe.”
“Wait, stop, you’re going way too fast for me,” Shelley said, her hands coming up to halt any more protests from the others. “Why should you have stepped down?”
Michael rubbed his stubbly jaw. “Do you remember that night we were in the truck, right after Pearl’s first attack?”
She thought back to their conversation. A lot of things had been said.
“When I said I would send you back home but have my men watch over you, make sure Pearl didn’t try anything again?”
“Yeah.”
“I made that offer that because alphas don’t usually take mates.”
“What?”
“What I mean is, they do, but when they do, they don’t always acknowledge them.”
“Why?”
“Well…”
“They create distractions,” Alex
said, saving his alpha from making the explanation.
“Distractions?” A flair of annoyance ignited within her. “Is Deena a distraction to Chris?”
“No, Shelley, it’s not like that,” Michael said. “Alphas who take their mates, like what I did with you, bring complications to their packs. It…” He started to look like he was struggling again.
“Spit it out. I promise I won’t be mad.” Much, she silently added, knowing he would hear it. Was this what Deena had been trying to tell her only a few minutes ago?
“We should split,” Chris said, taking Deena’s hand and heading for the opposite direction of all the negative energy.
“Right behind you,” Alex said, following suit.
Michael watched them go, waited for the sounds of their steps to disappear down the hall, and then waited another ten seconds after that.
“Remember when I also asked you to not treat my wolf like your pet dog?”
“Yes, I remember, and I promise I haven’t been.”
“I know, and no one appreciates that more than me, but I don’t think I ever told you why I needed you not to do that.”
“I figured it was because of your image. Your wolves need to see you as a strong leader, not someone who plays around or is all lovey to a woman in his spare time.”
He looked taken aback. A surprised smile lifted his lips. “That’s exactly...How—”
“I was looking up dog and wolf behavior in packs on the Internet. I read up on wolves marking their territories, how to spot alphas by their stance, the way they treat the puppies—”
He stopped her with a kiss, pulling her body to him until she was pressed into his hard chest. She wrapped her arms around his neck, let him open her mouth with his tongue, and just enjoyed the closeness and the feeling of his unshaved skin against her mouth.
When he pulled away, he kept her close enough that the warmth of his breath still touched her. “Should’ve known better than to doubt you.”
“Yes, you should have,” she said, entirely mellowed by his heat. If it had been a case of men having too much testosterone to show any affection to their wives, then Shelley wouldn’t have put up with it for a second, but this was different. Michael was a werewolf, as were all the men who lived here, and the ones coming as well. What they had inside them was an instinct that couldn’t be fought. If the other wolves smelled weakness, then Michael couldn’t be alpha, couldn’t protect them. “So, you’re not going to fight Cal? You’re just going to give him the pack?”
“No, if I step down, any member of the pack who wants to lead will step forward, and they’ll fight to be on top. My money’s on Alex to win. He won’t banish us from the pack like Cal.”
Shelley released a long breath. “Is that why you’ve been distant?”
He hesitated then kissed her hair. “I’m sorry, but we’re almost done with this. I won’t fight for the pack, Alex will take over, and everything will be okay. We’ll go somewhere the vampires won’t find us and spend more time together. I promise.”
Shelley got the feeling there was more he wasn’t telling her, but she didn’t feel like doing the whole guessing-game thing right now, not when they were so cozy, and talk of a romantic getaway did have its appeal. “We could start right now.”
He grinned as her hands reached for his belt buckle. She welcomed his kiss, the slide of his hands over the curve of her back, his fingers slipping under the elastic of her jogging pants. Then he got a firm grip on her rear, lifted her into the air, and sat her on the counter.
Shelley laughed as he pushed aside the coffee cups she and Deena had been using, spilling them in his haste. She wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him closer, gripping his hair, and—
“Michael.”
They pulled apart.
Alex stood in the doorway, and he looked sheepish for having walked in on them. His face was red and eyes looking at the opposite wall.
Michael clenched his jaw at the interruption. “Yeah?”
“Uh”—Alex scratched the tip of his nose with his thumb—“there’s a call for you. A local vampire is talking, thinks he saw something.”
“Are we sure it’s a local?”
Alex shrugged. “No. Figured you’d want to check it out anyway.”
Beneath her hands and between her thighs, Shelley felt as Michael’s muscles bunched up, torn between duty and desire.
She pressed a kiss to his neck. “You can go. I need to finish my workout.”
“Are you sure?”
This was one of those times where Shelley had to use her skills as an actress to hide her disappointment. She had to force herself not to feel it in order to make sure he didn’t feel it either. “I’ll be in the gym finishing my run. Don’t really need to do that outside if there’s a treadmill in the house.”
His hand went to the back of her head, and he pressed their foreheads together. That werewolf version of a kiss, even though he was not in wolf form. That alone must have been a lot for him to do, considering they had an audience. “Really soon, I promise.”
He kissed her one last time, a real kiss. It was a chaste thing that left her wanting, and he went with Alex to take care of business.
When alone, Shelley took a deep breath, slid down from the counter, grabbed another water bottle from the fridge, and went to the basement gym to finish her workout.
The land the house was settled on was sloped, so even though she was in the basement, it wasn’t entirely underground. The windows stretched all along the outer wall and went from floor to ceiling, giving the perfect view of the trees. Jake was still sniffing around outside, and he stopped at the edge of the inground pool, sat on his haunches, and stayed.
Shelley wondered if he knew she was on the other side of the glass and that was why he was parking it. Maybe he scented Pearl and her minions nearby.
Either way, she was glad for his protection.
If the only thing she could do to help the men in this house rest a little easier was stay under house arrest for a while, then she’d do it gladly.
Shelley bypassed the enormous dumbbells and weights and went straight to the Smooth Fitness treadmill. It faced the windows, as did the other machines, so she’d be able to keep her eyes on Jake while he watched the land.
She plugged in her iPod, set the timer, and got to work.
She all but fell off the thing an hour later, muscles sore and stiff, but otherwise she felt great, especially since it was an hour of not thinking about killer vampires.
She dragged herself back to her bedroom and had her sweaty clothes half-off when she spotted the little brown bag sitting on her pillow.
She went to it and grinned. Michael had left milk chocolate M&M’s for her. Her favorite. It was better than getting roses.
Chapter Four
The next morning, Shelley could hardly take two steps without walking into someone two feet taller and packing at least a hundred pounds more body muscle than her. Everyone seemed to arrive all at once, and for the first time, Shelley understood the need for such a huge house when so few people actually lived in it. Because when the pack came, they took up a lot of space. A whoooole lot.
She and Deena had been the only humans in the house before, but now with thirty-some-odd other men and women finding space for themselves, the same was still true.
Everyone was bigger than her, even the women, few that there were, and with their sharp, animalistic eyes that seemed to see through everything, they all stared.
Now she knew why Chris, Alex, and Jake had such a hard time adjusting to her presence. Not because she was the new girl on the land, or the semifamous actress, but because of how rare it was for an alpha to take a woman and then stay alpha.
Despite the odd looks, she was still welcomed into the circle they created in the living room. The leather couches, chairs, and love seats had been rearranged to give Michael the floor. He stood in front of the fifty-inch flat-screen mounted on the wall above the fireplace behind him. It was t
urned off. No need for it when an announcement was about to be made. Everyone had drinks in their hands, and Shelley had even prepared cracker trays with meats and cheese, a giant plastic punch bowl so the guests could grab their drinks—the whole deal.
Occasionally a curious hand would reach out and grab for something, but from the otherwise unenthusiastic response, Shelley got the impression these meetings weren’t intended as social calls.
Deena took a seat next to her on the arm of the black leather couch, drink glass in one hand, and reached out to take Shelley’s hand in the other.
She could have cried for her appreciation of the support.
“Is it pointless to ask which one is Cal, or can everyone already hear what I’m whispering?”
“They’ll either hear you or’ll be too caught up in their own conversations to pay attention. The guy right there with the dark hair and fancy cut is Cal. The little guy beside him is his cousin, Isaac.”
Shelley looked, sipping punch from her cup and trying not to be obvious. The two men were talking, so if Deena was right, then they weren’t paying enough attention to notice they were being talked about. Not like it mattered anyway, as they were sitting under the window, away from everyone else.
The pack seemed to create a natural bubble around the cousins. Shelley knew they weren’t the only ones who didn’t agree with Michael’s return. Maybe Cal just did it in a more open way that made everyone uncomfortable.
Cal looked like a movie star, and Shelley knew all about that. His hair was the same shoulder length as the majority of the other men in the pack, but she recognized a stylist’s touch when she saw it, the hint of highlights and gel to keep every strand in place. His hands were smooth, nails well trimmed. He looked like he was getting ready for a head shot instead of a meeting.
Shelley hadn’t known that werewolves could look so…well, good. Seriously, her former agent would’ve loved to get ahold of him. The serious, I don’t fuck around look in his eyes would hardly have acted as a deterrent.
His cousin looked similar in the way that relatives did, with the same pale blue eyes and the same dark hair, but it was cut shorter and his build was smaller. Not without muscle, however. Isaac wore a red T-shirt, and she could see that what little muscle he had was sculpted. That kid spent time in a weight room.
