by Robin Moray
In the bathroom he took the opportunity to check his bites. The arm had stopped hurting, which he'd taken for a good sign (or a sign his nerve endings had necrotised, or something) but when he unwrapped the bandage he was shocked to see how healthy it looked, no longer red and angry and gross but mostly closed-up. What–
He rolled up his jeans to check his calf, only to find that one had completely healed up, just smooth skin and a pale mark in the outline of teeth.
He bounced up onto the bed, leaning over Nero and poking him. "Hey! Did you heal my bites?"
Nero grumbled at him, burrowing under the covers. "You did it yourself."
"No, but," and he shook his arm at Nero, trying to get him to pay attention, "look at this!"
Nero opened one eye, glanced at the nearly-healed wound, and then up at Callum. "Did you expect anything different? This was the point of the bond for you."
"So, it really worked?"
Nero blinked at him. "Can't you tell? I have you in my head, now. Don't you have the same?"
It was ... weird. There was a sort of echo behind his thoughts, an underlying sense of Nero's wellbeing. Right now he was sleepy and comfortable, a little hungry, and something else Callum didn't really understand. It wasn't quite telepathy, though, not like he could read Nero's thoughts. But maybe Nero really could read his, now.
I wanna suck your dick, Callum thought, hard, willing Nero to hear him. Nero didn't even blink. No luck there.
"So," Callum said, still having difficulty wrapping his head around this. "I have, what? Super healing powers?"
Nero made an exasperated noise, pushing himself up on one elbow. "It didn't occur to you to ask this before we bonded?"
"No, mostly I was just worried about dying." Callum prodded him again, and Nero took his hand, squeezing it in the warmth of his palm.
"Mmm. Well, then." Nero frowned thoughtfully. "I'm not sure how it'll be different for a human, but yes, you'll heal faster. You'll be stronger, too, more resilient. I do know you'll be resistant to wolf bites, to most sickness, to disease."
"So I can't turn into a werewolf?" He wasn't disappointed, exactly, but...
Nero hesitated. "No-one can turn you now, but me," he said, slow and solemn. "Unless I die, and you bond to another."
"And if you die, I die," Callum clarified.
"Unless you bond to another," Nero said again.
He looked ... Callum wasn't sure, but the unknowable something that echoed down the bond made Callum want to touch his face so he did, fingers sliding along Nero's jaw. "Guess I better take care of you, then." And he could tell, so he added, "You're hungry, and it's making me hungry. I'll bring you breakfast, if you just wanna laze around all day."
Nero closed his eyes, turning to fit his nose to Callum's palm. "I won't turn down breakfast in bed."
"It would be a crime," Callum agreed. He made a move to get up, but Nero tugged him back, stretching his neck out. Callum thought he wanted a kiss so he leaned down, but Nero just nosed Callum's cheek, his mouth barely brushing Callum's skin. The contact was sweet, and the indefinable thing hovering in the bond seemed to thicken, making Callum feel dizzy and strange, and he took a deep breath to steady himself.
"Um." Yes, Cal, very helpful. "I'll ... be back. With food."
"I'll be here," Nero promised, slinking back down under the covers until he was only eyes watching Callum go.
Callum clattered down the back stairs to the kitchen. No-one was about, probably because the sun was barely even up, and Callum had a look in the fridge for something to make up. Grilled cheese sandwiches sounded pretty good. He got cheese, bread, real butter, and mustard (because hell yeah mustard), and turned around to–
"What the fuck are you doing?"
Hamish was standing just inside the doorway. He was barefoot, shirtless, sweatpants low-slung around his hips and, holy hell, with his hair sticking up all on one side of his head and the pillow-creases on his cheek he looked like a wet-dream. Callum tried not to look at him, just put the food down on the counter and shut the fridge door.
"I'm grilling cheese." In case it wasn't obvious.
Hamish scowled, folding his ridiculous arms over his ridiculous chest. It made everything bulge in ways that ... Callum just really wished he'd put a shirt on. "Just like that? Like you live here? Like that's your food?"
It hadn't even occurred to Callum that there was anything wrong with it, but then, okay, yeah that was kinda rude. But then he remembered – Hamish was a jerk, and he was being a jerk, right now. "Listen, first of all, it's not like I got much of a choice in all this. You kidnapped me, remember? And second, it's for Nero, so I'm pretty sure I'm allowed. Right?" Callum had a feeling he was pushing his luck, but Hamish just pissed him right off. "Nero's still the alpha, right?"
Hamish snarled, crossing the room in a heartbeat and slamming both hands down on the counter. "You little shit," he growled, and fuck, there were fangs in his growl. "You don't know anything – nothing – about the pack, and our alpha. You're worse than an omega. You're like ... an omega who doesn't know he is one," and the way his mouth writhed with this made Callum feel the weight of his disgust like a slap in the face. "Nero should have gutted you like a pig, instead of slobbering over you, like you're really his mate. What the fuck did you do to deserve this?"
And that ... whoa, Callum felt the rage come up in him like fire. "Get. Shitted. You fucking asshole. I didn't ask for any of this. Your bitch girlfriend ran into my car, and she could have taken off but she came back to kill me, only look how well that worked out! I'm making the best of this, and all I'm hearing from you is dick-measuring and pissing in the wind. So forgive me if I don't give a fuck what you think of me."
Hamish stared at him, impossibly-blue eyes wide with shock, and then they flashed inhumanly silver. He grabbed Callum by the shirt, claws tearing through the cloth, and yanked him forward, dragging him halfway up onto the counter. "I'm gonna break you in half."
Shit. Callum was absolutely sure that whatever super healing or strength he'd gained from the bond was nothing beside what Hamish could do to him. Could you head-butt a werewolf? Would that just make him mad? Could he bluff his way out of this? His heartbeat must already be through the roof...
Okay. Do it.
"You wanted to know how I killed Holly." Callum wrapped a hand around Hamish's wrist, digging his nails in. "Want me to show you?"
Hamish flinched, hesitated, and that was when Nero burst into the room.
The sound he made when he saw them was inhuman. Callum jerked back from it, stunned, and holy shit, Nero was still naked, which shouldn't have been terrifying but his fangs were out and his claws too and his eyes glowed like moonlight.
"Get your hands off him!"
Hamish twisted, and for a moment it looked like he was going to back off. but then he shoved Callum away, turning on Nero with his head down and his hands spread wide. "You don't need him," Hamish snarled, voice dropping, broadening with bassy harmonics as his claws lengthened.
"He's mine," and the force of it made Callum feel like his heart had stopped. Nero was so angry. Callum could feel it like fire, like his own anger, the two blending seamlessly into one.
Hamish made a sound of pure fury. "How could you choose him over us?"
What? Callum didn't understand, and he didn't think Nero did either, his anger hitching before it swelled again. "You dare question my choice of mate?" He took a step forward and, holy fucking Christ, Callum saw how his bones shifted, how the change came over him, flooding his skin with fur like ... actually exactly how Callum had always imagined it would happen.
Hamish's jaw dropped. "You ... made the bond?"
But Nero had fully shifted, and Callum finally understood why Nero was the alpha. He was enormous, a huge black wolf with a streak of silver from muzzle to shoulder. He growled, deeper and more threatening than any sound Callum had ever heard him or any of them make, haunches bunching like he meant to spring.
Hamish stared at him
, stock-still for a heartbeat, and then he twisted, shifting as he went, in wolf-form by the time his hands-that-were-now-paws hit the floor. He bolted for the door in a gray streak of lightning, just as Nero leapt for him, Nero's teeth closing on empty air with a heavy snap.
"Nero–" but Callum didn't know what to say. It didn't matter; Nero was out behind Hamish before the door swung shut. "Holy fuck!"
Callum lunged for the door, staggering down the steps, and fuck, Nero had Hamish pinned to the ground, though the gray wolf struggled under him, snapping and snarling, and clearly hadn't given up yet. They were both huge but it was clear now that Nero was bigger, thicker, stronger, even shaggier. Callum could still feel Nero's anger, but it had changed now, no longer a hot fury but a pointed focus. He wasn't even sure if it counted as anger or something else, an alien sort of thing that only looked like anger from the outside.
Another wolf came loping out of the trees, skirting around the wrestle taking place on the wet lawn, and then trotted up to Callum's side. It sat, as if nothing was wrong, watching Nero and Hamish fight with sort of calm implacability. Callum thought it might have been the one from yesterday, the one who'd prompted him to intervene.
"Should I do something?"
The wolf looked up at him, and how it managed to look so skeptical he didn't know, but it conveyed, How the hell do you think you're going to get in the middle of that? perfectly.
The door banged open; Ria came through it in a dressing gown, Gabby peeking around the doorway behind her. Ria looked from the wolves on the lawn and back to Callum, and seemed to relax. "Fucking finally," she muttered.
"Swear jar!" Gabby said gleefully, and then, "Why's Papa fighting with Uncle Hamish?"
"Because your Uncle Hamish is an idiot," Ria said, and then she shooed Gabby back inside. "Sweetie, can you get Vera to make some coffee? Good girl."
Nero had Hamish on his back now, the black wolf's jaw open, teeth close around the gray wolf's throat. Callum clapped a hand over his mouth, trying not to freak out, because he hated Hamish, but that didn't mean he wanted to see him get his jugular torn out.
The wolf by his side and the human-shaped wolf on the other didn't even flinch, though.
"So," Ria said conversationally, as if they were watching a game of tennis, "made the bond work, then." It wasn't a question.
"Uh ... yeah."
"Nice." She turned a level unblinking look on him, eyes flashing silver. "I guess that makes you pack."
Callum couldn't help the face he made, and it must have been amusing because Ria grinned at him. "Are you ... look, is Nero gonna kill him?" Hamish had gone still now, head tipped back, but Nero's teeth on his throat looked hard and painful, and Callum could still feel that weird alien almost-anger through the bond.
"What?" Ria sounded genuinely surprised. "Why would he kill him?"
"I don't know! Because that's what it looks like?"
Ria snorted, propping her hands on her hips. "He's just going to make Hamish submit," she said, tilting her head to watch.
Callum ... didn't get it. "Is that how Nero would have done it if he'd bonded one of you?"
She turned to him, eyes wide with fake innocence. "Are you saying that's not how he did it with you?" When he scowled at her she chuckled. "Just watch."
After a few moments, Hamish slowly shifted back into human form. He'd lost his sweats when he changed the first time so now he was naked, on his back on the wet grass, with a great black wolf straddling him and its teeth around his throat. He just lay there, limp and breathing hard, eyes wide and blinking at the early morning sky.
Nero held him there, shoved him firmly against the grass, and then let go. He lifted his head, and huffed expectantly. Hamish looked at him and then, with a resigned expression, he just turned his head to one side, offering his throat.
Wow.
Nero backed up, and then trotted up to where the rest of them were watching.
He growled at Ria; she went immediately to her knees, hands up, showing her throat. "We're good, alpha," she said. Nero seemed to accept this, turning to the other wolf who just rolled lazily onto its back as if submission had never been an issue.
Callum wasn't sure if he was supposed to do anything, but, for fuck's sake, if Nero didn't already know then– suddenly Nero was up in his face, paws on his shoulders, shoving him back into the wall of the house. "Oof!" Then Callum got his face licked. "Ugh! No, that's gross, stop it!"
He had his eyes closed because of the licking, but he felt the shift in weight as Nero changed shape, and then Nero leaned in to press his nose against Callum's cheek. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine," Callum told him, feeling silly.
"You were distressed," Nero said, "I felt it upstairs, and then ... but you're all right now."
It took him a moment to understand, but then it seemed so obvious. When Hamish had threatened him Nero had known, and burst in to, what? Rescue him?
It was stupid to resent the idea that he needed rescuing. And anyway, there was something pretty awesome about having someone who cared enough to try.
Callum shook his head. "I'm fine," he insisted, trying to make Nero feel it through the bond. Not that he was even sure how that worked. "Look at me, fine as beans. Um," and he wasn't quite sure how to say it. "You're not wearing any pants."
Nero gave him an arch look. "That doesn't usually bother you."
"People can see."
Nero glanced over his shoulder. Ria was helping Hamish up off the ground; Callum saw her swat him on the ass, laughing in a way he didn't much seem to like. And the wolf lolling on the ground by Nero's feet didn't seem to care about Nero's nudity one little bit.
"Fine," Callum conceded. "Go on, scar Vera and Gabby for life, see if I care."
Nero snorted, pushing his face into Callum's neck. "For you, I'll get dressed. Though, this is the worst breakfast in bed I've ever had."
Later, after an argument with Michael about how much butter to use for grilling, and the embarrassment of Gabby climbing into his lap, and the much worse embarrassment of Vera taking one look at him and just grinning her head off, Callum went out to the yard to get enough privacy to call Jackie.
This time she picked up. "Hey, little brother. You turned into a wolf yet?"
"Ha, ha. Funny you should ask. I've been thinking about growing a tail."
She laughed, a hard sharp bark. "Good luck with that. So, Ernie Wells brought your car around. And a bill. Reckon you can get your were-boyfriend to spring for it?"
"Yeah, no. Really no. Listen, though, I wanted to ask you something."
"Shoot."
"You're not really using my old room except for storage, right?"
"Uh, yeah. Storing a lot of your stuff, so, you know. You should help me lug it to the tip."
He took a deep breath. "If I said I was staying, maybe, for a little while ... could I crash with you? I'll help you clear out the shed, go through dad's stuff. Maybe apologise to Uncle Robbie?"
There was silence, and for a moment he thought she was going to say no, but then– "You're stupid if you think you have to ask."
"Cool," he said. "Thanks."
"I take it," she said after a moment, "that you, you know. Worked things out?"
"Yeah, yeah. It's all good. Not dying, actually not turning into a werewolf. My arm's better and ... it's all fine."
"So you got laid then?"
He winced. "I'm not talking to you about this."
"Aw, c'mon Cal! There's nothing good on TV, gimme details!"
"Thanks, no, bye!" he shouted, and hung up. Bloody Jackie.
But, he hadn't lied to her. Everything was fine. Unbelievably fine. Even Hamish just glowered at him a little now, had studiously ignored him over breakfast.
And as for Nero?
Callum grinned, feeling the tug of the bond. Nero was fine.
He took a deep breath, and went back inside.
About the Author
Robin Moray loves talking about writing, and
writing about romance. Robin lives in a house with a handsome man and a number of handsome teapots. For upcoming projects, follow Robin on twitter @robinmoray or tumblr at robinmoray.tumblr.com
Table of Contents
Copyright
About Bonded to the Alpha
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
About the Author
