by Amy Green
Alpha Wolf
Shifter Falls, Book 4
Amy Green
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Epilogue
Also by Amy Green
Copyright © 2017 by Amy Green
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
The Shifter Falls Series
Rebel Wolf (Book 1)
Lover Wolf (Book 2)
Warrior Wolf (Book 3)
1
Saturday nights, Brody Donovan came to the diner alone.
The other days, when he came, he was with others. His brothers, usually—there were four Donovan brothers in total, and at least one or more of them came to Brody’s usual booth to talk business. The Donovans were wolf shifters, and they ran the Donovan pack, which meant they ran the entire town of Shifter Falls, Colorado, the headquarters of Donovan territory. Every wolf, bear, eagle, and fox shifter owed loyalty to the Donovans. And Brody was the alpha.
So when Brody sat in his booth in the Four Spot Diner, people would come and go. His brothers—Ian, Heath, and Devon—were the most frequent visitors, but others would come too. Pack members, arriving and leaving on various orders of Brody’s. Others dropping in to give him some piece of information he needed. Brody had tried giving out cell phones, but shifters hated cell phones—they preferred to deal face to face.
There were also, from time to time, visits from Brody’s brothers’ mates. Ian’s mate, Anna, did administrative work for the pack. Heath’s mate, Tessa, owned a bar on Howell Street and heard lots of good information that she passed on. Devon’s mate, Nadine, was co-chief of police in town, so she was a frequent visitor, keeping Brody apprised. Brody didn’t have an office—the idea of an alpha wolf sitting in an office was unthinkable—so he saw people here, at the diner. And here, at the diner, Alison Masterson saw him.
She saw him every day, when she waited on him. She knew how he liked his coffee, what he liked and didn’t like to eat. She saw his bad moods and his slightly-less-bad moods and his silent, broody moods. She saw the plaid shirts he always wore with his jeans and t-shirts—the red made his dark brown hair look richer, but she had a personal preference for the dark green. The dark green plaid was the shirt he always wore in her fantasies.
He didn’t know she had fantasies.
That was fine. Brody was the alpha of the Donovan pack, a role he’d been chosen for after his horrible father had died after thirty years of violence and corruption. Brody had a lot of responsibility, trying alongside his brothers to rebuild Shifter Falls. He had a lot on his mind. He looked like a handsome, dark-haired man in a diner booth, wearing a plaid shirt and a baseball cap and drinking coffee, but he was actually the most important man for thirty miles.
Alison, on the other hand, was a waitress. She was human—only males were born shifters—and though her father was a Donovan pack wolf, she was technically no one. She didn’t have ravishing beauty or a spectacular figure, just red hair that she tied back in a ponytail and muddy gray eyes. Brody never noticed her, and that was the way things were. But Alison saw things.
She saw the mornings he came in looking exhausted—though still beautiful—with shadows under his eyes. She saw the times when he was between visitors and he sat alone, his thoughts far away. She saw that he almost never laughed. She saw that he never had friends come to visit him, and he never had women either. That last one, she was glad of. If Brody Donovan ever brought a woman in here on some kind of date, it would slice her open and leave her blood spilling on the floor.
But he never did.
Wolves were loners; it was their nature. Donovans were even more solitary, because the four brothers—who were technically half brothers, since they had the same father but different mothers—had grown up separately, ignored by their father. And though Ian Donovan had been in prison and lived alone in the wild for years, and Devon Donovan hated almost everyone, Alison always thought that Brody was the most alone of all of them.
Brody wasn’t just physically alone, though he lived solitary in a big house in the middle of the woods. He was alone inside himself. Alison could see it, the way his dark brown eyes would look away when someone was talking to him, keeping his thoughts and his feelings contained. Like he couldn’t say them aloud. Like he never had.
It amazed her all the time that someone didn’t climb over the table and grab his shirt and shake him. Come out! Come out of there! He’d probably kill anyone who tried that. Alison had heard Nadine say to Devon once: “Anyone who thinks Brody isn’t dangerous is a fool.” And it was true. Brody may not be loud or violent, but he had a body packed with sleek muscle and the lightning-fast reflexes of a wolf shifter. Wolves didn’t want to hurt anyone, but you had to be careful. A provoked wolf was capable of snapping your neck before you could take your next breath—and if you threatened him, he could spill your blood and never think of it again. That was life in Shifter Falls.
On Saturday night, though, Brody always came to the diner alone. He came in around nine, and on Saturdays he didn’t sit in the booth. He sat at the counter along the back of the diner. He ordered a grilled cheese sandwich and a bowl of tomato soup, and he ate them alone. He didn’t read the newspaper that was kept stacked on the counter, or work, or talk to anyone. He’d finish his sandwich, drink a glass of water, and then he’d leave.
Alison didn’t usually work Saturday nights, but when she found out that Brody came in, she added a shift. It didn’t matter, because she had nowhere else to be on Saturday night anyway. Instead of sitting home alone, in the small house next to her parents’, she found she’d rather be where Brody was.
It was late October. By nine the sky was pitch dark, and a harsh wind had blown up, bending the branches on the trees and scooting debris down Howell Street. Alison had to put a cardigan on over her uniform, because every time the door opened the cold blew in, a breath of beautiful mountain air that put icy fingers on your neck.
There weren’t many customers tonight. Saturday night was when the Burned Wolf, the bar down the street owned by Heath and Tessa Donovan, was the busiest place in town. Even though wolves couldn’t biologically get drunk, they still loved to hang out in bars and drink. In the diner there were only a couple of elderly people in a booth, talking softly, and a man eating a plate of French fries as if he hadn’t eaten in weeks. Patty, the Four Spot’s owner, was standing behind the counter, going through paperwork.
The door opened, the wind blew in, and Brody Donovan was there. He didn’t look left or right at any of the other customers, though if Alison knew wolves at all, he probably saw and smelled them. He saw Alison wiping one of the booth tables and gave her a brief nod, which she couldn’t help but smile back at, because he was here. Then he pulled up a stool and nodded at Patty.
“Evening, Brody,” Patty said. She was in her mid-fifties, and dyed her hair a vivid red that no one really believed but everyone pretended to
. “Menu?”
No, Alison thought.
“No,” Brody said.
“Okay. What can I get you?”
Leaning into the booth to wipe the table, Alison shook her head. Patty didn’t come in for very many Saturday nights.
“Grilled cheese and tomato soup,” Brody said. His voice was low, but melodious. Almost a growl but not quite. He used it so sparingly, Alison always savored the sound.
“Gotcha,” Patty said. She turned and shouted the order to the cook in the kitchen, then came back to the counter. “Say,” she said, “Brody, do you know anything about contractors?”
“Contractors?” Brody rubbed his chin, which was clean-shaven. He was the only one of his brothers who didn’t wear a beard. He was meticulous; he had never, in all the years Alison had watched him, worn so much as a shadow of stubble. “I’ve had lots of people work on my house over the years,” he said. “Why do you ask?”
His house. It was big, beautiful, set far in the middle of the woods outside of town. A house that had high beams and dark wood and big windows. He lived alone in it. Alison had only driven by once, when her father was dropping something off to Brody. She had never been inside. She wondered what it was like in there, especially on a winter’s night maybe, alone with him while the snow fell outside and there was a fire in the fireplace. That was one of her fantasies, and it featured the dark green plaid shirt coming off, and then a whole bunch of things she’d never admit to in a million years. She stopped wiping the table but stayed leaned in to the booth so no one could see her blush.
“Well, I need some fixes to the roof,” Patty was saying, breaking into Alison’s daydream. “And I called up these guys who advertise on the internet, and they gave me this quote. What do you think?” There was a rustle as she handed Brody a piece of paper.
No. Oh, no. Alison bolted upright again and hurried over to Brody while trying to look casually curious. “Fixes to the roof?” she asked Patty, a little loudly. “I didn’t know that.” She stopped by Brody’s shoulder and looked over it at the paper. For a second she was lightheaded as his scent hit her, woodsy and deeply masculine. She would be adding that to the fantasies. “Well, jeez, Patty,” she said, trying to stay on point. “This says the fixes will cost two thousand dollars and take three months. That’s a lot of money.”
A muscle in Brody’s jaw ticked. That was all.
He was mad.
“I have to fix it or it’ll leak worse than it is, and winter’s coming,” Patty said. She turned to Brody. “What do you think?”
There was a second of silence. Anyone else would think Brody was maybe putting an answer together. But Alison knew better.
“This is too much,” he said finally. “You should talk to Edgerton Tucker. He started up a roofing business when he lost his last job, and he’s pretty good at it. He’ll do it right, and he’ll charge you less than a quarter of that if you give his crew sandwiches and Cokes while they’re working.”
Patty blinked. “Edgerton? I didn’t know that. You see him, you tell him to come in here and talk to me.”
“I will.” Brody pushed the paper back across the counter.
“I’ll go get your sandwich,” Patty said, and disappeared into the kitchen.
Alison took a step back, preparing to disappear, but a hand shot out and grabbed her wrist. She sucked in a breath.
“What the hell was that?” Brody said in a low voice.
His hand was warm and so powerful she felt the touch thrum up her arm, even though he wasn’t holding her hard. He tilted his head and looked at her from beneath the brim of his ball cap. Those deep, impossibly dark brown eyes were fixed on her. On her.
“Alison,” he said.
She couldn’t say anything. Brody Donovan barely ever touched her. He barely ever touched anyone. It wasn’t his way.
And now he was touching her. Because he was pissed.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“You didn’t answer my question,” he said. “What the hell was that?”
What had she been doing? She’d done all of it by reflex, without a thought. The same way she made sure there was a little—but not too much—ice in his water and that no one else ever sat in his booth on weekdays. Just the things she did, unnoticed, to make Brody Donovan’s life a little easier.
Except this time she’d overstepped. She could see that in the anger in his eyes. She’d have known if she’d thought first, but she hadn’t. “I won’t do it again,” she said.
Still he didn’t let her hand go. “I want to know,” he said softly, dangerously, “exactly why you just did that.”
“You never read the menu,” she said unable to lie, “or the specials.”
“I don’t need to read the menu or the specials.”
“You never read the newspaper, or a phone, or anything,” Alison said, babbling now. “You never read a book or a magazine. And one time Anna brought you papers in your booth, and you said that your eyes were tired and it was better if she just told you what they said. And you were lying.”
His eyes widened at that for just the briefest second, surprise and something else making him take in a quiet breath. Then he was angry again. “Alison,” he said, “I can fucking read.”
“Sure you can. Of course you can.” She’d embarrassed him—the Donovan alpha wolf. Brody. “I know that, Brody. Please forget it. I’m sorry. I was just trying to help.”
He blinked, and then the anger drained away. He let her wrist go and turned back to the counter, scrubbing a hand over his face. Patty came back from the kitchen with his sandwich and soup. “Still here, Alison?” she chided, a glint of humor in her eyes. “Don’t you have other customers?”
Alison turned on her heel, unable to look at either of them anymore. She had never said anything, but Patty knew how Alison felt about Brody. Everyone knew. Over the years, it had become pretty plain to anyone with eyes. Everyone except Brody.
She’d thought it was a secret for a long time—that she was quiet and cagey about how she felt. And then one day Heath Donovan had come in for a cup of coffee—lean, gorgeous Heath, with his dark blond hair and rock star wardrobe. This was in the period before he was mated to Tessa, and when he came in that day he gave Alison one of his handsome, flirtatious smiles. Morning, Alison, he’d said in that easy way of his. You look beautiful as always. Did my idiot brother open his eyes yet?
That was Heath: nothing about love, or sex, or mating, embarrassed him. He wasn’t laughing at her or making fun; he was speaking frankly, as shifters tended to do. But her pleasure at the compliment—a woman didn’t have to be in love with Heath to appreciate his compliments—had been mixed with pain that came from her horrible shyness. Since then, she figured everyone knew.
She finished serving the old couple, and took money from the man who’d eaten the French fries, and when she had the courage to turn back to the counter, Brody Donovan was gone.
She closed the diner, as she always did, wiping down the chairs and the tables before putting the chairs up so the janitor could sweep the floors. Patty had gone home long ago, and when the cook had finished shutting down the kitchen, she turned out the lights and closed the doors.
The wind hadn’t let up. She pulled her coat tightly around her and hurried to her car, anxious to get out of her polyester uniform and sensible flats and into her pajamas. She lived alone in the house next door to her parents, which had come up for rent for next to nothing. So at age twenty-four she had moved out of home, but she hadn’t gone far. Everyone said that made her a good, dutiful daughter.
It was dark, and the wind was blowing her hair into her face, but she could still see that Brody Donovan was leaning against her car, waiting.
She was surprised, although on second thought, she shouldn’t be. He was probably here to get angry at her again. And suddenly, she didn’t want to hear it.
“Brody,” she said as she got closer, the wind trying to rip the words from her mouth. “It’s late. I have to go hom
e.”
“Just one minute,” he said.
She pulled her keys from her purse and waited. He was beautiful, even in the shadows, but her heart didn’t turn over like it usually did. It was too sore.
He looked around. “It’s late, Alison. They always make you close the diner?”
“I know it’s late,” she said impatiently. It was past eleven thirty. “And yes, closing the diner is part of my job. Did you wait all this time to ask me that?”
“I don’t like it,” he said, ignoring her question. “They make you go home alone in the dark. This is Shifter Falls.”
“No one bothers me,” she said, though the truth was that until the Donovans had started cleaning up the town, she had always gone to her car with her heart in her throat and her key clutched between her fingers. She still did sometimes, just in case. “Everyone in town knows me, and they all know that Dad is Donovan pack.”
“That doesn’t mean anything,” he argued. “Jesus, it’s Saturday night. I’ll follow you, make sure you get home okay.”
“You don’t have to do that,” she said. The wind howled, and she shivered. “Is that all?”
He crossed his arms over his chest and looked at her. He didn’t even wear a jacket—just his usual plaid shirt. Wolves didn’t feel cold, and only wore things like jackets to fit in and make humans feel less uncomfortable. “I can read,” he said, the words low and even. “I can. It’s just that the letters get jumbled.”
Alison went quiet and waited.
“They cross over each other,” he said, “and sometimes they just look like… nothing. But when the letters behave, and I can see them in sequence, I can read just fine.”
Despite her irritation, she felt a pang at that. That would be humiliating for any man to admit. It would be especially hard for an alpha wolf. “I take it no one knows,” she said.
“No one but you.” He took a step closer, his arms still crossed. “I’m asking you not to tell anyone.”
