Alpha Awakening

by Diana DeRicci

  Gripping the clothes in her fist, she drew air into tight lungs. “Rush,” she managed, her mouth feeling dry, while her body almost hummed with a renewed need. She had to push him away. She couldn’t look into those eyes and be cruel to him. He stopped her before she could speak.

  Slowly, so slowly, his hand cupped her fist, covering her. “Kay, give it a chance.” She caught the cock of his grin when he told her, “This is new to me too, you know. This only happens once, if we’re lucky.”

  Her eyes widened with disbelief and surprise. “No one divorces? Or dies?”

  “Divorces? No.” He drew her hand closer, pinning her to his chest. “If one dies, the other can find a companion if they can, but there’s never a second mate. There’s only one shot at this.” His voice had dropped to a husky whisper, and she felt his breath as he tipped, caressing her knuckle with his lip, the way he had before, in thought. What was going through his mind then? What was causing the dark clouds and shadows? No! She couldn’t do it. She could not let this continue.

  The hoarse echo of his voice filled her ears when he told her, “I never thought I wanted this. I wasn’t even remotely looking, but now that I have you, I would split the earth to keep you.”

  She swallowed to hide the burning lump in her throat. Here she was a walking wreck and he was spouting eternal love. He was feeling pity, compassion, trust, and mistaking it all for more than attraction. She knew because she was having the same problem. She didn’t ever let anyone this close. It wasn’t safe.

  Closing her eyes, she did the only thing she could do. She denied everything, and him. “Look, I can’t tell you how grateful I am for how much you helped me.”

  He froze next to her. “Grateful? I don’t want your gratitude.”

  She yanked on her hand, but he held firm. “What happened here is no more than a step out of time.” Now in the light of day, there was a very surreal feeling to the days she’d spent on that bed, wrapped around his lupine body, or tucked into his human one. She shook her head to clear the images. How many people slept with wolves? Kevin Costner, eat your heart out.

  “You’re kidding?”

  “Do I look like a woman who’s kidding?” she shot back, glaring up at him. “You weren’t looking, or expecting anything out of this. Neither was I. There is no bond. We had a connection of commonality, nothing more.”

  A hiss broke through his teeth, like he’d been hit or worse, hurt. She turned a deaf ear to it. She had to get out of that house. She had to get away from him before she succumbed to the pull of his gaze, the sexy taunt of his lips. Something she knew she could never do.

  “You are the fem-alpha of this pack,” he said, the tone direct and decisive. “You can run all you want, Kaisha, but that will never change or disappear.”

  She huffed impatiently. “I don’t even know what that is! I can’t turn wolf!” He needed to just stop! He wasn’t doing himself any favors.

  “It’s not necessary.” The words were firm, yet trying to be comforting and supportive.

  She stopped herself from rolling her eyes. She was not like them, what “they” were. Kay was willing to bet her grandmother’s emerald on how well a non-shifter fem would go over. She saw the way Zoe’s family protected her, how they circled Sheridan when she’d told them she was bringing Rush home to heal. No one cared then that Kay was around, and they won’t care now that she was gone. They wouldn’t miss the dime-sized fem-alpha who never existed for them.

  “I can’t love you, Rush. It’s time I went home.” She couldn’t make it any clearer than that.

  Coldly, he released her hand, and stepped back. “Then go,” he snapped, a diamond-hard, forbidding light in his eyes that she’d never seen. It sent a shiver screaming down her spine.

  Surprised he didn’t fight harder and confused as to why she wanted him to, she whirled for the bathroom to hide the tears she felt building. She knew it was for the best. This couldn’t continue. They hardly knew each other. They’d hardly spoken in all the time they’d shared the same bed, the same room. For the duration, at least one had been incapable. Until last night.

  Bracing herself on the sink, she sagged, sucking air in taut gasps, fighting the pain. It would end. This is not real. People don’t meet and fall in love like this. People nothing! He wasn’t even human in the real world.

  Just one more reason she couldn’t stay. She didn’t belong with him. It would never work. She knew that from experience.

  Swiping her eyes with a palm, she cleared the blur of her tears and landed on her reflection. How could he fall in love with this? The grimace of pain was more than her face fighting back, but she refused to say it was her heart.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sheridan frowned at Rush. “How long are you going to stew over this?”

  Couldn’t she just quit asking? He ignored her looks, eating his dinner with quiet patience. It had been three weeks since he’d let Kay walk away from him. Three long, painful weeks of calling himself everything in the book.

  “It’s not me,” he told her coolly. Spearing another piece of meat, he slowly chewed, refusing to let her see the deep agony he’d been living with since the slam of the front door the day Kay had turned her back on him. He wondered if she was fairing any better.

  Snarling inwardly, he knew he shouldn’t be thinking of her at all. Late at night though, when he was alone and felt the hunger of his soul, he did think of her. Couldn’t avoid it. She’d grown into a specter that he couldn’t shake.

  “And you’re going to let it stay like this?” she asked bluntly.

  He tossed his fork down, leaning away from the table, and not bothering to hide his glare of annoyance at her prodding. “What am I supposed to do?”

  Sheridan’s eyes shone with sisterly love. “Rush, she wanted to help you. No one forced her to stay. She’s the one who needs to learn how to be an alpha, not you. You’re doing just fine on your own.”

  He swallowed the snort out of habit. He wasn’t so sure. He’d let his woman walk out of his life with hardly a growl or argument. “She doesn’t want to have anything to do with being alpha.” Or with me, but he left that unsaid.

  “Are you feeling it?” she asked gently.

  God damn it, he hated when she sounded like their mother, sympathetic and understanding, because that wasn’t sympathy in her eyes. He didn’t have to ask what she meant. Long term separation wasn’t easy to handle, typically for either, but Rush guessed if Kay hadn’t complained, who was he to start?

  He stabbed at his eyes with stiff fingers and rubbed. It didn’t help.

  “Go see her. Convince her. Court her. That’s what you would have done if she’d stayed. Ease her into being the fem-alpha, let her find her way with you at her side and protecting her back. Nothing says you can’t win her because she didn’t stay. Usually that’s the way it’s done anyway, the courting and then the pissing off.” She smirked at him knowingly.

  He crossed his arms over his chest. “I know I sprung it on her, but I didn’t see the problem with it.”

  “Of course you didn’t. You weren’t the one having to completely uproot your life and create a new one with a shifter that she’d never known existed until you.” That was a definite rebuke in her gaze now. He didn’t wince, but he wanted to. How did his sister, his younger sister, manage to make him feel like he was the baby? Rush wasn’t the one living in the land of denial, not now. Maybe in the beginning, but after what they’d shared? No, he knew what she was and knew he needed her. The problem was, she didn’t need him.

  Sheridan cleared her throat. “I’ve been putting this off because I was hoping…” She picked at the table with a fingernail. “Anyway, I’m moving out.”

  “What?” He shot straight in his chair. “Why?”

  “Well, because you don’t need me here anymore. I’m not leaving the pack, but you need your own place. Especially when Kay comes back.”

  He snarled under his breath. “She’s not coming back.”

&nb
sp; “Uh huh,” she murmured, her lips twitching with suppressed laughter. Rush refused to answer her. She left him at the table, glowering after her. Thinking. And wanting.

  “Damn you, Sheridan,” he whispered, dropping his head into his braced palms. Rubbing his eyes with the heels of stiff hands, the slowly building groans turned into impatient growls. By the time he rose from the table, there was only one choice to be made. If she wouldn’t come to the mountain, the mountain would go to her. Even if he had to do it with her kicking and screaming, she was coming back with him. Where she belonged.

  If Kaisha thought she was going to brush him off like a layer of dust, then she had another thing coming.

  * * * *

  Kay stood in the kitchen with Stacee, rinsing off the dinner dishes. Jonas had wandered into the living room to give the girls a couple minutes of privacy, which wasn’t easy considering the living room, dining and kitchen were essentially one room.

  “How are you holding up?” Stacee asked, toweling off an item or two.

  Kay ran water methodically over a bowl in her hand then slid it into the dishwasher. “Fine,” she answered. “Why?”

  Stacee cut her a glance. “Because you’ve changed since your incident.”

  Kay’s hands paused, her gaze glued to the water sluicing over her fingers. “What do you mean, changed?”

  “You hardly smile. You don’t laugh. It’s like you’re depressed, when usually nothing ever gets you down.” Stacee rested a hip against the counter, her longer legs giving her quite the height advantage over Kay. “So, what is it? Are you worried about Steven?”

  Kay shook her head. “No, since he was arrested again, his probation was broken.” He was completely out of the picture. “I just never found out what the big deal was about me.”

  “Was he ever here with you?” she asked Kay, coming closer to keep her answer in confidence.

  “Once or twice, picking me up for a date, but not overnight.” Kay slid the upper shelf into the dishwasher and closed the door. She’d run it before bed.

  “What about Rush? Have you heard from him?”

  Kay blinked at Stacee’s hopeful note. “No.” Kay had made sure of that.

  She ignored the apologetic sigh from her best friend. Stacee hadn’t stopped beating herself up over having to leave her in the hands of a stranger. “He sounded more trustworthy on the phone. I’m sorry I left you there to stay with him. If I’d known—”

  “No,” Kay cut her off. “It wasn’t like that. He was a perfect gentleman.” The most patient, understanding, compassionate man she’d ever known.

  He just also happened to be a wolf shifter.

  Kay bit her cheek to not say those words. She wasn’t entirely sure she could, to be honest.

  Gathering her courage, she whispered, “What if I told you he was an important person? Like a leader?”

  “Really? Like politically?” Kay saw the way Stacee’s eyes focused inward. “I could have sworn he told me he worked at the South Lake precinct as a detective.”

  Kay nodded, stilted. “He does, but that’s not what I mean.”

  Stacee set the towel down, and Kay purposely shut off the water.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean—” A knock interrupted her before she could let her mouth cause her trouble, which was probably a good thing. It would sound insane anyway. Sucking in a breath, she asked, “Jonas, could you get that? It’s probably a newspaper salesman.” They’d been canvassing again, pitching sales almost every weekend that month.

  “Sure.”

  “Look,” Kay said, focusing on Stacee again. “It just didn’t work out, not that surprising. I was a victim that he took pity on.”

  “Honey, that wasn’t pity in his voice when he all but begged me to take care of you himself. He had a reason.”

  Kay’s chin dropped. Yeah, he had a reason all right.

  The front door opened, and the one voice she hadn’t heard, yet had craved for weeks, sharp and snarled, carried all through the apartment.

  “You have exactly ten seconds to tell me what the fuck you’re doing in my woman’s den!”

  Kay whirled and gasped. “Rush!”

  Oh, God, he looked good. Good and pissed. And good enough to eat.

  Stacee hopped out of the kitchen to stand with Jonas. That was when Kay noticed how tense both men were. Rush had a fist already curling, and Jonas looked ready to receive and return the volley. Angry heat glittered in Rush’s eyes. She had to do something to diffuse this. She’d never seen Rush or Jonas behave like this.

  She took a step on the linoleum. “Rush? What are you doing here?”

  His gaze flashed, flickering over to her. “Who is he?” he coldly demanded with a stony glare.

  “Jonas,” Stacee said, with a hand on his shoulder. “Calm down, honey.” Kay watched as Stacee not only laid claim to the man at her side, but he seemed to relax and calm under her gentle touch.

  He turned and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “Sorry. It’s reaction.”

  “I know,” she purred with a smile that could melt even the most hardened heart. She turned and smiled at Rush. “Hi. You must be Rush. I’d offer to shake your hand, but until you’re both calm, let’s just not go there.”

  Kay was following this and trying like hell to not get lost between the three in her own apartment. Why was she talking like that? What did she mean?

  “You’re…?” Rush’s gaze flicked over them. “Stacee?”

  “Yes, and this is Jonas.”

  Dawning reality had him looking around at everything else for several seconds, until he scrubbed a hand down his face.

  “Damn it,” he muttered. “It was just a shock.”

  “Come in,” Stacee said, not even bothering to ask if Kay was okay with it. Rush stepped in and Stacee closed the door. Jonas took a step back as well.

  Kay’s chin came up, stung by his curtness. “What? I’m not allowed to have friends over?”

  “It’s not that.” He hadn’t come near her yet, and her whole body ached. After so long without him, he was too far away. “Having the door opened… Finding him…”

  His voice trailed off, and he looked uncomfortable, like he knew he was digging himself deeper.

  Kay swallowed. “Look, Rush, whatever you have to say—”

  His blue hazel eyes glistened, making her heart pound. “Stop. You got to do all the talking last time. My turn.” He cleared the distance between them, a long jean-covered stride that ate up the steps in nothing flat. “You could have told me your best friend is mated to a shifter, baby.”

  “What?” Kay’s eyes popped wide. Whipping around to look at them, there was no difference that she could see. They looked the same, for as long as she’d known them.

  “She didn’t know, Rush,” Stacee informed him. Both looked toward the other couple and saw that Jonas had wrapped a hand around Stacee’s waist, her head on his shoulder. A complete couple.

  Kay rubbed her eyes. “Wait. A. Damn. Minute.” She blew out a breath. “Jonas?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Whose pack?” she asked, determined to get to the bottom of this.

  “Cougar Nall’s.”

  Rush nodded his head. “He was a friend of my dad’s when he was alive.”

  “Are you Rush Donovan? Alpha Donovan?” Jonas asked with a new respect.

  “Yes.” Rush’s voice had calmed, smoothed, but still held a rough edge, like something darker, stronger lay just underneath the cool exterior. His chin was up, his back straight even though he was relaxed; he was prepared for anything. Kay was seeing his alpha side in person. Her next indrawn breath was staggered with a mix of emotions.

  He stood like a man in charge, like the man she’d seen at the coffee shop who had faced down Steven with nothing more than a few words and a stare. Like a man who would spend an entire night tracking a missing girl and risk his life for any of his pack, for any of his family.

  There was strength, patience and so much lovin
g tenderness. She wanted to sink into the floor as she acknowledged she’d been a royal bitch. And not the regal kind, either. Running scared, overwhelmed and insecure with so much to try to understand. She still didn’t, but she knew he deserved an apology. Being scared didn’t give her the right to be cruel.

  “God, Rush, I’m so sorry.”

  “No, shh. Let me.” He pressed a tender finger to her lips, his gaze once more on her. “I didn’t do one thing right. You make me feel out of control, wild in ways that scared the shit out of me.”

  Kay saw the other couple move, but stopped them. “Don’t go,” she asked quietly.