by L. C. Davis
Table of 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
A Cowboy for Caleb
Great Plains Shifters 1
L.C. Davis
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A Cowboy for Caleb
Great Plains Shifters #1
L.C. Davis
Copyright © 2017 L.C. Davis
Contents
Acknowledgments
Also by L.C. Davis
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
About the Author
Acknowledgments
Licensed material on the cover is being used for illustrative purposes only and any person depicted in the licensed material is a model.
This book is 100% a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
This steamy romance contains content for adult audiences only, including MPREG, knotting and other Alpha/omega themes. HEA, no cliffhanger.
Also by L.C. Davis
Wolf Conan & L.C. Davis Books
Undercover Alphas
Gray
Jayce
Lionel
L.C. Davis Books
The Mountain Shifters Series
His Unclaimed Omega
His Reluctant Omega
His Unexpected Omega
His Runaway Omega
His Second Chance Omega
Their Omega
His Reformed Omega
His Verum Omega
His Reclaimed Omega
Alpha, Beta, Omega
Chapter 1
DUSTIN
Thunder growled far beyond the hillside and Dustin had to give his horse a gentle tap with his spurs before the beast got too spooked. The overcast sky flashed silver and the first droplets of rain began to fall. His farmhand had bailed on him that morning, so he would have to find a way to get the herd back into their pen on his own before the storm hit.
Damn summer flash storms. As a child, Dustin had loved nothing more than the scent of newly fallen rain and the crackle of energy in the air, but as a grown Alpha responsible not only for his own small ranch but for an entire pack that subsisted primarily on the trade? Not so much.
Despite the inconvenience, it was beautiful. Dustin couldn’t deny that. There was something about the way the lightning lit up the sleepy little Oklahoma town that made it seem full of possibility, like something truly incredible might lie just beyond the edge of the territory.
Of course, Dustin knew better than that. The Meadowlands were beautiful and the pack was the only place he’d ever called home or cared to, but incredible wasn’t the right word to describe it. Nothing out of the ordinary ever happened in Sawyers, and how could it? All the town’s residents were shifters, and they’d all lived there for their entire lives, with the exception of a few wolves who’d moved to the city for school and returned with mates.
Then there were the ones who didn’t return at all. Dustin’s twin brother was one of them. Alec’s decision to move halfway across the country to study medicine in New York had been a source of contention in the family for years, and Dustin couldn’t deny that it stung, but he was proud of his brother all the same. Alec was his own man and he’d always done things his own way. Dustin might not have understood the burning need to leave their pack that Alec had been nursing ever since they’d shared a bunk bed, but he could respect it.
What he couldn’t respect was the fact that Alec had gone off and taken a mate without so much as bothering to tell his family. Sure, Noreen and Blake had been less than gracious about their son’s decision to leave the pack, but to put his mark on some city omega without even bringing him home for an introduction? That was the kind of thing that drove a wedge between families, and it had. Every month that passed drove the wedge in deeper.
Even Dustin had yet to meet the omega who’d enticed his brother to remain in New York and break his promise to his family that he’d return to set up a practice in the town that had given so much to him throughout his life. They’d both talked of arranging a visit, even if Dustin knew getting their parents to agree to it would be a long shot, but between Alec’s residency and Dustin’s responsibilities within the pack, they’d never actually managed to get around to it. The fact that Alec’s omega was five months pregnant might well be the incentive needed to push them to finally set a date. Dustin hoped this would be the catalyst his family needed to start mending old wounds, but knowing the stubborn streak that had run through the Andrews’ blood ever since his great, great, great, great grandfather had led a caravan of six exhausted and half-starved wolves to Sawyers in the 1800s, he wasn’t overly optimistic. Still, if anything could motivate two sour old wolves to put aside their pride and make amends with their prodigal son, it was a grandchild.
If Alec’s new family happened to get them off Dustin’s back when it came to the subject of carrying on the pack legacy, all the better.
“Dustin!”
The Alpha looked up in the direction of the young beta who was barreling toward him at full speed and stumbling over the rocks in the pasture.
“What is it, Carl?” Dustin asked, urging his horse into a gentle trot to meet the boy halfway. Carl looked like he was ready to collapse.
“It’s your brother,” he said, gasping for breath with his hands planted on his knees. Dustin took one look in the young man’s eyes and he knew that the next words out of his mouth were going to change the rest of his life. They were going to change everything.
“What is it?” Dustin asked, keeping a calm exterior even if he felt ready to crumble like the face of the rock just beyond the pasture. If there was one thing his father had taught him, it was that no matter what happened, an Alpha kept his calm. Even if the whole world was falling apart around him, the pack needed and deserved a steady hand and a cool head. An Alpha who couldn’t give them that much wasn’t worthy of the title.
“There was an accident in the city,” Carl said, looking down at Dustin’s boots like he was afraid the Alpha would shoot the messenger. “I’m so sorry.”
Dustin swallowed the lump in his throat and gripped the reins tighter. The thunder struck and his horse whinnied, picking up on his rider’s distress. “And his omega?”
“He
was in the passenger’s seat. He’s at the hospital, but I don’t know much more than that. Your mom sent me out to find you.”
“Thank you,” Dustin said calmly. He dismounted the horse and let himself slip into autopilot as he offered the reins to Carl. “The girls need to go back. Can you take care of that for me?”
“Of course,” Carl said, watching him nervously. He stared for a moment before hastily taking the reins, like he’d just remembered the task he’d been given.
Dustin nodded in appreciation and took off in the direction of the farmhouse his family had owned for generations. Each step he took was a step closer to the end of the life he’d always known, and he found himself lingering on each one a bit too long, just to hold off the inevitable for a few seconds longer.
Chapter 2
CALEB
The steady rhythm of the heart monitor became the soundtrack to Caleb’s fevered dreams. For hours, he’d been caught between the sensation of falling and grasping to escape the footage of his nightmare that was playing on a loop in his mind. There was no escape, either in consciousness or in sleep. Not when his dreams replayed the accident and the waking world held nothing more than the aftermath.
He could still hear Alec’s voice as he recounted a story about his last patient for the day. They’d been on their way to dinner. Caleb’s cravings for sushi had become intolerable since he wasn’t allowed to have it, so Alec had promised to take him out for California rolls as a compromise. One of Caleb’s favorite songs—a ‘90s ballad about “the one that got away” sung in the raspy voice of a big-haired superstar—had been playing on the radio.
He’d heard it again through the radio in the hall by the nurse’s station, but it was anyone’s guess whether that had happened hours earlier or days. Caleb had been caught too firmly in the grasp of sleep to beg them to turn it off. All he could do was mumble unintelligibly and the nurse had increased the intravenous drip of the cocktail that was keeping his broken bones from causing him the same excruciating pain that had a vice grip on his heart.
Same difference, he decided. He didn’t want to be awake. When they upped the drugs, he didn’t even have to face the dreams. The blackness was like a warm blanket and all he wanted was to wrap himself up in it and stay there forever.
Forever had seemed like such a short time when he’d been promised the rest of it with Alec and their child. Now that they were both gone, it felt like exactly what it was: a life sentence.
When Caleb finally opened his eyes, he wasn’t in any physical pain but he was ready to plead for more drugs regardless. His limbs were heavy and his thoughts were disjointed, but he was just conscious enough to remember when his sanity itself depended on forgetting.
There was a nurse in his room, one he didn’t recognize. She checked the cords keeping his left leg in traction and gave him a kind smile when she saw that he was awake. “Hi there, darling. How’s your head?”
What a question. The answer depended entirely on whether she was asking about the swirling void of pain and despair inside of his mind or the subtle throb in his temples that barely registered in comparison. He reached up and felt the bandage taped to his forehead. He vaguely recalled his head hitting the dashboard before his seatbelt had locked him in as the car had collided with the guardrail.
They’d been so close to the end of the bridge when the other driver had slipped on the ice. A few more feet and they would have gone into the clearing on the other side instead. A few more feet, a few more seconds, and Alec would still be alive. Caleb would still be able to feel the faint fluttering in his belly that had terrified him when he first noticed it and gradually become his very favorite feeling in the entire world. Now, all he felt was emptiness, like a black hole had formed somewhere deep inside of him and was sucking in every bit of light, every ounce of joy he’d ever felt or ever would.
“It’s okay.” He felt the words come out of his own mouth, but he could have sworn they were coming from someone else. He couldn’t keep a thought in his head, let alone speak calmly and coherently.
Then, a thought did stick. A good one, if a bit desperate. “My leg hurts, though. Can you turn it up?” he asked, looking toward the IV bag above his bed.
“I can, but you might wanna wait,” she said, reaching behind his head to swap out his pillow. “You’ve got a visitor.”
Caleb frowned. There had to be a mistake. The only person who cared if he lived or died had already done the latter. Sure, he had a few friends from work, but after leaving his job to move upstate with Alec for his residency, they’d lost touch. He had an aunt somewhere in Pittsburgh, but they hadn’t spoken in years. He supposed she might have been listed as his next of kin somewhere and that the hospital might have looked her up, but when a tall Alpha stepped into the room holding a bouquet of flowers that still had the tag from the gift shop on them, there went that theory.
Caleb didn’t have the first clue who this man was, but it sure as hell wasn’t Aunt Haley.
The Alpha stepped closer and Caleb’s drug-muddied vision cleared up enough to get a better look. All his confusion faded and turned to grief sharper than any he’d been sober enough to feel since the accident.
The resemblance between Alec and the man standing in front of him was so pronounced that there was no room to doubt this was Dustin. Even if he hadn’t been Alec’s identical twin, the similarities were too great and the pain was still too raw for it to be bearable. Dustin’s hair was a bit longer than Alec’s had been, and a shade darker than the other Alpha’s dirty blond, but their eyes were the same exact stormy gray.
God, how many times he’d prayed to look into those eyes just one more time. Now that his prayer had been answered, it seemed like the cruelest blow that had befallen him yet.
Alec had spoken so much of Dustin and how proud he was of his stalwart, devoted brother that Caleb felt like he already knew him. He’d longed for nothing more than to see the brothers reunited and had once hoped that the life growing inside of him would serve as a bridge between the years and make up for his role, however unintentional it had been, in driving the Andrews family apart. He’d wanted this moment to come so desperately, but not like this.
His eyes welled with tears as Dustin approached the bed and looked at the omega like he was every bit as broken on the inside as he looked on the outside. The Alpha cleared his throat and set the flowers down on the bedside table. “Caleb. Hi, I’m —”
“I know who you are.” Caleb’s voice sounded as weak as he felt. Thin, frail, trembling. “You’re Dustin. You’re his brother.”
“And you’re his mate.” Dustin looked like he regretted the obvious statement the moment he said it, but they both knew it was too late.
Silence balanced itself between them as precariously as a car hanging over the edge of the bridge. This time, Caleb knew there was no crew coming to rescue him and cut him out of the scrap metal.
“I’ll give you two a moment alone,” the nurse said in a sympathetic tone before leaving the room.
Caleb envied her. How was he supposed to answer any of the questions Dustin would have about his brother’s death when he couldn’t even look the man in the eye?
Not that there was any question as to who was to blame. He already knew the Alpha’s family blamed him for the fact that their son had chosen to stay in New York. How much more would they hate him now that he was gone forever?
Not that it mattered. No matter how much they despised him, they would never come close to hating him as much as he already hated himself.
For a long while, Dustin said nothing. It was hard to tell what was going on behind those eyes. As similar as they were to Alec’s at first glance, the late Alpha’s eyes had always been so full of expression that they betrayed whatever he was thinking. Dustin’s eyes were as cold as their shade implied and it was impossible to know if he was trying to figure out what to say because he felt as awkward and out of place as Caleb did or because he didn’t know where to begin the tirade the omeg
a knew he had coming.
Finally, Dustin said, “I heard you lost the baby. I’m sorry.”
Coming from anyone else, those words might have sounded curt or even callous, but somehow, Caleb could tell Dustin meant them. He could tell the Alpha had thought carefully about what to say and how to say it.
“I’m the one who’s sorry.” Caleb didn’t know what else to say, so he decided just to stick with the truth.
Dustin frowned. “What do you have to be sorry about?”
“I’m the reason he was here instead of at home, with your pack.” Caleb’s voice broke so he took a moment to steady himself. “If it wasn’t for me, he’d still be here.”
Dustin didn’t reply, not at first. His expression was still impossible to read, but when he set his jaw and a look of all-too-familiar determination came into his eyes, Caleb readied himself for the anger that was long overdue. He welcomed it.
The Alpha opened his mouth as if to speak, then shut it again. Whatever he had been about to say, the words that came out of his mouth instead were, “I came to take you back.”
Caleb searched Dustin’s face in confusion. He knew it might easily have been caused by the cocktail of drugs in his system, but no matter how he tried, he just couldn’t make sense of the Alpha’s words. “I’m sorry…back where?”
“To my pack,” Dustin said quietly. The sadness in his voice was the first sign of emotion he’d shown the entire time he’d been standing there. The longer he was in Dustin’s presence, the easier it was for Caleb to see just how different the brothers were.
