by Molly Prince
The Lone Alpha Unleashed
A Big Girl and Bad Wolf Romance
Copyright 2014, Molly Prince
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Connect with the author by emailing me at [email protected], check out my blog (where you’ll find more background information about the world where this story is set) at http://mollyprince.com/ or sign up for my mailing list at http://eepurl.com/I3UZf.
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Do you really think you’re the first? That a human hasn’t fallen in love with a shifter before? You might think you love him with all your heart, but you can only ever know half of him and you can’t love what you don’t know
After a string of bad luck, Carrie thinks she’s finally found her perfect man. James is a hunky shifter, an alpha wolf. They have a connection, the sex is amazing and he can’t get enough of her ample curves.
But within days of these two lonely souls finding each other, she begins to have doubts. They come from different worlds, how could it ever last? Scared of inevitable heartbreak, she decides it can never be more than a fling and she needs to end it before it becomes anything more.
However, when a threat from James’ past puts Carrie in danger, James responds the only way he knows how. Carrie will witness just what lengths her fated mate will go to, to save the woman he loves... And discover that their worlds may not be so different after all.
The Lone Alpha Unleashed is a 22000 word novella and a sequel to the bestselling Curves for the Lone Alpha. While it tells a complete story (with a sweet HEA ending that will have you reaching for the tissues), some mysteries remain as it is part of a bigger ongoing story. It is intended for mature audiences, contains explicit language, several scenes of a sexual nature and some moderate violence.
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Epilogue
A Note From The Author
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Chapter 1: Carrie
James had cleared the back of the pickup and liberated a mattress from the cabin. I guessed the rental agency could bill me for it along with the damage to the door. The damage that was sustained when a man who had shifted into the form of a rather large wolf had crashed through it as part of a confrontation that had dramatically changed my life.
As a result, not only was I sleeping under the stars in the back of my father’s pickup truck, but I was doing so next to a man who could, at will, change into a wolf.
James was handsome in a rough-around-the-edges kind of way. James was buff and then some. James was a shifter. An alpha male no less, born to lead and protect his pack. He was more of a man than everyone else I had ever dated combined.
I was surprised at how quickly I’d come to accept the monumental change in my worldview that was necessary to accommodate the idea that shifters were real. That’s what they called themselves. They weren’t werewolves from horror movies of old. No full moon. No silver bullets. They were people. People who could transform into animals. In the end my acceptance of the situation came down to the fact that I’d seen it with my own eyes. Although I had, admittedly, been a little drunk at the time.
That said, I was still struggling to come to terms with the fact that this gorgeous hunk of a wolf-man lying naked beside me was, if not in love, then at least in lust, with me. I think it said a lot about my self confidence that I could readily believe in the existence of shifters, but was still struggling with the idea that one of them was attracted to me. That one of them was sleeping next to me right now.
I’d never actually slept outside before. My father was a recreational hunter. But for him this was a solitary pursuit and not something I’d ever been invited to be a part of. Instead, I’d get dropped off at a friend’s house for a night or two while he went off to do whatever it was that men did when alone in the woods. I never went camping either. Any trips into the great outdoors usually involved retiring to a luxury cabin, complete with hot tub and champagne, once it started to get late. So sleeping under the stars was a new experience for me.
In general, I’d have to say I wasn’t a fan. It was too cold and every chirp of an insect or hoot of an owl seemed to be amplified by the crisp clear mountain air. Nature was noisy and uncomfortable. I was much more at home with the honking horns, late night sirens and drunken revelers outside on the street in front of my snug inner-city apartment.
But James’ presence next to mine made everything all right. His body radiated heat. He was always so warm, almost hot to the touch. And whenever I got spooked by the sounds of nature I could just listen to him breathe. The gentle purr at the back of his throat that accompanied the rise and fall of his broad, bare chest.
I smiled to myself and turned onto my back to look at the stars.
Without waking, James reached out to lay an arm across my torso. An action that reflected his instinctive need to protect, and perhaps possess. We had known each other for a matter of days, but both of us knew there was something between us. Something more than the raw lust we seemed to arouse in each other. Some kind of bond that neither of us could explain.
I knew the nature of this bond both concerned and confused James. He had explained to me that shifters sometimes felt it. If they numbered amongst those lucky enough to find another who was destined to be their mate for life. But, I wasn’t a shifter and right now I didn’t care about these mysteries. I just wanted to live in the moment.
I sighed. Living in the moment. That was the problem. I didn’t want this moment to end, but it would have to. I couldn’t live like this. I had a job. I had a life. I’d have to return to it at some point. I briefly entertained the idea of throwing it all away, but for what? Regardless of any mysterious connection we had, I didn’t really know James. He had a past. He had secrets. He had scars. Beyond that he had a job of his own. A job he refused to talk about.
But others weren’t so tight lipped. They spoke of it in hushed tones. How James was a traitor and a killer. Paid by the government to hunt down and terminate shifters who had gone rogue. I was sleeping with a killer. I wasn’t sure that was something I could ever come to terms with.
As much as I wanted to live in the moment I found myself thinking about what the future could possibly hold for us. I couldn’t see James settling down to a tranquil life in the suburbs and I could never really be part of a pack. I struggled to think of any kind of middle ground between our two worlds. The more I failed to envisage any kind of compromise, the more the connection that brought us together began to feel like a cruel joke.
My thoughts were interrupted by movement and the creaking of the truck’s worn suspension as James turned towards me, his hands sliding under the thin blanket we shared to find and cup, my full round breasts.
Well, good morning to you too.
I remained silent but for a hiss of pleasure escaping from between my pursed lips. Our moment had lasted a few days and in that time our lovemaking had been frequent and energetic. James appeared to be insatiable and when I was with him my libido seemed to go into overdrive. But for now I was happy to lie back and enjoy his uncharacteristically gentle attentions in silence.
He took his time as he explored my breasts with workmanlike thoroughness. Even though it felt like we had known each other all our lives, that we were destined to be together, we lacked a certain familiarity with each others bodies that long term partners would usually have. It felt like he was making up
for lost time.
I wasn’t complaining. One of the unfortunate side-effects of being a big girl was that a lot of men assume you’re so grateful for any kind of interest or sexual contact that they don’t need to make an effort. As I’m sure you can imagine this doesn’t exactly do wonders for your self esteem. Someone taking this kind of interest in my body was an amazing new experience.
I groaned as one of his hands made its way down my body, the heel of his palm pressed firmly against the soft flesh of my torso. My breath caught in my throat. Even though I had never sensed anything other than admiration from James, there was always that lingering fear that my body would disgust him. It was an old habit that would be hard to break.
I groaned again and raised my hips to meet him, as his fingers entwined themselves in the neatly trimmed hair between my legs.
“Oh…”
“Oh?”
“How do you do this?”
“This?”
I giggled at his confusion. I’m not normally a giggler, but I couldn’t help it. “This… how do you do this to my body? You always know exactly what to do. You always know exactly how tooooo….”
His hands returned to my breasts as he shifted position. The blanket fell away, exposing me to the elements.
“I listen…”
I chewed my lip and squirmed beneath him. I was beginning to think he was showing off. Every touch, every single touch, made my body sing.
“I listen to every little breath and every silent sigh. I hear the beating of your heart and the pulse of the blood in your veins. I notice every time your eyelids flicker, every time your lip trembles. And I taste…”
Oh God, his fingers were replaced with warm lips and the prickle of his stubble as he began to repeat his explorations of my breasts with lips, teeth and tongue.
“Oh… Oh…. is this…. is this a shifter thing?”
“Hmph,” he made a noncommittal grunt in the back of his throat before replying, “it’s a shifter thing. It’s an alpha thing. It’s a pride thing.”
I got it. He wanted to be the best. He had to be the best.
I relaxed and let him be the best. His mouth made his way from my breasts, leaving a trail of nibbling kisses down my torso and across my thighs. When he reached his destination I arched my back, rising to meet him as I locked my legs around his neck, my lower body supported by the knotted muscles of his wide shoulders. It wasn’t long before I gave him a lot more to listen to.
I had to admit that while I still wasn’t sold on the idea of sleeping under the stars, this was a pretty good way to wake up.
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When we had first arrived at the pack’s compound a couple of days earlier, I had been shocked by the sight of it. As I helped James unload supplies, medicine and bottled water from the back of the pickup, I felt for a moment as if I was taking part in some sort of disaster relief effort.
This was a den, home to an extended family of wolf shifters that James claimed had once been a proud and prosperous pack, one of the largest on the continent. But now?
The place was a dump. Three rusted trailer homes on cinder blocks and a couple of flimsy looking lean-to shelters. Between them rotting garbage had been left where it fell and the stench suggested a somewhat lax attitude towards waste disposal in general.
Everywhere I looked there were signs of poverty and decay, but more than that was the overwhelming sense of a complete lack of pride. That these were a people who had given up and given in to the inevitable.
I could tell it shamed James. He struggled to look me in the eye as we unloaded much needed supplies in silence. He wasn’t the only one. No one in the camp would look me in the eye and I didn’t detect a hint of gratitude as we distributed our bounty.
They treated James with distrust and at times outright contempt. In their eyes, he was a traitor and, despite the fact he tried to save him, implicit in the death of their former pack leader. But they still accepted the supplies. They clearly needed them. Leaderless and lost, they needed them more than ever.
Once everything had been distributed, James paused for a drink of water before fetching a toolkit from the cab of the truck. He set to work like a man possessed. Mending doors and hinges, sanding and sealing rust and rotten wood.
Over time others joined him. Shamed into action by a stranger who took more pride in their surroundings than they did. Some began to dispose of the rotting garbage, transferring it to freshly dug trenches well outside the boundaries of the camp.
I joined some of the youngsters on garbage duty. I didn’t owe these people anything, I was not one of them, but I didn’t want to just sit back and watch either. Unlike the adult shifters, the children weren’t so standoffish and pretty soon they were bombarding me with questions about the world beyond the woods and mountains they called home.
When the light began to fade James nodded in the direction of the road back down the mountain. Time to go.
“So that’s it?” The speaker was a slender young man barely out of his teens. His face was a mask of righteous anger, but he was also scared. His hands shook as he spoke.
A woman, slightly older, placed a restraining hand on his shoulder and spoke softly, “Leave it Dan. Let it be.” But he shook himself free of her and took a step closer to James.
“Joseph is dead and you think a couple of bottles of water and a lick of paint will make up for that, traitor?”
James turned with unnatural speed and bared his teeth, “I didn’t kill Joseph. Joseph died because he was old and slow. He should have gone into the wild years ago, but he was too proud and you were too weak. You all were.”
The younger shifter bared his own teeth and adopted a more aggressive stance as he took a step forward. My heart started pounding in my chest as I felt a surge of adrenaline, but James didn’t look the least concerned. He shook his head dismissively as he turned his back on the youngster and guided me towards the pickup. I held my breath, sure that we were about to be attacked, but the young man was too afraid to follow through.
As he opened the door James paused and addressed the gathered pack as one, not bothering to hide the contempt from his voice, “I’ll be back later. One more day. Maybe two. And then I’ll be out of your hair and you can go back to living in squalor like animals for all I care.”
As I climbed into the passenger seat a young woman approach James. Despite her boyish appearance and the thick layer of dirt and sweat that covered her skin, she walked with a predatory, feminine swagger that immediately set alarm bells ringing in my head.
“I’m sorry about Dan. He was very close to Joseph. There was a time when we thought he might lead us. But he has… limitations.”
James shrugged and turned to leave. But the woman grabbed his hand and I felt a tightness in my chest. A familiar twinge of jealousy that came from a lifetime of being set aside for thinner, prettier girls.
“Will you stay? You know he was right. This helps and although we’re too proud to admit it, we are grateful. It helps, but it’s not enough. We need you. We need someone to lead or we’ll all go into the wild.”
“I need to go. I’ll be back later,” said James. He glanced at me and I saw an intense longing in his eyes. At the time I didn’t recognize its significance. But, whether by accident or design, the girl had awoken something in him. A need to protect and provide that had laid dormant for a long time. I didn’t know it at the time, but it was the beginning of the end.
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Chapter 2: Carrie
I lay naked and exposed, luxuriating in my post-orgasmic bliss, for as long as I dared. James was the first person who had ever made me feel comfortable in my own body, but even that had limits. As I pulled on my clothes James sat on the tailgate and watched, his charming grin glistening with the nectar he had found between my thighs.
“What?”
James shrugged by way of a reply.
I tried to retain some semblance of dignity as I pulled on panties, jeans and my last clean top, but
whatever I did it felt like I was exposing myself in the most undignified way possible. By the time I was done. I no longer found his grin quite so charming. I think infuriating would have been more accurate.
“You could have at least averted your eyes. I don’t exactly have much privacy here.”
“I was enjoying the view… and anyway, we’re not exactly that hung-up on privacy.”
I’d noticed. While most of the pack, in human form, remained fully dressed, it was obvious that clothing was optional. Over the last couple of days I’d seen both men and women wander through the camp in various states of undress. It didn’t seem to bother anyone.
Then again, they were all so damn beautiful. Despite the run-down state of the camp, their lack of adequate supplies and some rather dubious personal hygiene, every single one of these people looked like they were only one good scrub away from being a model.
I can’t imagine what they must have thought of me. Out in the world I was self-conscious about my weight, but managed to keep it in check. It wasn’t like I was anything that far outside the norm. Here, amongst James’ peers, I felt like a freak. Something I don’t think James understood.
I snapped out of it when a still naked James hopped off the back of the truck and stretched. It was my turn to grin and stare as I admired the lean muscles that rippled along the length of his torso.
“Oh, so it’s OK for you to stare, but I have to avert my eyes?”
I knew he was joking, but I don’t think he realized that his words still stung a little. The idea that there would be any kind of parity between the two of us with regards to how comfortable we felt showing our bodies was laughable. But rather than ruin the moment by pursuing it, I decided to change the subject.
