Christmas Mate

by M. L. Briers

“That’s not…! You can’t…! I won’t…!”

  Angelique couldn’t seem to keep her thoughts on track to finish a single sentence. She knew what she wanted to say — and it had a lot of swear words in it — but she couldn’t seem to get it out of her swirling mind and into something that resembled a heartfelt plea for leniency.

  “Sorry — this Christmas present doesn’t come with a refund,” George offered back.

  He did feel kind of sorry for her — or maybe for her mate — but still, it was his job.

  “How about a one-way ticket to I’m going to kill you town?” Angelique bit back.

  “Okay — I was starting to feel a little guilty — now, not so much,” George scowled at her.

  “You cannot leave me here…”

  “Of course not. I’m not going to leave you — I have to stay and make sure that you meet your mate,” George snapped on a bright and breezy smile, there was glee in his eyes.

  Angelique wanted to kill the man.

  She knew the kind of bad luck that you could get from killing a fairy.

  She could imagine the kind of bad luck that you would get by killing the Christmas fairy.

  But a mate?

  That was a different kettle of fish entirely.

  It felt like she had all the bad luck that she could handle anyway.

  Ergo – What did it matter if she killed the Christmas fairy?

  CHAPTER SIX

  ~

  Angelique had decided on a plan of action, and she was determined to stick to it. She couldn’t see another way out of her predicament. She couldn’t see another option.

  Angelique was going to have to kill the Christmas fairy.

  Of course, the fairy godmother wouldn’t be overly joyful about it. The fairy nation probably wouldn’t be overly joyful about it — although, having met the Christmas fairy — they just might.

  But what other plan was there to get what she wanted? What she wanted was not to be mated to a shifter.

  George was going down. One way or the other, when she got free of the magical findings; Angelique was going to kill him.

  It wasn’t as if there were any witnesses. If she was lucky, then nobody knew he was there at all.

  It couldn’t be that hard to get away with murder — could it?

  It was, after all, a supernatural murder. And his body would return to its fairy form after death – so she wouldn’t have too much trouble burying it — him.

  Angelique felt a little pang of guilt and then dismissed it. It was him, or her, and she’d much rather that it was him.

  Smug him. The destroyer of spells – him.

  Yep, that was the plan.

  ~

  ~

  ~

  “Fee-fi-fo-fum, I scent magic and this way it comes,” Jett chuckled at his own funny.

  “What are you supposed to be, the green giant?” Luke grumbled at his beta.

  It had been a long day, full of things that the alpha didn’t want to deal with, and he was looking forward to putting his feet up and watching the sports on TV. Bliss.

  “Only after eating your chili pot surprise the other night,” Jett said as he raised just his left eyebrow and offered the alpha a knowing look.

  “That chili pot surprise was damn tasty. I can’t help it if you’re not man enough to handle it.”

  The alpha chuckled at the memory of his friend drinking a gallon of water to wash down the meal. He didn’t think he’d ever seen a man sweat as much as Jett had that night.

  “I’m sorry my tongue and throat aren’t fire retardant,” Jett tossed back. “But that magic in the air is still coming this way…”

  “I’ve got it,” the alpha assured him. “Circle back around the grove and come from behind.”

  “Watch out — I smell a witch,” Jett whispered.

  “What are you, crazy?” The alpha growled. “Scenting the air like that can only lead to trouble.”

  “Not for a mated male, it can’t,” Jett chuckled. “I wouldn’t advise it for a bachelor like you.”

  “Damn straight!” The alpha growled back. “I don’t need a ball and chain, just yet.”

  “You don’t know what you’re missing,” Jett chuckled.

  The beta turned away from his alpha and heard the man mutter something into the darkness. Even his ears couldn’t pick it up, and he had supernatural hearing.

  ~

  ~

  ~

  “Is this really because I reported you to the fairy godmother?” Angelique was looking for any way out that she could find.

  Begging — pleading — killing — it was all the same to her.

  “You’d think that would miff me right off, wouldn’t you?” George shot back with a look that said he wasn’t best pleased by her actions. “But — no. This is about you having a fated mate and not doing what fate wants you to do…”

  “And you think if you put my alleged mate and me together that I’m going to do what you and fate want me to do?” She snorted a chuckle of contempt at that idea.

  “I think if I put you on the alpha’s radar…”

  “Alpha!” Angelique tried once more to ground to a halt, but her feet just kept moving. It annoyed her so.

  “Did I forget to mention that part?” He offered her something approaching a cheeky grin.

  “Now that you come to mention it.” She offered him a death glare in return.

  “Whoops! My bad,” he chuckled.

  Angelique swore to herself that it would be his bad as soon as she broke free. She’d been having guilty thoughts about killing him — not so much anymore.

  “Look.” She’d forgotten one important part in her plan. There was pleading — killing — and then there was the old faithful chestnut. “What will it take for you to let me go?”

  “Well, if you’d asked me that question two days ago…” He stopped them in their tracks, put his finger to his lips, and tapped it thoughtfully.

  “Yes?”

  “I could have had a list for you. But unfortunately…”

  “Let’s not be rash — I always say don’t rush to judgment on these things,” Angelique cautioned him.

  “True,” George offered back a ray of hope. “But…”

  “Never start a sentence with but…”

  “Now that I’m the Christmas fairy — I can’t be bought off.” Then he snatched that ray of hope away and stomped up and down all over it.

  “Fine,” Angelique huffed.

  She was just going to have to go back to her other plan — kill him.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” George smiled as if he had a secret to share.

  “Oh, I don’t think you do,” she offered back with an acidic song in her voice.

  “Oh, I think I do,” George offered back with his own singsong voice that was much sweeter than hers.

  “Trust me, you don’t,” Angelique snapped back.

  “I’ll bet you I do,” George sang back to her.

  “Done! Bet on…” Angelique snapped at the chance.

  “What?” George was taken aback by her words.

  “You bet me, and I accepted — game on,” Angelique offered back. “Unless you want to squelch-a-welch on the bet, and then, of course, I get anything I want as a prize.”

  “That’s not how this works,” George offered back.

  “Sure it is,” Angelique tossed back at him.

  ‘You seem to have backed yourself into a corner — silly, Christmas fairy.’

  “Huh?” George was confused. He hadn’t agreed to anything – he was almost certain of it.

  ‘I guess you didn’t read the manual…’

  “There was a manual?” George asked, and Angelique snapped a quick look around the area to see who he was talking to.

  There, upon the branch of a tree was an aura — she should have known that they would never have sent a male Christmas fairy out alone into the world alone.

  She berated herself for missing that.

  ‘No �
�� but, you didn’t try to find one either — bad, Christmas fairy.’

  “Could you stop? You’re giving me a headache,” George grumbled. The woman was more than annoying; she was impossible to deal with. He wished that she’d stayed at home.

  Then he turned his attention back to Angelique, her eyes were full of suspicion, and they narrowed at him like a hawk on its prey. He was just grateful that she couldn’t strike out.

  “So who am I talking to? The monkey, or the organ grinder?” Angelique asked.

  “I’m the Christmas fairy,” George assured her.

  “And I’m the alpha, and you’re on my land,” Luke growled like he had every intention of eating the magical pair for dinner.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ~

  “Don’t sniff!” Angelique rushed her demand toward the alpha as she snapped a look in his direction.

  She had to say — if he was her mate as the Christmas fairy had said — then fate had her back on that one. The man was way out of her league.

  Tall, over six feet, with the kind of broad shoulders that blocked out a good portion of the landscape, and even under the heavyweight leather material of his jacket, she could still see that he was packed with a heck of a lot of muscles.

  The unruly mop of dark hair on his head reached out in all different directions like he’d just got out of bed. Sexy hair – sexy guy.

  She couldn’t tell if his eyes were naturally dark or if his emotions had darkened them, but the dark lashes and eyebrows gave him the appearance of having puppy dog eyes. She suddenly hated the fact that she had a fondness for puppies.

  Add to that the couple of days-old stubble that clung to his chin and reached up for his hairline in front of his ears made him look entirely too sexy for his own good. For her own good.

  “What do you take me for?” Luke growled.

  Of course, he wasn’t going to sniff the air — he wasn’t a damn pup that didn’t know any better. But, her words did make him curious as to why she didn’t want him to.

  He hated curiosity — curiosity might have killed the cat — but, when somebody told you not to do something, especially when you were an alpha, it always made you want to do it more. He might not have been a cat, but he certainly was curious.

  Luke’s beast growled within him. The wolf had become unsettled the moment that they’d felt the magic in the air.

  Now, the beast was just plain agitated, and Luke had to push back on the cage door in case the wolf decided it wanted to be free and have a taste of their unwelcome intruders.

  “You’re a shifter — you people sniff — things.” Angelique slowly spelt it out for him.

  “Like their own butts,” George offered with a chuckle that neither the witch nor the alpha shared. He did hear Jessica splutter a little chuckle though, even over the sound of the alpha giving him a warning growl. “Hey, deny it all you want — we all know a wolf is going to be a wolf.”

  “And that’s a perfectly natural thing, right?” The alpha asked.

  “Of course, if you want to go around sniffing your backside — be my guest,” George offered back.

  “So, it follows — that a perfectly natural thing would be for me to get my fangs and claws out, no?” Luke growled.

  “Her…” George immediately rushed to panic and pointed towards the witch.

  “Her?” Luke growled some more.

  “Don’t you dare!” Angelique hissed at the fairy.

  “A gift — from me to you,” George said.

  “Why would I want a witch?” Luke growled.

  “Not just any witch…” George started, but Angelique started to sing at the top of her lungs, and George shot her a curious look.

  “An insane witch?” Luke growled over the top of the woman’s voice.

  Sweet, it wasn’t, and it was hurting his sensitive ears.

  “Better yet,” George called back to the alpha. “She’s your mate!”

  The song that Angelique was singing immediately died on her lips. Her gaze snapped toward the alpha and his to her. She grimaced.

  Luke swallowed a good portion of his tongue. His dark eyes narrowed on the witch. He shuffled his feet as the fairy’s words ping-ponged around within his mind, and his lips moved as he tried to form words but couldn’t quite manage it.

  “You see what I have to deal with!” Angelique rushed out.” Kidnapped by a fairy — thrown into the back of my own car — dragged through the woods, and all because he wants something from you,” Angelique lied.

  Luke snapped his gaze back to the fairy. A slow, angry rumble started in his chest and got lodged in his throat.

  George wanted to bend over and kiss his backside goodbye. The damn devious little witch had set him up.

  Why kiss him herself when she could get the alpha to do it?

  He hadn’t seen that one coming.

  “You know?” Luke growled long and hard at George. “I’ve always wondered what roast fairy tastes like.”

  “But I brought you your mate,” George looked confused.

  The alpha should have been thanking him — not threatening him. If it hadn’t of been for the witch…

  “You can’t trust a fairy,” Angelique warned.

  “Even if that were true,” Luke said as he flicked out his claws, and watched George rush to panic. “Kidnapped — car — dragged — do you see where I’m going with this?”

  “Now that you mention it,” George nodded.

  “And still I’m bound by his magic,” Angelique said as she tried to lift her arms, but all she managed was a large shrug of the shoulders.

  “Set her free,” Luke growled.

  “I have a little problem with that,” George admitted. “If I set her free she’s planning to kill me.”

  “If you don’t set her free — I will kill you,” Luke offered back.

  He had no idea if the witch was his mate or not — but she was female, and you didn’t treat a woman that way.

  “Ouch!” Angelique said as she turned towards the Christmas fairy and offered him a smug smile.

  George groaned. Caught between a rock and a hard place, he had no other choice.

  Although, as he had already announced that the witch was the alpha’s mate, perhaps, she wouldn’t need to kill him after all.

  “Fine,” George released her from her bonds with a click of his fingers, and the first thing that she did was zap him.

  The second thing that she did was turn on her heels and take off in the opposite direction from where they had been going.

  “Bet you didn’t see that one coming,” George ground out the words through clenched teeth.

  “Wrong!” Luke growled.

  He’d seen that one coming a mile away — and the witch was running straight towards Jett.

  ~

  ~

  ~

  The alpha still didn’t want to do it — curiosity, and all that — but, he figured that the damn curious cat was already dead, so he breathed in hard, taking in as much air as possible, and captured her scent within it.

  “Damn,” he growled.

  The fairy was telling the truth.

  Luke set off hard and fast after his mate. He had little choice; his beast had already risen within him and was demanding a chase.

  That was not a good sign. At least, not for the witch.

  “And where do you think you’re going?” Jett asked as he stepped out in front of Angelique, and the witch ground to a halt.

  “My cookies are burning,” Angelique lied as she lifted her hands and blasted the beta backward.

  Jett’s feet were torn away from the ground as he sailed backward through the air. His arms and legs were stretched out in front of him as if he’d caught a cannonball to the stomach, and he landed with one heck of a hard thump against the ground.

  “Don’t run from me!” Luke growled out the warning as he closed the distance between them.

  “Oh, poop!” Angelique turned a look over her shoulder to see the alpha coming f
ull steam ahead and heading right towards her.

  Angelique knew that she had only a few options open to her. One of them was to kill him.

  She’d never been a violent person before. But there was something about being kidnapped by the Christmas fairy and foisted onto your mate that had made her rush in that direction – twice.

  She still wanted to kill the Christmas fairy — but, that was because the man was damned annoying. He’d done this, brought her to this moment in time and place, and someone had to pay the piper, didn’t they?

  By the time that Angelique had decided on a course of action, the alpha was almost upon her. She lifted her hands, pulled on her magic, and was then rugby tackled to the ground by a sexy hunk of a shifter that knocked the breath, and the magic, right out of her.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ~

  Caged in by Luke’s hard body as he lifted his weight from her, all that Angelique could see were those damn puppy dog eyes staring right into her very soul. She felt a sudden and somewhat overwhelming need to kick a puppy, not a real one, just him.

  “I told you not to run from me,” Luke growled.

  “Did you not notice that I’d stopped?” She managed to breathe out the words before she gasped in a hard, wheezing breath.

  “There was intention in your eyes,” Luke growled.

  “There was madness in yours — am I complaining?” Angelique snapped back.

  “Well now.” George clapped his hands together and rubbed them with glee. “This looks like my work here is done.”

  He mentally patted himself on the back and puffed out his chest. He could now return to the easy life where alpha’s and witches weren’t threatening to kill him.

  ‘Not yet, it’s not.’ Jessica said from somewhere over his left shoulder, and it felt like a kick to the balls.

  “Why not?” George demanded as he deflated right there in front of the woman.

  “Who’s he talking to?” Jett asked as he grumbled and growled, and clicked his bones back into place while trying to pull his bruised body up from the ground.