Hunt Mates

by Mary Hughes

  Noah shook his head to clear it. He felt so strange. He finally managed to focus on the front door where a woman stood, hands over her mouth, staring at him.

  The woman stuttered, “The door was open and I… D-did that man just turn into an animal—?”

  Noah froze. Had he shifted without meaning to? That hadn’t happened since he was in diapers. He reached for his human…and nothing happened. What was going on?

  “No, no. That’s an illusion.” Linda bustled to the woman and turned her away. “All mirrors and such. Come back tomorrow.” She hustled the woman out, closed the door and collapsed back against the jamb, hand against her forehead.

  “Mr. Blackwood. Noah.” Heaving a breath, she straightened and trotted toward the back of the store. “You stay here. I have to go check out a few things.”

  “Yip?” He couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing.

  “I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Then, in a flurry of hairpins and a rattle of beaded curtain, she was gone.

  “Yip yip…? Yip!” He ground his teeth. Witches. Couldn’t trust the lot of them. Always secretive, and not in the necessary, protecting-the-pack way. He started after her, using the long-legged lope that was his wolf’s stride…and upended, landing on his back, little furry legs batting above him.

  That was when he found out he was a fifteen-inch dog.

  Available on Amazon.

  Mind Mates

  Pull of the Moon

  © 2016 Mary Hughes

  Pretty little shifter, wizard prince—their taboo love could burn the barriers between worlds.

  Shifter Emma Singer has more problems than she can shake her pretty wolf tail at. Her father has been executed, and her mother and brother plan to sell her to a pack alpha for his harem. Even the wicked little crush she has on her boss is doomed—why would six-and-a-half feet of hot, handsome, royal wizard want a boring, good-girl, iota shifter like her? Not to mention her only power is going berserker—that's a real relation-shipwreck!

  Gabriel Light is a wizard prince who turned his back on his exceptional powers after he was accused of causing his parents’ death. Now he pours his intellect into his tech business, and hides his naughty, forbidden lust for his pretty shifter clerk. But when his sister is imprisoned, and Emma is kidnapped, it's time for this alpha-geek wizard to decloak with all laser cannons blazing. Only one problem—with Emma at his side, how can he stay focused, with his inner wolf howling to have her?

  Emma’s father left behind a journal. When Gabriel and Emma accidentally release its hidden magic, they learn that together, they hold a key to power beyond imagining—if they can stay alive long enough to use it. But when Emma unleashes her berserker wolf on their enemies, can Gabriel draw her back from the brink before she destroys everyone in her path?

  Warning: Contains a hot wizard prince panting to bring out a good-girl shifter’s naughty side. Accidental voyeurism, deliberate orgasms, a jealous rival wizard, and fun with prophecy

  Enjoy the following chapter from Mind Mates:

  Swaying atop the three-story ladder, Emma Singer swallowed hard and forced herself to climb higher.

  Her fingers curled tighter around the rungs as she neared the metal braces of the Choice Buy’s exposed-structure ceiling. An Employee Appreciation Day banner drooped from her clenched hand.

  “Damn. This good-girl shtick is getting old.”

  Wolf shifters, even iotas, weren’t afraid of heights, but her stomach slid toward her legs the higher she got, maybe knowing something she didn’t.

  She glanced down and immediately wished she hadn’t.

  From the hushed, rarefied heights, her fellow Techie Titans looked like ants gathered around the home-theater setup, where their boss was installing a game. The huge flat-panel was reduced to postage-stamp size by her height.

  Strangely, her six-foot-five boss looked just as imposing as usual.

  “Hurry up, Emma.” Brant the Blundering, the gangly teen who’d pulled down the streamer in the first place, called from the base of the ladder. He was built like a puppy who hadn’t grown into his paws—and was as coordinated too.

  Swallowing her vertigo, she stretched to refasten the crepe paper to a joist.

  “More to the right.” Brant waved an arm to demonstrate, hand like an oven mitt on a broomstick.

  He hit the ladder and knocked it sideways.

  Emma tottered, arms pinwheeling. The streamer fluttered away, waving mockingly in crepe paper’s version of the finger.

  No good deed goes unpunished flashed through her thoughts as she toppled off. The ladder rocked a few times before righting itself with a kerchunk.

  It seemed an eternity for Emma to fall the three stories. Below, Brant’s wide eyes followed her descent. She had time to wonder if there was a twelve-stepper for acute volunteeritis.

  Well. This is gonna hurt.

  “Emma!” In the nick of time her boss, Dr. Gabriel Light, swooped in, doing his usual hero thing.

  He caught her.

  She landed in his strong arms (no problem). They were tight around her (no problem). His scent, masculine and heady, filled her sudden sucked breath (still no problem, or not much of one).

  Automatically she clung to his broad shoulders, hard muscles under her fingers, her inner wolf wagging its tail (starting to be a problem). Her fingers threaded into his silky hair (definitely trekking into problem territory). Her lips, a whisper from his chiseled jaw, his delectable earlobe, opened, her tongue aching to swipe a taste.

  Red-alert problem.

  “Emma, you’re safe. Trust me.” Behind his plain glasses, his lids lifted to her. His irises were a startling, star-shot blue-green, like the moon sparkling off a warm sea, making her want to dive in and do the breaststroke.

  For all that he dressed like a junior college professor, the man was teeth-achingly beautiful.

  She tried to swallow, but her tongue had swollen to fill her mouth and nothing happened. She tried again, managing to pant and gulp at the same time, swallowed wrong, and started coughing uncontrollably.

  Dr. Light set her on her feet—by sliding her down his sleek, muscular, cotton-and-male-smelling chest, oh yum—and rubbed her between her shoulders to ease her.

  His big, warm palm did ease her cough, but the breadth of his hand filled the entire area between her shoulder blades and made the rest of her clench with aching desire. Gabriel Light wasn’t simply lead Techie Titan—he was their nerd king, and he was built like royalty.

  The little iota wolf in Emma yipped happily.

  But she, her human self, wasn’t so pleased. Despite her interest in him, he’d never shown anything more than kindly concern. The last thing she wanted was to be a poor lovesick fool.

  But he smelled so good.

  “Are you all right?” Dr. Light, one arm clasped around her, slid a long, large finger under her chin. Tilting her head up, he gazed deep into her eyes. His own were sympathetic.

  She stopped breathing at the oceans of tenderness in that gaze—fraternal tenderness, but so damned gorgeous.

  Plus side, no breath meant her hacking cough stopped, long enough for her to wheeze with what air remained in her lungs, “I’m fine.”

  One corner of his mouth tipped up in a gentle semi-smile. “You always say that. ‘I’m fine.’ Whether you are or not. You’re not a trainee anymore, Emma. It’s okay not to be fine. You won’t get fired. It’s okay to admit you need help.”

  An iota wolf, admit to being vulnerable? Hell no, it wasn’t okay. Her breath surged back in a rush. She was bottom of the pack, and worse, built like a kitten, tiny and cute to the point that she had to buy her clothes in the kids’ section at WallyWorld and one of her nicknames was Piglet. She could never ever be caught out as needy and vulnerable, surrounded by apex predators all day.

  She wasn’t sure whether she meant her shifter pack or the six-foot-five walking sex bomb who was her boss.

  Human boss, she reminded herself. Who didn’t seem to have a clue sh
e was interested in him.

  “I’m fine,” she repeated through clenched teeth.

  “Are you?” His gaze shifted to her mouth, and she stopped breathing again. “That’s bad for your teeth, you know. Relax.”

  He eased the chiding words with a slide of his finger along her jaw, the rough whorls of the pad caressing her flesh. His touch raised tremors in her that shimmered down her throat, waking nipples and belly and wolf.

  Oh, to grab him, hook a leg behind his, and take him down to the floor—with her underneath.

  She was strong and tricky and might have tried it in private, except he moved like he’d studied martial arts and knew what to do. A warrior’s grace hinted at an extremely muscular body lurking beneath his sweater vests and slouchy pants. She’d probably only embarrass herself.

  Her wolf didn’t seem to care. It was panting and lifting its tail, and her human wasn’t far behind.

  So naturally, when her eyes were big pools of do-me and she was spurting pheromones like a department store perfumery, her alpha wolf Bruiser prowled into the store.

  * * *

  Bzz-bzzt. A buzz like an angry hornet stung wizard prince Gabriel Light’s ears the moment the predator slunk into the store.

  Cap’n Crunch me. Gabriel had magically alarmed the door for just such an event, but why now, when he’d finally gotten a semi-innocent excuse to wrap his arms around this warm bundle of soft, sweet-smelling heaven?

  Emma. It felt like he’d been dying to hold her forever. Now, with her in his arms, was the first time in months he could breathe.

  But that buzzing alarm told him the approaching beast was male, a wolf shifter, and, from that level of sting, Emma’s alpha. The beast was not going to appreciate seeing her in another man’s arms.

  She started trembling, no doubt in response to the alpha’s rampant fight-club stench, a musk even Gabriel could smell. He tried to ease her tension with a joke.

  “Hey, Emma. How many tickles does it take to make an octopus laugh?”

  She skewered him with a disbelieving stare, icing his flesh. He’d blundered, she didn’t understand he was trying to comfort her, nobody gets my skewed sense of humor… Then she gulped and said, “Eight? Like, um, eight legs?”

  Immediately his world brightened. “Nope. Ten tickles. Get it? Tentacles?”

  She managed a tiny laugh, tinkling bells to his ears, and her body relaxed slightly under his arms. “That was such a dad joke.”

  He loved that she, of all the people he knew, actually laughed at his jokes. He smiled into her eyes like a besotted fool.

  Of course, that was when the he-wolf prowled into view.

  Gabriel wondered how far he could get with the wolf by protesting his intentions were honorable. Probably not far. The creature was only barely in human form.

  The wolfman was medium height but had a face like a dented shovel and a body like a trash compactor, his muscles-on-muscles popping in a stringy T-shirt that barely qualified past no-shirt-no-shoes-no-service.

  Worse, with the hair sprouting everywhere, nose elongating like a snout, and lengthening canines, this alpha was dangerously pissed.

  Hard to reason with a pissed-off wolf. They tended to bite first then ask questions…never.

  Yet instead of releasing Emma, Gabriel’s hand dropped from her clenched jaw to open protectively on her back.

  “The fuck?” the wolfman snarled.

  Something inside Gabriel snarled right back.

  He throttled it. Whether his own masculine instincts or maybe he’d developed a wolf to complement Emma’s, down boy. Diplomacy first. “This isn’t what it seems—”

  “I know.” The he-wolf tapped his snout. “Good thing too, or you’d already have my fist in your face. Let her go. Now.”

  Briefly Gabriel clenched his eyes. The wolf didn’t smell it, but Gabriel really reeked of desire. He’d magicked up a way to hide the odor because of the Witches’ Council.

  Witches tangling bed sheets with wolves was a huge taboo—punishable by anything up to and including the headsman’s axe. He’d have risked the ultra-close shave, but the Council Enforcers usually hit the female with the worst of the punishment.

  He couldn’t stand the idea of one hair on Emma’s head being harmed.

  Trying to deescalate the situation, Gabriel loosened his arms around her. But he couldn’t quite let her go. “Sorry, sir.” He forced a smile and managed a creditable professionalese. “Store’s closed. Private party.”

  “In the middle of the fuckin’ day?”

  “Yes, sir. A special recognition celebration.” He had a small one every month, but this month they’d had record sales, so he closed the store early, locked the doors, and put on a real shindig. He wondered momentarily how the he-wolf had gotten in. Maybe with the caterers. “You’ll have to leave.”

  “Not without her.”

  “Sir, what part of private eludes you?”

  The wolf held up one ham hand and slowly curled his fingers. “What part of my fist eludes you? If I’m leaving, so is my cousin.”

  Probably not by DNA. “Cousin” was a common cover story for pack members living together, caring for each other, getting naked together… Gabriel’s arms tightened around the pretty little shifter. The he-wolf growled in response. Gabriel would have to let go of her.

  Soon.

  At least the creature didn’t know Gabriel was a witch. No one would, unless he was working active magic. If the wolfman had known, he would’ve attacked immediately. The Witches’ Council’s taboo meant most wolves had no use for witches, and some actively hated them.

  Let her go.

  Problem was, if he stepped away now the alpha would see Gabriel’s intentions were no longer perfectly honorable.

  Slouchy pants only covered so many inches of rock-hard hey-how-ya-doin’?

  The wolf stalked nearer.

  Let her go.

  Not yet.

  Hell and cornflakes, Gabriel had been constantly aroused, ever since Emma started working at his store two months ago. Her pretty face, pert body, and sparkling personality called to everything in him.

  What nailed it was that she actually got his weird sense of humor.

  The he-wolf prowled the edge of Gabriel’s kill zone. Getting steamed.

  Gabriel really needed to let Emma go.

  But none of it seemed to matter squat, not Witches’ Council headsman nor the hairy promise of death, not when his dreams had become reality at last, and he had her soft, curvy body in his arms.

  “Dr. Light, it’s okay.” Emma’s sweet voice snared his attention. “I know this, um, man.”

  She gazed up into his face so adoringly he fell into her big brown eyes, momentarily blotting the alpha shifter from his awareness.

  Which was when the wolfman grabbed Emma’s delicate arm in one hairy ham hand and yanked her out of Gabriel’s embrace.

  Yanked her so hard she stumbled.

  Fury seized Gabriel. He grabbed the wolf’s slab of a shoulder and shoved him back, popping Emma loose. Stalking after, Gabriel tore off his glasses to glare down at the he-wolf. Bad idea to challenge an alpha, but this beast dared touch Emma.

  The wolfman’s ears lengthened and definite fangs flashed. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

  Gabriel ripped out, “Nobody manhandles a woman, or any being, in my…in our store.” His jaw clenched against his slip of the tongue. At pains to blend in, he didn’t advertise the fact that he owned this Choice Buy. Hell, head Techie Titan was bad enough. He’d taken great care to stay under both mundane and magical radars, to the point of wearing glasses he didn’t need. Huffing a calming breath, he put said glasses back in place.

  “That is my cousin, and I’m head of the family.” The he-wolf’s eyes narrowed, spitting fire. “You interferin’ in family business?”

  While the wolfman spoke, his hairy hand dipped behind his back—where a concealed gun or knife would be.

  Damn it. Gabriel played the wimpy nerd t
o humans and potion geek to witches to avoid exactly this.

  Mentally, he called up a shield spell. Violence was about to erupt.

  “Enough!” Emma wedged her tiny self between them, shoulders back, chin up, and chest puffed like an irate cat’s fur. “Bruiser—I mean Bruce. Leave Dr. Light alone.”

  Gabriel found himself a little surprised and a lot impressed. She was standing up to a wolf twice her size and her alpha to boot.

  This was a totally new side to her. In the couple months she’d worked here, she’d only ever been diffident. Eager to please.

  Always saying “I’m fine”. He found himself even more intrigued with the pretty little wolf. And more anxious to defend her. He started to cut in.

  She slashed him a glance, a clear “back off” in her eyes.

  He hesitated. If this was a wolf thing, his interfering could harm her pack standing.

  Fine, he’d back off—for now. He stepped to the side, a hand cocked near his waist. Not for a gun, but ready to plunge under the sweater vest for the row of charged magical talismans that studded his belt.

  “I don’t like your attitude, missy. We’re going.” Bruiser grabbed Emma and hauled her toward the door.

  She dug in her heels. “No.”

  The wolfman slapped her face, so hard it left a red mark on her creamy cheek.

  Gabriel forgot all his talismans, took one step, and planted a fist in the wolfman’s snout. Bam.

  Bruiser rocked back on his heels. His hand sprang open, releasing Emma.

  Shocked gasps from the employees gave way to a quiet cheer or two.

  Mentally, Gabriel facepalmed. He was a crunchy-even-in-milk idiot. Yeah, that punch felt satisfying, but it as good as announced that he’d had a raging hard-on for sweet, soft Emma for two months. A freeze potion or calm amulet would’ve worked more subtly.

  Bruiser straightened, rubbing his snout. “Why you…you fucker…”

  Gabriel shifted his weight to the balls of his feet. This could get ugly.

  “You heard Dr. Light.” Another male dressed in Choice Buy blue, equally tall with Gabriel, glided up to stand beside him. “Private party.”