ROMANCE: The Alpha Howls (Paranormal Werewolf Shapeshifter New Adult Contemporary Romance) (Shapeshifter Mystery Alpha Werewolf Romance) (2 page)

By the time I graduated from high school and moved away to New Mexico to go to college, we found out that Grandpa had been diagnosed with lung cancer. The man never smoked a day in his life and ate an entirely vegetarian diet, and he comes down with stage 2 lung cancer. Because of his distance from any major hospitals, my mom moved him into my old room and made it her job to make sure he recovered from cancer. And for a while there, it really seemed like he was going to beat it. Of course, the doctors had to remove one of his lungs and he seemed to be responding well to chemo and radiation treatments. But in the end, like so many cancer patients, it wasn’t the disease that got him, but pneumonia.

His death was sudden and devastating to our small family. As expected, my mom took it the worst, I didn’t think she would ever stop crying. My mom had lost her mom when she was 13, so Grandpa had raised her alone. So it wasn’t that she had just lost a father, she had lost the last living strand to her family other than me and my sister. But what was even weirder was how Grandpa’s death affected my dad. Grandpa was my dad’s mentor when he was first learning to become a welder and they had been best of friends—it was how he’d met my mother—but they drifted apart after my dad joined the Army, and the two of them just never seemed to be able to reconnect. Of course, the alien stuff didn’t help either. But since Grandpa had come to live with my folks, he and my dad finally re-bonded and they became the type of friend’s they used to be. So I won’t say he was as much of a mess as my mom, but he was hurting more than I had ever seen him hurt.

Because of all of the heartache going on around our house, I decided to take on the funeral arrangements. Grandpa had drawn up a will when he found he was sick, and he stipulated that he wanted to be cremated and that he wanted us to spread his ashes near his beloved cabin in Flagstaff. He also stipulated that the cabin and all his possessions should go to me upon his death. I was stunned when I read this because I figured he’d want to leave it to mom and dad to help cover his medical expenses.

“No, kiddo,” My dad said to me on our back porch while he smoked one of his rare cigarettes. “Your Grandpa was actually pretty well off from when your grandma died. He gave us the rest of the money before he died. He wanted you to have the cabin.”

So that was that. We cremated Grandpa and then I went back to college, graduated, got married, and then two years later, got divorced.

No, I never thought I would be the type of woman who would be divorced by the time she was 25. In fact, the way I had my life mapped out I would meet the man I was going to marry at 20, graduate from college at 22, then get married, then enter my masters program at 23, complete that by 26 and start hunting for teaching jobs while I shopped my first novel. I would, inevitably, find a tenure-track professorship (Desirably somewhere out east.), have my novel pick up by one of the big 6 publishers with a meaty 3 book deal to go along with it, and then and only then would I start thinking about starting a family.

But the monkey wrench in this whole process was the man I chose to become my future husband. His name was Scott. He was 225 pounds of ginger haired muscle who loved rugby, Hemingway, and mixed martial arts. I should have known the minute he told me about how much he loved The Sun Also Rises and For Whom The Bells Toll that I should have run for the hills. But, Scott, well, he also possessed certain other … attributes that made him very desirable as a husband. To be blunt, Scott’s penis and the things he could do me with it left me in a bit of a fog that didn’t lift until a year after our wedding and nearly a year into my master’s program. This is when I found out that I wasn’t the only one who had been charmed by Scott’s trouser snake, and his extramarital shenanigans ended our marriage and turned me into an emotional wreck.

All of my carefully laid plans, nothing but dust, and I returned home to Phoenix to cry on my mother’s shoulders and perhaps write my way through my pain, and maybe get myself back on track in a year or two. The whole problem with living with my mom and dad after so many years of independence was that I was living with mom and dad after so many years of independence. Don’t get me wrong, I love my mom and dad more than anything, but god are they annoying. So obviously the whole cry on mom’s shoulder thing only lasted about 2 weeks, but then I was ready to crawl out of my skin. Thankfully, the solitude I so desired was only a short hour-and-a-half drive from my parents house to Uncle Dale’s cabin.

No, not Grandpa’s cabin, my cabin.

“Oh, Mandy, why would you want to go up there?” My mother asked in her Eee www that’s gross voice. “It’s been years since anyone’s even been up there. For all you know it's full of bats or raccoons, or both bats and raccoons.”

“I just need to get away for a while, Mom,” I didn’t have the hear to say that I needed to get away from her. “Besides, the quiet is exactly what I need right now. And maybe if the cabin needs a little fixing up, it’ll help me take my mind off everything else.”

All she did was shake her head in that disapproving way that makes me want to gouge her eyes. But it’s also the same shake that basically lets you know that she’s washed her hands of the whole situation.

More or less, I had her approval to go up to the mountains and go as bug shit crazy as her dad did.

No, the cabin wasn’t infested with either bats or raccoons because before he left for the final time, Grandpa had shut the place up nice and tight, so there was absolutely no way any vermin were going to make their way inside. But, it had been over 5 years since anyone had stepped foot inside of the place, so the minute I walked inside, I was practically choked by the 1-inch coat of dust that was kicked up by my sneakers. I’d come prepared for a little bit of cleaning, but not for this kind of major clean up. But that seemed to be the story of my life as of late, underprepared for life’s challenges and unwilling to accept what was right in front of me. The fact was I was a control freak, I needed everything to fit in a neat little box of my design, and if it didn’t, I turned a blind eye to it and refused to see the truth until it had me pinned to the ground and it was punching me in the face.

I locked the front door of the cabin and made the 20 minute drive into Flagstaff to stock up on what I would actually need to get the place clean, I cursed under my breath the entire ride there and on the way back.

                                                                                      ***

I spent my first and last day at the cabin scrubbing it clean from one corner to the next. By the time I was done, I was covered in a layer of grime that I looked like some kind of weird mud person from a B-horror movie. Thankfully the well pump was still in working order and I was able to wash off the grime. Unfortunately, it was a cold shower because the propane tank was bone dry, so therefore no hot water and no heat. Luckily, I’d brought huge stack of thick comforters from home to repeal the cold until I arranged for a service to come out and fill the propane tank.

I crawled into bed in Grandpa’s old room as the winter sun went down at around 6 pm. I’d never been so tired in my life, and sleep took me into its dreamless embrace.

                                                                                           ***

It felt like I’d only slept for only a few hours when the light burned behind my closed eyelids. The sun seemed impossibly bright, and I was positive I had closed the heavy curtains. Well, it didn’t matter if it was daylight or not, I wasn’t getting out of bed yet and I decided just to go ahead bury my head under the covers until my body absolutely forced me to get up. I tried to pull the covers over my head, but then I noticed something else, I couldn’t move a muscle, I was completely paralyzed. I opened my eyes and was immediately blinded by a searing white light. I wasn’t in the cabin anymore! I closed my eyes tight against the glare of the light and attempted to calm the sudden panic that was raging inside of me.

First thing first, I had to figure out where I was. I needed to calm myself down and assess my situation rationally. For years, I’d practiced transcendental meditation to focus myself, especially during midterms and finals. I’d fallen out of practice since my divorce, but it was kind of like riding a bike, I simply found my center and concentrated on my mantra. 5 minutes passed, then 10 minutes. As I brought myself back to reality, my waking mind now laser focused, and I came to the conclusion that I had to be dreaming. Even though from a sensory perspective, I could feel, smell, hear, and taste everything that I had to be in some kind of waking dream brought on by ongoing emotional turmoil as well as my physical exhaustion from the previous days labor. The phenomena of the waking dream weren't unheard of, in fact, it was quite common.

As I convinced myself of this fact I opened my eyes again to the white, blinding light, and I came face-to-face with a gray man. His black eyes were impossibly huge and insect like. I saw myself reflected in those blacker-than-black eyes and I finally allowed myself to lose control and I began screaming. The gray man seemed to panic and seemed to begin running around me. Through my screams I could hear this odd ticking noise, it was as if this thing was trying to communicate with me. My voice began to crack from my screams, and I once again forced myself to calm down. The gray man continued to click at me and I stared at him with deep confusion.

“I … I can’t understand you. What are you saying?” I asked, my voice edging towards panic again.

The gray man stood over me, his head tilting left-to-right as if it was a curious dog and I had a treat in my hand. The gray man then reached behind his head and I heard and audible click, and his like air escaping from a balloon, and the gray man removed his head and revealed one of the most beautiful faces I’d ever seen. It was light blue, but it was absolutely gorgeous.

“Where is Dale Huggins?” The beautiful blue man asked, and then I passed out.

We all thought Grandpa was insane.

For years we thought he was, nothing more than an acid casualty and that his aliens were nothing more than vivid, reoccurring hallucinations.

For years, we forced antipsychotics down his throat and shook our heads, treating him like he was nothing more than a child with an overstimulated imagination.

But here I was, face-to-face with one of his gray men.

Make that one of his blue men. I suddenly remembered the painting from the last time we came to visit Grandpa and he showed me the true face of the gray men and how I thought painting was more beautiful than anything I’d ever seen.

And here I was sitting with the living, breathing version of that painting, and I was as naked as the day I was born. I would have been embarrassed, but the blue man was just as naked as I was, but he didn’t exhibit any of the obvious discomfort I was feeling. Of course, I didn’t exactly mind seeing him naked, because he was, well, in possession of the same exact thing that made blind to my ex-husbands obvious faults, but even more so.

I had come back to the land of the living just a few minutes earlier and the fog was lifting from my mind and I attempted to acclimate my surroundings. The first thing I notice was that I was completely naked and I felt myself flush bright red and I attempted to cover myself with my hands. It’s not that I’m embarrassed by my body, I’m perfectly comfortable with who I am and what I look like, but since the divorce I had kind of let myself go and I had abandoned my once near-religious work out routines and packed on a few extra pounds. The blue man noticed my discomfort and briefly disappeared from the blinding white room we were sitting in and then returned with a thin blanket for me to cover myself. He’d also put on a pair of what looked like spandex shorts. That was a shame.

“You’ll have to forgive me. Our transport system can only move living organic matter and your clothes were most likely left behind when I brought you here. I also forgot how … modest human beings can be.”

I squinted up at the blue man, pushing back my amazement and disbelief over my current situation and asked.

“Is there any way you could turn down the lights? The glare in here is killing me.”

The blue man made several swift motions with his hands and suddenly the lights dimmed, but we were still surrounded by a brilliant white which seemed to pulse as if it were a heartbeat.

“Where am I?” I asked, knowing full well what his answer would be.

“You are on my ship. Its name would be impossible to pronounce it your language, so I will simply call it ship.”

“It’s alive?”

“Yes, ship is organic. They are my home world and they help us travel between universes … But before I answer any more of your questions, please answer mine: Where is Dale Huggins?”

“My Grandpa died. He died almost over five years ago. I figured with you kidnapping him so much you would’ve known that.”

The blue man’s face became slack and sorrowful. It almost looked like he was going to cry.

“It has been quite some time since I was last near your planet. I was not aware he’d moved onto another universe. I’m sorry did not get to say goodbye to him. He was my friend.”

“Your friend?” I said at a near shout. I couldn’t help myself, this blue man, this alien had destroyed my uncle. He had cost him everything. “You kidnaped him for years. You literally drove him crazy. He lost everything that matters because of you!”

I was on my feet, in the blue man’s face, and shaking with anger.

“I… I did not mean to do this to him. But it was necessary because of the nature of our mission I had to wipe his memory when I returned him to earth. When I would bring him back to the ship, I would restore his memories. But once he was on earth, he would have been in too much danger if I allowed him to remember. Just as if I allowed you to remember, Amanda.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

“You … You kidnapped me, too?”

I wanted to smash his face in. I wanted to tear his eyes out with my fingernails. This man … this thing had been kidnapping me for god knows how long!

“No, Amanda, not me, but another of my brothers. He was your trainer, just as I was Dale’s trainer. You and I … We were something else.”

“We were what?” My mind couldn’t comprehend what I was hearing. What he was saying to me made absolutely no sense.

“Here,” He said as he gently tapped his finger against my forehead. “Let me show you.”

Suddenly my mind flooded with images of me as a young girl, maybe only 8-years-old, being comforted by my Grandpa as a bald blue man with a thick yellow beard stood over us, and a blue boy stood next to him looking at me with concern in his eyes. Then I am older, maybe 12, I am sparring with the bearded man, Grandpa is fighting against the blue boy. The blue boy is fast, almost faster than the eye can see and he easily brings Grandpa down. I do the same to the bearded blue man. Next, I am 16, the blue boy and I sit holding hands, he kisses me, his hands explore my body and I explore his. We are both shy, but we love one another. Next, it is me at 18, I hold the blue boy as he cries. I wipe away his tears with my fingers, I kiss them away, but I tell him that I’m sorry, but I have to go away.

And just as suddenly, my mind snaps forward to now, my eyes fill with the boy who is now a man, D-Arin. HIs name is D-Arin and we’ve known each other since we were children. We’ve loved one another for just as long. As children, it was as brother and sister, but as we grew older, it became deeper. I pull D-Arin’s face to mine and I kiss his angelic lips. He is so familiar and wonderful, my soul swells with my love for him. I pull away so I can see his face, my fingers exploring it as if I was blind.

“After … After you said you were leaving, I couldn’t bear to return. That’s why I didn’t know that Dale had died …”

“It doesn’t matter,” I say, kissing him again, pushing his skin hugging shorts down and letting them puddle around his ankles. “You’re here now. That’s what matters.”

I gently stroke his swollen member while kissing his chest, moving down to his stomach and then fall to my knees and take him into my mouth. His taste is heady and sweet, so unlike the taste of a human penis. He runs his fingers through my hair, gently pulling it and guiding his cock deeper down my throat. I gag and pull him from my mouth. He takes this brief moment to lie down on the floor of the ship next to me, kissing me and rubbing my swollen clit with his fingers. Bolts of electricity run up and down my back with his touch. He lays flat on the ground and motions for me to sit on his face. I swing my leg over him and he plunges his thick tongue into my labia and then begins to expertly lick my clit with the tip of his tongue.

I take him back into my mouth as I feel an orgasm building. He knows exactly how to touch me as if his brain is hard wired to my pleasure. As he licks, one of his wet fingers teases and explores my ass, and as he plunges the tip inside of me, my body explodes with my orgasm. My body thrashes and fills with fire. I push myself down hard against his mouth, his tongue sliding deeper inside of me, his finger continuing to plunge in and out of my behind. I erupt, my juices soaking his face, drowning him.

I’m still shaking as he pushes me off of him and he roughly puts me on my back. He positions my legs behind my ears, folding me in half, and plunges his cock deep inside of me. He pounds me with every ounce of his strength as if he’s trying to push his entire body inside of me. My moans echo through the hollow space of the ship, reverberating melodiously back at me. I stop D-Arin’s manic thrusting and pull him out of me and guide his slick penis to the rosebud of my ass, gently pushing it inside of me, motioning him with my eyes for him to go deeper. I cum almost immediately as he inserts his full size inside of me, and I keep coming as I feel his cock explode, his seed filling me to overflowing.