True Alpha (11 page)

Clarissa settled at his side, her fingers still tangled in his fur and her face tilted back so she could gaze at the moon. The bandage Ronnie had wrapped around Daniel’s head stood out against his dark fur, true white in the moonlight, and the nearby tree line had been reduced to a muted riot of red and gold hues. As Mandy leaned against a porch beam, she couldn’t help but think that the sight was romantic in a way. Even the coppery odor of blood leant to the atmosphere – maybe that was because she and Jack had fallen in love in a haze of danger, moonlight and blood.

Jack sighed, interrupting the silence. “I’m gonna kick his ass.”

“Jack…” Mandy admonished, reaching out to grasp one of his hands. “Someone’s already done that for you.”

As Daniel lifted his head and turned his gaze to Clarissa, Jack said something under his breath about him deserving it. “I don’t know what he was thinkin’. Lucky he didn’t get himself killed.”

Jack contented himself with a couple more threats, then waited in silence until Daniel finally shifted back into his human form.

Mandy quickly diverted her gaze, trying not to notice how Daniel’s bare backside glowed in the moonlight. “I’ll get him something to wear,” she said, hurrying past Jack and the others and into the cabin.

Inside, she selected a pair of jeans from Jack’s wardrobe. Daniel was muscular like Jack, though leaner and taller. The jeans might be a little short, but they’d certainly be better than nothing. Folding them hastily and clutching the bundle of denim to her chest, she made her way back outside.

Clarissa had pulled Daniel’s head into her lap and was stroking his hair. As the screen door squeaked faintly on its hinges and Mandy emerged, Daniel lifted his head and sat up, finally turning to look at the others.

“Here, I brought you these,” Mandy said, stepping down the short flight of stairs and offering the jeans she’d fetched from the cabin.

Clarissa rose and took them, quietly thanking Mandy, who promptly headed back toward the porch. “Do you want the rest of us to go inside?” she asked, keeping her voice low as she approached Jack, who was watching Daniel with a stern expression.

“No. We had this fight in private last time. I want all of you to stay.”

Daniel had put on the jeans and risen. The hems fell an inch or two above his ankles, but at least Mandy was able to look at him and Clarissa together without feeling like a voyeur. Daniel faced Jack, a hint of defiance in his eyes as he pulled off the bandage, revealing a scar that extended about an inch past his hairline, forming a stark line across one corner of his forehead. Clarissa stood by his side, her shoulders squared as she held his other hand tightly with one of her own.

Jack descended the stairs and stood in the grass as the others watched from the porch. “You disobeyed two of my explicit orders, which were to not leave Half Moon territory and to return to me immediately if you found any sign of the outsider we’ve been searching for.”

Daniel raised his chin and looked like he wanted to cross his arms, though Clarissa’s grip on his hand prevented him from doing so. “If I’d come back for you, the outsider woulda been long gone by the time we made our way back. I never woulda caught him.”

“A damned lot of good that did you,” Jack said, his voice cold. “You’re lucky you’re not dead. And you’re lucky I came and dragged your ass back into Half Moon territory where you shoulda been the whole time.”

Daniel grimaced. “At least I took action. You’re such a control freak, as if all your rules make you a true alpha.”

Jack’s tone was calm – a little too calm for Daniel’s good, maybe. “I’m the alpha of this pack, whether you like it or not. If you’re unwilling to do anything besides cause problems for yourself and the rest of us, you can pack your bags and head back to Alaska.”

A flash of something strange passed through Daniel’s eyes before his expression hardened, and he said nothing.

“Yeah, I thought not,” Jack said. “Going back to Alaska ain’t an option, is it? You didn’t come back to Tennessee because you missed the scenery, and you sure as hell didn’t return for my sake – there’s somethin’ you’re not telling me. Somethin’ that happened in Alaska.”

Daniel maintained his silence as Clarissa paled beside him, the color draining from her normally light-caramel colored skin.

“I’m not gonna make you tell me what it was. Not now, anyway. You can take your sweet time, because you’re family, and family is always welcome in this pack, as long as they can follow the rules.”

For a moment, Daniel’s gaze flickered toward the ground, but when he looked up again he met Jack’s eyes, his gaze colder than ever. “Like it matters. How can you think you have any right to judge me as a subordinate when you’ve never had a taste of true responsibility? Sometimes I wonder if you’re even a shifter, let alone an alpha. You haven’t even marked your so-called mate.” He shifted his gaze suddenly to Mandy, and he narrowed his golden eyes as he zeroed in on the hand Mandy had placed on the porch railing. “What’s that, an engagement ring?” He snorted. “If I hadn’t seen her shift myself, I wouldn’t believe she’s anything but a human.”

Jack went from man to wolf in the blink of an eye, ruining his jeans in the process. Pieces of torn denim fluttered to the ground like blue confetti, raining around a huge, dark wolf. No sooner had Jack’s paws touched the ground than he leapt, throwing himself at Daniel.

By the time their bodies collided, they were both in their lupine forms. Mandy’s heart jumped into her throat, cutting off her cry of surprise as the two wolves tumbled to the ground in a blur of snapping jaws and guttural growls. Snarling abounded, and they attacked each other with all the viciousness of fighting dogs.

“Jack!” Mandy cried, her voice finally working. “Stop!” Her gut twisted with a sickening sort of horror as Jack and Daniel fought – she’d never seen a werewolf fight before. It was terrifying, like something out of a nature documentary, only one of the struggling animals was someone she loved, and the other was her packmate.

The two wolves stopped fighting just as suddenly as they’d started, freezing with one on top. They looked so similar that it took a few moments for Mandy to realize that Jack was the victor – or at least, that was what it looked like. He’d pinned Daniel to the ground and was leering down at him, a constant, menacing rumble emanating from the pit of his chest.

Daniel lay on his back, his golden eyes narrowed as if he hated every second of it. But as Jack kept him there, Daniel pinned back his ears – a gesture that was easily recognizable as submission, regardless of the fact that Mandy had never seen a fight like theirs before.

Jack stepped back, allowing Daniel room to rise.

Daniel leapt up quickly from the ground, met Jack’s gaze for a moment, and then lowered his eyes.

Mandy had been thrown so badly off-kilter by the fight that she hardly had any feelings of shock left to spare when the two wolves became two naked men – Jack first, and then Daniel. Both of them were covered in scratches and bruises, their bodies marked-up from head to toe.

“I won’t allow you to talk about my mate like that,” Jack said, his voice still half-growl. He looked ready to shift back and launch into combat again if Daniel spoke another word against Mandy.

Daniel must have recognized that fact, because he glowered silently for several moments. “All right, your choice of mate is none of my business, but how you act is. As alpha, you represent the rest of us; it’s not just you and your little family anymore. If you’re not gonna own up to your responsibilities, you don’t deserve them.” Daniel turned on his heel and started across the lawn, toward the road that was hidden by a screen of pines, apparently indifferent to the fact that he’d left every last stitch of his clothing behind on the ground, torn to shreds.

Clarissa, who hurried to his side, turned to look over her shoulder, her wide eyes brimming with moisture as she eyed the group while Daniel led her away. A tear streaked down her cheek, the trail it left shining in the moonlight. Then she turned, her hair swinging in a dark curtain as she disappeared with her mate, silently slipping beyond the tree line.

The porch’s floorboards creaked as Noah moved.

Jack held up a hand as Noah descended the steps. “Let him go, unless you wanna go with him.”

“What?” For a second, Noah looked as stricken as he had earlier that day, when Jack had berated him. “You know I don’t wanna stomp off in a rage with Daniel; I was only gonna try to talk some sense into him.”

“I reckon that blow to the head knocked out what little sense he had in the first place,” Jack said, still watching the place where Daniel and Clarissa had disappeared. “He’ll come back when he finds it again.”

Noah seemed less sure. “And what if he doesn’t?”

Jack turned back to the rest of the group. “Then he doesn’t.”

“We need the information Daniel has about his attacker. What if he doesn’t return, Jack?” Mandy eyed the tree line where Daniel had disappeared, a sense of unease prickling down her spine.

Jack sighed. “Daniel’s never liked admitting when he’s wrong. He may lick his wounds for a little while, but he’ll come around.”

“Do you want me to tell you what happened in Alaska?” Noah stood beside Jack, his shoulders rigid.

Jack shook his head. “Before you came back alone from the patrol, I started somethin’ I need to finish. Y’all can go home for the night. Just be careful – though I think you’ll be fine this far inside our territory. Whatever’s out there has been avoiding us on purpose.”

Jack turned to Ronnie. “Sorry you came out here for nothin’.”

As the others crossed the lawn, eventually disappearing behind the screen of pines to walk up the mountain road to their own cabin, Mandy’s heart beat a little faster. Her shoulder still felt hot where Jack’s teeth had dented it – where he’d come so close to marking her. His words about finishing what he’d started had her entire body tingling with anticipation, her flesh aching for the touch of his tongue and teeth.

“I’m gonna head home,” Ronnie said. “I’ve got the day off tomorrow; I’ll come by then to work on the extension.”

Jack thanked him, and Ronnie climbed into his truck and drove off into the night.

“Come here, sweetheart.” Jack extended his arm and held out one hand, beckoning her to descend the short flight of porch steps.

She went to him, her bare feet whisper-silent in the grass.

“You up for a walk?” he asked, taking one of her hands in his.

“Into the woods?”

He nodded. “Yeah. I want to do this outdoors so the moonlight will heal your wound quickly. Don’t worry; we won’t go far from the cabin, and you’ll be safe with me.”

She believed him. Mysterious wolves and dangerous predators seemed a million miles away when Jack pulled her against his side, wrapping an arm around her waist, settling his hand just below her belly. “Sure.”

Chapter 6

They walked about halfway to the stream, stopping at a place where a gap in the canopy allowed moonlight to spill onto the layer of fallen leaves that cushioned the forest floor. Jack slipped his hands beneath the hem of Mandy’s sweater, grasping fistfuls of material and pulling it gently up over her head. Now her shoulder was exposed, but Jack didn’t stop there. He removed her bra, pausing to cup the fullness of her breasts in his hands, and helped her slip out of the rest of her clothing. “So you don’t get blood on anything,” he said as he set her garments aside in a pile.

She nodded. She’d have to shift into her wolf form anyway in order to mark Jack, so there was no point in keeping her clothes on. Despite that logic and the fact that she was used to being nude around Jack, her skin prickled with nervous excitement beneath his gaze, her nipples hardening as he caressed one of her hips, his fingertips rough against her soft skin. Being totally bare with him felt … exciting. New, even. Not because he’d never seen her like this, but because her body was about to be irrevocably changed, and in a few moments’ time, he’d be looking at her as she’d appear for the rest of her life – marked, by the alpha. His. And vice-versa.

Jack kicked off his jeans, tossing them aside to reveal a body that Mandy had always thought of as perfect. Now, her eyes lingered on his right shoulder – there was one improvement that could be made. The thought of doing something as savage as sinking her fangs into his flesh made her nervous, but at the same time, her mouth watered with excitement at the thought. She liked the idea of marking him as her mate, more than she would’ve expected. The desire to receive and give the mark in turn seemed to be something like an instinct; as soon as the idea had been put into her head, she hadn’t been able to shake the urge.

Jack wrapped his arms around Mandy and pulled her against his naked body, holding her that way for a moment before urging her to sink down to the forest floor with him.

Like last time, she obliged, allowing him to support her as she descended, letting her knees fold beneath the rest of her body.

Jack swept her hair away from her right shoulder and pressed his lips against that side of her neck, kissing a slow trail all the way down to her shoulder. Her skin seemed to sizzle everywhere his lips touched, and his kisses sparked a slow burn inside her. When he cupped one of her breasts, her core tightened, and she couldn’t help but think again that the line between pleasure and pain was about to be blurred. At least, she hoped so – the anticipation of Jack’s bite was so arousing that it would be a shame if the pain killed the desire that was building up inside her, encouraging her to run a hand up Jack’s thigh and into his lap, where his cock was rock-hard.