Filed to story: The Alpha’s Pen Pal Book
She smiles and walks out of the conference room, but not before shooting me a glance and giving me a very obvious once-over.
Old me would have changed into my clothes and followed her in no time flat. But old me didn’t have a mate. And even though Taryn can’t feel our bond, it’s not right to be intimate with another female while we’re still mates. Plus, my wolf wouldn’t let me. Plus, this female is as fake as they come.
Maybe old me wouldn’t have noticed that, either. But I do now.
My dad and Felix change and leave quickly, but I take my time, laughing and talking with my friends. With Wesley finding his mate and becoming alpha and Nolan always busy with his gamma duties with Luna Haven, it seems moments like this when it’s the four of us are rare.
Nothing against Haven, of course. I adore her. She’s perfect for Wes, and our pack, and she’s like a sister to Nolan and me. She fits into our group dynamic like a puzzle piece that was lost and then found years later. But sometimes I miss when it was just us four guys.
“Where is Haven?” I ask.
“Rehearsal,” Nolan says, glancing at Wesley.
“Alone,” Wes adds, frowning.
“She’s fine,” Nolan says, his voice patient but his face telling me he’s repeated this phrase to Wesley more times than he can count. “And she’s not alone. Levi is there, and so is Maya. And Peter and Ramón.”
“I still don’t like it,” Wesley growls, grabbing his wallet from the conference room table. “I’m leaving. See you all later.”
I chuckle as he storms out of the room. “You’d think he’d have gotten used to it by now. It’s been three years since he marked her.”
“Imagine how much worse he’ll be when she’s pregnant,” Sebastian says.
“I thought they were waiting for a while?” I ask.
“They are. I’m just stating a fact.”
“Can’t blame the man, honestly,” Nolan says. “After everything that happened? Her ex attacking her with his lycan and Tiny Tim trying to claim her? It’s a wonder he’s comfortable when she’s off pack lands at all.”
“He wouldn’t stop her from dancing, though,” I say. “He knows how much she loves it, and he’ll do anything to keep her happy.”
“That’s what the mate bond does,” Seb says. “Turns us from scary beasts into domesticated dogs who will do anything to see our female smile.”
I don’t respond, but my wolf agrees with his statement. Love-struck fool. He’d do anything Taryn asked him to. He’d jump off a bridge or let her walk him around on a leash. He’d even let her put ribbons in his fur.
Not me, though. I’m not smitten like he is. I will not go out of my way to do things for her. Like spend hours in the library researching warrior laws and small wolves. Or invite her to the pack to do extra training with her so she can become a warrior in her pack. Or buy her extra cookies to take home with her because she loved the ones we shared at lunch.
Fuck.
The room spins and I can’t catch my breath. I need to get away, get outside and run like I was trying to do earlier.
“I’ll see you guys later,” I say, waving at Nolan and Seb over my shoulder and sprinting out of the conference room.
This is why I need to reject her. Why I shouldn’t be spending time with her at all. The bond is already working its magic on me, making me want her, making my wolf’s desires and instincts to be with his mate my own desires and instincts.
I have to figure out what’s going on. I need her to feel the bond, too. Once she does, once she feels it and knows I’m going to reject her, she won’t want to see me anymore, and I won’t have to worry about the mate bond’s hold on my heart and my wolf.
Two small hands grab my shirt and yank me into the cramped hallway leading to the laundry rooms and the basement. I don’t have time to react, caught off guard because of my spiraling thoughts and my pacing and whining wolf. I find myself with my back against the wall, the female from the tux shop—Caroline, I think—pressing her body to mine and rubbing her hands on my chest.
I flatten my hands on the wall, straining my neck as I tilt my face up and away from her while still keeping my eyes on her. The pungent scent of her perfume is so overpowering I don’t think a gas mask would protect me from it.
She peers at me through fluttering lashes and licks her lips, and I gag. The contrast between Taryn’s sweet scent and her sassy, adorable flirting to this she-demon’s putrid odor and dismal attempts to seduce me is glaring.
Her lips move, words coming out of them. But I hear nothing over the snarls of my wolf, the pounding of my heart, and the rush of blood in my ears.
The audacity. The fucking nerve of this bitch, to corner me and pin me against the wall when I didn’t display even a millimeter of interest in her. Her touch is sandpaper against my skin, yet another obvious difference between her and my mate.
Her hands slip under the hem of my t-shirt, and the snarls of my wolf in my head turn to audible growls of my own. The sound rattles the windows and shakes the lights in their fixtures. I spin us, pinning her with my hand around her throat, my rarely used beta aura pouring out of me and washing over her.
I narrow my eyes keep myself at arm’s length, my teeth clenched, my voice low and quiet but still a growl. “Don’t fucking touch me.”
She cowers, her eyes watering and her body trembling. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think you’d—“”Exactly,” I snap. “You didn’t think.”
“You seemed tense.”
“And you cornering me and pinning me to a wall is going to help with that how?”
She swallows and her eyes widen more, her lip quivering, but she doesn’t respond.
I inhale, even though I don’t want to breathe in her stench, but I need to identify her pack scent. She’s not one of ours, that much I know. The females in our pack know better than to approach me like that. They know I don’t touch pack females.
The undercurrent of amber hits my nose, and I breathe out, releasing her from my grip. Amber Forest, then. I will contact Alpha Benjamin about her. Goddess, I hope she hasn’t pulled this on him too.
“Get off our pack lands,” I growl. Her hands fly to her throat, rubbing it where I gripped her. “And if I see you making unsolicited advances on anyone the next time you’re here, it won’t be just my fingers digging into your neck. It will be my claws, too.”
She whimpers and scurries away from me and down the hall, past a bewildered Sebastian. Our eyes meet and he raises a brow at me before turning his head to watch her hurried steps out the back door.
“She cornered me,” I say, crossing my arms.
“I saw,” he says, looking at me with his hands in his pockets, his gaze expectant.
I stay quiet as we look at each other. I have nothing to say to him, no excuse to cover up my uncharacteristic behavior. My fingers pinch the bridge of my nose and I shake my head, walking away from him and towards the back door.
New Book: Veiled Desires of the Alpha King Novel
Dayson was the alpha of the largest pack in North America. Powerful figures from other packs sought to offer gorgeous girls as potential mates for Dayson. He steadfastly rejected these advances, he was not a pawn to be manipulated. But eventually there came a mysterious girl he could hardly say No. Who was she?