Filed to story: Mated to the Alpha and His Beta Novel Free >>???
I could sense the two of them were still not at peace when they arrived. Xander and his brother were no longer furious with each other, but there was a cool distance between them that flared to an even deeper iciness when Mason strode straight to me and took me by the hand. He shook it while he used the other to grip my shoulder.
I sent some calming sensations toward Xander, who looked totally affronted that his brother had reached me first. Mason, if he noticed, didn’t care. I sighed at their rivalry.
“First off, I’m apologizing to you,” Mason said firmly. I don’t blame you for being pis sed off. We were both heinous as sholes to you upstairs.”
“Hey,” Xander broke in with a scowl directed at his brother. To me, he gave a grim nod before saying to Mason, “Speak for yourself.”
Mason pulled me into a half-hug before letting me go and stepping back. He made a sweeping gestu Xander. “Fine. I speak for myself. I’m sorry I was a giant di ck to you, and I’m sorry my brother can’t take ownership of his actions.”
This wasn’t going like I’d hoped it would. I was ready to jump between them, but Xander laughed and shook his head. He feinted a punch at Mason and then turned to me. “He’s right. He was a giant di ck. But so was I. We shouldn’t have treated you that way when you were just trying to do your job.”
“Now both of you are trying to do my job for me,” I complained, but without real heat.
Aresidual tension still coiled in each of my Alphas, but I could hardly be surprised, considering their personalities. It wasn’t likely they’d never argue again, unless one of them wasn’t around any more. As far as I was concerned, as long as they were willing to try to get along, that was good enough for me.
“Ahh, there it is.” Xander closed his eyes with a grin and tipped his face to the ceiling. “Gimme that sweet, sweet, Beta energy.
Ahbh….”
“You’re being a di ck again.” I punched his arm but also pulsed out some more of my individual glow.
Our wolves greeted each other with snuffling yips. After a moment, Mason’s joined. I relaxed into the “I came down here to let my wolf run free, but I decided it would be more fun if I wasn’t alone,” I said to them both. “I found a great set of corridors off the training field that we can use. Kind of like a race track and an obstacle course combined. You in?”
Mason grinned. “Hells yeah. My wolf’s been dying to get some freedom.”
“I’d love to be in the forest,” Xander said, “but if this is what we can get, yeah. I’ll take it.”
His wolf flashed in his gaze. I started pulling off my shirt, and Xander stopped me with a hand on my arm.
He waited for me to look him in the eye.
“I’m really sorry,” he said seriously. “It shouldn’t take someone else to get me to say it. You are an amazing Beta.”
When he pulled me into an embrace, I let my arms link around his neck. I couldn’t tell him how afraid I’d been, running out of that room. How terrified that everything we’d built over all the years was crumbling. That I was failing him.
“Never,” Xander whispered in my ear.
I hadn’t said a word, not even though the mind link. I hadn’t had to. He just knew and understood.
When he pulled away, his wolf was rising and rippling across his features. Xander stripped down, racing Mason. When all three of us were naked, our wolves made their appearance.
Together, we howled at the ceiling, since there was no moon. Then we took off, tearing up the earth of the training field, heading for the track where we’d be able to run, and run, and run..
Lanie–
Panic instantly set in, and I shouted Stella’s name. My eyes swept the empty hallway. My stomach was a hot ball of fear.
That’s when I heard the familiar set of three giggles, I was so relieved I could hardly even be angry with them as three small faces peeked out of an open doorway. I swept them into a hug. They’d been hiding just inside what looked like a storage closet.
“That wasn’t funny,” I scolded. “You scared me. Please don’t do that again.”
Isaac, my sensitive boy, looked as though he might cry. Alaina also looked chastened. Stella, on the other hand, frowned and looked surprised.
“I thought you liked Hide and Seek, Mother! It was one of your favorite childhood games, wasn’t it?”
I paused as I studied her. “I guess it might have been. My sister and I played it ”
With all the rush and up and down of my emotions, I should’ve been used to going from fear to sadness and back again. Even so, my throat clenched at the memory of me and Selena running and playing. Such happier times, long before I’d ever imagined what awaited me.
I hadn’t spoken to her in so long. How could I have let so much time pass without reaching out to let her and my mother know I was all right? Yes, I had to keep my distance to secure their safety, but there had to be some way to reassure them, and to find out if they were okay.
“Mother?”
I shook away the thoughts and looked into Stella’s concerned eyes. “I do like that game, sweetie, but it not fun to play a game if you don’t know you’re playing it. Does that make sense?”
Stella’s eyes welled with tears. “I’m sorry, Mother!”
“Shh. It’s all right. Tell you what. Let’s head back home and I’ll order some ice cream for a snack. And after we’re all done, we can play Hide and Seek. Okay?” I cupped my darling girl’s face in my hands. I didn’t want her bursting into tears, which would send the twins into a crying fit along with her. Goddess knew, I’d probably end up sobbing, too.
This time, all three of them held tightly to mine or each other’s hands, and nobody ran off. Our quarters were still empty when we all got back, and I did my best not to show my disappointment. I didn’t want the children to sense something was wrong, but although Alaina and Isaac happily started playing with a set of plastic bricks, building a castle, Stella was very quiet. I could tell she sensed something.
“I’ll order the ice cream,” I told them and went to the house phone to place the order. I might not have a fridge of my own, but I could still treat my darlings to ice cream in the comfort of our own space. I was determined more than ever to make sure that these quarters, which might not be our forever home, would still feel like home for as long as we stayed here I did enjoy the convenience of being able to call down to the kitchen and have three small cartons of sweet treats arrive within a few minutes. Chocolate, strawberry, and vanilla, the favorites of each of my three pups. Stella, however, shook her head when I told her the snack would be here soon.
“I’m not hungry, Mother. May I please be allowed to go read in my room? Miss Janice says if I’m to get better at reading, I should practice on my own.”
I hesitated. We didn’t have any children’s books that knew of. “What will you read?”
Stella pointed at the big bookcase on the other side of the room. “One of those.”
Of course I checked first to make sure that the book was appropriate, and she seemed happy with the choice of an encyclopedia of supernaturals. It looked boring to me, but Stella ran off with it like it was a prize.
“Mumma,” Isaac said a few minutes later from around a gigantic spoonful of chocolate ice cream. “Why is Stellie difftent?
I paused scooping some strawberry ice cream into Alaina’s bowl. “What?”
“She’s not like us.” Alaina supported her twin as she eyed the treat impatiently. “Mumma, please give the ice cream?”
“Sorry,” I murmured and finished filling her bowl. I sat down across from them. “What do you mean, Izzy.
Why is Stella different?”
I kept my voice pitched low, aware that even though Stella seemed to be reading happily in the other room, she could still overhear. My heart had started beating a little faster, Isaac licked his spoon and dug back in for another bite. “Bigger.”
“Well, you and Allie aren’t smaller than she is anymore.”
Alaina shook her head, a frown on her ice cream smeared lips. “Her with the bigger kids.”
“Do you mean the reading group?”
“All the bigger kids,” Isaac said.
Alaina nodded. “Stellie’s got the magic.”
Stunned, I wasn’t sure I’d heard her right. “What?”
“Magic, Mumma,” Alaina repeated. “You know. Magic!”
any Lanie–
I kept my voice steady. “What do you mean, my love? What magic?”
Wolves didn’t have magic. Vampires didn’t, either. Not like Witches or even Fae. But my dear Stella wasn’t of those. She was, as her siblings had pointed out, different.
Alaina shrugged and helped herself to a spoonful of her brother’s chocolate ice cream. “Her make the teachers say funny stuff.”
“She,” I corrected absently. “She makes the teachers say funny stuff?”
“She makes,” Alaina repeated.
“Like what? Jokes?”
Isaac laughed, his little face tipping upward. “No, Mumma! Silly.”
“Her…she,” Alaina said, “thinks at them.”
Her brother picked up the explanation. “Her thinks make them do it.”
“She thinks for them to say silly stuff, and then they do it. That’s kind of like a joke,” Alaina says, her little face scrunched up in thought. “Is that a joke, Izzy?”
“No, Allie, a joke is ‘knock-knock, who’s there,” her brother said with absolute confidence.
I loved them so much it almost hurt. I checked to see if Stella was still in her room. The door remained shut.
“Can you give me an example?” I asked the twins.
“What’s a zample?” Alaina asked with a frown.
Again, her brother had an answer. “It’s that red fruit from a tree, duh.”
“That’s an apple,” I told him and caught Alaina’s hand before she could use it to smack him. “No hittin I had to cover my mouth against a laugh, not wanting them to think I was making fun of them. They wer both so adorable I wanted to squeeze them, but at the same time, I really needed them to tell me what they meant.
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?