by M. L. Briers
“Like?”
“To stop your rabid wolves for one…”
“Slight of hand for two,” Maxi tossed in, and Bree glared at her. “What? A lot of good it did me with the whole stopping the sniffing thing.”
“But my pack will be fine?”
“Hopefully,” Bree muttered to herself.
“And you couldn’t have just told me this right at the beginning?” Mason grumbled.
“Good things come to those that wait — learn a little patience,” Bree snapped back.
“Maybe somebody should tell that to the beta,” the vampire said.
Jon groaned inwardly. It was like he was never going to hear the end of this. He still had a witch for a mate — and he still needed to woo her.
~
“You’re coming home with me,” Jon bit out and Maxi rolled her eyes to the ceiling and then over to Bree. She questioned her friend with a glare.
Bree grimaced. “He is your mate.” She gave a helpless little shrug as Maxi groaned.
“And you’re coming to,” Mason informed her. Bree turned toward him and questioned his sanity with a hard stare. “I want to know where to find you in case this spell doesn’t wear off.”
“I’ll be right here…”
“Not good enough,” Mason growled. “I don’t trust you as far as I can throw you…”
“Throw a lot of women, do you?”
“What do you take me for?” Mason growled. His beast appreciated her words about as much as he did.
“Do you really want me to answer that?” Bree tossed back. The alpha offered her a low, deep warning growl of annoyance and she sneered back at him.
Bree knew that this was all her fault. The alpha — the beta being Maxi’s mate — and the guilt pinged around her brain like a rampant ping-pong ball that just wouldn’t be quashed.
In the grand scheme of things; she supposed that having a mate wasn’t the end of the world. After all, fate had taken it upon itself to put the beta and Maxi together in the first place. They were an ideal match — allegedly. How could that be wrong?
She also supposed that she was being selfish in not wanting Maxi to go off and leave her, they had been best friends for a very long time, and Maxi was like the sister she’d never had. But, she wanted her friend to be happy — and fate said that Maxi would be happy with the wolf shifter.
Bree wanted to be happy for Maxi, and in a roundabout way, she’d brought the mates together — double guilt. She admonished herself for those feelings – she was a witch, not religious, guilt shouldn’t have been a problem for her, but there it was tapping away at her like a Woodpecker in her brain.
Maxi had it being restless lately as if magic and normal life wasn’t enough to fulfill her. Maybe she’d inadvertently made a wish that had come true – but, who would wish for a wolf shifter?
Still, what was done couldn’t be undone, so good for Maxi — bad for Bree.
That was life as Bree saw it.
Maybe it was time to put her matchmaking skills into action and help Maxi accept her mate. The only trouble was; she didn’t have any matchmaking skills — but, she guessed that she could learn on the fly.
“Fine,” Bree bit out. “I’ll come with you — but only because you’re forcing me to,” she lied.
CHAPTER TWELVE
~
“Oh no, not again!” Bree bit out as she stared out of the back window of the truck as the pack’s wolves came out of the shadows of the night and took off on fast paws to chase after them.
Maxi leaned in towards her friend and sniffed. When Bree turned a death glare on her, Maxi offered her a wicked smile in return. “I guess the one thing about having a mate is that I’m not sniff bait,” Maxi chuckled.
“But, they don’t know that,” Bree offered back, and that gave her pause for thought.
“Sure they do. I used the mental link between the pack to warn them off…” Jon tossed over his shoulder from the driver’s seat.
“Well, couldn’t you warn them off me?” Bree asked.
“No.” Jon and Maxi said together.
“Well, look at that – already finishing each others’ sentences, how cute,” Bree said in a teasing voice that got her a pointy elbow in the ribs from her friend.
“I could put you outside and let you walk the rest of the way,” Jon offered back to her, and she scowled at the back of his head.
“I don’t need the exercise,” Bree bit out. She was only doing her matchmaking duties as she saw fit, she didn’t think that he had to be so rude about it.
“Don’t even think about it,” Maxi hissed.
“What?” Bree turned her attention to her friend.
“You have an evil look in your eyes; you’re up to something.”
“I am no such thing…” Bree lied.
“Yes, you are, and I’m warning you – you’ve caused enough trouble for one night, Bree.” Maxi scowled right back at her as Bree’s mind ticked over on how she would get her friend mated to the beta wolf shifter by morning light.
Bree shrugged and tried for an innocent look. “You have a suspicious mind, Maxine,” Bree offered back.
“I know you too well, Bree!”
That was true. Talk about finishing each others’ sentences for them – they didn’t need to do it because spoken or unspoken, they knew what each other was thinking.
But, Bree knew one thing – Maxi had no idea what she was thinking this time.
~
“Well, they’d better not come around sniffing me,” Martha bit out as Jai drove up the drive following the beta and witches in Mason’s truck.
The alpha had gone off on his own to collect the witches’ car, and he’d been lucky enough to have been given the job of driving Martha back to pack land so that she could get her car. She hadn’t stopped grumbling the whole way.
“No offense, but I think you might be a little past your sell-by date for their liking,” Jai informed her, and she chuckled.
“What – I can’t get me a nice young toy-boy, stud-muffin with muscles up the wazooie and the stamina of a Gladiator?” There was a wicked glint in her eye at the thought, and Jai thought that on some level the elder might just have liked that idea.
“You could – but, I fear you’d fall asleep on him,” Jai offered back to a hoot of a cackle from her.
“Nice thought though,” Martha grinned. “Spoilsport.”
“Maybe we’ll meet up in your next life,” he grinned.
“I said muscles not bloodlust, Vampie,” Martha bit out.
“I feel so unloved,” he offered back, laying it on thick and getting another snort of laughter from her.
“Note to self – don’t feel sorry for the bloodsucking leech,” Martha muttered.
~
Bree was out of the pickup truck and running at full speed for the front door of the house before Jon had even put the gearstick into park. Maxi sat in the backseat with her nose and palms practically pressed against the window watching her friend hightailing it to the house at breakneck speed, and with an air of disbelief and a low whistle on her lips.
“Look at Bree go,” she giggled. “The only time I’ve seen her run that fast was when we got to the all-you-could-eat buffet, and she spotted the dessert section.”
Jon couldn’t help but chuckle. He flicked a look in Bree’s direction and watched her toss open the front door with her magic before she’d even made it up the front stairs.
“Boy, if I’d known she was this skittish around wolves, I would have paid to have one chase her out of the bathroom in the mornings.” Maxi grinned at the sight of Bree tripping up the last stair and entering the house headfirst as if she was after the winner's tape in a race.
The front door slammed shut behind her and Maxi sat back and blew a breath upward. “She sure can run when she’s got a pack of wolves on her tail.” She met his eyes in the rearview mirror, and they were smiling back at her.
Maxi got lost in his gaze. Then she mentally slapp
ed herself around the back of the head and cleared her throat. “Any-woo-hoo!” she said, reaching for the door.
“Not so fast!” Jon twisted in his seat to look at her.
Her scent was all around him in the small confines of the cab, even more so now that Bree was gone, and that scent made his wolf a little crazy, and his libido hit new heights. It was insane, but he wanted her more than he wanted the blood in his veins – and he didn’t even know anything about her.
Talk about your arranged marriage – signed, sealed and delivered to his doorstep by fate – this was one union that was sure to last – as long as she didn’t kill him anytime soon.
“Problem?” Maxi asked, her hand hovered over the door handle.
“Just to be on the safe side with my pack, I’ll come open the door and walk you in,” Jon lied.
There wasn’t one wolf outside those doors that would dare to even try and sniff a mate. She might not have been claimed, mated, or bonded to him yet, but she was his – body, mind and soul, and he belonged to her the same way.
No shifter would dare to mess with another man’s mate.
“Okies,” Maxi shrugged.
She sat still and watched the man climb out of the truck. She didn’t know why, but she had the feeling that he was lying.
Still, the view out the window was good, and it held her attention – him – big, musclebound, sexy-as-hell, him. Hers if she wanted him – all hers, and she couldn’t help but lose herself in that thought.
She also wondered what he looked like naked. Was that wrong? She didn’t think so.
While she didn’t believe in objectifying anyone – he was a different kettle of … wolf. He was already hers, and the man was a throwback to caveman times, she reasoned – different times, different attitudes to life, so a little daydreaming on what those big muscles looked like naked wasn’t too bad – was it?
Maxi thought it wouldn’t be bad at all, but very, very good.
Jon looked in at his mate sitting there staring out at him, and he didn’t know if he was wishful-seeing things, but she looked hungry, and not for food. She had the kind of wicked smile on her lips that she said was picturing him naked – and that was okay with him.
Hell, he’d undress for her there and then if she wanted him to. Nudity was part of pack life, and a bashful shifter wasn’t an everyday occurrence. He growled inwardly, and his beast rallied within him – then he growled outwardly, and she snapped to attention, and that look on her face was banished.
He could have headbutted the roof of the truck if he’d thought she wouldn’t have run a mile from him in the opposite direction.
‘Idiot,’ he bit out, unthinking in his action as he put that out into the pack link.
‘She doesn’t look that bad,’ Joel said, careful to eye the witch from a safe enough distance that the beta didn’t take it the wrong way and try to rip his head off.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
~
‘Not her – me,’ Jon growled back, berating himself for both slipups.
‘Okay, that I can agree with…’
‘Me too…’
‘You got my vote…’
‘That’s enough,’ he grumbled at the ribbing his pack was offering him. ‘Say, who wants to get off patrol for two days in a couple of weeks?’
‘Me…’ There was a chorus of takers.
‘Fine, play along and pretend to sniff at her – you’ll need her scent now that she’s going to be pack anyway, but if one of the goons gets too close – my wolf won’t be forgiving.’ Jon warned them.
‘You want us to be the big bad wolf to your knight in shimmering armor?’
‘It’s shining…’
‘That too,’ Toby chuckled.
‘You’re sneaky and duplicitous, no wonder fate paired you with a witch,’ Joel chuckled.
‘You swallow a dictionary, Joel?’ Zane chuckled.
‘You’ll swallow my fist,’ Joel bit back.
‘Can we concentrate on my problems?’ Jon growled at the closest wolf, making sure that his mate heard him loud and clear.
“Problem?” Maxi asked. She noted that the wolves looked a little edgy, and were cautiously padding closer.
“They’re just a little more determined than they should be – must be the magic. You’ll have to stay close just in case one of them steps out of line,” he lied.
‘Geez, why don’t you just go the whole hog and call us mutts,’ Zane grumbled on the rumble of a growl
“Should I zap them?” she asked, eyeing a big grey that was edging closer.
‘She’d better not, or my fangs are going in your damn backside,’ Joel growled.
“No-no,” Jon rushed out as he popped the door open and reached in for her. “Just don’t make any sudden movements.
“That one looks … shifty.” She pointed at the grey and Joel growled again.
‘So help me, Jon, if your witch zaps me…’
“Him?” Jon shook his head. “He’s toothless.” He assured her, and Maxi snapped her attention back to the wolf in question.
“Looks like he’s got a full set of fangs to me,” she said with a scowl for the beast.
“Harmless, like a playful pup,” Jon said and got another growl from Joel as he reached in and scooped her from the seat and into his arms.
“Hey!” She protested, but not too much. If anything, being swept off her feet by the big bad wolf was kind of as sexy-as-hell.
“Just to be on the safe side,” he whispered back, but she certainly smelled a rat and not one that the wolves had been hunting. This rat was hiding in plain sight, and the amusement in the beta’s eyes and the small smirk that touched his lips told her he was the big, bad – rat.
Maxi could have called him on it, but instead, she wrapped her arms loosely around his broad shoulders and let him carry her away.
After all, she thought it was kind of sweet that he’d gone to all the trouble to scare her.
~
“Well, would you look at that,” Martha said as she allowed the vampire to open the door for her, even if she did snort a refusal at his outstretched hand to help her from her seat. Big mistake – his sports car had a grip on her that didn’t want to let go. “She’s letting the big bad wolf play Sir Galahad.”
Martha finally wrestled her way to her feet, and all the wolves turned in her direction.
“Looks like somebody is about to be popular,” the vampire couldn’t help but snigger.
“One of you boys so much as sniffs the air within ten feet of me, and I’ll neuter you,” Martha announced as she drew on her magic and eyed the beasts with contempt. “I’m a cat person.”
“A wolf has got to do what a Wolf has got to do…”
“Okay, let me put it this way — roses are red, violets are blue, if they sniff me then I’ll kill you.” Martha offered him a sickly sweet smile, and Jai took a moment to ponder that thought.
Then he turned toward the wolves that were slowly padding in their direction, probably more out of interest to see what the witch would do to him than the intention of finding out if she was a mate, either way — he was screwed. Perhaps playing toss the wolf earlier hadn’t been the best idea.
He was sure those beasts were grinning.
“Martha, steel yourself, I’m about to play Sir Galahad.”
~
“Go away — go away — you can’t come in!” Bree called from behind the front door as Jon balanced the witch in his arms and tested the handle. It didn’t move.
Bree had her back to the door and was defending it as if her very life was on the line. She wasn’t about to let any mingy mutt sniff her.
While she’d come to terms with the fact that Maxi was a mate — she was happy for her — there was no way in hell that she was going to suffer that same fate.
When the handle stopped rattling; Bree relaxed a little, maybe a little too much as she sagged against the door. A moment later and she was being propelled across the hallway to land spread-eagle o
n the floor. The door had been forced open by magic — and she knew whose magic that was.
“Oh, do get up, Bree. You’re making the place look untidy,” Maxi sniggered as her mate carried her into the hallway and reluctantly put her down on her feet.
Bree turned a scathing look back at Maxi as she blew her hair out of her eyes and groaned. Then she noted that the door was still wide open, she scrambled to her feet and rushed at it to slam it shut before a wolf crossed the threshold.
She pulled up short as the vampire appeared with Martha in his arms and she cocked her head to one side and eyed the man with an air of amusement. “What’s wrong with this picture?”
“You're prejudiced against older people,” Martha tossed back.
Bree stepped aside to let them in; then she reached for the door — just as a large, majestic looking beast raced up the stairs toward her.
“Yikes!” Bree slammed the door just in time to hear the thud from the wolf on the other side.
“Chivalry is alive and well,” Martha said as the vampire placed her down on her feet.
“If the only place to find chivalry these days is a vampire — we’re all doomed,” Bree said as she turned from the door, just as it was being opened once more. “No, you don’t!” She used her magic to slam it shut once more.
From the other side of the door, she heard a manly groan of pain. “Lord, help me not kill that witch!” Mason bit out, and Bree grimaced.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
~
“I think it might be more helpful if you stopped trying to kill the alpha,” Jai announced with a devilish grin that annoyed Bree.
“How was I supposed to know?” Bree said as she rushed to her own defense because nobody else would.
“Maybe you should have asked?” Jon tossed back, but the amusement was there to see in his eyes.