You lied to Malcolm to get him to come here, I scream through my thoughts, bribing him with riches that don’t exist. You tried to kill me.
She nods slowly, sickly. All for the sake of the pack. You must know how this would’ve benefited them in the end.
For a split second, I entertain her statements. No one can say she wasn’t going all-out to save the estate for the sake of the pack, and in the back of my mind, maybe I wish I had that kind of loyalty to them…but not this far, not this way. It’s like saying people who kill bad people are simply doing what’s right for society by wiping evil off the earth. No, killing is still killing, no matter how the insane mind tries to warp it.
In the end, my father always wanted me to be happy. He wanted packmates to be able to choose their own mates, in their own time. As my heart beats strong and true, I know this is what he would’ve wanted. He wouldn’t have wished for me to marry Malcolm to save the estate. He would’ve wanted me to marry for love, to set an example to the rest of the pack.
She seethes, flaring her nostrils and showing her fangs. In response, the guard holding on to her by the neck tightens his bite.
What should we do with her? one of the guards asks from behind them.
Silence stretches until I realize they’re all looking to me for the answer. Feeling suddenly strange in my own skin, I lower my gaze to the floor. As the last few moments replay through my head—the fight and accusations, the threats and the way the guard is holding my stepmother prisoner now—realization cracks through me like a whip.
I didn’t need an official declaration in front of the pack. I challenged the reigning Alpha and emerged victorious from the fight.
With my mother’s royal blood surging through my veins, I’m able to rule.
They’re waiting for your command, Hunter says, his voice like a caress through my mind, Alpha.
His final words hit hard, like a gong in my chest, and I know that everything is going to be okay. Better than okay. It’s going to be perfect.
Chapter Seven
Snow
Leaning over my bathroom sink, I let the cool water fill my palms before I splash it on my face. When I glance up into the mirror, Hunter is watching my reflection, a smirk curling his gorgeous lips.
“You’re not going to talk into that thing again, are you?” he asks, coughing to cover up a laugh.
A blush heats my cheeks. “You heard me before?”
“Kind of hard not to.”
“Well,” I say, drying my face and tossing the towel. “What do you think I should wish for this time?”
“How about a happily-ever-after that involves crazy-hot, rock-your-world sex with a stud named Hunter?”
If I hadn’t experienced the last few days firsthand, I might’ve thought they were a dream. Never in my wildest ones would I have imagined my stepmother would cross the line the way she did. That I’d become Alpha this way, in a fight rather than a simple, orderly announcement. That I would’ve turned down Malcolm Taylor for Hunter, my best friend in the world. But we’re so much more than that now.
“Sounds like heaven,” I answer, but before I can turn to face him, his arms are around my waist and he’s drawing me against his chest.
“Snow, don’t get me wrong,” he says, staring into my eyes through the reflection, “I’m never letting you go, but—”
“But what?” Keeping my back against him, I crane around and plant a kiss on his cheek. “You better not be getting cold feet about bonding with me.”
“No, never.” He nuzzles my neck, sending chills scattering up my spine. “I just wonder if you’re ever going to regret choosing me and splitting up the pack. I hate to think I’m the reason you’re losing your home.”
“Listen…” I spin in his arms and cup his square jaw in my hands. “At the end of the day, I can honestly say that even though I failed, I did everything short of selling my soul to save this place. Who knows? Maybe one of your lodges will make a suitable place for future festivities. All I know is they’ll be fine. As for me, I couldn’t be happier because you’re my home now, Hunter.”
“And you’re mine, love.” He pierces me with the adoration glimmering in his sapphire eyes. “Before we complete our bond, there’s something I have to give you.”
I frown, confused, as I follow him into my bedroom. The room is dim, lit by soft auras of candlelight, and warmth spreads from the crackling hearth. Digging into his duffel bag, Hunter pulls out a small wooden box.
My eyes go wide at the sight—at the promise—of what’s to come. There’s only one thing that comes in a box like that. I feel foolish for hoping, but he winks at me, and now my chest is tight, and the air won’t come.
“Hunter…”
“It’s not from me, not really.”
My heart does a flip-flop. “What do you mean?”
“It’s from your father.” He holds the box clutched tightly in his hand as he strokes the back with his thumb. “Before he died, he gave this to me, and asked me to give it to you today, your birthday, after you become Alpha.”
“Why would he give this to you?” I whisper, staring at the box. “Why not my stepmother?”
“After what we witnessed earlier, it’s clear she can’t be trusted.” He shrugs his big, strong shoulders. “Maybe deep down he knew it all along.”
“I don’t know what to say.” I’m hollow, aching, wanting desperately to know what my father would’ve wanted me to have and so touched by the fact that Hunter was the one who’d been keeping it safe for me all these years. Even back then, my father knew he could trust Hunter. And now, I can trust him with my heart. “What is it?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never opened it.”
Slowly, with trembling hands, I unhinge the box and expose a diamond. It’s not a ring, but a giant, uncut stone. The biggest I’ve ever seen.
“Wow, it’s gorgeous,” I breathe, clutching my chest. “Wait, what is that?”
A tiny slip of paper inside the box catches my eye. It looks like a tag, or a scrap of cardboard torn from the bottom of the box. But it’s not the actual paper that has my eyes narrowing to see more clearly. It’s the ink bleeding through it—the familiar loop of an “S,” inscribed the way my father used to scrawl the first letter of my name.
“What?” He lifts up the box to peer at it from underneath.
“There’s something inside.”
Taking the box from Hunter, I lift the satin pillow that cushioned the diamond and hand it to him. And then, pinching the corner of the paper, I remove it and unfold carefully. The writing is small and neat, as if each letter had been composed with careful consideration. As I unfold the final flap, the air catches in my throat.
“Snow,” I read aloud, my voice strained by tears, “you are so much like your mother and rule from your heart. Don’t ever stop. When you find your mate, use this to build a bright future with him. Love, your father.”
I look up into Hunter’s eyes, but his attention is honed in on the scrap of paper clutched in my trembling hand.
“Look on the back.” Taking my hand in his, he turns it around so I can see what’s written on the flipside. “Does that look like a map to you?”
“It does, actually. It’s—the path leading to your cabin.” I know it well. Squinting, I struggle to make out the shapes. “And another path that leads to the—is that the hot spring?”
“Where we made love.”
I nod, agreeing. “But why would he want me to know where to find the spring?”
And then I see it. On the corner. A cluster of three diamonds covered by what looks like a stick-figure shed. Two lines for walls. Two slanted over the top to make a roof.
A mine.
“Snow,” Hunter says, drawing out his words, “is there the smallest possibility that your father didn’t trust your stepmother with the location of the diamond mines?”
I nod quickly because I can’t talk, can’t make sense of what this could mean.
“He wanted y
ou to have everything—just you.” He wraps me up in his arms and swings me around, my feet flying out behind me. “This is your inheritance, Snow. He left you a way to save the estate.”
I don’t dare hope what he’s saying is true, but as I brush my fingers over the uncut diamond, I know it is. I feel it deep down inside me.
As I meet Hunter’s eyes and kiss him square on the mouth, a flutter of happiness flares through me. “I can save our home, and the pack, and”—a deep, relieved sigh escapes me—“everything is going to work out. But wait…”
Hunter was on board with my plan to move three weeks out of the year, using one of his lodges as a safe haven during the full moon, but now that I’m able to save the estate, I want—
“Shh,” he says, gently grabbing my head and tangling his fingers in my hair. “I can hear your thoughts whirling in there. I want to be here, with you, for the rest of my life. I’ll have to take care of this lodge in Iceland because I can’t leave the developers hanging, but after that, it’s you and me. I’ve been all over this world, searching for all kinds of adventures, but my greatest is you, Snow. It’s your love, and I don’t ever want to lose that.”
As I melt inside, he lifts me up, cradling me in his strong arms as he marches to the bed and tosses me onto a giant mound of pillows. I squeal in sheer bliss and before I forget, set the paper on the nightstand beside the bed.
Hunter kicks off his pants and peels his shirt from his chiseled body, and then crawls over the bed. He eyes me hungrily, and his muscles flex and strain as he creeps closer, the heat from his body radiating through the space between us. Squirming in anticipation, I strip off my dress and toss it to the floor and wait with bated breath for his body to cover mine.
How is it possible that Hunter wants to bond with me? The playboy of the pack wants me. Forever. I can hardly believe it.
Breath hitching in my throat, I settle back on the pillows as he slinks up my body, kissing my calves, inner thighs, and—oh God—the juncture between my legs.
“Hunter,” I say, and then suck in a breath that sounds like a hiss. “I can’t believe you’re mine.”
He rears up, presses his hips against mine, sheathing himself inside me in one long, slow, glorious stroke. “All ten inches, baby.”
God, yes.
And then he smiles, lighting me up as he thrusts in and out, in a rhythm that drives me wild. Moving beneath him, I plant my feet to arch my hips up. He groans, the pads of his fingers grazing my thigh before grabbing my rear.
“I love you, Hunter.” Running my hands up and down his back, I press him down over me so I can take in everything. The heady, masculine scent of him. The thick length of his cock as he drives deep inside me. “Forever.”
“I love you, too.” He draws back slightly, his gaze sliding over my features in wonder. Ghosting his hands over my hair, he studies my eyes, my nose, my mouth, as if I’m the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen in his life. “I always have. But I denied it for so long and wasted so much time because I didn’t think there was any way I deserved someone as good as you.”
“You deserve everything and more,” I say on a moan as he swells inside me. “All I have to give is yours. Take it—take me.”
He captures my mouth on a primal growl that calls to something deep within me, and when he slips his tongue past my lips, I lose myself completely. Every move is heightened, his every thrust bringing me closer to the violent crest of ecstasy. With each pound of his hips against mine, each languid swirl of his tongue against my cheek, my body comes alive. Blood roars through my ears as he braces his weight on one hand and reaches between our bodies with the other. And then, as my clit throbs, aching for his touch, he swipes his fingers through my heat. I buck at the contact, the climax exploding through me like a firework.
“Snow…” He goes rigid over me, his muscles tensing. “You’re gorgeous and, fuck, you’re…”
With a roar of possession and gripping need, fangs drop from his gums. He smudges a wet kiss across my neck. His cock thrusts slowly through my heat, unwinding me, distracting me. For an instant, pain flickers through me where his fangs sink in. But then it’s gone, and I’m fevered with the thought of being branded—marked—by this magnificent male.
“You’re…” He rises up on his hands and sheaths himself deep in my heat, all the way to the hilt. “…mine.”
Pleasure spears through me as his cock pulses, filling me with his release. Gripping his shoulders, I draw him down over me, skin to skin, heart to heart. When the orgasm wanes, and his rhythm slows to a halt, he rolls beside me, pulling me into the nook between his arm and his chest. I melt against him with a sigh, relishing the warmth and safety provided by his embrace.
“In your wildest dreams,” he says, breathing heavy into my hair as he strokes his hands across my back, “did you ever think we’d wind up together this way?’
“Maybe,” I whisper, lifting my eyes to his, “once upon a time.”
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Acknowledgments
Thanks, as always, to Candy Havens, Curtis Svehlak, and the rest of the Entangled team for being story saviors.
To Aggie Smith, Jennie Marts, Laurie Shaw, Lora Walker, and my steadfast family support group, I owe you everything I have and more. The words wouldn’t flow without you.
To Justin, Kelli, and Gavin, my precious three, I’ll always love you most.
About the Author
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Kristin Miller writes sweet and sassy contemporary romance, romantic suspense, and steamy paranormal romance of all varieties. Kristin has degrees in psychology, English, and education, and taught high school and middle school English before crossing over to a career in writing. She lives in Northern California with her alpha male husband and their two children. You can usually find her in the corner of a coffee shop, laptop in front of her and mocha in hand, using the guests around her as fuel for her next book.
www.facebook.com/AuthorKristinMiller
www.twitter.com/kristinmiller02
www.kristinmiller.net
Don’t miss the rest of the steamy serial with…
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