Possessing the Alpha: A Wolf Shifter Romance (Southern Shifters Saga Book 1)

by C. J. Beaumont

  His gray eyes were piercing, and the longer he stared at me, the more tension radiated from the men on either side of me. I wasn’t too happy about it either, but I knew better than to react to it visibly. The last thing I wanted to do was let this coyote see that his behavior had any sort of effect on me.

  I laid one hand on Charlie’s leg and the other on Brandon’s under the table, silently pleading with them to calm down and be cool. Dad wouldn't like it if they made an unnecessary scene over a guy doing nothing more than staring at me. I didn't like his scrutiny, but I didn't dare allow it to undermine Dad.

  "Bay Minette seems to be a lovely little town," the messenger—whose name was Ethan—drawled.

  "We've always thought so." Dad nodded his agreement. You'd have to be listening very closely to hear the barest hint of emphasis on the word "always."

  "What brought such a big pack to such a small town, anyway?" Ethan asked.

  What’s with the questions? It seemed like more than just casual small-talk. I didn’t like the interest the Sterling coyotes appeared to have in our pack.

  "Our ancestors helped negotiate the shifter tribe treaties, and they were granted Bay Minette as their territory in return," Dad shrugged. "It was a pretty fair trade for helping negotiate the end of the bloodiest war ever recorded between supernaturals."

  Ethan toyed with the food on his plate. "Perhaps, but it seems a bit of an odd pick since red wolves haven't been a part of the indigenous mammal population of Alabama in quite a long time."

  "That's true, but we tend to be careful, and the few people who have spotted us usually mistake us for wild dogs or coy-dogs."

  "That's an interesting assumption for them to make," Ethan mused.

  He opened his mouth to say something else, until Maddox shot him a dark look.

  "Like Alan said, let's leave business until after dinner, shall we?" Judging by his tone, it was an order, not a request.

  So, their business with us had something to do with the fact that the Blackburn pack had been granted this territory following the shifter treaties? That possibly just raised more questions in my mind. Troubling questions that killed my appetite and made it impossible to eat. I pushed the food around on my plate, but didn’t lift a bite to my mouth.

  The rest of the meal was spent batting around idle chit-chat, all of us attempting to pretend there wasn't a strange, tense undercurrent running through every bit of it.

  The coyotes didn’t seem to have any similar difficulties gobbling down the food on their plates, however.

  Once all the food had been cleared away, my father and Maddox sat studying each other with calculating expressions, taking the other’s measure. The moment seemed to stretch into one of infinite, painful tension, until my father finally spoke.

  "So, what brings the Sterling pack to our little corner of the world?" Dad's voice was light, curious.

  But I wasn’t fooled. My father might be acting casual, but it was only on the surface. I knew him well enough to realize much more was going on inside his head than he’d ever reveal to these unknown coyotes in our midst.

  I didn’t trust them for a second. And I couldn’t believe my father did either. While his health might be failing, his mind was still as sharp as ever. He must be wondering the same thing as me—what did these coyotes hope to gain by coming here?

  They were here because they wanted something. The question was, what?

  "As you can see, our numbers have dwindled significantly in recent years," Maddox began. "We've run into a lot of unforeseen problems. Hunters. Bounties on coyotes because humans consider them to be ‘varmints.’ Sickness. You name it, it's hit us these past few years."

  "I'm terribly sorry to hear that your pack has fallen on hard times," Dad said, the curiosity not gone from his voice.

  "That's not the only problem," Maddox continued, his voice dark. "When the shifter tribe treaties were negotiated by your ancestors, we coyotes were the only shifters to be overlooked by them. The Sterling tribe are a people without so much as a scrap of land to call home, thanks to your ancestors."

  Words fought to leave my mouth in response to his statement, but I stifled the impulse, keeping them to myself. My father wouldn’t appreciate any interference from me right now.

  "I'm sure that was a simple mistake, and we can find a satisfactory way to remedy the situation." For once, Dad seemed bewildered and caught off-guard.

  Had he not known that the Sterling Pack had been left without a territory following the shifter treaties? Not that I thought this pack’s situation should be our concern. The treaties had happened over one hundred years ago. It had nothing to do with us here and now.

  "Or, it could have been a purposeful oversight by your ancestors because no one thought we coyotes mattered enough to get a territory of our own," Ethan growled.

  Maddox silenced him with another dark, warning look.

  "We came here tonight in the hope that you would be willing to right your ancestors' wrongs." Maddox's gaze assessed my father with an unnerving focus that, to me, indicated he was carefully calculating the impact of every single word he said.

  "I'm certainly willing to look into it," Dad nodded. "It bears researching, and if the records prove that the Sterling tribe was wronged, I will do my best to make it right."

  Maddox shifted in his seat, leaning a little closer to Dad, his voice growing urgent. "I was hoping you'd be willing to be a little more proactive, and also that you might consider that the records are skewed against our tribe."

  Why was did this coyote think it should be up to my father to fix it? Assuming a mistake had even been made—which I doubted. The Blackburn Pack wasn’t the only shifter pack involved in negotiating the peace treaties a century ago.

  I bit my tongue to keep from saying something that would only make the situation worse, as I waited to see how my father replied to the insult against the integrity of our pack’s forebearers.

  "I'm open to the possibility that the records might be biased, but it would make things easier if you had some kind of concrete proof to share with us," Dad suggested.

  "I very much wish that were the case," Maddox sighed. "But as you know, history is written by the victors, not the victims." He exchanged a significant look with Ethan, who I guessed was his Beta.

  While what he said might be true, still there should be some sort of proof. Written accounts from Sterling Pack ancestors. Diaries, letters, something, at least. Although, even were Maddox to produce such so-called historical documentation...could we really believe any of it? How were we to judge truth from fiction with only the coyotes’ word for it?

  My father cleared his throat and spoke again. "I can understand how your tribe might feel victimized in this situation, and I will work with you to make things right. I'm curious, though, what kind of proactive action were you hoping for out of us?" My father quirked an eyebrow at the coyote Alpha.

  Dozens of possibilities ran through my mind as I waited for Maddox to respond. His gaze shifted to me, and he didn't speak for more than a minute.

  Instead, he took his time to study every single bit of me that he could see, leaving me feeling exposed and a little dirty. "I was hoping you'd be willing to combine our packs and share your territory with shifters who are truly indigenous to this area, perhaps through a marriage?"

  Suddenly, the tension was back. I could feel Charlie and Brandon's discomfort as they snapped to rigid attention on either side of me.

  No. Not gonna happen.

  Not just ‘no,’ but hell, no. Never gonna happen.

  This wasn’t the dark ages. I wouldn’t be bartered into marriage. Especially not to this shifter. A man I hadn’t trusted from the first second he’d walked in the door.

  Revulsion oozed through me like oily tar, coating my insides with a sick sensation of nausea, as he continued to stare at me.

  Dad shook his head. "I'm sorry, but that's not something I can offer you." He stood up from the table, indicating that the conversa
tion was unequivocally over.

  Chapter 5

  The room was heavy with brittle tension as Maddox Hale and Alan Blackburn stared at one another. My father's refusal stretched out between them like a rubber band on the brink of snapping.

  I waited to see what would happen, wondering if Maddox would try to challenge my father here and now. But he had to know he was seriously outnumbered and every wolf here would defend our Alpha from attack. Maddox couldn’t really be that stupid. Could he?

  An ambush is probably more his style. Which wasn’t a comforting thought.

  Without another word, the coyote shifter Alpha pushed back from the meeting table and stood, every member of his pack following suit. The expressions on their faces were anything but accepting of how this meeting was ending. They all strode toward the barn doors as one, and Maddox paused, tossing a dark glance at me over his shoulder.

  Why was he looking at me? I mean, sure, I’d immediately rejected the possibility of marrying him, but ultimately my father made the decisions for the pack.

  "I would advise you to rethink your decision, old man,” Maddox warned, almost as if he had heard my thoughts. “It wouldn't do at all to make a rash decision without considering the situation from all angles first."

  Or without considering the consequences, his tone implied. It sounded a lot like he was making a thinly-veiled threat.

  Charlie and Brandon must have thought so, too. They both shot up from their seats, ominous growls reverberating from deep inside them as their inner wolves fought to get out. My father held up a hand to stop them. The two younger men stood down instantly at their Alpha’s silent command, but they both fisted their hands at their sides, glaring at the backs of the retreating coyote pack.

  The tension in the room didn’t dissipate until they were gone, and even then, a feeling of unease lingered in the air.

  My father sighed and shook his head. "That won't be the last we hear from them."

  I had a strong suspicion that he was right. And that when the coyote pack came back, they’d only bring more problems with them. But what could we do?

  No way was I marrying that coyote. Even if I didn’t resent the whole marriage-of-convenience-to-unite-two-packs thing that he was trying to push on me, there was just something about him that seemed off. Something about his whole pack that seemed off, actually. Was it just because they were coyotes, and thus, inherently sneaky? Or was it something more?

  "I'll be more than happy to put together a strike team and take them out before they have the chance to cause more trouble," Dalton muttered.

  Obviously, I wasn’t the only one who didn’t trust Maddox or his pack. And I couldn’t say I was against Dalton’s suggestion. Actually, It sounded like a good idea to me. But it wasn’t my call.

  "No, I don't think that will be necessary. At least, not yet,” Dad murmured. “I don't want to risk violating the treaty between tribes by striking first."

  But the coyote pack wasn’t part of that treaty, so... would we really be violating it by attacking them? I kept the thought to myself, however, already knowing how my father would react.

  "And if they strike first?" Charlie asked, helping Dad up from his chair and passing him his cane.

  "If they strike first, then we will defend the Blackburn territory as any wolf would." Dad's voice was grim, but didn't waver.

  Despite his failing health, there was no doubt that he would do whatever was necessary for the good of the pack. And maybe it made sense not to rush in blindly. But I hated just sitting around waiting for something bad to happen—because I was pretty sure that it would.

  "Do you want me to do a little investigating, maybe run some background checks on them?" Dalton already had his smart phone out of his pocket, ready to make notes.

  "I suppose having more information couldn’t hurt," Dad shrugged.

  It would be smart to know just what—and who—we were dealing with.

  Brandon was one of the few pack members who stayed behind to help me clean up the barn and pack the dirty dishes into crates to take up to the house so I could run them through the dishwasher.

  "I've got a bad feeling about how things went tonight," I muttered as we hauled crates across the yard toward the back door.

  "Me, too," Brandon agreed, walking beside me. "I think we need to get back to your training—for real this time."

  "Good idea." I’d been serious from the very beginning, but now didn’t seem like the best moment to mention that to him "Got time to get started now?"

  "Lucky for you, Leslie is busy tonight. So, yeah, I've got time." Brandon set the crate of dishes down on the back porch and rolled his shoulders, loosening up his muscles for the coming training session.

  Setting my crate down next to his on the porch, I moved to the center of the yard and bounced on the balls of my feet as I tightened my ponytail. “Ready?”

  “Ready whenever you are.”

  I stepped forward and swung my fist toward his face, but he easily blocked my punch.

  For the first time since I began my training with Brandon at just ten years old, he didn't hold back on me, not even an ounce. After the first five minutes, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was in serious trouble. I was nowhere near ready to take on a man of Brandon’s size for real. Which meant that my plans to be the pack’s Alpha one day were in grave jeopardy.

  No matter what I threw at him, it didn't faze him at all. Even worse, everything he did appeared to require very little effort from him. He wasn’t even really trying. At least, not trying to win. He was obviously serious about not going easy on me. He could swat me off like a fly, as he blocked every single hit I threw at him.

  Not to mention, he wasn’t even sweating, despite the humidity in air. My damp hair was clinging to my skin, and I’m sure my face was flushed as red as a lobster by now. I scrubbed my forearm across my brow to remove the beads of moisture that threatened to drip into my eyes.

  Then I tried to take Brandon by surprise with a kick to his solar plexus. He caught my leg before I could make contact, and I almost ended up on my ass. He could have easily taken me down if he’d wanted.

  When we switched things up and he went on the offensive, instead of just defending against me, I struggled to deflect his attacks. With every swing, every kick, every dodge, and every block, I was getting more and more winded, finding it harder and harder to keep up. I was sore before the session was even over.

  The only thing I had going for me was the fact that I had absolutely no intention of giving up, no matter how ragged I felt. Unfortunately, sheer stubbornness doesn't really hold up as a tactic in a fight. Especially not when I lacked the strength to back it up. Not to say that I was weak, but I was no match for Brandon. And he wasn’t even seriously trying to hurt me. I’d be dead if had been going up against an opponent who was actually intent on killing me.

  Brandon and I sparred for what felt like hours as the other pack members started getting in their vehicles and heading their separate ways. But I knew it had only been about fifteen or twenty minutes, max.

  "You need to work on controlling your breathing," Brandon ordered. "If you did a better job of keeping your breathing steady, you wouldn't tire out so fast."

  "Easy for you to say," I gasped, struggling to suck in enough oxygen to keep my muscles from giving out. "I can't believe how much you were holding back on me all these years, Brandon. I'm starting to think Charlie's right about me. If I had to step into the position of Alpha right now, we'd all be fucked sideways."

  I sat down on the ground hard because I no longer had the energy to stand upright—or to care whether or not Brandon hit me. I felt a nauseating lead weight in my gut, and it was only partly due to the physical exertion. I blew out a frustrated sigh as he flopped down beside me.

  "I'm sorry, Lucy. I really didn't mean to put you at a disadvantage in any way. I just...couldn't imagine there ever being a time when your Dad wasn't well enough to lead this pack. He's been our Alpha for years,
and I thought we'd have a lot more time to get you prepared for the whole Alpha thing. I can’t believe that he’s sick at all, but especially not how quickly his illness has progressed."

  "I didn't expect him to get sick, either, to be honest," I groaned, dropping my face into my hands. I hated to think about him not being here. I wasn’t ready for that. Would never be ready for that, but especially not this soon.

  "The whole thing is disturbing, really. The doctors may call it cancer, but you and I both know it's incredibly rare for a shifter to get that kind of sick. With our regenerative capabilities, cancer has never been a problem for our kind before."

  Which made me wonder what was different now. I might have suspected the coyotes’ sudden appearance had something to do with it, if the thought hadn’t been so ridiculous. How could they have made my father sick?

  I wanted to doubt the doctors. They were used to human patients, after all. What did they know about shifters anyway? Except there was no denying that something was wrong with Dad. The question was, what?

  "It doesn’t make any sense, but all the tests show cancer. I'm not sure how that's possible, but—"

  Suddenly, the night was shattered by panicked shouts from the front yard.

  Chapter 6

  Brandon sprang up, moving like greased lightning as he sprinted around the corner of the house toward the cacophony in the front yard. Our recent training session hadn't slowed him down even a little. I might have resented him just the tiniest bit for that, if I hadn’t been more concerned about what was happening out front.

  In spite of the fact that I was aching from head to foot, winded, and drenched with sweat, I shoved myself into an upright position and scrambled after him as fast as I could. Brandon had already disappeared around the front by the time I reached the side of the house. I couldn’t tell if anyone had shifted yet, and that worried me. The last thing I needed was a bunch of wolves or coyotes—or both—running around the street in front of my father’s house. Adrenaline shot through me as I heard voices disintegrating into howls and snarls.