Douglas looked a little green as they bounced over the bumpy roads on their way to the meeting house.
Once they got there, Creel found Benjamin standing outside. “Everyone’s trapped in the meeting hall!” he yelled.
He and Douglas rushed inside, with dozens of shifters at their heels. Creel carefully set the dynamite at the banquet hall door. He could just barely, faintly, pick up sounds from inside the room, and that was just because of his superior hearing. The room had clearly been designed to be soundproof, so that none of the guards outside the building would hear what was going on until it was too late.
The shifters stood back as Creel set up the dynamite by the door, praying that it wouldn’t be too late. He unreeled the fuse line, and detonated the dynamite with a tremendous blast that shook the hallway and sent plaster raining down from the ceiling.
Before the smoke even cleared, he’d leaped through the gaping hole in the doorway, with Douglas and Benjamin right behind him.
He bellowed Miranda’s name, frantically scanning the room for her as he waved smoke from in front of his eyes.
The hall was a scene of carnage. Alpha Primes were locked in combat, overwhelmed by the roiling mass of angry energy trapped in the room and feeding on itself. Their animals had surfaced and they were out of their minds with primitive rage. Fur flew and blood splattered the walls and floor. Everywhere he looked was a furious hell of snarling jaws, bared fangs and raised hackles.
The angry energy washed over Creel and he felt his wolf pushing against the inside of his skin, urging him to let it loose. To go wolf and throw himself into the fray, biting and clawing until all the other Alpha Primes had surrendered – to him, or to death.
Except there was something else his wolf wanted. Something more important. Something both man and beast agreed they didn’t want to live without.
Miranda.
He caught her scent and waded across the room, through the knots of snarling, fighting Alpha Primes. Paws wickedly tipped with claws lashed out at him as he passed, and he was almost bowled off his feet when a massive wolf, driven back by his opponent, slammed into his solar plexus, knocking the wind out of him. Douglas was right behind him, and he half-caught and steadied him.
Miranda and Sophia were hunkered down in a corner, and looming over them was an enormous Alpha Prime in human form, madness in his eyes and drool dripping from his mouth. Miranda was using a broken chair as a barrier, jabbing the legs towards his chest and face in an attempt to fend him off.
Douglas and Creel grabbed the snarling man and shoved him away, hard. He fell. He started to struggle to his feet again, but Creel turned on him and snarled, and even through the maddening waves of Alpha Prime energy, a glimmer of sanity must have reached him. He decided this wasn’t a fight he could win.
Creel hauled Miranda into his arms. Sophia was sobbing into Douglas’ shirt front and mumbling something about a frying pan. When she raised her face, Creel realized she was crying not out of fear, but out of frustration that she hadn’t been able to do anything but hunker down. He wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of her and her cookware.
Organized by Benjamin, shifters swarmed through the room, pulling the Alpha Primes away from each other and dragging them bodily out into the fresh air. They fought, but they were outnumbered. As the angry energy in the room began to dissipate, some of the strongest among them were able to shake off the intoxicating rage and help with the efforts to clear the room.
Creel and Douglas ushered Miranda and Sophia towards the exit, physically putting their bodies between them and the occasional knots of still-struggling Alphas as they passed.
Miranda inspected the smoking ruins of the door. “You used dynamite to come get me?” she asked.
“You’d better believe it,” Creel said.
“Much more romantic than flowers and poetry,” Grammy Edith chirped up approvingly. “Kaboom!” She looked thoughtful. “Do you know where to get some more of that stuff?” she asked Creel. “Only my friend Hank has this ex-son-in-law…”
Epilogue
Ten months later…
Miranda sat on the front porch of the new house that Creel had built for them, right down the road from Miranda’s Candles. She was rocking back and forth in the rocking chair that Creel had built for her, and cradling their new baby cub in her arms. Creel sat next to her, nursing a beer. Miranda could feel the contentment radiating from him as he looked at her and his lips curled in a slow, sexy smile. He winked at her.
“I wouldn’t mind another one of those,” he said, reaching out to caress their daughter’s silky curls. “Or two or three. You did pretty good with the first one.”
“Whoa, slow down there, cowboy!” Miranda laughed. “Can I get a few more months spoiling this one before we put another bun in my oven?”
Their baby cub was named Barbara, after Creel’s late mother.
Creel smiled and leaned back in his chair and took a long, slow pull on the beer. “Take all the time you need.” He grinned.
“When’s your brother getting here?” she asked. Benjamin and his wife were on their way up to visit and exchange baby presents. Phoenix had just given birth to another boy, and Creel had hand-carved a cradle for them. Benjamin and his family were planning on staying for a few weeks.
Creel glanced at his watch. “Couple hours,” he said.
Suki was doing most of the work at Miranda’s Candles for the next few months, while Miranda was still breast-feeding.
“Rock slower,” her grandmother said to her. “You’re going to give that baby whiplash.” She looked at Hank and shook her head in dismay. “I swear, it’s a good thing I’m here, or she’d accidentally kill this cub.” She ran a ghostly hand over the baby’s head, and Barbara smiled and looked right at her. She’d inherited the ability to see ghosts, Miranda could tell already.
“Damn, Grammy, you were never that overprotective with me,” Miranda said.
“Language!” her grandmother said in shocked tones. “Do you want your daughter swearing like a sailor?” She looked over at Hank again. “I don’t know where she gets it from.”
“Beats me,” Hank said, with a straight face.
Creel choked on his beer and started laughing.
“Do not encourage her,” Miranda said, shaking her head with a smile.
She glanced over at her shop, which was just barely visible down the road. Douglas and Sophia had built their restaurant near there.. Rory and Hephzibah lived a little further back in the woods. They were mated and expecting their first cub, and they were excited to see if it would be furry or feathered. Rory had opened up a comic book and gaming shop, which perfectly suited his geeky personality, and Hephzibah had turned out to be an excellent book-keeper with a great head for numbers.
Joseph and Terrence had been hunted down and killed the day after Creel had rescued her from the meeting house. The meeting house, after all that time and effort and money had been poured into building it, had been destroyed. Eight Alpha Primes had died there, after all. The Coldwater Pack had been forced to pay for it, which had pretty much bankrupted them.
“Oh, look, here comes Benjamin! They’re early!” Miranda pointed at a car that was heading up the road towards them, and Creel set his beer down and went to greet them, waving happily at his twin brother.
“You did all right for yourself here,” Grammy Edith said to her quietly, as Creel walked down the road.
Miranda leaned down and kissed her daughter’s head. “I know, Grammy. I know.”
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About the Author
Hello, I am Georgette St. Clair, writer of hot, sexy romances which star all Alpha heroes, all the time. The road to love may be rocky and fraught with pe
ril, (and humor and scorchtastic sex and healthy heapings of snark) but my shifters will stop at nothing to claim their fated mate.
A little about me: I live in Florida. My checkered career involved stints as a newspaper reporter, EMT, internet marketer, cocktail waitress, temp, nurse’s aide (but not all at the same time...)
Now I’m living my perfect life, spending my days in a fantasy universe where I nudge my smart-mouthed, take-no-guff heroines onto the path that will set them on a collision course with true love.
Check out my website for a complete list of titles and what’s coming soon. Or connect with me on Facebook.
Also by Georgette St. Clair
The Mating Game Series:
The Mating Game: Big Bad Wolf (The Mating Game Book 1)
Dating a Dragon (The Mating Game Book 2)
Shifters of Silver Peak series:
Mate Marked: Shifters of Silver Peak
Shifters of Silver Peak: Mate for a Month
Shifters of Silver Peak: A Very Shifty Christmas
Bridenapped Series:
Bridenapped: The Alpha Chronicles
Bridenapped: The Alpha’s Choice
Shifters, Inc Series:
The Alpha Meets His Match (A paranormal romance) (Shifters, Inc. Book 1)
His Purrfect Mate (A Shifter Romance) (Shifters, Inc. Book 2)
Pixie the Lion Tamer (Shifters, Inc. Book 3)
Shifters, Inc. The Bear Who Loved Me (A BBW Paranormal Romance)
Spotting His Leopard (Shifters, Inc.)
Blue Moon Junction Series:
Blue Moon Shifters: The Alpha Claims a Mate (A BBW Paranormal Romance) (Blue Moon Junction Book 1)
Blue Moon Shifters: The Bobcat’s Tale (A BBW Paranormal Romance) (Blue Moon Junction Book 2)
Blue Moon Shifters: Hard to Bear (A BBW Paranormal Romance) (Blue Moon Junction Book 3)
Blue Moon Shifters: My Heart Laid Bear (A BBW Paranormal Romance) (Blue Moon Junction Book 4)
Timber Valley Pack Series:
Bride of the Alpha (A BBW Paranormal Romance) (Timber Valley Pack Book 1)
Purr for the Alpha (A Paranormal Romance) (Timber Valley Pack Book 2)
Hard as Steele (A BBW Paranormal Romance) (Timber Valley Pack Book 3)
Timber Valley Pack: Lynx on the Loose (A Paranormal Romance with Shifters)
Taken by the Alpha (Timber Valley Pack Book 5)
The Alpha Won’t Be Denied (Timber Valley Pack Book 6)
Standalone titles:
Grayslake: More than Mated: Grayslake: Furrever Yours (Kindle Worlds Novella)
Badlands: The Lion’s Den
THE END
His Curvy Mate (Alpha Prime Book 2) Page 15