by Michelle Fox
Table of Contents
Bring Her Wolf (Werewolf Romance)
Blurb
Disclaimer
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Bring Her Wolf
Michelle Fox
Copyright 2012. All Rights Reserved.
Blurb
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Chloe is a wolf with a problem: She can't shift and if her wolf doesn't come soon, pack law demands she leave the only home she's ever known.
Then temptation comes calling...
Hot hunky werewolf, Jackson promises Chloe he'll make her howl. He’s been pining for her from afar and won’t miss a chance to claim Chloe for his own.
The bad boy alpha will have Chloe howling before she knows it.
A short paranormal romance of approximately 8,000 words in length.
Disclaimer
This is a work of fiction intended for adults age 18 and over. All events depicted are fictional. Characters are consenting adults. Any resemblance to places and persons, living or dead, is unintentional coincidence.
Every effort has been made to provide a quality reading experience, but editors and technology are fallible. Please report typos or formatting issues to [email protected].
Chapter One
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***
I raised the wine bottle in a toast. “Happy twenty fifth birthday to me.” My living room was empty, so no one answered or looked at me funny when I went on to say, “And to being run out of town.” With a morose frown, I tipped the bottle back against my lips and let the fruity wine flood my mouth. Using a glass was an unnecessary formality when drinking alone.
Taking another slug from the bottle, I contemplated my immediate future. Tomorrow I would load up a moving truck and go out to make my life among humans. Even though I wasn’t one. Technically. But those were the rules and I didn’t belong in Huntsville. Not anymore.
A knock sounded at my door.
“Pizza’s here,” I said. Talking to myself kept me from being lonely. I fumbled with my purse and extracted the requisite twenty. Flinging my front door open, I accepted the box from Peter. He was seventeen with a lanky frame still waiting to fill out. He’d been my pizza guy for at least a year. “Thanks, Pete.” I offered the money.
He held up his hands. “This one’s on me, Miss. Stark.” He looked at me with pity. He knew. Hell, they all knew. I was the talk of the town. The only null in four generations, and the horror that kept the parents of Huntsville up at night. The frightful aberration they used to make children behave.
Clean your room or you won’t change either.
Eat your peas or you’ll be homeless too.
I blinked and swallowed back the bitterness. “Thanks.”
“Good luck, Miss Stark.”
“Luck has passed me by, Pete.” He didn’t know what to say to that and shifted uncomfortably, staring at his feet. I saved him further discomfort by slamming the door shut, and retreating into the living room with the pizza.
I’d taken two bites when there another knock sounded at the door. I froze and furrowed my brow at the noise. The knock came again. I finished chewing and went to the door, irritation creeping up my spine.
I flung the door open a little harder than I’d intended and it bounced off the wall, forcing me to keep it from closing with my hand. “What is it, Pete?” My tone was hostile.
“Hello Chloe.”
I would never mistake that deep baritone for an adolescent pizza delivery boy.
My breath caught in my throat and I looked up, up and up to meet the gaze of Jackson Swift. There are bad boys and there’s badass. Jackson was very much the latter. He’d moved to Huntsville at the invitation of the pack alpha. I’d given him wide berth because staying out of pack business was expected of me and a new wolf was definitely pack business.
We’d worked together for a bit at the one bar in town. I’d waitressed there ever since I was of age, and, six months ago, he sweet talked his way into bartending. I’d seen it happen. My boss, Sheila, had swooned like a flower in a wind storm. She was putty in his hands.
Whenever we worked the same shift, he’d watched me like he was hungry and I was raw steak. It weirded me out, and I avoided him every chance I got. A few times he had even tried to talk to me, but I had just turned around and gone the other way, heat burning my cheeks. Eventually whatever interest he had in me cooled and he’d focused his attention on Allison, the bar slut. She went home with everyone.
For the record, I never went home with anyone.
Mostly because no one wanted me.
“What are you doing here?” My eyes narrowed and I shifted my weight back, ready to step into the house and slam the door for a second time that night. Yet despite my wariness I couldn’t help but drink in the sight of him; handsome as rock star and built like a fireman. He should be on a stud-of-the-month calendar, not my front porch watching me with eyes the color of chocolate streaked with caramel.
“I heard you’re leaving.” His gaze tracked my every movement, no matter how small. It was unnerving.
I shrugged. “I’m twenty-five. Cal said it was time.” The pack alpha had been kind to me. Given me extra time, but I was a null, a dud, a nothing. The little town of Huntsville tucked in the rural hills of Appalachia had rules about people like me. You had to fit in or leave. I didn’t belong and I never would. I wasn’t a wolf.
“Where you going?” He sounded like my answer mattered and the sincerity caught me by surprise.
“I don’t know. What do you care?” I watched him as carefully as he watched me. The hair on the back of my neck rose. He was trouble. I could smell it even with my stunted senses.
He lifted his head and sniffed. “You got pizza in there?”
I nodded, my expression guarded. He wanted something from me and I didn’t want to get played for a sucker. I was no flower in a wind storm.
“I’m starving.”
I stared at him, refusing to give in. The last thing I needed was to tangle with a wolf like Jackson. He’d chew me up, spit me out and think nothing of it. After Allison, there’d been Susan, Polly, Jenny and who knows how many other girls made their way in and out of his pants. The circus clown car had nothing Jackson’s love life.
“You’re not going to invite me in?” Shock registered on his face. It was possible I was the first woman in history to tell the man no.
“I’m not looking for anything you got.” I crossed my arms, leaning against the door jamb.
“Fair enough.” He stepped closer, crowding me, our bodies almost close enough to touch. His voice dipped down into a husky whisper that seemed to reach out and stroke my skin. “What if I could help you?”
I snorted. “Where were you two weeks ago? I’ve already quit my job, packed my stuff and sold the house.” Cal had bought it from me so I would have some money to start over with. I tried not to think about how the house had belonged to my parents. That just brought back the memory of their deaths. A car accident had left me alone at a young age and spared them the pain of their only child being a waste.
He stepped back and cool air from the early autumn night rushed in to fill the void. “I’ve been away, visiting my mom down in Louisiana. She knows something that might fix you.”
I gritted my teeth, nostrils flaring. “Fix me? What am I? Getting spayed?”
“She’s my pack’s shaman, Chloe. I think you should listen to what I have to say.” He
managed to look serious enough that I gave a curt nod and backed away, allowing him into the house.
Chapter Two
Jackson settled on the brown leather couch my mom had bought when I was still a kid and helped himself to a slice of pizza. He lifted the wine bottle off the coffee table and gave me questioning look.
I flopped into the recliner across from him. It had been my Dad’s seat and it still smelled like his pipe. “Go ahead. Help yourself.”
“Thanks,” he mumbled through a mouth full of food.
I gave him a minute to eat and then pushed. “Spill it, Jackson.” What Bayou voodoo did he have up his sleeve?
“An alpha can bring out your wolf.” He snagged another piece of pizza and gulped it down.
I sighed, deflated. “If Cal could’ve done something, he would have.”
Jackson lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “He might not be able to. Every pack is different and so are the alphas.”
“Well, thanks for nothing.” I leaned forward to close the pizza box and pulled it closer to my side of the coffee table. At the rate Jackson was eating, there wouldn’t be any left for me.
He held up a hand, his gaze focused on the pizza. “Hold on. Cal might not be able to, but I could. Maybe.”
I raised my eyebrows and motioned for him to continue.
“My pack has a history of helping nulls and well—” He squared his shoulders and sat a little straighter. “I’m an alpha.”
I rolled my eyes. “Sure you are.” Every male wolf thought he was an alpha, which was one of the things that made them so annoying. As much as I’d wanted to belong, being spared the endless posturing and strutting of a male wolf in lust was one thing that went in the plus column.
He looked puzzled. “No, I’m really an alpha. Why do you think Cal asked me to come to Huntsville?”
Crossing my arms, I said, “Why did he ask you here? Was he aware that you would leave no woman untouched?”
Jackson winced. “Come on, that’s not fair. Listen, you guys don’t have an alpha here. There’s no one to come up after Cal.”
That made my ears perk up. Pack succession was a primary concern among wolves and I’d had no idea Huntsville lacked true alpha material. Of course being a null, I was banned from the pack clearing and thus had no way to know. “Is Cal sick?” My stomach sank to think of a world without him. He’d been as kind as a father to me many a time.
“No, but he’s planning for the future.” He eyed the pizza box and I moved it closer to me, pushing down on the lid again for emphasis. Mine.
“You’re the future of the Huntsville pack?” I stifled a laugh. God help us. Them, I corrected. Considering that Jackson would someday lead made my situation slightly more palatable. A gigolo was not my idea of prime leadership material.
“Why is that funny?” He looked perplexed.
“Never mind. So tell me, how exactly can you make me a wolf?” I couldn’t wait to hear what Pack Master Gigolo would say next.
He cleared his throat and rubbed his hands on his pants, gaze roaming the room and looking everywhere but at me. Nervous was a new look for him, usually he brimmed with brash confidence. “We have to sleep together.” The words came out fast in a jumble, but my mind quickly interpreted the message.
I jumped out of my chair, hand over my mouth and backed away from him. “Holy shit. You have got to be fucking kidding me.” I paced the living room and then froze, shooting him a look that could kill. “Wait, this is a joke. You sick fuck.” My hands balled into fists and I stormed over to where he sat.
He stood up and side-stepped me, his arms raised in a placating gesture. “No joke, Chloe.”
“You’ve slept with everyone else. Why not give me a whirl, huh? Sleep with the null and see if it’s any different? Am I right?” I was yelling now and stalked him across the room, one hand cocked, fist at the ready. I wasn’t as strong as a real wolf, but I wasn’t human weak either. Oh yeah, I could bring the pain.
“Wait—” he began, but I lunged for him, my fist aiming for his jaw.
Instead of feeling my bones grinding into his, I connected with flesh stronger than my own. He caught both of my hands and pulled me close as he pinned them behind my back. Then his lips crushed mine in a fierce kiss.
I’d never been kissed. Nulls can’t be mates so I was out of the dating pool from day one. The shock of his lips against mine left me motionless for a moment. A strangled gasp escaped my throat and I wrestled with his grip, but couldn’t break his hold. His mouth was insistent, plucking at my lower lip, tongue probing. He tasted like pizza and wine and the smell of him filled my senses.
So this is what it’s like to be kissed.
“The thing is Chloe, you smell like wolf to me.” He spoke with his mouth still on mine, his words telegraphing through my body in little shivers. “I think she’s in there and just doesn’t know how to come out.”
He nuzzled my neck, nose caressing me as he inhaled deeply. I froze under the assault of sensations I didn’t fully understand. My body felt like it was the wrong size, stretched too thin in some places and too slack in others. The smell of fur filled my nose along with hyperawareness of Jackson’s musk. When I blinked, I saw a wolf staring back at me from behind my eyelids. She—instinctively I knew she was female—was light gray and her gaze bore into mine. I gasped and my eyes flew open.
“What is it?” He lifted his head, concerned.
“I don’t know.” I licked my lips. “I think I saw my wolf.”
He gave me a satisfied smile. “See? I told you.”
I closed my eyes again. She was still there, but pacing now. Something under my skin prickled as if she moved through my flesh. “She’s beautiful.”
“You never saw her before?”
I shook my head, keeping my eyes closed. I’d heard talk about how your wolf danced in your mind. Wolves appeared right before the first change, which, for women, often coincided with their first menstrual cycle. I’d hit puberty, but my wolf had been a no-show. Now that she was finally here, I couldn’t stop watching her.
“So now you know I wasn’t joking.”
“Am I going to shift?” The idea of that took my breath away. I’d never dared to hope, but now that very emotion blossomed in me like spring after a desolate winter.
“It takes more than a kiss to bring out a wolf, Chloe.” His voice was a soft murmur on my skin. He kissed me again, nipping the nape of my neck with his lips.
“How do you know?” I tested his grip again, disappointed to find it as firm as ever. Jackson wasn’t going to let me go any time soon. My wolf gave a low growl, unhappy as I was at being restrained.
“Because my mom said so.” His lips moved to the hollow of my throat and pressed against the pulse that thundered there.
“Did she also tell you to sleep with everything that moved?”
His lips went still. “You sound upset.” His inflection implied I shouldn’t be and it rankled.
I huffed, irritated. “You’ve been sleeping your way through town. It doesn’t exactly make a girl feel special to be last on the list.”
“You’ve got me all wrong.”
I opened my eyes for a second to glare at him. “How so?” I closed my eyes again, not wanting to lose sight of my wolf. She sniffed the ground intently, looking for something.
“You were always first on the list.”
My eyes opened wide. “What?”
His gaze locked with mine and his wolf came through in the yellow gleam of his pupils. “Like I said, you always smelled like wolf to me. The second I met you, I wanted you. I didn’t know you were a null until Cal told me.”
I was silent for a moment. “So then you slept with everyone else instead?”
He sighed. “You have to understand, I’m supposed to find a mate. Preferably sooner than later. Cal wants me settled in.”
I furrowed my brow in confusion. “Are you like some mail order wolf groom? Cal just sends out an order and you show up?”
&n
bsp; “In a roundabout way. My pack has too many alphas, yours is all betas. Word got out and Cal made me an offer.” He shrugged. “So here I am. Ta-dah. The alpha on order.”
His tone was so light and self-effacing that I couldn’t hold back a giggle. My wolf’s ears perked up at the sound and she cocked her head, listening.
“So are we going to do this, Chloe? Are you going to let me bring your wolf?” His soft, low voice made me weak in the knees.
I didn’t hesitate, not with everything I’d ever wanted so tantalizingly close. “Yes.”
“I’m going to let you go now. Don’t hit me, okay?”
I bit my lip as shame washed over me at my behavior. “Sorry about that.”
The pressure on my wrists eased and I was free. I shook out my arms, releasing the tension from being locked in one position for so long.
“Let’s start over, from the beginning.” A hand on each shoulder, he pulled me against him and kissed me. With gentle persistence he won his way into my mouth, tongue laving mine. A dizzy heat surged through me, rushing with my pulse until I tingled all over. He grasped the hem of my shirt, lifting it up to expose my stomach and grazing my rib cage in the process.
Unbidden, I raised my arms overhead and he pulled off my top. Tossing it to the floor, he continued to ply me with kisses as he worked to unhook my bra. Shy about being the only one naked, I decided to remove his t-shirt, forcing him to pause in his efforts to strip me bare.
Jackson’s chest was broad and sleek with muscle. I ran my hands over his pecs, the nubs of his nipples brushing across my palms. His shoulders flexed at my touch and he sucked in his stomach with a hiss when I trailed my fingers over his abdomen.
“There’s something you need to know,” I said, my voice hesitant.
He raised an eyebrow, his hands pausing in their efforts to remove my bra.
“I’m a virgin.” I breathed it more than said it. Closing my eyes, I retreated to my wolf who paced anxiously against the screen of my eyelids.
Jackson cupped my face in his hand, thumb caressing my cheek. “It’s okay, Chloe.”