by Viola Rivard
Though his nature had always skewed more towards the human side, he had never understood why humans were so private in their affections. He would have thought that Taylor, given how prone she was to jealousy, would be eager to flaunt the attention of her mates. Instead, she rarely permitted more than a peck on the lips when others might see them. It was a quirk that Alder found both annoying and charming.
His mouth closed over hers, and he couldn't resist groaning when she kissed him back in earnest. Her soft lips parted in invitation, one which Alder was quick to accept, his tongue delving into the warm cavern he knew all too well.
Usually, it was Taylor pushing him away, looking flushed and embarrassed. This time, it was Alder who had to stop, and after only a few seconds. Her unexpected reciprocation had lit him up, and he was already hard and wanting to abscond with her.
For an instant, he wished he were more like his brother. Hale would have had no reservations about carrying her off, and he frequently did. But unlike his brother, Alder’s mind possessed a chamber of rationality, one with a chiding voice that sounded an awful lot like his older brother Cain’s. At present, the voice was reminding him that Silas would be there soon and he couldn’t rely on Hale to handle the encounter with sufficient diplomacy while he was off fucking their mate.
Taylor shot him a small pout as he turned her so that she was sitting with her back to him. Alder ignored the look and curved his hands around his new favorite part of her body, her rounding belly. It seemed like just last week he could cover the entire bulge with his outstretched hand, now it took both hands to adequately cup it. He knew it was only a matter of time before he would be feeling it kick.
“He’s not glaring at me anymore,” Taylor quietly remarked.
“Don’t worry about him,” Alder replied, knowing that she was referring to Hale.
Many of their conversations centered on his brother, which also didn’t bother him, except when it did. Taylor often looked to Alder to be the translator of Hale’s moods, not realizing that he was usually just as clueless as she was. This time, however, he was confident that he’d handled his brother deftly.
“What happened between the two of you?” she asked. “Last night, I was pretty sure he’d never speak to me again. Now, he almost seems like his normal self. Maybe a little standoffish, I suppose.”
“You know Hale. He gets pissed, says things he doesn’t mean, and then regrets it. He’s probably worried that you’re still angry with him.”
Alder had already decided that he would spare her the details of his argument with Hale. He knew that Hale was still seething inside and not ready to make nice with Taylor, but he’d also ensured that Taylor would know none of that.
“Don’t worry,” he told her. “He’s not going to pick any more fights with you.”
Her lips quirked. “Yeah, right.”
“I’m serious.”
“What did you—?”
Alder silenced her with a finger. “Enough about Hale. Just trust me.”
Taylor pushed his hand down gently. “Tell me one thing. Do you agree with him?”
Briefly, Alder thought back to what his brother had said, or rather, yelled at their mate. That she was wrong to have invited Carly to the valley. That her actions would destroy their family. That she never thought about the consequences of anything that she did. The last one was particularly ironic, coming from Hale, the king of impulsivity.
“I think that you should have included us from the start,” Alder said carefully. “But everything else Hale said, it was ridiculous.”
Taylor wet her lips. “Are you mad that I tried to find Silas a mate? I know that you hate him.”
“I don’t hate him,” Alder said, and he meant it.
He had hated Silas following Snow’s abduction. Even after he’d gotten her back, he still might have killed Silas, given the chance. However, time had dampened his animosity. It helped that Silas and his pack adhered to all of the rules set forth by their treaty, and that the young alpha was adequately deferent when in Alder’s presence.
Alder would never like Silas, but there was no room inside of him for hatred. He had a mate and a family that he cared for dearly, and so long as Silas never threatened them again, Alder would remain neutral towards him.
He went on to say, “I believe that everyone is overreacting to this situation with Carly and Silas. You, most of all. You need to relax and focus on yourself.”
“How can I possibly focus on myself?” she muttered, leaning back into his embrace. Her eyes stared off in Carly’s direction. “So, you say I’m overreacting. Does that mean you also think that Silas is going to turn her down?”
“I never said that.”
Her eyes widened. “You think he’ll like her?”
“I didn’t say that either,” he said, his lips twisting. “It’s difficult to say. I can’t really picture the two of them together, but then again I never would have imagined that I’d be able to share a mate with my brother.”
“That’s completely different.”
“All I mean is that anything can happen. You should have seen Sarah when Cain first brought her home to the den. She was so mousey-looking, and always squinting at everything because her eyesight was terrible.”
“What? Sarah is beautiful,” Taylor protested.
“She’s gotten better with age.”
Taylor fell silent, and Alder could practically hear the gears clicking in her head.
“Sarah must have been closer to your age than Cain’s,” Taylor finally said.
“Not really. What are you implying?”
Alder knew precisely what she was implying, but he did want to give her the chance to save face. Despite expecting her mates to share her harmoniously, she couldn’t handle the thought of either of them even expressing interest in another female. He knew that part of the reason her attention was fixed on Carly was that she was in close proximity to Hale, and she would tense ever so slightly whenever he spoke to her.
“I don’t know,” she said, running a hand through her hair.
“When I met Sarah, I had already made the mistake of falling for one of my brother’s mates. I wasn’t about to let that happen a second time.”
Taylor tilted her head up, her bottom lip puckering. “That’s not what I meant. I… I’m sorry.” She sighed, her shoulders slumping. “This whole situation has me so on edge. It’s really bringing out the worst in me. I feel like such an asshole today. Do you know that I pretty much accused Carly of ditching Henry?”
That did come as a surprise to Alder. Although Taylor could be every bit as aggressive as her female pack mates, her brand leaned towards passive.
“How did that go over?” he asked.
“Fine,” she said, pursing her lips. “She’s so damn nice, she just brushed it off. I guess I can see where Henry gets his friendliness from.”
Alder kissed the top of her head. “That’s something you would have never known if you hadn’t met her. I’m sure there are more things, too. Maybe you’ll even be friends one day.”
“Doubt it,” she said emphatically.
“You made friends with Holly and Bekka, and they aren’t even nice.”
That made her laugh. “Point taken.”
With an exaggerated yawn, Taylor stretched her arms up and then looped them around Alder’s neck.
“Can’t we skip all this and go to your bedroom? You do still have a bedroom here, don’t you?”
“I think so,” he said, feigning thoughtfulness. “Strange, I can’t seem to remember a time before the cabin.”
He kissed her again, this time making no effort to shield her from view. Predictably, she was the one to push him away. The shy look on her face only made him want her more.
“You don’t have anything to worry about,” Alder said, idly combing his fingers through her hair. “Everything is going to be fine.”
He was intentionally vague, his words casting a broad blanket over anything that might trouble h
er. No matter what happened, he would protect her and do everything in his power to ensure her happiness. It was his responsibility, because he owed all of his own happiness to her.
Chapter Five
Silas arrived accompanied by a handful of pack mates. Taylor recognized two of the larger males as his betas. She had only ever met them in passing and couldn’t remember their names, if anyone had ever even told her.
Olivia was there, too, as well as Silas’s youngest sister, Feather. Though she couldn’t be much older than twelve or thirteen, Feather was one of the sweetest and hardest working shifters on Taylor’s farming crew, and Taylor adored her. The native heritage that was part of her family’s bloodline was more pronounced in Feather. She had long, willowy limbs, dark skin and eyes, and sleek black hair. Embracing her name, she always wore a decorative headband of feathers.
Tonight, Feather went all out, wearing not only an elaborate headdress, but also a long, flowing cape of strung goose feathers and beads. Taylor made a mental note to ask her who made it, because she absolutely had to have one for herself.
Silas grew handsomer with each year. Taylor remembered the first time she’d seen him. He’d been good looking for a boy, but still going through the awkward transition from adolescent to man. Now, three years later, the transformation was complete. Years of eating well on Halcyon territory had bulked up his once wiry limbs and he had one of those long, muscled chests that Taylor had only ever seen on movie stars, models, and shifter males.
Framed by chocolate-colored hair that now reached his shoulders, Silas’s face was classically handsome. Two small scars, one under his left eye and the other on his jawline, only served to make him look more rugged and mature. In the years she’d known him though, Silas’s eyes had never changed. They were amber, a common color among wolf shifters. What was so striking about them was that they were not only wise, but also guileless. Silas always had the look of someone who was too busy analyzing everything to spend any time plotting.
At the moment, Silas’s gaze was fixed on Carly. His eyes belied little of what he was thinking, but his lips were pressed tightly together, as if he’d just bitten into a lemon.
Silas’s displeasure was to be expected, but Taylor was confused when she saw that Carly looked equally averse to Silas. She stared back at him, her jaw clenched and her shoulders stiff.
Hale was closer to the Whiteriver wolves, but he made no attempt to greet them, so it was Taylor and Alder who reached them first. When Silas saw Alder, his expression sobered, as it always did. While Silas and Hale’s relationship was combative at best, Silas was clearly intimidated by Alder.
“Welcome,” Taylor said. “It’s so good to have you all here.”
Silas rarely spoke to Taylor even when she wasn’t at Alder’s side, and so she wasn’t put off when he gave her only a nod of acknowledgement. Feather more than compensated for her brother, rushing up to Taylor to give her a big hug.
“We missed you in the fields today,” Feather said.
“I missed you all, too. You have no idea.”
Taylor and Holly both spent almost every morning in the fields with the Whiteriver wolves, usually with one or two pups in tow. The soil had been tilled and seeded in the spring, and now all that was left to do was to pull weeds and check for pests. Nevertheless, the farming crew passed entire mornings in the fields, chatting and exchanging stories until the afternoon heat pressed them to seek shade or sleep. Though Taylor would never admit it, she’d grown closer to the Whiteriver wolves over the past few months than she had to many of her own pack mates.
Feather sniffed at the air, her eyes brightening. “Do I smell boar meat?”
Boar meat was a rarity in Whiteriver. The roaming bands of wild boars lived on the other side of Halcyon Mountain. They were a bit out of the way for the Halcyon wolves to hunt, but still common on the menu. For the Whiteriver wolves, boars might as well have been on Mars for all they could hunt them.
“That you do,” Taylor said with a smile. “Come, all of you. Let’s eat.”
They all sat around the large bonfire where Carly had already been sitting with Lark and Hale. Lark lacked the presence of mind to get up when Silas sat beside her, effectively partitioning the would-be mates. The months that she’d been held prisoner by Whiteriver seemed not to have daunted her, because she immediately struck up a conversation with Silas as if they were old friends.
While Taylor tried to find an opening to introduce Carly, Hale simply interrupted Lark.
“Carly, this is Silas, alpha of Whiteriver.” As he spoke, he put his hand on the back of her neck, guiding her to look in Silas’s direction. “Silas, this is Carly Jasmine Wright, the mother of one of our pups.”
Taylor bristled. How the hell did he know her full name? Taylor wasn’t even sure that Hale knew her full name. She certainly couldn’t remember him ever saying it aloud.
“Good to meet you,” Silas said with zero inflection.
“You, too,” Carly said, glancing up at him briefly, before looking back to her feet.
Taylor’s stomach clenched with the awkwardness of it all. Unable to let the moment drag on any longer, she clapped her hands together loudly and put on her widest smile.
“Well, I’m starving. How ‘bout you guys?”
The chemistry between Silas and Carly showed little signs of improving as the meal began. Though everyone seemed intent on conversing with their closest neighbors, they were all watching the pair with clandestine interest.
It was painful to observe them. Though separated only by Lark, neither of them spoke to one another. Carly cast a few glances in Silas’s direction, but the young alpha didn’t once look her way.
As though oblivious to her brother’s lack of interest in Carly, Feather wedged herself between Carly and Hale, engaging the human in conversation about her pack and how much Carly would love living there.
“This boar meat is so good,” Feather gushed in between bites of skewered meat. “Do you know that we’re going to have pork next year? We’re building pastures and a barn. Since there are no herds in our territory, we’re going to dominate some animals.”
“Domesticate,” Taylor gently corrected.
Feather’s eyes brightened. “Right, domesticate. Oh, but don’t worry, Carly. We have still have plenty to eat. You’ll never go hungry.”
“That’s good to know,” Carly said softly. She was staring down at her meat skewer, twirling it around but not eating.
“Yeah, you’ll never go hungry,” Hale said. “As long as you don’t mind eating frog legs from time to time.”
At that, Carly looked up, a small smile gracing her lips.
“Frog legs?” she asked skeptically.
Hale leaned in, pushing Feather back to whisper conspiratorially. “I hear that frog legs are a Whiteriver staple.”
Clearly paying more attention than he’d let on, Silas shot Hale a warning look. Taylor’s mate ignored him.
“It’s not so bad,” Hale said. “I hear they taste similar to quail, except with an aftertaste of pond water.”
His comment earned a small chuckle from Carly, as well as a disbelieving shake of her head.
“You’re making that up.”
“He is,” Feather said, forcibly reinserting herself between them. “We don’t eat frog legs, not anymore. I mean, some people still like them, but there are plenty of other things to eat.”
“Yeah,” Hale agreed. “They also make bread out of ground pinecones. It tastes like ass.”
“How would you know what ass tastes like?” Feather shot back.
In her exasperation, she’d raised her voice and it carried over the crowd, garnering the attention of several groups of shifters. To Taylor’s complete and utter mortification, Hale looked directly at her and smiled. After shooting him a look of pure contempt, Taylor looked away, feigning interest in her food. She could only be grateful that none of the pups were there to witness what he’d done.
Carly seemed to think
that Hale was hilarious, though she had the grace to try and hide it. She kept a hand clamped over her mouth, her face red with exertion as she tried to keep from laughing. Once she recovered, she gave Hale a playful smack on the leg.
“Stop being so gross. Everyone’s eating.”
Briefly, Taylor wondered if she’d stumbled into another universe, one where Carly was so familiar with her mate that she thought nothing of touching him. Her sense of unreality only intensified when Hale responded with a flirtatious grin.
As her mouth ran dry and her blood began to pump faster, Alder’s arm looped around Taylor. He gave her a quick squeeze and offered her a piece of fragrant meat, fresh from the fire.
“Everything’s fine,” he said softly.
Taylor followed his gaze to Silas, who was finally looking at Carly. She looked back to Hale. He was holding a piece of meat in his hand, offering it to Carly.
“Try this. It’s the best part.”
Carly pursed her lips. “What part is it?”
He waved the meat in front of her face. “If I told you, you wouldn’t eat it. Just open your mouth.”
“No way,” Carly protested.
Hale leaned in close, once again pushing Feather out of the way. The juvenile looked indignant, but she wasn’t bold enough to argue with Hale a second time. Even Olivia, outspoken as she was, was hesitant to stand up to an alpha.
“Open your mouth,” Hale ordered, his voice nothing short of sultry.
Taylor’s skin crawled.
As soon as Carly’s mouth popped open, Hale placed the meat onto her tongue. After wiping invisible residue on her bottom lip, he placed his thumb on her chin, shutting her mouth.
“Now chew.”
Face flushed, Carly moved the meat around in her mouth. Before she could swallow, Lark burst out with, “It’s brains! You’re eating brains!”
Carly immediately gagged and coughed up the food, prompting laughter from many of the shifters. If she hadn’t been so livid over Hale’s antics, Taylor might have felt some sympathy. She remembered the first time she’d tried tripe and the laughter it had garnered once she’d realized what she was eating.