Alpha 3: Home

by Treva Harte

  ALPHA 3:

  HOME

  Treva Harte

  ®

  Warning

  This e-book contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language and may be considered offensive to some readers. Loose Id® e-books are for sale to adults ONLY, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers.

  * * * * *

  This book contains explicit sexual content, graphic language, and situations that some readers may find objectionable (ménage and homoerotic sexual situations).

  Alpha 3: Home

  Treva Harte

  This e-book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Published by

  Loose Id LLC

  1802 N Carson Street, Suite 212-2924

  Carson City NV 89701-1215

  www.loose-id.com

  Copyright © January 2007 by Treva Harte

  All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this e-book may be reproduced or shared in any form, including, but not limited to printing, photocopying, faxing, or emailing without prior written permission from Loose Id LLC.

  ISBN 978-1-59632-409-1

  Available in Adobe PDF, HTML, MobiPocket, and MS Reader

  Printed in the United States of America

  Editor: Catherine Gilbert

  Cover Artist: April Martinez

  www.loose-id.com

  Prologue

  Bright-eyed, Rome crouched lower, waiting for the next yahoo who might crawl out his hole and try something new. He could use the exercise. He wasn’t afraid of a bar brawl, even with the odds against him. Except for The Change. A little too much excitement and he might give the cretins in this place a real surprise with his transformation. Then he’d be both bright-eyed and bushy-tailed ‑‑ and have good sharp teeth and claws to top things off. So be it. They’d started the fight, after all.

  He didn’t listen to the catcalls and noise. Instead he kept his eyes and ears open for whoever moved next. Someone threw a beer bottle and the light on the ceiling swayed, the electric glow giving a weirdly strobe-like effect.

  A split second later the outer door opened and everyone’s attention turned to the newcomer. For just a moment the waves of light played over his face, as if it was a theater marquee.

  “What the hell ‑‑ ?” The gravelly voice at the doorway was cool, despite the words.

  Rome tried to stay alert, tried not to stare at anything but the crowd in front of him. But prickles rippled over his skin and the hair on the back of his neck rose.

  The face had been revealed clearly in the eerie light. He knew that voice very well. He’d lived with that face and voice, night and day, in his dreams and wide awake.

  He’d vowed when he left that he was never going to listen or dream about that voice again.

  He’d lied to himself.

  “Stay out of this, Grey.” Rome jammed his elbow, hard, into the fool who thought he had a chance to take him off guard. The man crumpled to the floor, whimpering. “Stay out or take me on.”

  “Shit, boy.” The new man took a step forward.

  Rome whirled, adrenaline surging, and grabbed Grey by the collar.

  “Didn’t you hear me?”

  They were almost mouth to mouth. Shit. Yeah, it was Grey all right. The same scars criss-crossing his face. The same scowl. Grey said people were put off by his scars. He’d even seriously thought Rome should be put off because Grey was older. But there was a hell of a lot more to him than some old wounds or grizzled hair. Ah, hell. Grey’s scent was just as sexy as ever. His body was just as muscular, tough and potent. Rome swallowed, his throat suddenly going dry.

  Grey barked out a short laugh. “You’re getting mighty close for a fighting man. Do you want to fight me or fuck me?”

  Both. Holy God, he wanted both.

  “Why’re you here?” Pushing Grey away, Rome kicked out, landing a blow right under the chin of the bartender, who had been inching toward his nightstick.

  “To fetch you back, boy. We need you.”

  “Why?”

  We need you, wasn’t I need you. But then Grey wasn’t much for telling folks what he wanted. Hadn’t that been the problem? Grey’s dumb ass, “I don’t feel anything” act was why Rome had vowed he wasn’t ever going back. And he wasn’t.

  Grey slammed the next would-be brawler onto the bar and then slid the unconscious man onto a bar stool, where he slumped, completely out for the count. “Well, like they said in another family, we’ve got a little proposition we don’t think you can refuse.”

  He wasn’t doing what Grey or the rest told him to do any more. But somehow Rome found himself inching out of the bar, when a few minutes ago all he’d wanted was to stay and fight. Grey was at his back ‑‑ protecting him? Herding him? ‑‑ both were possible. But neither of them bothered to say anything until they stepped out into the night air.

  Then it seemed Grey had plenty to say.

  “Shit, boy, haven’t I told you to keep out of stupid damn brawls? I don’t care if your wolf is up and you want to go howl. Fighting like that just isn’t smart. Non-weres can get the best of us if there are enough of them. I’m proof of that. If it hadn’t been for your Daddy ‑‑ ”

  “I know the lecture. How Dad saved you from death when you got into a fight where you were outnumbered. How I’m just a stupid pup with no sense. How you should never try to mess with anyone when the odds are bad. I’ve got it memorized.” Rome threw his hand up in the air. “Now you need to ask me if I care.”

  “You’re an idiot, Rome.”

  “I’m on my own now. All grown up and not listening to what my elders tell me. I’m not going back.”

  “You fucking well are. I promised.”

  “Ohh, because you promised. That’s why. Be honest. You wouldn’t give a damn if I did die in some damn fight. Good riddance, I’d finally stop bothering you. Right?”

  Before he got his answer, lightning struck ‑‑ lights danced in front of his eyes before darkness slid, peacefully but inevitably, around him.

  Grey spat once, flexed the fist that had knocked Rome out and looked down at the huddled heap in front of him. Damn, the boy had turned out handsome. Handsome as his daddy, but with his mama’s pretty eyes.

  Pretty boy. He’d never gone for pretty boys before. Non-weres would call Rome a twinkie. Weres didn’t like things that sweet. They went for meat. Preferably raw. But damned if this twinkie wasn’t tempting. Rome had been tempting him for years, in fact. When he wasn’t getting Grey mad enough to do something like hit him.

  Ah, hell. There was no way around it, no way to make little of Rome or ignore him. Rome wasn’t just a pretty boy, even though he had the face of an angel. If he had been, Grey would never have looked twice. What he was remained to be seen.

  The kid had a tongue on him, though. He could hone right in and make a man’s head buzz.

  You don’t give a damn. Right?

  Ask me if I care. Do I?

  “Yup. I guess I forgot to ask if you cared.” Grey hoisted Rome’s dead weight over his shoulder and headed for his truck. “But then again, boy, you forgot the part about even when it looks safe, you still gotta keep your eyes open.”

  Chapter One

  “I’m getting tired of stalling. If we have to play nice much longer, I’m going to forget myself and bite them.”

  Lin grinned at Leila. “Sorry
, Mom. You wouldn’t be all that effective seeing as you can’t change. Maybe you should ask one of the pack.”

  “Oh, shush, smart mouth.” Leila began to pace. “I can’t help it if the rest of you get hairy and toothy during the full moon.”

  “Weres rule, humans drool.”

  Lin’s mother swatted her after that response. The rest of the group didn’t crack a smile.

  “This strange pack isn’t going to wait forever. I’ve been doing some investigating. They’re not known for playing nice but apparently they’re willing to try because they badly want a breeding female.” Lowell tapped his finger on the chair’s arm rest. “If we cross them, however, I wonder how long they’ll stay pleasant?”

  “Maybe they know your rep as well and don’t want to challenge you.” Lin hopped onto the arm of Lowell’s chair to hug her mate.

  Lowell shrugged. “Whatever. I appreciate your support, Dek and Leila, but this is about an offer for someone within my pack. You may boss your own pack but neither of you are Alpha here. It’s my problem. My pack and my problem.”

  Mia froze.

  And it’s about me. Not that anyone has checked for my opinion lately. Then again, I’m just the omega. The omega who happens to be a breeding female. And we have a pack desperate enough to consider having a non-alpha for breeding. A pack desperate enough to make a formal offer for me.

  She glanced over at the alphas in the room and reminded herself to keep her mouth shut. Over the years Mia had come to like and respect not only her alphas, but also the alphas of the neighboring pack, who happened to be her mistress’ parents. That didn’t mean she felt comfortable speaking up when they were meeting.

  “It’s not necessarily all your problem.” Leila looked at Dek, who nodded agreement. “We have a proposition to make. One that might solve both our problems.”

  “What problem?”

  “Our own breeding issues. What if you tell the outsider weres that you’ve already accepted an offer from our pack for Mia?”

  Mia let out a small, surprised yelp.

  “Who do you have to mate ‑‑ ?” Lowell glanced at Dek and hastily turned his eyes back to Leila. Definitely not Dek. Everyone knew that Dek and Leila were thoroughly bound to each other.

  “Rome left you months ago. No one knows where he is. Besides, I thought he had the same ‑‑ uh, fertility problems ‑‑ that I have. He is my brother, after all.” Lin spoke calmly, but her jaw was clenched.

  Mia had figured out that Lin wasn’t going to be having any children for their pack. Everyone knew it wasn’t for lack of trying on Lowell and Lin’s part ‑‑ good Lord, trying wasn’t the term for what the two of them had been up to for the past six years. But six years was a long time.

  “No, not Rome.” Leila shook her head.

  Lin continued, “We would have accepted a formal offer from you years ago but you have the same problem that we do. There’s no one. Our pack has Lowell ‑‑ ”

  “ ‑‑ who would rather not have his balls removed for trying anything with anyone but his mate, thank you ‑‑ ” Lowell smiled, briefly.

  “ ‑‑ and Oscar and his mate, who are just as bound as Lowell and I are.”

  And just as infertile. Two beta males who bonded with each other didn’t upset pack dynamics, but they’d never produce children.

  Mia swallowed. Both their packs were so small. Too small. Lowell and Lin had Oscar, his bondmate, Enrique, and her. Leila and Dek once had Rome in their pack but he left after the fight with Grey ‑‑

  Mia, probably because she had the most at stake, saw it first. The idea was so stunning that she actually spoke up without permission before all four of them. “Grey? You’re offering Grey?”

  * * * * *

  “Grey, you fucking asshole.” The words might have sounded more forceful if they hadn’t ended in a hiss. “What the hell was that sucker punch for?”

  Grey handed him some aspirin and a glass of water. “Just a love tap, boy, to remind you I still care.”

  There was a brief pang of relief when the younger man swung his body up from the bed and grabbed for what Gray held out. Rome had been lying so still on the motel bed, breathing so heavily…

  “Bull.” Rome gulped the medicine and the liquid with his eyes shut. “You never gave a damn about me. Do you think I’m going to forget about the last night we were together?”

  Gray sure as hell hadn’t.

  “We were never together, Rome.”

  “We might not have had sex ‑‑ well, technically ‑‑ but we damn well were together.”

  “You were too fucking young. And you’re still too fucking young for me. You’re not even twenty, for God’s sake!” Grey heard himself yelling. Damn it! He was known for keeping calm. When did all that half-concerned, cool amusement vanish? How the hell did this pup get under his skin? No one had done that for years.

  No one but Rome. Shit, the boy had inherited some gene that let him zero right in and gnaw at a man. Got it from both his parents, most likely. Damn Rome‘s whole family. I’m an idiot for putting up with the pack of them all these years.

  Decades.

  Decades of wanting. First Rome’s daddy and then him. Knowing he couldn’t have either of them for real. Knowing it was wrong and stupid and futile to feel that way.

  “You’re wrong. Wrong about us,” Rome whispered.

  Wanting.

  Just like the want he saw in Rome’s eyes, now that they were open and looking straight at him. Still. Rome wanted him that bad still. No one had ever had that look for him. Just him. A burn rose up in Grey’s throat, almost stopping his speech. He got the words out anyhow.

  “I hurt you once. I figured you’d get over it.”

  “Oh, I did. Licked my wounds ‑‑ and someone else ‑‑ after I crawled away from your bed that night. I didn’t die from you saying no, Grey. In fact, I’ve done just fine on my own and with other people, both in and out of bed.” Rome’s lips twisted. “But I knew then and I know now that we could have built up something even better together. We should have. It was your stubbornness, your blindness that spoiled it.”

  “Maybe it just delayed things a mite.”

  Rome didn’t answer. Grey couldn’t blame him. He didn’t know what to say himself to that last sentence.

  “What does that mean?” Rome sounded shakier now than he had when he first came to.

  “Why don’t you take your pants off and find out?” Hell. He really hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

  “Don’t try to shit me, Grey.”

  Then again, maybe he had meant it. His body hummed with excitement. What the hell did he have to lose? The kid was already angry with him for not having sex. What difference would sex make?

  “Hey, where’s all that sweet talk, boy? I’m giving in, letting you have your way with me. It was all ‘I love you’ when I wouldn’t put out.” Grey unbuttoned his shirt. “Are you telling me you won’t respect me in the morning?”

  He heard a shaky sigh.

  “Unbutton your pants, too, Grey, and I’ll bet I respect you a hell of a lot. I remember the monster inside there.”

  “It remembers you, too, boy.” His cock stiffened, as if in agreement.

  “Rome. Call me Rome, damn it, not boy.”

  “Then let me see what kind of man you are.”

  It was a wonder Rome didn’t rip his pants, he got them off so fast. Grey would have smiled, but when all the blood in your body was rushing to your cock, it was kind of difficult to remember how. The kid didn’t bother to pace himself, just tore his clothes off and let Grey see.

  God. Damn. It.

  The body was as perfect as his damn face. This was no kid. Rome was a man. Hard muscles, furred chest, tight ass. Rome’s cock was already jutting out in excitement. Oh, yeah. He was just as tasty as Grey had imagined in his fantasies.

  Grey stopped, pants halfway down his legs and said, “Suck me off.”

  “We’ve been there before.” But Rome’s eyes were shining
. “You better plan to go a little further than that tonight. Or are you going to back off again, old man?”

  “Your ass is going to know where I’ve been soon enough. But I want your mouth right now.” Those full lips and those teeth with just the slightest overbite. That freaking agile tongue, longer than any non-were’s. God, yes. They both wanted it, no matter what might be said out loud.

  Rome was on his knees and drawing Grey’s leaking cock inside almost before Grey had told him what to do, the kid’s cheeks already hollowing out as he began the suction. Oh yeah, this boy knew how to suck cock.

  Grey clenched his hands into fists, fighting the urge to spew right then, right into that clever mouth. It had been too long since Rome had done that and it had ended too abruptly.

  “Jesus, don’t tell me to stop this time, Grey. Don’t.” Rome murmured the words against Grey’s aching shaft. Grey shuddered, holding onto Rome’s shoulders before he slid to the floor.

  “You can bet I won’t. We’re not stopping until we’re both dripping wet, cross-eyed and face down on the floor.” Grey loosened his grip long enough to transfer it into Rome’s too long hair. He thrust hard into Rome’s mouth and that mouth let him in. Harder, longer, faster. He thrust deeper than he had in years with any of his partners.

  Grey was too damn big for most people and he’d learned to be considerate. Fuck consideration this time. He finally had a partner who knew how to match him. Rome was already making him forget everything but the animal that wanted more.

  And Rome was giving him more.

  Jesus, he was buried to his balls, with Rome’s lips still wrapped around his cock. And the kid was murmuring approval and making things feel too damn good…

  “Shit. Not. Yet.” Grey forced himself to stop.

  “You’d better be planning to finish this or ‑‑ ”

  “Or what?” Grey didn’t wait for the answer. “Get on your hands and knees. I want your ass bad.”