by M. L. Briers
“Perhaps her husband could have an unfortunate accident of the buried under a car variety…”Shaun offered, still at the threshold to the room. Cornelius was an old man, Alex wouldn’t pummel him, but his Beta on the other hand…
“No.”Alex growled out to his Beta. He wouldn’t bring heartbreak to his mate, no matter how much he wanted her to be his. She was someone else’s and she needed to stay that way.
“Just a thought, it’s always good to have options.”Shaun offered, and Cornelius sighed again as he shook his head in disapproval at the Beta.
“Perhaps you could woo her and win her in the old fashioned way…”Cornelius offered helpfully and Shaun chuckled.
“What’s that, tossing her over his shoulder and carrying her off…?”
“They’ll be no carrying her off…”Alex turned towards them. “And no wooing. She’s married. That’s the end of it.” Alex stalked towards the back door and yanked it open. The door protested under his not-so-delicate touch. Stripping off his clothes as he went, he shifted into his wolf and took off at full speed for the woods.
“They’ll be wooing…” Cornelius assured Shaun.
“And knowing Alex, they’ll be carrying off as well…”Shaun sighed as he strolled towards the stools and jumped up onto one beside the elder. “And I would not want to be Mrs Sofia Winchesters’ husband.” He added looking at the sorrowful remains of the tomato.
Sofia slammed the front door closed and used every single lock that she had, and there were many. Jonathon was nothing if not testy about her safety and had the men arrive on the first day she moved in to burglar proof the house.
Trouble was, this wasn’t a damn burglar, it was an Alpha, and it was her mate. There wasn’t a damn lock that could keep him out if he wanted to get in. As for doors, she thought the neighbours might object if she fortified her house with steel doors and windows.
“Crap….”She spat out, heading for the back door and checking to make sure she’d locked that before going to pack land. “Why didn’t he say anything?”She muttered as she kicked off her shoes and walked towards the counter, snapping the kettle on.
She reached for the mug and thumped it down onto the side. Pulling a bottle of scotch from the cupboard she put it next to the mug and reached for a spoon. Damn it, how could she be so stupid as to go to the pack in the first place? She should have just let Jonathon do it when he came on Saturday…
Saturday… Her eyes went wide and she reached for a glass putting it down next to her mug. Well, she couldn’t let Jonathon come down on Saturday, not now, not here…
She opened the jar of coffee and absently spooned in the instant brand. Perhaps she should come clean to everyone? Jonathon would understand… She reached for the kettle and added water to the glass… The alpha might not eat Jonathon if she told him not to, after all she was his mate… His mate… She opened the scotch and tipped it into the mug, returning it to the side…
God, she couldn’t be the mate of an Alpha, how wrong was that? She’d never been attracted to the dragging knuckles along the ground type that were just so Alpha-ish… she stirred her coffee and dropped the spoon on the side, bringing the cup to her lips…
The sound of her mobile going off made her jump… go away, not now. Didn’t they know she had something of a crisis going on here? Her new life had become a nightmare. This was supposed to be a new start, away from the city, away from the ladies that lunch... right now she’d prefer the claws of the ladies that lunch over the Alpha and what he wanted to eat…
Sofia groaned at the thought. The man was just so damn big. His muscles had muscles… her insides quivered unhelpfully and she took a mouthful of coffee… Her eyes went wide and she screwed up her face, staring down into the mug of coffee and scotch… spit or swallow? Spit or swallow?
She swallowed hard and regretted in with a long shiver.
“Damn.”She put the cup down on the side and eyed the glass of hot water. Picking it up with a shrug she tipped it into the mug and stirred it, tentatively tasting the brew… “Better.”She snorted as her mobile went off again.
Snatching it out her bag, she looked at her husband’s name and sighed. She did love Jonathon, he might not be her one true love, but he was a good man, and they complimented each other…
“Hey, babe…”She kept it light as she wrapped her hand around her mug and sipped the brew with its fiery kicker.
“How’d it go with the Alpha?”He chuckled, and she wanted to groan and smack her forehead down onto the counter. Maybe, if she hit just right, she might forget the last few hours of her life…
“Good. He says hi…”She lied. He may well eat you when you get here…
“That’s good. Listen, leave the heavy boxes for when Steve and I get there on Saturday…”
“Actually, Babe, it’s all nearly done…”She surveyed the boxes around her. Half the damn kitchen was still packed up.
“Seriously?”He chuckled and she swallowed a gulp of her scotch coffee.
“Yep. Why don’t you stay in the city this weekend, get the apartment sorted…?”
“But I thought you needed help?”He liked to stick to the plans he made. He had lists, long ones, and he lived by them.
“I made a new friend at the pack and she’s helping me…”She sucked the rest of the coffee down, hovered it, if she could mainline the stuff she’d be happier.
“Well…”
“Just think how great it will look when you come home to see everything done.”She eyed the boxes. Fat chance.
“You are trying to be a bit more independent aren’t you?”He chuckled again and she grimaced. Damn it, but she hated lying to him. He’d never told her a lie in his life. He couldn’t lie, it wasn’t in his make up to do it. He had good genes and she was Satan personified. She wanted to kick a cat. Any small, harmless, defenceless little fluffy creature… or maybe just a big furry Lycan alpha male…
“I gotta start somewhere right?”She wanted to bite off her lying tongue.
“Well, I do have some work to catch…”
“Great!”She almost did a jig. Her husband wasn’t going to get mauled to death, not this weekend anyway.
“Don’t sound so pleased not to see me. Anyone would think you had a man…”
“Ok. Gotta go. Speak later.”And she cut him off.
Sofia put her head against the cool marble kitchen counter and blew out a long breath of panic.
“I’m going to purgatory….”She rolled her forehead back and forth.
Alex watched her roll her head back and forth over the cool marble of the counter top and knew one thing about his mate from what he had just witnessed…
Not only did he have a Fae mate, not what he had pictured for himself, and not only was she married, a slight complication to the happily ever after he’d hoped for himself, but she was also… insane.
When life kicked you in the nuts, boy did it kick you in the nuts, and then it kept kicking while you were down rolling around on the damn ground. An insane, married Fae for a mate. He’d kind of like to have a word with The Fates, get a refund for this life.
Alex snorted his dismay as he watched her slide up onto a kitchen stool and reach for the bottle of scotch. It appeared she was also something of a drinker… Just what would he discover next? That the woman practiced Hoodoo instead of witchcraft? That she was skilled in the dark arts? Maybe she ate small children and robbed churches in her spare time. Maybe she raised the dead and had a basement full of demons that she would unleash on high days and holidays?
Alex turned on his paws and slowly walked back through the woods. Just because she was married, and slightly insane, didn’t make her a bad person. And he shamed himself by even thinking ill of his mate.
Not answering the mobile was easy enough, and as the constant ringing started to get annoying, next came the steady ping-ping-ping of the texts to really test her nerves, and finally she launched the bloody thing at the nearest wall, immediately feeling a sense of calm relief
wash through her.
Sofia went into her new art studio and sat down in front of the canvas in front of her. With the bottle of scotch in one hand and a paintbrush in the other she stared blankly as the scene of the woods that she had thought would be an ideal first project in the new house. Now she wished she’d never left the city.
The thumping on the front door wasn’t so easy to ignore as the mobile had been, or as easy to dispense with. Maybe a Lycan Alpha could rip the door from its hinges and launch it across the room. She had to content herself with yanking the front door open and glaring at… Her sister in law.
“Surprise!”
And then bloody some, she told herself, as Julia threw her arms up in the air and posed as her wonderful-self.
“What did I do to deserve this?”She spun her words into a positive when they were anything but…
“Thought you could use the company until my debauched brother comes up to join you on Saturday…”
Don’t bloody remind me, she growled into her own mind. “And then he called to say he was staying in the city over the weekend… so here I am…”
Yes, you are. Sofia thought, curling up in the corner and rocking back and forth wouldn’t give the best impression that everything was ok.
“Great.” Go away, go away, please for the love of the triple Goddess, go the hell away. She wished she could say that out loud.
“Well can I come in or what?”Julie pouted and Sofia stuck her head out the door, looked in either direction and yanked her inside, slamming the door and putting all of her locks back on as her sister in law stood there quietly watching her.
“Is there an axe murderer in the area I should know about?”She put one hand on her hip and the other had a finger out counting the amount of locks.
Sofia turned, blew out a laugh, and shrugged. “That’s your brother’s doing, apparently when he’s not here I have to keep it locked.”She lied, blowing out another laugh as she raised her brows and told herself she wasn’t a bad person for lying to her best friend, as she scurried into the living room and blew out a long breath of remorse.
“Ok. We’re going to have dinner and you’re going to tell me what’s going on…”
“I don’t know… what is going on?”Sofia shot back innocently, throwing the question back at Julia, who narrowed her eyes in confusion and shook her blonde bob over her shoulders.
“I don’t know what’s going on, but something is up.”Julia knew her friend. She might be her brother’s wife, but she had known her a lot longer, and this woman was hiding something, and it was a big something…
“Up? The bedrooms, want to see?”Sofia thought she’d sidestepped that one well, but then she had sunk a third of a bottle of scotch…
“Sofia?”Julia had that look, it was a cross between severe constipation and I have your number, and Sofia took a long breath and blew it back out on a sigh, as she rallied. Her back was snapped straight and she looked her friend in all three eyes… Scotch is good… and then tipped her head to one side and gave her an innocent look.
“Julia?”She turned the question back around and Julia took a few paces towards her and sniffed the air.
“Do not scent me.”Sofia snapped out indignantly and then frowned as Julia frowned.
“Scent?”
“Sniff. No sniffing, sniffing is wrong.”Sofia said adamantly as she took a step back. Her heel hit to sofa and she tipped into the seat, not very ladylike, but job done. She thought, looking at the pieces of the mobile scattered over the floor and gave a small ahhh.
“You’re as drunk as a skunk…”Julia announced indignantly and Sofia raised her brows in surprise and then frowned.
“I’ve never condoned the use of that, why…? How would a skunk get drunk? Unless you purposely got a skunk drunk, and that would be wrong…”
“Oh god, you are drunk. How dare you start without me…”Julia eyed the open bottle of scotch on the side and snorted. “The good stuff too. You need food…”
When Sofia looked up Julia was gone, and she snorted and looked back at her poor dead phone. When she looked up again the blonde bombshell was back and frowning like her mother, all she needed was a wagging finger…
“You have no food in the house whatsoever…”Julia wagged her index finger at her as she scolded her.
“Not true. There’s pop tarts in the studio.”Sofia sneered back.
“Well, you’re not going to mop that scotch up with pop tarts. Let’s go out to dinner…”Julia checked her watch, she was still on city time and city time said it was too early for dinner, but still…
“Nope. The local bar serves food, but that’s owned by the pack…”Sofia turned her body on the sofa and snuggled into the cushion.
“Oh yes, them, I forgot you chose to live next door to the hounds…” Julia had a thing about Lycans. She didn’t much care for them. Vampires were acceptable, Lycans were just big dogs with attitude and muscle.
“Snob.”Sofia was slipping down the cushion face first and Julia raised a brow and considered halting her progress, but then left her too it.
“So what’s got you reaching for the scotch in the middle of the day?”
“I couldn’t find any water.”She face planted the sofa cushion and Julia chuckled. She reached down and hauled her friend back up to a sitting position. Too fast, her head spun, or the room spun, or both.
“I’m going to make you a coffee.”Julia informed her and she snorted.
“That’s what got me into this state.”
Three cups of coffee and a pop tart later and Sofia felt more able to control the urge to run screaming from her life and never look back. The alpha had scented her that much was obvious by his reaction, it was only a matter of time before the mating pull brought him sniffing around, and by sniffing, she meant just that.
Julia was on a mission to put food in her cupboards and into their bellies, and a trip to the local shops had their baskets overflowing with food that she was glad she didn’t have to cook.
Sofia was on the hunt for a certain type of pasta that Julia had sent her to find, and she was just rounding the bottom of the aisle when she saw her alpha walk through the door, more like filled the door to the damn shop with his broad chest and thick muscled arms, and she froze in place before backing up and looking for the nearest exit that wasn’t filled by him.
“Damn it to hell.”She hissed out as he suddenly scented the air and his head snapped around in her direction, just as she disappeared from view.
She was at the top of the aisle and ran head first into Julia a moment later with the heavy sound of footsteps coming up behind her, and she froze in place again.
“Found it.”Julia announced holding up the pasta sauce triumphantly and searching Sofia’s basket with her eyes for the pasta. “You didn’t find yours.”
Not in so many words, but I found the big damn alpha coming up behind me…
“Mrs Winchester…”The growl was definitely all Lycan, definitely all male, and definitely a wakeup call to her whole body, and she tensed every muscle, even the ones she didn’t know she had, and some of the ones she didn’t want to be reminded of, as she looked up at Julia and saw her taking in her mate with a slight snort.
“Lycan, on your butt.”Julia hissed as she went to take a step back and Sofia’s hand shot out, grabbing her arm and digging her nails into the skin in a death grip.
“Stay.”She hissed up, imploring her with her eyes and getting an answering look of confusion back, but Julia stood her ground, and Sofia was grateful for that as she turned in place and came face to chest with her mate.
“Mr… Alex…”Sofia didn’t particularly want to tip her head back and look up into those dark brooding eyes. The image was already seared into her very soul; there was no reason to add fuel to the fire that was already smouldering inside her.
“I wanted to apologise for my mood this morning…”Alex’s deep sexy tone was making her heart beat faster and her palms sweaty, and she didn’t much care f
or the feeling, not with her best friend standing behind her.
“Not a problem, I’m not fond of printers either, and…”She ran out of lame excuses for his behaviour, and he had to know that she knew who he was by now. He could hear her heart probably better than she could, although it was pounding pretty damn loud in her ears right now.
“I wanted to invite you to dinner…”He drawled, drawled was an understatement, it was like a caress down her bloody spine and she wanted out of there before she got the urge to do something stupid, like rip all of her clothes off, throw herself over the display of fresh vegetables and ask him if there was anything he’d like.
“As a guest or the meal…”Julia mumbled from behind Sofia and put Sofia right in the firing line for the deep growl that rolled through his chest and up and down her body, leaving a tingling in its path and making her groan with the sensation.
“We haven’t met…”His eyes locked on Julia and she felt the power of his steady gaze.
“That’s true. Sofia we need to go…”Julia yanked her backwards, away from the temptations of the alpha’s chest that she was still staring at. The motion brought Sofia’s head back and her eyes locked with his, and boy did she feel that all the way down to her damn toes, curling inside her shoes…
Sofia got the distinct impression that he wanted to reach out to her, haul her back into place, maybe even haul her up against his body, and she flushed hot with the thought of palming that chest, feeling his heat and his strength against her.
“We...I… Going’s good…”Sofia wanted to pull out of her grip and fling herself at him, but she also wanted to let Julia drag her all the way through the shop and out of the door, to say she was tore would be the understatement of the year.
Alex’s eyes narrowed on her and confirmed what he already suspected, she knew she was his mate. This wasn’t just the pull of the attraction between them, she recognised who he was and her emotions were already intensified by it.
“Dinner?”He took a step forward and Sofia opened her mouth to answer, but Julia got there first.