by Bonnie Vanak
THE MATING CHASE
Book 1 in the Werewolves of Montana series
Bonnie Vanak
THE MATING CHASE- Copyright © 2013 by Bonnie Vanak
WARNING: This is a short story containing explicit sex.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
All characters in this book are fiction and figments of the author’s imagination.
Published 2013 by Bonnie Vanak
Visit www.bonnievanak.com
Welcome to the sensual world of the Lupine, where the burning drive to mate claims all...
Home from college, where men teased her for being overweight, Beth doesn’t fit into pack life at the Mitchell ranch. Because she’s forgotten how to shift into a wolf, the pack alpha has ordered her to choose a mate or leave. The only male Beth desires is Dale, a fiercely protective Lupine who loathes the human lifestyle she embraces. She hungers for the handsome shifter’s touch, but fears their differences are too vast to overcome.
Dale has waited for four long years for Beth’s return. Her scent ignites his desire and her voluptuous body fires his blood. He is determined to awaken her to the sensual world of the Lupine. Although she acts more “Skin” than wolf, he can’t deny his overwhelming drive to claim her.
As the heat of passion threatens to consume them both, a new peril arises. Someone is killing a local rancher’s livestock and blaming it on wolves, endangering the pack’s ability to shapeshift. It will take all Beth’s courage and Dale’s skill to find the enemy threatening to destroy their world...
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 1
SHE HAD ONE week to shift into a wolf before Aiden kicked her out of the pack forever.
Beth Langston jerked open the frosted glass door, stepped into the shower and twisted the knobs to full blast. Hot water pelted her shivering body. Letting it rinse away her troubled thoughts, she leaned against the marble wall. Instead of showering, she should have accompanied the pack members who’d gone for a morning hunt. But it was hard to run with wolves when you couldn’t turn into one.
Because she’d forgotten how to Change. After four years of living among humans, she’d forgotten everything about being Lupine. Lately her bedroom in the pack lodge provided the only escape from scrutinizing stares.
Beth picked up the natural glycerin soap and lathered. Foam streamed downward, past her big breasts, down the slight curve of her belly, past the red rose inked on her too-big left hip. The tat had been a drunken impulse, an attempt to look cool among humans, or Skins as Lupines called them.
In the college she’d attended back East, men had teased her about being overweight. Bookish and shy, Beth didn’t blend in with the model-thin students and their trendy clothes.
Here at the ranch in Montana, the males also avoided her. She was more Skin than Lupine. Beth didn’t blend in with other female Lupines either, who loved riding horses, rounding up cattle and running with the moon.
Swirls of odorless suds pooled at her feet. Beth threw the soap at the wall.
“I’d screw a troll for a bar of lilac soap right now,” she said aloud.
“How about a cowboy?”
Through the fogged glass she saw a wide-shouldered man over six feet tall, a dark Stetson tipped low on his forehead. She’d know that deep, raspy voice anywhere. Dale Mason, head of security for the pack.
“What the hell are you doing in my bathroom?” she yelled.
Instead of answering, he pawed through her medicine cabinet, removed something and then shut the door. Shock pummeled her as the shower door opened and he held out a lavender bar of soap.
“Found this behind a big bottle of peroxide. You must have forgotten it was there.”
Beth covered her breasts. “Ever hear of knocking?”
“I did. You didn’t hear. Take it. I’m not looking.”
She took the soap, her fingertips brushing against his calloused palm. A shiver born of something deep and intense raced down her spine. Cool air brushed against her nipples, turning them into hardened pearls. Or maybe it was the rugged cowboy, his masculinity wrapping around her like a warm towel.
“Thanks,” she muttered. “I was joking about screwing a troll.”
“I wasn’t.”
The words made her stomach clench. Heat that had nothing to do with the shower poured through her. Beth inhaled the soap’s delicate fragrance before setting it on the little brass dish.
Face still averted, Dale grabbed a towel and dangled it before her like a rope. Or a noose. “I’m to escort you to your uncle. He wants you in his study in ten minutes. I’ll wait for you in the hallway.”
The reckoning had come. No longer could she hide from Aiden. Beth shut off the water, took the towel. Dale headed for the door as she wrapped the terrycloth around herself, the ends barely meeting past her truck-sized hips.
“Nice tat,” he murmured.
“You said you didn’t look!”
Dale opened the bathroom door and glanced her way.
“You’ve been gone a long time. You forgot one thing about me, little Beth.” He flashed a lazy grin. “I lie.”
When she emerged from the bedroom five minutes later, Dale gave an approving nod.
Leaning against the wall, one dusty boot crossed over the other, he hooked his thumbs into the pockets of his tight, faded jeans. Her gaze drifted from his uncompromising jaw to those eggshell blue eyes to the tufts of hair peeking from the V of his chambray work shirt. Beth glanced at the bulge in his crotch and jerked her gaze away.
A small, amused smile played on his wide mouth. He touched his hat’s brim with a forefinger, acknowledging her look.
“Let’s go.” He motioned down the hallway.
She followed those wide shoulders as he walked with a natural, swaggering grace. Everyone else had ignored her. Not Dale, who loathed Skins and preferred a cabin in the woods to living on the ranch. Yet, despite her Skin lifestyle, he’d been kinder and more companionable than the 98 others in her uncle’s pack.
The double oak doors were closed. Dale rapped once, then turned a doorknob. He flashed a smile.
“He’s not just the alpha, he’s your uncle. Don’t worry. Everything’ll turn out okay. Trust your instincts.”
As she stepped inside, he closed the door behind her.
Staring out the window at the horses cropping in the pasture, Aiden Mitchell sat in a leather chair behind a granite-inlaid desk stacked with file folders. A matching credenza held a computer monitor, its icon blinking lazily. He turned, greeting her with a warm smile.
“Beth. Please sit.”
Spine rigid, she sat in a matching leather chair in front of the desk.
Her mother’s brother was classically handsome. Thick ebony hair curled at the collar of his white shirt, the sleeves rolled up to display tanned, muscled forearms. A black beard wreathed his firm mouth. He stood well over six feet, all muscle and sinew, a Lupine who could bench press one of the ranch’s pick-up trucks.
Other than the dark hair and eyes, they looked nothing alike.
Squeezing her fingers together in her lap, she waited. Dominating Aiden’s desk was a framed photo of a laughing woman. Wind teased the woman’s long blonde hair, and her blue
eyes glinted with mischief as she gazed into the camera.
The photo hadn’t been there when she’d left for college. “Is that Nikita, leader of the Blakemore pack? The one who asked you to help build a new barn a few years ago?”
Aiden opened a drawer and put the photo away. “It’s ancient history.”
Interesting. Her rugged uncle had a soft spot.
He drummed long fingers on the desktop. “I’ve come to a decision about your future, Beth. You must be mated. Or leave.”
Perspiration dampened her palms. “You said I had a week to shift.”
“I’m sorry, honey. You’ve been home for two full moon cycles, and show no signs of turning Lupine. You leave me no choice. I have a pack filled with single males who get cranked up every time they scent an unmated female in heat. I can’t risk having you around unless you have a mate to protect you.”
Piercing brown eyes regarded her with keen intelligence. “Is there is a Lupine in the pack who captures your interest?”
Beth thought of the ranch hands. The only one she desired was Dale. She hesitated. Dale was too Lupine. With her Skin habits and love of the Skin lifestyle, they’d clash.
“I can’t pick out a guy like he’s a pair of shoes from a catalog.”
Disappointment showed in Aiden’s eyes. “Then one will be selected for you, according to the ancient rituals. You have three choices. Agree to a challenge match in which all the single males fight and you mate the winner. Submit to a chase and you mate with the first male who catches you. Or leave. I’ll need your answer by noon.”
She gripped the chair’s handles in white-knuckled panic. “So you’ll only allow me to stay if I’m mated. Not much of a choice, uncle.”
He leaned forward. “It’s for your own safety. Especially since you’re acting more Skin than Lupine and can’t defend yourself if a male loses control and tries to force you.”
“I can protect myself. They taught self-defense in school.”
Her uncle snorted. “Defend yourself in your Skin suit during your fertile period against 150 pounds of muscled wolf whose biological instinct is to cover and impregnate you?”
“You’re their leader. You can control them.”
“Not any more. They’re too wild. I have to find them mates and settle them down.”
“Why pick on me? What about the other females?” she challenged.
“All of them except Arianna are mated. She’s a unique case who requires careful consideration.” Aiden’s jaw tensed. “Dale volunteered to be your champion for the mating challenge.”
Bile rose in her throat. Dale hated violence. Captured by Skins as a wolf, for nearly two years he’d been forced to fight small dogs for sport. The Skins always kept him hungry so he’d fight harder. Lacking fresh meat, Dale had remained trapped in wolf form until Aiden found and freed him.
The experience had turned Dale into a mute, empty shell. Aiden had given him responsibilities to coax him back into life. And then she’d arrived a year later, and had taken to the silent, but strong Lupine with an oddly fierce desire to protect her.
“No,” she whispered. “It would destroy him.”
“He is my head of security.”
“And he does it out of loyalty to you, to keep the pack safe. That’s different from fighting friends. I won’t force him into drawing blood.”
“Then you’re left with the mating chase. Or leaving. You can return to your parents in Alaska.”
The room turned glacial as she thought of her unconventional parents who’d chosen to live in Lupine form to “get in touch with our roots.”
“As a Skin with wild wolves? I can’t do that. I came here because I felt more at ease with you and everyone else. But now I don’t. I can’t remember how to shift.”
Misery tightened her throat. She wasn’t going to cry. Not here.
But she couldn’t help the tears springing to her eyes. As she wiped them away with an angry fist, Aiden pushed back from his desk and took the seat beside her. Her uncle squeezed her palm. It felt reassuring and comforting.
All Lupines craved touch. But in college, she’d learned to live without it.
“I don’t want you to leave, honey. I know how miserable those Skins made you when they mocked your weight.”
A dull flush rose to her cheeks. “I dated.” Once.
“I saw the photo you texted. He’s beneath you.”
“Bobby wasn’t bad.” He didn’t even try to kiss me, but we had fun at the movies.
“You could do much better,” he said gently.
“I went to school to get an education, not a boyfriend. I graduated Summa Cum Laude.”
“We were very proud of you. And now it’s time for you to resume your place among the pack.”
A headache began pounding in the back of her skull. “You’ll have to bribe the males for this.”
Aiden’s mouth quirked. “You’re thinking like a Skin. When I proposed the mating chase this morning, fifty-seven males begged to compete. All the single males, except for Kyle.” His gaze grew distant. “He’s away on an assignment.”
She stared at him. “For me? Are they that desperate?”
Her uncle gave an inscrutable smile. “No, you’re that attractive. You just don’t realize it. Yet.”
Chapter 2
DALE HOVERED IN the hallway. Lupine hearing allowed him to listen to every word through the closed doors.
Four years of college living with Skins had changed Beth. Instead of growing confident, she slunk around the ranch like an Omega, trying to hide beneath those oversized black dresses. She covered her sexy natural scent with floral lotions. Before she’d gone away, Beth had enjoyed keeping him company when he patrolled. Now she stayed inside and surfed the Internet, as if she hated fresh air.
Hair of rich ebony tumbling down to her waist, Beth had a face as pretty as any Skin model. She was smart, sexy and sassy, and he’d always enjoyed sparring verbally with her. Now she’d become quiet and withdrawn.
Aiden had told him the Skins in college teased Beth about her weight. But whoa, her body was perfect, the type to make a Lupine male salivate. Those wide hips and generous breasts were perfect for bearing and suckling young, and providing many enjoyable nights making those babies.
When he’d glimpsed her naked in the shower, Dale had fought for control. Tight coral nipples tipped her breasts, the kind he loved to squeeze. Water cascaded down her body in an erotic river. He longed to trace every droplet with his tongue. Position her against the wall, spread her legs wide, drop to his knees and demonstrate how erotic her own natural scent was to a hot-blooded male. His muscles knotted as he imagined how delicious she’d taste beneath his tongue, how he could make her squirm and squeal and then finally scream.
Then he’d push his cock into her soft, wet heat, branding her with his scent, his touch, his body.
But she acted more Skin than Lupine. Dale distrusted Skins. He only drove into town to fill his basic sexual urges. Sex with Skins meant his natural inclination to dominate in bed. If his partner attempted to take charge, he bolted.
Flattening his palm against the door, he felt his heart twist. Beth was unhappy. She needed to accept becoming Lupine again. But most of all, she needed to accept herself.
He stepped back as the door swung open. Beth emerged, looking like a meteor hit her. Pity filled him. He knew what it was like to feel trapped and your world turned inside out.
But damn, he agreed with Aiden. Their kind got a little crazy when an unmated female went into heat. Felt like someone flipped a switch and triggered him to think of nothing but sex.
“Make your decision?” he asked.
Her lush, pink mouth thinned. “Thanks for offering to be my champion. But I don’t need your sympathy.”
“I didn’t do it because I pitied you, damn it.” He drew in a breath. “Ever consider that maybe I want you, too?”
“How much did my uncle pay you to say that?”
Frustration filled him. �
�You can’t get it through your head. Those assholes kept mocking your weight. You’re not fat, Beth.”
“Right.”
“You’ve lived among the Skins too long. They’ve ruined you. You’re using artificial soap, hide in your room instead being outside...”
“I like scented soaps.”
“I like the way you smell without them.”
“Yeah. I smell without them all right.”
Dale stepped close enough to see the sparks of green in her brown eyes. He loved the way her gaze lit up when she was happy. He itched to see her eyes dazed with passion as he made love to her, and then sated and sleepy afterwards.
“No, you don’t. You smell like sun-dried cotton. Crushed wildflowers after a spring rain. And tart grapes in a full-bodied red wine.”
Her expression softened, then the suspicion returned, a wariness he’d noticed since the moment she walked through the front door and dumped her suitcases in the front entryway.
“Guess it’s a good thing I don’t smell like your favorite beer.”
Dale’s mouth curled. “Darling, I drink beer because it’s available. But rare wine I savor slowly. Some things taste too good as they slide down your throat. You want to take your time, and make them last.”
Beth gave him a doubtful look, but the wariness fled. She looked intrigued.
Time to kick it up a level. “I’d do the same with you. Taste you, all over. Love you slow and easy. Real slow until you got accustomed to my touch.”
Sniffing, she shook her head. “You’re pretty sure of yourself, Dale. You’re like a frat boy who thinks he can flatter and seduce the chubby girl and then dump her.”
“I’m not a Skin,” he said, struggling to curb his rising temper. “Don’t ever compare me to one. And stop thinking of yourself in Skin terms or you’ll never shift into a wolf. Your uncle is too easy on you. If I were your guardian, I’d have kept you here among your own people until you chose a mate, and then allowed you to attend college.”
“And if I refused?”
“Turned you over my knee and given you a good spanking.”