by Flynn, Donna
Mercy frowned. He was trying to smoothly move on to another subject so she wouldn’t question him about the bruising on his face, but she was having none of it. It was bad enough he left her every weekend, but now he was coming back with injuries that he refused to explain to her and that made her angry. “You are not turning this around. I want to know what happened to your face.” She placed her hands on her hips and glared, waiting for an answer.
Alec shook his head at her persistence. He had worried about her reaction the entire drive back to the mountains and now she was doing exactly what he had feared she would do, over react. Not long ago she would have just accepted his refusal to talk about it, but now that she had found her werewolf side she was not so easily swayed into obedience. While he found it adorable at the present, soon it was not going to be acceptable. When he took over his father’s pack, his word would be law. Her disagreeing with him in public would be detrimental to his position as Alpha and he had to make her understand that, but he didn’t want to hurt her. “It was just a little misunderstanding, nothing for you to worry about.”
She blew out an exasperated breath and stared him down, but she could tell he wasn’t going to budge. “In other words you aren’t planning to tell me what happened.” Since he had started traveling back and forth, he had been keeping many things from her. She wasn’t sure what exactly, but she was hurt that he thought he couldn’t come to her with whatever situation was bothering him.
Alec sighed inwardly. The monotonous travel was taking its toll on their relationship. She was upset he was gone so much and keeping things from her, and he was tired of longing for her when he was at home amongst the pack he would soon lead. Soon, he was going to have to tell her everything that was going on, but after being separated from her for days, all he wanted was to hold her in his arms and forget about everything else but her.
Mercy sensed his need for peace, decided to let the bruise go for the moment, and just enjoy the fact he was there beside her and was just as happy to see her as she was to see him, but soon she knew they would have to talk. “I love you,” she said, kissing him long and hard to remind him what he had been missing when he was gone.
“I love you too,” he said as he pulled back, resting his forehead resting against hers. “You will never know how hard it is for me to be away from you.”
“Oh I think I understand completely. It is no picnic being away from you either,” she murmured as he moved in to kiss her again.
Fire, ran through Alec’s body as she pressed herself against him. Every part of him, human and wolf, responded to her. Before he knew what happened he had her pressed against the car, his hands moving over her body as his lips danced in time with her own. She tasted sweet, like honeysuckle, and she smelled so dangerously intoxicating that he couldn’t get enough of her. It was a dangerous game they were playing, one that neither wanted to end, but as always, the promise he had made her brothers repeated in his head. He knew he had to stop before they got carried away and went too far.
“Alec,” Mercy murmured against his lips, her breathing raspy, her voice laced with desire as her hand moved under his shirt, her fingers cool rubbing against his overheated skin. “Why don’t we take a walk in the woods and continue this there?”
“You’re killing me, Angel,” he said, dipping his head to taste her sweet lips once more.
Mercy knew he was as tempted as she was, and played on it. He had promised her brothers he wouldn’t have sex with her until they were bonded, but the nightmares she experienced recently made her fear they might never be together if it didn’t happen soon so she pressed him for more.
Alec’s wolf growled deep inside of him as he broke off the kiss and took a step back. He breathed in some of the cold night air hoping to cool himself off, but Mercy wasn’t done with him. She looked up at him with desire-laden eyes and smiled devilishly, moving so fast he barely had time to register what she was doing before she had him pressed against the car, her mouth laying siege to his as her hands roamed over his already over-stimulated body. He knew he should push her away and make her see that he was trying to do the right thing by her, but when her hands slid over his stomach, pushing his shirt up, he forgot all about the things he should do and turned his thoughts to the things he wanted to do to her. Unconsciously he lifted her against him, moaning her name. She wrapped her legs around his waist, pressing her mouth harder against his and sunk her fingers into his thick hair. He turned toward the forest with a growl and took one-step forward, when the sound of the screen door slammed behind him alerting him to Lucan’s presence. Immediately Mercy stiffened, dropped her legs, and pulled out of his arms. He tugged his shirt back down just seconds before Lucan stepped to the end of the porch and looked to where they stood with easy-to-read censure.
Alec looked to Mercy, who was flushed and breathing heavily, and sighed. “Is he still upset about you wearing my ring?”
Mercy fingered the ring that hung around her neck and took a deep, calming breath, hoping to ease the trembling of her body. “You know he’s not upset about the ring. It’s the idea that I am no longer a little girl that bothers him.”
“That is for sure,” he said leering at her playfully, before pulling her against his side with a chuckle and walking her to the porch where her brother waited.
“Letch,” she said, slapping his arm playfully, her face filled with concern when he flinched. “Alec, what is going on?” She pulled his arm into the light the porch offered, gasping when she saw three deep lacerations on the back of it that looked fresh and raw. “I want to know right now what is going on!” she demanded.
“Will you just trust me? This is nothing I can’t handle,” he snapped, looking away unable to bear the look of hurt in her eyes.
“Welcome back, Alec. I made brownies, come on inside and have some,” Lucan said, aware of the tension between them and hoping to avoid a fight.
“Alec,” Mercy said, clearly upset about his injuries and the fact he had obviously intended to hide them from her.
“Let it go, Mercy,” he warned, his aggressive Alpha side coming through.
She bristled at the arrogance of his tone, but said nothing more as he escorted up the stairs and into the house.
“How’s your dad doing?” Lucan asked Alec as they took their seats at the table.
“He’s fine,” Alec answered looking nervously toward Mercy. He had yet to discuss the fact his father was stepping down with her or her brothers. Gregory wanted to make a smooth transition, which was why he had been going home on weekends. He needed to reacquaint himself with pack dealings and deal with those members of the pack who had in his absence tried to assert themselves as possible candidates to succeed his father. Some of them thought they had what it took to usurp him and had challenged him to rank fights, which he had to accept and win if he wanted to take his father’s place. That was the reason why he had been gone so much. It seemed in his absence many of the young males had forgotten just how fierce he was in a fight. As the challenges progressed more and more of them had learned the hard way why he was going to be the next Alpha of their pack, and he was proud of every scrape and bruise because it showed he was earning his place, not having it handed to him.
Presently, though, his worries were not about fighting for his place in the pack. His worries were for Mercy and how she was going to react when he told her that his father was stepping down right after graduation and handing him the reins of the pack. It would definitely complicate the dynamics of their relationship. As Alpha, he could not continue to live in the mountains full time. He would have to move back to the small town where the pack lived, in the central part of the state, and until they were fully bonded, she couldn’t join him there. It would just be too dangerous. The obvious solution was for her to bond with him as soon as he took over as Alpha, but he had the feeling Lucan was not going to be happy about that option.
“Alec, are you alright?” Mercy asked, noting his distraction.
; “What?” He looked down at her frowning face and forced himself to smile. “I’m fine, just thinking about how much I missed you this weekend.”
“I missed you too,” she told him, laying her head on his shoulder, her fingers twining with his on his lap.
“I missed you too,” Lucan teased, batting his eyelashes at Alec.
“Cute,” Mercy told her brother, swatting him on the arm playfully. “Do you think we could have some dessert now?” She stared at the tray of brownies on the counter with a lustful expression that made them all laugh.
“Great, I’m gone for two days, but it is the tray of brownies she longs for,” Alec said with a grin.
Lucan turned to the counter to cut the brownies she had been eyeing
“You know that’s not true,” she murmured in his ear. “But you said we had to be good so I’m lusting after something I can actually have.
Alec chuckled and pulled her onto his lap wrapping his arms around her. “While I agree I might have been hasty in that promise, I know once we have bonded I will be thankful I made it.” He nuzzled her neck playfully and she sighed. “What’s wrong, baby?”
“I can’t stand all of this time apart from each other.” She met his gaze evenly. “I want to do the Bonding Ceremony as soon as possible after graduation.”
Lucan, hearing their conversation, dropped the plate had been holding. The plate hit the ground, shattering immediately, sending pieces of brownie and glass across the floor. “There is no need to rush this,” he said, ignoring the mess on the floor and striding quickly to the table. “You have the rest of your life together, why try and hurry this along.”
“Lucan, we know what we want. Why are you so against this?” Mercy said with a sigh.
“I’m not against you two being together, someday. I just want you to have time to explore the world, to go to college, and live a little before you are drawn into the demands of being the mate of an Alpha.”
“It will be a long time before Alec has to become the Alpha of his pack. I can still explore the world and I can still go to college after we bond. There is no law that states a female cannot attend college once she is bonded, is there?”
“No, of course not,” Lucan said wearily.
Alec figured it was as good a time as any to broach the subject of his father stepping down as Alpha, but was interrupted when Cade walked into the room after a weekend away with his mate’s family.
Mercy cried out happily, jumping from Alec’s lap to hug her brother. Since he had found his mate, he now traveled back and forth between her pack in Tennessee and their home on a regular basis and she missed him terribly. “I missed you,” she told him as he enveloped her in his muscular arms.
“Not as much as I missed you,” he said hugging her close, his expression grim as he met Alec’s gaze over her shoulder.
Alec stiffened, sensing something very wrong and when Cade let Mercy go, he pulled her back into his arms wrapping her tightly in his embrace, dreading what Cade had to say.
Lucan, too, read his brother’s anxiety and knew he wanted to talk without their sister around. “Mercy it’s late, why don’t you get to bed and let Alec get some rest. I am sure he is tired, and you both have school tomorrow,” he said, rising from the table.
“Are you serious?” Mercy replied, angry he was treating her like a child.
Alec felt her anger and faked a yawn, then placed a kiss on her head. “I am kind of tired, Angel, why don’t we call it a night?” he asked, playing along with her brother.
“Oh, alright then,” Mercy said easily, all her anger at her brother disappearing at the idea of spending time alone with Alec. It seemed lately that when he was around, they were almost never alone, so if she could catch a few minutes by herself with him then she was up for calling it an early night. She allowed him to escort her outside where they walked to the rose garden and he promptly pulled her into his arms for a goodnight kiss.
For once, she thought, everything in her life was perfect. She had embraced her Were side, was in the arms of the one male on earth meant to be hers, and only weeks away from graduation. She should be over the moon with happiness but a niggling feeling in the back of her mind kept her from rejoicing. If there was one thing she had learned in the last year, it was that life could change on a dime and could take a course very different from the one she had been expecting.
*****
“No!” Alec bellowed after hearing the news Cade brought. “Mercy is mine. I won’t turn her over to the Elders.”
Cade looked upon him with apathy, knowing if anyone told him his mate was free game for any male who could fight for her that he, too, would lose his cool. “Look, I completely agree, but their word is law and since they have heard about the rogue’s interest in Mercy, they want her protected until she is well and truly bonded to a male they deem capable of protecting her for the rest of her existence.”
The Elders were the supreme ruling body of werewolf society. They handled any disputes amongst the packs and were the keepers of all werewolf laws and history. They were the oldest of their kind and possessed powers that were beyond comprehension. Their word was law and their decisions final. If they decided to allow a challenge for the right to bond with Mercy, he would have to go along with it and beat everyone else to claim her for his own.
Lucan sat still, shocked and unable to believe that the Elders were willing to evoke a law no one had ever even knew existed. That law stated that a Born Were, because of how rare a treasure they were to all packs, was to be offered up in a challenge that would pit males of all packs against one another for the honor of becoming her mate. The law had apparently been created to test the prospective mate’s ability to protect her and keep her safe, but if anything, it only succeeded in making the Born Were a prize for any who sought her for their mate. Since they still didn’t know to what extent the rogues had infiltrated other packs it would give them a chance to claim one of the werewolf society’s greatest treasures. “How long before they come for her?”
“She has until her eighteenth birthday before they can enforce the law,” Cade said, barely containing his own anger at the idea of his sister being treated like a possession, not a person.
Lucan thought about his brother’s words and came up with only one answer that would save his sister from becoming a prized possession. “You need to bond with her right after graduation,” Lucan said to Alec. “Her birthday is two days later and I have no doubt they will be here to retrieve her.”
“You wanted her to wait,” Alec whispered, unable to believe Lucan was now on board with their bonding so quickly.
“I want her to be happy and with you she will be, with another that might not be the case.” Lucan looked to his brother, who nodded in agreement. “She was always meant to be yours anyway, now it will just be a little sooner.”
“Lucan, I…” Alec didn’t know what to say, but it didn’t matter because Lucan raised his hand and stopped him from saying anything.
“You’re her mate and she needs you more than ever to take care of her, now. It might be sooner than I would have liked, but this is how it will have to be.”
“What do we tell Mercy?” Cade asked. “She isn’t going to believe you just suddenly changed your mind when you have been so adamant about them waiting.
“We need to tell her the truth,” Alec said. Mercy was no longer a child and she wouldn’t be pleased if they lied to her again. After keeping the secret, she was werewolf from her for most of her life he was lucky she spoke to him now. He would not risk their relationship again for something she would soon find out about anyway.
“I agree,” Lucan replied. “If we don’t tell her and she finds out, I don’t think she would ever forgive us.”
“You think she can handle this?” Cade asked worriedly. With everything that was going on, he feared one more thing that endangered her relationship with Alec might just be too much for his sister.
“I know she can, but that doesn’t mean she�
�s going to take it well.” Lucan shook his head. only imagining how the news was going to affect her.
“I will tell her this week,” Alec said, resigned to getting it over with, even though he knew it would upset her immensely.
“Don’t look so unhappy, man, you’re finally getting what you want,” Cade teased.
Alec knew the moment had come to tell them that his father was stepping down. “There’s something else I need to talk to you about.” Both men’s eyes immediately turned to him. “My dad is stepping down as Alpha after graduation. That’s why I have been going home every weekend. I have been handling the rank fighting with those who are challenging my right to take his place as Alpha.”
“That’s why you have that bruise and those claw marks on your arm,” Lucan said. Although they healed fast, deep marks, and injuries took longer without a healer’s aid and Alec’s marks still looked fresh. Also the marks were extremely deep, which told him a lot about the fight he had been engaged in. “Must have been a hell of a fight.”
Alec nodded. “Yeah, he didn’t exactly play fair, but he’s the one paying the price now so I feel alright about my battle scars.” The wolf that fought him had tried to use drugs to enhance his strength, but halfway through the fight, those drugs wore off. Unfortunately, by then, Alec had been enraged and near killed him. Fortunately, he had the control to back off despite his wolf wanting to tear him to shreds.
“I can’t believe Gregory’s stepping down,” Cade said in shock.
“He and Marlo want to travel,” Alec told them, keeping Marlo’s vampire status to himself. If his father wanted them to know, he would tell them himself. “I can’t ask him to give up his only chance at happiness, not after all he has done for me.”