Harper (Destined for the Alpha Book 1)

by Viola Rivard

Against his better judgement, he told her about his day. Specifically, he told her about the troublesome pack, how he was working to arrange a meeting with its alpha before heading home for the winter. As he delved deeper into the topic, he mentioned his frustration with the alpha, who had been evading him for some time and was now pressing against the borders of one of his allies.

  “So, his is the big pack I saw beneath yours, on the map?” she deduced.

  Shan had not realized she'd had more than a passing glance at the map, and he resolved himself to invest in a lock.

  She asked, “How did that pack come by so much territory? Did they take over all of the ones that were crossed out?”

  “They drove out any pack that stood in their way. Packs that refused to move were overtaken, their leadership executed. Most of the packs were nuisances. Groups I had pushed out of my own lands when I claimed them.”

  “Why push them out, instead of making alliances? That seems like your modus operandi.”

  She had gotten more comfortable as they spoke, drawing her legs up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. Her chin rested in the small dip between her knees.

  “I tried, but they refused to abide by my laws.”

  A corner of her mouth lifted, though he wasn't sure what he'd said to make her smile. He tried searching her eyes, but she looked away, turning her attention to the dying fire.

  “So what's this alpha like?” she asked. “You've never met him, even in passing?”

  “No. I only know what others have told me about him. Their accounts and descriptions vary greatly. At times, he seems like a shrewd diplomat, and at others, a senseless warmonger.”

  “Like Jekyll and Hyde, huh?”

  She nibbled her lip, and Shan felt the urge to close the distance between them and cover his mouth with hers.

  “Hey, have you considered that there might be two alphas? Aside from the conflicting descriptions, it just makes sense, right? I mean, a territory that large, controlled by just one guy?”

  “I control a territory that large,” Shan said, though he recognized that her idea had serious merit. It had not occurred to him before now, as alphas rarely shared territories. In all of his travels, he had met only one pack that had two alphas, and they had been brothers—twins, even.

  “Yeah, but you're...” she waved her hand, as if to indicate some ineffable quality. “What are you, anyway? Was your dad like you?”

  Shan almost answered, but decided against it. It was one thing to talk to her about a minor conflict with a neighboring pack, another thing entirely to divulge details of his background. She was still an outsider; an unknown that could not be trusted.

  “Okay, I get it,” she said. “Too close to home. My bad.”

  She stood as she spoke, and Shan thought she was coming to him. An image flitted across his mind of her lowering herself into his lap, her arms going around his neck, her fingers burrowing to his hair, and her lips connecting with his.

  She walked past him.

  He watched her bend down at the foot of the bed and pick up a fur. A second later, his view of her body vanished, swallowed up by the fur she'd wrapped around herself. Seeing her wrapped in his bed fur was a different sort of arousing, the sort that was harder to dismiss.

  Sitting nearer to him than before, she picked up the food tray he'd left her that morning. The meat was gone, replaced by overripe berries that were out of season. There was nothing overly erotic in the way she ate them, yet as he watched her, was soon fully erect.

  “Where did you find those?” he asked, knowing he wouldn't like the answer.

  “Cade gave them to me.”

  Shan reasoned that they were only berries. He was sure several people, possibly males, had fed her throughout the day. Knowing that didn't quell his urge to snatch the berries from her. He refrained, as it would have been juvenile. Instead, he plucked one of the berries for himself.

  “You shouldn't accept things from males,” he found himself saying. “It will give them the wrong impression.”

  Harper popped another berry in her mouth and peered up at him through her thick lashes. “Wrong by whose measure? Yours? Maybe I wanted to give him a particular impression.”

  “You want him as your mate?”

  She let out a bark of laughter, the half-chewed berry flying from her mouth and sticking to Shan's chest.

  “Mate?” she repeated. “No way. Humans and shifters can sleep with each other without having to be mates, you know. The mating bond only happens after conception.”

  “I know how the mating bond works,” he said, flicking the berry from her chest. It hit her in the nose. It was juvenile, but quite satisfying. “So you want to sleep with him? I take it you mean that in the euphemistic sense.”

  She sucked a tooth. “What if I did? Would that be a problem?”

  “Yes. It is forbidden. Cade would be reprimanded and likely stripped of his position.”

  “Just because of a little sex? Wow, you guys really are Victorian.”

  Shan wiped a speck of berry juice from her nose with his thumb. “Because you're human. It's forbidden for males to have intercourse with human females, not without first having my consent to take them as their mate.”

  His touch had not seemed to bother her. He thought he saw her relax a little.

  “How come?”

  He said, “Because, if they are not fit to provide for offspring, then the burden will fall on the pack and myself.”

  Back before the law had been enacted, he'd had to dedicate an entire subdivision of his pack to supporting the pups of low-ranking males. Now, that subdivision had been reduced considerably, and focused primarily on aiding pups that had lost their fathers, or placing orphaned pups with capable mothers.

  “So, I guess birth control isn't a thing here?” She made a gesture with her fingers, like a gun shooting into her arm. She must have noted his creased brow, because she said, “Mine's an injection. I get it every three months. Jo, too. So you don't have to worry about us throwing your pack into a tizzy while we're here.”

  “How does it work?”

  Contraception was a gap in his knowledge. Shifter females were infertile. Many of the males were as well, though which percentage was a topic of debate. It wasn't as significant to their kind, as the sort of males that had the instinct to mate were typically fertile, whereas the males that had little drive to do so seldom conceived if they tried. For the females, it was accepted as a matter of course that they would never carry children, though few of them were ever settled in the knowledge.

  Among the human females in his pack, some would, from time to time, abstain from producing children. Twins were common among their kind, and their healers would often suggest that the females waited a year before conceiving again. How they prevented pregnancy, Shan hadn't the faintest idea. That had seemed to him to be a matter best left between a man and his human.

  “It's a hormonal shot,” Harper said. “I don't remember exactly how it works—I never read pamphlets. All I know is that it stops us from ovulating for a few months. We got ours before we left.”

  “Huh.”

  It was all he could think to say, or at least, all he was willing to say. Her contraception may have made it so that she couldn't be mated to a male, but she could still establish a courtship bond, which caused almost as many problems. Once a male got it into his head that a female was going to be his mate, then little, short of violence, could stand between him and his intended.

  “Don't worry.” She held up the last berry. “I only took these because I felt bad about turning him down. I wouldn't actually sleep with Cade, or any male in your pack. It would compromise the integrity of my work.”

  “I don't recall giving you permission to study my pack.”

  “I'm still here.” Her eyes lit with challenge. “So, either you're keeping me here because you're going to let me study your pack, or you're keeping me here because you're inexplicably attracted to me.”

  “
Inexplicably?” Shan scoffed. “When has a male ever been 'inexplicably' attracted to you?”

  “'Inexplicably' because you're not usually distracted by women. Yet, here you are, the oh-so-busy alpha wolf, lazing beside me, telling me about your day, discussing my birth control, pretending you're not jealous about some berries a kid gave me.”

  Not since his youth had anyone cut through his facade so quickly and confidently. Somehow, it wasn't alarming. As if she were a mystic, telling his fate by the lines in his hands, Shan wanted to know everything she saw in him.

  “And are you indulging me just so that you can seduce me into returning your friend, or have you already forgotten that was your intent?”

  Her tongue flicked across her bottom lip. It could have been to wipe away berry juice, but to Shan, it looked like an invitation.

  “Well, now that you mention it, I do need you to return my friend.”

  “And your plan is to seduce me?”

  She shook her head. “Actually, I was hoping I could just ask nicely. You're not the type to grant wishes in exchange for sex.”

  “And how did you reach that conclusion?”

  She was right, of course. If anything, he had the tendency to draw a harder line with the few females that shared his bed. Had Harper asked for her friend back after having sex—assuming he would even allow things to get that far—he might have rejected her on principle.

  “Rosa confirmed it, though I'd already figured you weren't the type.”

  “And you know what type of male I am after only two nights?”

  She chuckled and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Only two nights? If you were any other man, I'd already know everything from your favorite color to your mother's maiden name.”

  Her blue eyes lingered on him, waiting for his response. After a few seconds, she glanced away to watch the dying fire.

  “Slate gray, and my mother had no maiden name.”

  What could it hurt, to tell her such trivial things?

  Her eyes widened. “Gray? No way. No one likes gray. It is quite literally the color of unhappiness.”

  Shan gave an indignant sniff. Gray was a fine color. It was strong and had no need to impress anyone.

  “What is your favorite color, then?”

  “Chartreuse,” she said.

  “Bullshit. You just like saying chartreuse.”

  Her laughter was robust and delighted as she bobbed her head up and down. “You're right, you got me! My favorite color is silver.”

  “Silver?” he repeated. “As in, metallic gray?”

  “Pfft! Silver is in a whole different league than gray. Silver used to be more valuable than gold, you know? Not only is it valuable, it's pretty, it can kill monsters and demons, and—”

  “Your argument is flawed. You're ascribing the merits of an element to its corresponding color.”

  She stuck her tongue out at him.

  “Not my fault there's no element for slate gray.”

  She yawned, and Shan knew that the sound signaled the end of their conversation. He couldn't remember the last time he'd derived so much pleasure from a conversation, particularly one so aimless and peppered with whimsy. He wanted to keep talking to her, almost as much as he wanted to kiss her.

  She wouldn't deny him. He knew that. But Shan knew the way his mind worked. He would swear to himself that he would only kiss her, all the way up until his cock was poised to enter her. Then, he would reason that they'd come that far, and had passed the point where either of them could be expected to stop.

  Harper looked longingly at the bed. “Okay if I sleep here again?”

  He couldn't very well send her down the mountain in the rain. Besides, he was tired enough to actually sleep. Between the last, sleepless night and two shifts into his wolf form, he was eager to be resting.

  “Tonight, only,” he told her. “Tomorrow, you will find a place in West's camp to sleep.”

  She was in bed and under the furs before he'd finished speaking, her arms and legs stretched out.

  “You're not going to tie me up tonight, right?” she asked, her voice muffled by the bed furs.

  “I will if you take up that much of my bed.”

  He climbed into the bed and lay down beside her. The fire finally died to embers, leaving so little light that even his nocturnal eyes had trouble taking anything in. He could see her staring at him, or at least, in his direction.

  “Shan.”

  His name on her lips made his skin tingle.

  “Hm?”

  “Ian is my friend. I have issues with people taking things that are mine.”

  “Don't we all?”

  “I need him back.”

  Shan rolled onto his back, stretching his arms above his head. “I'll take your request under consideration.”

  Chapter 8

  “How did it go?”

  It was the question Harper had been dreading all morning, and the reason she'd dragged her ass in getting down the mountain.

  Her rest had been uneventful, save for the part where she'd woken to finding Shan petting her. She had spent the morning convincing herself that it was a very realistic dream, because the alternative was not something she had the mental bandwidth to contemplate.

  When she'd woken to daylight, she'd been alone and chilly. It was another overcast day and a cold front had swept through the mountains, making her exceptionally reluctant to put on her wet clothes. She'd remained huddled in bed for a while, contemplating the series of bad decisions that had gotten her to where she was.

  “I asked him,” Harper said. “He said he'd 'take my request under consideration,' whatever the fuck that means.”

  She had fallen asleep so mad at him. There was no way she'd let him pet her, no way she'd enjoyed it.

  “Did he say anything else? What did you say?”

  Jo offered her the stack of neatly folded clothes, compliments of Rosa. Harper hoped that the clothes had been procured by Rosa and did not belong to her, otherwise there was no way she'd fit in them.

  “I barely remember what we talked about. To be honest, I was a little bit stoned.”

  She removed her shirt and braced herself for Jo's wrath.

  “Jesus Christ, Harper. Couldn't you have waited?”

  “I was stressed!”

  She pulled on the buckskin shirt. It barely fit over her chest and left some serious mid-drift.

  “He wasn't going to budge anyway. I feel like the more I ask, the more resolute he'll become. If we drop the issue for a few days, he'll probably have Gareth give him back.”

  “So, we're going to go get him right now, right?”

  Harper tapped the side of her head. “Duh. You know how I feel about waiting.”

  “Awesome!” Jo said, her irritation forgotten. “Okay, what's the plan?”

  Harper sucked in a breath as she tried tying the waistline of the pants. They fit her, just barely, but were tailored for someone about five inches shorter than her, making them fit more like capri pants.

  “Step 1, we find Ian. Step 2, we kick the asses of anyone who gets in our way.”

  She could see Jo's enthusiasm wilt. “What do we do about the part where I can't fight and everyone can turn into wolves?”

  “I never said it was a perfect plan. You can stay here if you want,” Harper said, motioning back towards the campsite. She could see Rosa through the trees, threading beads on a string and pretending not to listen.

  “Really? I can?”

  Harper clicked her tongue. “You're supposed to say, 'No, I wouldn't let you go without me, Harper.' Geez.”

  “Yeah, but I kind of feel like I might just get in your way. Stop looking at me like that, I'll come. Next time, don't ask me if you're going to make me come anyway. It's like when you ask me where I want to eat and I tell you and you say...”

  Harper tuned her out as she bent to put on her shoes. The clothes felt far too tight, and she was surprised that the pants didn't rip as she bent over.

 
Jo was still ranting when Harper had finished putting her shoes on. She stood and glanced around the area.

  “All right, which way to Gareth's camp?”

  “It's on the other side of the stream,” Jo said. “That's why we didn't see it yesterday. Come on, I'll show you.”

  Shan met with Gareth in the relative privacy afforded by the river. The sounds of their conversation wouldn't carry over the rushing water, but their scents would. Members of their pack would know better than to disturb them.

  “Now rotate it counterclockwise,” Shan instructed, watching Gareth's face, rather than his arm. The man had more pride than sense, and when Shan saw a slight wince, he knew that Gareth was still in a great deal of pain.

  “I'm ready to shift,” Gareth insisted.

  It had started to rain again, precipitation coming down in a fine mist. If the temperatures held, it could be snowing by evening. An October snow was not unheard of in the mountains, but it would make the pack grow even more restless than they already were. It was well past time for them to return home.

  Ignoring Gareth's weak assertion, Shan said, “I think I'm going to send you back. You can lead the pack with Eko and West. I'll keep a few of the scouts to deal with this nuisance to the south.”

  “I can stay and help you fight.”

  “I don't want to fight with them. Not unless there is no other alternative. And, to be frank, if it comes to that, I will not need you.”

  Gareth was not insulted. He'd been with Shan since the beginning and had seen him fight in a hundred battles.

  “You're not infallible,” Gareth said. “Everyone survives until they don't.”

  “Stretch it out. Good. Now bend it.”

  “Fuck!” Gareth snarled his arm.

  “You're not ready to shift,” Shan said. “You'll begin moving preparations tomorrow. The following day, you're going back to The Steppes where Merry can take a look at you.”

  “I just need another day!” Gareth snapped.

  “You need a fortnight, at least.”

  “I wasn't aware you'd become a healer.”

  There were few in his pack that would speak to him as Gareth did. Shan suspected that half the reason the pack feared Gareth was that he and his sister were the only ones who would show him disrespect. The other reason was that as the leader of the enforcers, Gareth personally carried out most punishments and, when the crime called for it, executions.