by M. L. Briers
“Christie,” Tom turned towards the witch. “I’m sure it’s not your intention to start a war between the pack and the herd…”
“He started it,” Christie raised a hand and pointed an accusing finger at Grundig.
“And he’s going to apologize for it,” Tom raised just one eyebrow at the reindeer shifter.
“I am?” Grundig’s eyebrows drew down over his eyes, but a swift elbow in the ribs from Katrina made him snap to attention. “I am. I apologize — unreservedly.”
“No harm — no foul, right?” Tom raised both of his eyebrows at the witch.
Christie took in a deep breath and sighed it back out again. She reached for the amulet that hung on a long chain around her neck and wrapped her fingers around it.
“Fine. Reindeer, reindeer take to flight, fill the skies upon this night,” she channeled her magic through the amulet as she repeated the unlocking spell over and over again.
“Grundig?” Katrina looked to the alpha for confirmation that the spell had left him.
“It’s done. We must leave — now,” Grundig informed the vampire.
“Well, thanks for the visit — come back next Christmas Eve,” Jake’s sarcasm knew no boundaries. “Don’t forget to tell Santa that we’ve been good. Except for her.” He pointed towards Christie, and she snorted her contempt for him.
“You’re not as funny as you seem to think you are,” Katrina offered her counterpart.
“In that case, I must be exceptionally bland,” Jake offered her a smug smile.
Grundig shifted into his beast. The reindeer was impressively large. The antlers on his head would have been a formidable tool in any fight.
The beast bowed its head on its long neck in respect to the elder, and again to Katrina before it turned and started on fast run into the veil of snow. Just before it disappeared, it pushed upwards and took to flight.
“Rudolph with your nose so bright…” Jake chuckled. He wasn’t sure that he actually believed what he’d just seen.
“For future reference,” Katrina offered the vampire, “reindeer are touchy about their noses — and references to Santa.”
“For future reference — what are you touchy about?” Jake asked.
“Young vampires who believe that sarcasm is attractive,” Katrina berated him before she turned and was gone into the snow storm.
“Nicely done, elder,” Doug offered praise where it was due.
“Now get on with this mating thing — it’s getting older than I am,” Tom growled as he started back towards the cabins with something of a spring in his step. It was good to feel useful again.
‘Run — run, as fast as you can. Silly alpha, you’re on our land.’
“Oh — crap!” The alpha growled out.
~
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~
Saffy didn’t know why she was so relieved to see the alpha walk back through the door, but there it was, relief washing through her body, mind, and soul. She’d like to be able to blame the mating pull once more, but she knew that she wasn’t immune to the alpha’s charms.
Doug saw the look on her face and stopped in his tracks. His eyes narrowed slightly, and he twisted his head on his neck as he took in the look she was giving him, and offered her a questioning one back.
Saffy couldn’t help but smile, and it was contagious. Doug’s smile started slowly, the more she grinned at him, the more his smile grew.
It was a moment between them, and he was enjoying the connection while it lasted. He started across the room toward her, slowly at first to see if her smile would either fade or drop completely, but when it did neither of those things, he covered the distance in record time.
“Alpha alert!” Natalie rushed out on a whisper close to Saffy’s ear, dragging her attention away from Doug, and causing the alpha to hit his internal brake.
“I’m going to mate with him,” Saffy gave a small shrug of her shoulders and a chuckle of excited disbelief.
“You’ve just decided that this minute?” Natalie looked just as disbelieving as Saffy felt.
There was a low, deep, hungry growl, and Saffy knew who it was, but she chose to ignore it the moment.
“Yes.” Saffy gave an affirmative nod of her head.
“Did the faeries do something to you?” Natalie scowled at the thought of magic being involved in Saffy’s decision.
“I don’t think so…” Saffy shrugged.
“Did he do something to you?” Natalie tossed up an absent hand in the direction of the alpha.
That low, deep, hungry growl turned into something resembling annoyance. Saffy ignored it again.
“Now hold on a minute…!” The alpha growled.
“In a way…” Saffy started, but she saw the look of horror on Natalie’s face as the witch became flummoxed and angry all at once.
“So help me — I’ll zap him until he begs to be put out of his misery!” Natalie hissed in anger.
“Huh…?” Doug was confused, but he didn’t like the way the conversation was going.
“Natalie, will you just…!” Saffy tossed her hands onto her hips and scowled at her friend.
“Of course, you get the first zap. I wouldn’t want to deprive you of that pleasure,” Natalie shrugged.
“Nobody is zapping anybody…” Doug growled, but they ignored him once more.
“Pleasure?” Saffy gave a small shake of her head in disbelief.
“Vengeance? Retribution? Revenge?” Natalie was tossing words at her friend in a fast and furious manner.
“Revenge…?” The alpha had no idea what he’d done to warrant revenge.
“Just hold on a minute!” Saffy told the alpha.
“Sure, I’ll just wait for my retribution, shall I?” Doug growled.
“I’m sure it’ll be coming along any minute,” Natalie hissed out at the alpha before turning her attention back towards Saffy.
“Natalie, whatever you’ve been sampling from the array of alcohol, don’t give any to me!” Saffy tossed up her hands in the air and let them fall to her sides.
“Wow,” Christie stood beside Rex, twisted her head to the side, and watched the two witches going at it.
“Yeah, it’s more entertaining than watching the television,” Rex gave a slow nod of his head.
“I have not been drinking!” Natalie protested.
“Then you’re just being naturally stupid?” Saffy offered back.
“Take that back before I zap your mate,” Natalie grumbled.
“Hey…!” Doug growled. He certainly didn’t like that idea.
“If you zap my mate, I’ll zap your bloody mate,” Saffy hissed out the warning to her friend, but Natalie just tossed up a hand, shrugged her shoulders, and gave a small chuckle in reply.
“Go ahead — he standing right there,” Natalie motioned toward Jonathan as if he was an exhibit to be inspected.
“Fine!” Saffy grumbled. “I will!” She turned toward Jonathan, and the man’s hand shot up to his chest in surrender.
“I didn’t do it — the alpha did!” Jonathan protested and pointed an accusing finger at Doug.
Doug growled in annoyance and disbelief at his brother’s treachery. Then he turned his attention toward Natalie and Saffy and offered them an angry growl.
“Nobody is zapping anybody…!” Doug got the words out, but obviously, neither witch had bothered to listen to them.
Natalie zapped Doug and Saffy gasped in disbelief. She turned her magic on Jonathan and zapped the beta.
It was then that all hell broke loose.
CHAPTER THIRTY
~
Jonathan reached out and wrapped his arm around Natalie’s waist. He lifted her feet from the ground and spun her around to face the Christmas tree and away from his brother.
The alpha made a beeline for Saffy. The witch caught the movement out of the corner of her eye, but she turned too late — a heartbeat later and Doug had dipped at the waist, and tossed her over one broad shoulder.
/> “That’s not…” Natalie’s feet were still off the ground, and her legs were swinging back and forth as if she were trying to run in place.
She twisted and turned within her mate’s arms, trying to break free, trying to twist around so that she could continue to zap the alpha, but to no avail.
“Nice view!” Saffy chuckled as she stared at Doug’s backside.
“You witches are like squabbling teenagers,” Doug growled as he started toward the staircase.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Natalie ground out as she continued to fight against her mate’s hold on her.
“Don’t tar all witches with the same brush,” Christie snorted her contempt for the alpha’s words.
“You fight like a cat in a sack — but you’re still not getting anywhere,” Jonathan chuckled.
“Oh yeah?” Natalie didn’t consider her actions before she took them. She forced out her magic from her body, everywhere that her mate was touching her, but it only served to tense up all of his muscles — and then they were falling into a heap on the floor.
“Did you learn nothing from my fubar earlier?” Saffy chuckled as she tilted her head to one side and caught sight of Natalie being squished by her mate.
“My goddess, he weighs a ton!” Natalie managed to get out as she fought for a decent breath.
“I’m stocky! Well built,” Jonathan protested as he fought against his weakened muscles to try and push his weight up and off his mate.
“You wanna tell me where we’re going?” Saffy already knew the answer to that.
The constant bump of her stomach against his shoulder and the heady height as she looked down on Natalie told her they were starting up the stairs. She knew exactly what was at the top of the stairs, but still, she teased him.
“You said you wanted to mate with me,” Doug growled. That growl sounded hungry once more.
“I don’t remember saying when ” Saffy chuckled with nervous excitement.
“Sometimes a man just has to take things into his own hands,” the alpha said, as another growl rumbled through his chest and through her body.
“Especially, an alpha?”
“Definitely, an alpha.” Doug stalked down the corridor towards his bedroom.
Whatever was happening downstairs didn’t concern him. He was fully focused on his mate.
The alpha booted open the bedroom door and stalked inside. He went to backheel the door closed, but Saffy used her magic to slam it shut behind them.
He took that to mean that his mate was definitely all in. It wasn’t like he wasn’t going to make damn sure, but for now, he took it as a good sign.
~
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~
“Get off me you big oaf before I zap you to kingdom come,” Natalie bit out.
She knew that she had brought it on herself, and yet, she still wanted to zap the man. Everywhere that his body was touching hers she had that damn, stupid tingle — she didn’t want that tingle — that tingle meant that he was her mate, and there was no escaping that.
Saffy had been carted upstairs over the alpha’s shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Was she to have that same fate?
The heck she was!
Jonathan was a nightmare of epic proportions. He was a mate — fate was on his side — and it didn’t help that he was a whole lot of sexy shifter wrapped up in a smile that made her toes curl in her boots in a good way.
Why did he have to be so sexy?
Why did he have to have eyes that were so soulful and felt like they were devouring her?
Why did he have to be so damn heavy that she couldn’t just escape from beneath him? Every second that he was pressed against her body felt like exquisite torture.
It wasn’t right.
It wasn’t fair.
It was just damned annoying.
Natalie hated fate.
She wished she could say the same about her mate — but he’d been growing on her like a fungus since the moment that she met him. She hated that too.
Yes, she’d messed up with her magic, and now the man was even more imprinted on her body. But oh, for the love of the goddess, the way that her body was buzzing from head to toe felt sinfully good.
How was she supposed to escape her fate?
How was she supposed to escape her mate?
Natalie felt his weight lift a little at a time. He grunted and groaned as he drew on a whole lot of willpower and what little strength his muscles gave him to push up and toss himself over onto his side on the floor.
“Squished witch anyone?” Tom chuckled.
“Don’t you have some nose fur to tweeze out,” Natalie hissed at the elder.
“Sweetheart, at my age I have excess hair growing out of lots of places. It would be a full-time job to tweeze it out, and that’s not how I want to spend the twilight of my days,” Tom chuckled.
“Well, that chucked up a lot of images that I don’t want to ever think about again,” Natalie grumbled, as she rolled over and pushed up to her hands and knees.
Her mate gave a hungry growl, and she tossed him a death glare before pushing back on her knees and sucking in all the good air that she’d been denied.
“You just put some images in my mind that I do want to think about — constantly — over and over again,” Jonathan growled at the thought of his mate being on her hands and knees as he stroked into her.
Mine…
“You can take your dirty mind, and you can shove it where the sun don’t shine,” Natalie grumbled.
She really hated the fact that he’d put those images into her own mind and the response of her body had basically been to assume the position, in more ways than one.
“You can deny it to yourself all you want, but we both know what you’re thinking,” Jonathan said on what sounded like a very dirty chuckle.
It didn’t matter if he was growling, laughing, or offering that chuckle. Every deep rumble of a sound that came from her mate seemed seductive to her mind, body, and even her soul.
That definitely wasn’t fair.
They said nothing was fair in love and war — and she had to wonder about when those two worlds collided. She’d been fighting a battle against fate, against him, and even against her own instincts. The trouble was she was losing that battle, and fast.
They said that love at first sight was just lust, but in normal humans, love at first sight was fate tapping you on the shoulder and pointing you in the direction of your fated mate. In witches, it was different because they already knew about mates, and there was the crux of it — Jonathan was her forever love.
Saffy seemed to already have fallen foul of fate. At least, she’d allowed the alpha to carry her upstairs, and the sound of her excited giggling told Natalie that it wouldn’t be long before her friend was mated to the alpha and stuck with the pack.
Natalie expected a similar fate. There was only so much a witch could do to fight against the mating pull — one of those things being to get the hell out of Dodge.
She’d missed that chance.
One way or the other, Natalie knew that she would succumb to the will of fate. But she couldn’t help but wonder if her mate needed to look so damn smug about it.
She wanted to zap him just to get rid of that look of certainty within his eyes.
“I suppose you think this is a done deal between us?” Natalie eyed the man as if he was Demon personified in a hot, sexy, shifter body.
A part of her was desperate to reject him — while the other part wanted to go full steam ahead and lick him from head to toe.
“I think it might be pretty much a done deal,” Jonathan grinned from ear to ear.
“A little too overconfident, I think,” Christie chuckled, she could feel magic in the air, and it wasn’t the faeries.
Natalie wove her magic around and around telling it what she wanted, and where to go to get it. One string of green fairy lights from the Christmas tree slinked across the branches like a snake hunting its prey.<
br />
Before the beta could do anything about it, those Christmas lights had wrapped themselves around his body like a boa constrictor.
“Make the wire as tough as steel, a change of attitude to unlock the reel,” she muttered under her breath, dusted her hands off, and pushed up to her feet.
“Hey, what gives?” Jonathan grumbled and growled as he tried to break the bonds that held him in place.
Natalie stared down at her mate in amusement. It was a sweet victory, of sorts, because a part of her kind of hoped that he would have a sudden change of attitude just so that he was free once more to pursue her.
“Think of it as a Christmas game — a Christmas puzzle — you need to figure out how to get free,” Natalie offered him a victory smile before she turned on her heels and stalked across the room toward the kitchen.
If she couldn’t have her mate — the next best thing was cake.
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
~
Doug lowered his mate down from his shoulder, keeping every inch of her that he could pressed against his hard body, and torturing himself in the process.
Mine…
Saffy’s eyes were alive with amusement and excitement as she stared at him, just a slight tip backward of her head had brought her eyes to his, and her lips had become even more accessible. He resisted the urge to kiss her.
“Be mine, Saffy.”
The underlying growl that rolled through his chest and caught in his throat was unavoidable. His beast wanted out to claim their mate.
“I kind of expected you to toss me on the bed and have your wicked way with me,” Saffy couldn’t help but chuckle like a schoolgirl. The excitement within her was almost too much to bear.
“Disappointed?” Doug grinned from ear to ear in one of those sexy smiles that made her heart race for the finish line.
“Maybe a little,” Saffy giggled again as if she’d told a secret that wasn’t supposed to be shared with him.
Doug could barely contain the hungry growl that rumbled through his chest. He was also having a hard time keeping a leash on his beast.