Wolf and Prejudice (The Alaska Princesses Trilogy, Book 2)

by Taylor, Theodora

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  EPILOGUE

  About the Author

  Wolf and Prejudice

  Published by Amorous Publishing

  http://theodorataylor.com/

  Copyright Ⓒ 2013 Theodora Taylor

  ISBN: # 978-0-9849193-8-3

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  1

  “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single alpha in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife,” Alisha whispered to her friend, Chloe, as they watched her parents shamelessly shove her older sister, Janelle, at Maguyuk Lonewolf, Alpha King of Wyoming. Janelle was in the middle of the dance floor, but Alisha could feel her sister’s abject discomfort from where she stood with Chloe.

  “Stop,” Chloe hissed, widening her eyes and shaking her head frantically. “Stop it right now! You know I can’t be seen laughing at one of Rafe’s best friends.”

  This was probably true. Chloe was engaged to the event’s host, Rafe Nightwolf, Alpha Prince of Colorado. And tonight’s party was being held in honor of his friend and ally, Mag. So making fun of said honoree probably wasn’t a great idea. In fact, Alisha’s own father, Tikaani, Alpha King of Alaska, definitely wouldn’t approve. Mag Lonewolf was an Alaska Native like Tikaani and had fought the former King of Wyoming’s son to the death for the Wyoming kingdom.

  And as it turned out, Alisha’s sister, Janelle, had been engaged to the loser of that deathmatch, so she was now in need of a new fiancé. Alisha supposed in her father’s head, pairing her sister up with the wolf who killed her fiancé made perfect sense. Unlike human kings who’d actually evolved in their thinking over time, wolf kings were still of the opinion that the primary purpose of a wolf princess was to help kings form alliances with other powerful states through marriage.

  So what if Mag had grown up in Inu-Amaruq, literally “Bad Wolf,” a nomadic pack made up of wolves who didn’t recognize King Tikaani’s state sovereignty? So what if he’d recently had two dark lines tattooed from the corners of his mouth to his earlobes to denote his killing of two fellow wolves? So what if he looked at Janelle like he was planning to eat her rather than offer her his pledge of mateship?

  So what? King Tikaani wanted to be allied with Wyoming so why not throw his oldest and most beautiful daughter at its new king?

  Alisha could practically see the empire building going on behind her father’s almond-shaped eyes. And though it wasn’t very mannerly to make the future Queen of Colorado laugh at the expense of her fiancé’s best friend, Alisha simply couldn’t help herself.

  “On tonight’s episode of Game of Wolves, the Alaska king offers up his eldest daughter to the “bad wolf” King of Wyoming in the hopes of forming another important alliance within the lower forty-eight and of course, gaining a second who will keep him in power until further notice.”

  Chloe snorted and covered her mouth to hide her smile. “Please stop. You’re going to make me laugh, and I’m already in enough trouble with Rafe as it is.” She took a deep, calming breath. “One: I talked to you about life in post-colonial Alaska instead of mingling during the aperitifs. Two: I spoke out of turn to your mom during dinner. And three: I’m wearing the wrong dress for this kind of event.”

  Alisha rolled her eyes. As much of a catch as Rafe was considered, especially for someone like Chloe who hadn’t been born with a title, he was forever and a day picking on his fiancée. Yes, Chloe had only talked to Alisha during aperitifs. That was because there were only a handful of African-Americans at this event and neither Alisha nor Chloe hailed from kingdoms that held a ton of black people. Most wolf states were pretty progressive in terms of race, but Alaska’s human population was only three percent black, and its black werewolf population even less than that. Alisha loved her Alaskan Native and white pack members just like any good princess should. But it had been lonely for her, as one of the very few half-black wolves in her state pack, and one of three in Wolf Lake, their kingdom town.

  To top it all off, Chloe was intelligent, curious, and interested in Alisha’s field of historical expertise: post-colonial Alaska. So clearly they were going to talk. But Rafe acted like they were committing some crime against humanity whenever they spent what he deemed as too much time in each other’s company.

  And as for Chloe’s dress, Alisha loved it. True, it wasn’t exactly appropriate for a formal dinner honoring a new alpha king. But Chloe ran a popular DIY website called “Black Mountain Woman,” so the dress, like all Chloe’s clothes, was handmade by Chloe herself. Not only was her frock reflective of the gorgeous future queen’s inner values, it looked great with the over-the-shoulder braid she always wore. In Alisha’s opinion, Chloe’s prairie dress had a hell of a lot more character than the low-cut, blue evening gown her own mother had forced her to wear.

  Alisha tugged up the sweetheart neckline of her gown. It was a similar design to the one her sister, Janelle, was wearing. Except Janelle’s was red and its neckline was even more dangerously low. Overall, the style definitely suited Janelle.

  The dress’s mermaid bottom accentuated her sister’s long and slender body, and looked great with the waterfall of glossy black hair she’d inherited from their father’s Inuit ancestors. However, Alisha’s hair was neither kinky and cute like their African-American mother’s, or long and straight like their father’s. Her curls were wild and messy. As a result, she’d had her hair cut in an easy to maintain style—short on the sides and back, longer on the top—years ago rather than deal with the hassle of a back-length’s worth of unruly curls. And though she and her sister were roughly the same height, Alisha carried an extra forty pounds on her frame. So while Janelle looked like a beautiful, bi-racial mermaid in her gown, Alisha felt like a plump sea witch stuffed into fancy evening attire.

  Not that she minded not being the brightest diamond in the room tonight. Alisha dreaded the day when the King and Queen of Alaska mated Janelle off and turned their unwelcome matchmaking attention to her. Back when Janelle had been engaged to the original Wyoming prince, the only thing that kept them from going full-throttle on Alisha was that she’d been attending grad school in Juneau, a multi-hour journey from their remote kingdom town, Wolf Lake. But she doubted even the distance would keep her parents from trying to manipulate her into an arranged marriage for much longer.

  “I’m just saying my parents could be a little less obvious.” Alisha watched her mother, who was at that moment actually
making Janelle spin in a circle in front of the Wyoming king. Alisha would have cussed both her parents out in front of witnesses if they’d pulled that mess on her, but of course Janelle, being perennially good-natured, merely turned with a self-conscious smile nailed to her face.

  “Poor Janelle,” Alisha said, shaking her head.

  “Whatever. The new king is so hot, I don’t feel sorry for Janelle at all.” Alisha’s younger sister, Tu, appeared at their side.

  At five-foot-six, the twenty-year-old hadn’t inherited their mother’s height like her two older sisters, but Tu had been lucky enough to get her mother’s kinky hair and was wearing her dramatically large afro pulled back into a stately puff. It looked terrific on her, and highlighted her strong shoulders and athletic body. She wore an equally dramatic turquoise necklace and a yellow version of the “family” mermaid dress. In a word, Tu looked stunning. But her sophisticated veneer was ruined when she snatched the half-empty flute of champagne from Alisha’s hand and downed it before Alisha could stop her.

  Tu clunked the empty glass down on a passing tray as she said, “We just better hope Mag wants to hit that enough to mate with Janelle. Or we’re going to be regular wolves as soon as someone gets bold enough to challenge Daddy next year.”

  Tu was right, King Tikaani would be turning forty-five next year. That meant his kingship would be up for challenge unless he named a male heir to his throne or found a second--a younger, stronger state king who was willing to fight in his place should another male wolf challenge Tikaani for the Alaska throne. As of now, the King of Alaska had exactly zero male heirs in his direct line, and though he was well-liked by the state pack, it was only a matter of time before someone like the ambitious Alpha King of Wyoming came along and challenged him. As much as Alisha resented her father sometimes, she still loved him. A shiver of dread went down her spine at the thought of a younger, stronger wolf fighting him to the death for his title.

  Alisha grabbed another full glass of champagne from a passing waiter and held it well out of her younger sister’s reach.

  “Maybe it would be wiser if Daddy ceded the throne and let the would-be kings fight it out amongst themselves. Historically, that’s been the most peaceful way to crown a new king.”

  Tu gave her sister a skeptical look. “You know Daddy doesn’t care about history, only about grandcubs to carry on his line. At least the Wyoming king is a hottie with a body. Who knows who he’ll try to throw Janelle at next if she doesn’t open his nose?”

  Tu shot Chloe an envious look. “You’re so lucky. You’ve already got yourself a future king and you don’t even need one! Daddy would have thrown Janelle at Rafe so hard if you hadn’t come along.” Then after dropping that bomb, she said, “Ooh, there goes that cute wolf Rafe got to deejay the party! Time to talk to somebody not boring. Later.”

  She shot across the ballroom to catch up with the young Brad Pitt lookalike, leaving her apparently boring conversation partners behind, including a rather distressed Chloe.

  “Don’t listen to Tu,” Alisha told her friend, passing her the full flute of champagne. “Here, drink this. It’s the only thing that makes these parties remotely bearable.”

  Chloe took the flute, but a shadow crossed over her face as she sipped from it. “I know your dad’s upset about my engagement to Rafe. So is the King of Colorado, especially now that it’s gone on so long.”

  Most female wolves went into heat within a year of getting engaged, shortly after which they could formally get married. Rafe and Chloe had been engaged for nearly six years with no sign of it ending any time soon.

  But Alisha refused to let her friend feel bad about this. “The truth is, my father and the King of Colorado would love nothing more than to use us all as pawns in their Game of Wolves. But you and Rafe managed to subvert them by agreeing to marry for love, so good job!”

  She grabbed a flute of champagne for herself and clinked her glass against Chloe’s to make her point, but the shadow still hung over Chloe’s face.

  “I do love Rafe,” she said. “I know I haven’t gone into heat yet, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love him, because I really, really do.”

  “I know you do,” Alisha assured her, even though it sounded a little bit like Chloe was also trying to convince herself more than Alisha. “But look at Janelle! She’s the same age as you and she still hasn’t gone into heat, even though she was engaged to the last King of Wyoming for three years. Plenty of female wolves get to your age without going into heat.”

  “Even female wolves engaged to a prince as cute as Rafe?”

  Now Alisha had to laugh. It was true, Rafe was definitely one of the most handsome princes in the lower Forty-Eight, thanks in part to his mixed Chicano and Native American heritage, which made for one pretty and chiseled face.

  “Contrary to what my sister says, it’s not all about looks and status.” Alisha leaned in and whispered, “Don’t tell my mom, but if I ever go into heat, I plan to mate with someone way below my quote-unquote station, probably a fellow academic. I’m much more concerned with being able to talk to my possible future mate than how he looks or whether he’s titled.”

  A wolf princess claiming she would mate for companionship as opposed to status was a scandalous statement indeed, one Alisha wouldn’t dare utter within earshot of her parents or even her sisters, but all Chloe seemed to hear was, “You don’t think you’ll go into heat? Ever?”

  Alisha shrugged. “A lot of academics don’t. Up until a couple of decades ago, many female wolves weren’t even allowed to teach beyond the high school level, because there was a theory that teaching college rendered females sterile.”

  “And that doesn’t bother you?” Chloe asked, now looking even more distressed than she had a few moments ago, but this time for Alisha. “Even though it means you’d never have cubs?”

  Alisha's eyes went to Janelle, who had been left alone with the new king for the first dance of the evening, a waltz. Though Janelle was smiling up at Mag, Alisha could tell her older sister was extremely uncomfortable. Her body was as stiff as a marionette's, and the couple's waltz looked painfully awkward.

  With her model-esque looks and delicate features, Janelle was the prettiest of the Alaska princesses, but that didn’t mean she was comfortable being trotted out under the lascivious gaze of any king with enough money and strength to satisfy their father’s lust for continued power.

  “No, it doesn’t bother me at all,” Alisha answered. “In fact, the thought of my progeny being used as pawns makes me sick to my stomach.”

  “Then it’s a lucky thing your dad’s not staking his throne on you,” a voice said beside her.

  Alisha looked up to see Rafe, Chloe’s longtime fiancé, looming over them.

  Her breath caught in her throat, just as it did every time she saw him, and shame pinged around Alisha’s chest. Her human understood Rafe was Chloe’s fiancé, and even if he wasn’t, she had no interest in a titled wolf since marrying one would guarantee being caught up in the Game of Wolves for the rest of her life. But all her wolf saw when she looked at Rafe was the teenage boy she’d secretly crushed on as a sixteen-year-old college student visiting his family for the summer.

  And though Alisha had put that school girl crush far behind her, her wolf still thought he was beautiful, the most beautiful man she’d ever seen, with his lightly toasted brown skin and hazel eyes. Hazel eyes that never landed on her, even after handing her a not-so-indirect insult. No, his eyes stayed on Chloe as if Alisha wasn’t even there, like she didn’t even matter.

  “Hi, Rafe!” Chloe said, in that simpering way she had with the alpha prince. Like she was just oh-so-grateful someone like him would deign to align himself with someone like her. It drove Alisha crazy.

  Chloe might be an orphaned nobody as far as wolf society was concerned, but she was smart and kind and talented, whereas Rafe was simply the pampered prince of a thriving state pack, one who’d had everything handed to him his entire life. In Alisha’
s opinion, Rafe was lucky to have someone as lovely and decent as Chloe accept his proposal.

  But from the way his eyes scanned over Chloe’s dress, Alisha could tell he didn’t see it that way. “Is there a reason I’m out there mingling all by myself?”

  “Well, you weren’t happy about my dress, so I thought I’d—”

  “Stand in the corner, gossiping with Princess Alisha,” he finished for her. “And this is after you spent all of the aperitifs hour with her and talked back to the Queen of Alaska at dinner.”

  “I’m sorry,” Chloe said, bowing her head. “If you want I can go apologize to the queen, too.”

  But Alisha couldn’t bear to see her friend cowed this way. “Don’t be a jerk, Rafe. I’m visiting royalty and she was keeping me company. That’s what good hostesses are supposed to do. I mean, believe me, there are always places I’d rather be when your family come up to visit us in Alaska, but I do my duty, and not nearly so well as Chloe.”

  She turned to Chloe. “And don’t you dare apologize to my mother. She was out of line for teasing me about not having an intended and unlike some people who are fine letting me be insulted at the party they are supposed to be hosting…” she threw a pointed glance at Rafe, though of course he couldn’t see it because his eyes were glued to his beautiful fiancée as they always were, “…you were kind enough not to just sit there and let her do it. And furthermore—”

  The opening strains of “Wanna Be Starting Something” interrupted her impassioned defense of Chloe, making it impossible to keep going since Michael Jackson songs were pretty much kryptonite to anything she might be doing, including arguing.

  “This is my jam!” she said going from angry to delighted in zero seconds flat.

  Tu appeared again. “Oh my God! I asked the deejay to play Michael Jackson after the waltz and he did!” she screamed over the loud music, aglow with the power of being young, pretty, and bold. “C’mon! We’ve got to dance. C’mon!”

  Tu grabbed Alisha’s arm and started dragging her toward the dance floor and Alisha yelled to Chloe. “Come with us!”