“Stand down, Sarelle,” I ordered, but she kept coming. Her eyes were locked on Allegra.
“She’s dominant, back off,” I said again. But she kept changing. She was a bi-pedal monster now. Fur crept over her body and I heard her clothing rip. I shook my head and forced my own change. I ripped right through my jeans and t-shirt – I hadn’t dressed for changing – and the pain of the change flooded through my body.
Sarelle was in wolf form before I was, and she jumped onto Allegra.
“No!” I heard the other pack members shout in unison. She could kill Allegra now, but if she broke skin at all while she was a wolf, Allegra would become one too. That was how it worked.
My changed finished. John shot past me, in human form, and knocked them both to the ground. Allegra’s head hit the wall and her eyes closed, her body crumpling limp to the floor. My change was finished and I charged Sarelle. I hit her shoulder full on with my chest and grabbed her neck with my teeth, forcing her onto the floor. She whined and rolled onto her back.
She was submitting. Finally.
I let her go and growled at her. She turned her head away, and squirmed on the floor. Her tail was tucked between her legs and she made small whimpering sounds.
The others were all huddled around Allegra when I pushed through them and sniffed her.
“No broken skin, but she’s unconscious,” Carlos said. He was the medic in our team. She was going to be safe. She wouldn’t change. And she’d won the fight.
Chapter 8
Allegra
I woke up staring at my own ceiling. I couldn’t remember how I’d gotten in bed. The room was dark and a thick line of moonlight fell through a crack in the curtains. When I moved, my head throbbed painfully. I groaned and pressed the palms of my hands to my forehead.
“Are you okay?” I heard a man’s voice, and it wasn’t Reid. I turned my head to see Carlos sitting on a chair at the foot of the bed.
“Where’s Reid?” I asked.
“He’s taken the pack out to hunt. They need the extra meat.”
“Why aren’t you out with them?” I asked.
“I’m on medical watch,” he said and he smiled. “Can you remember what happened?”
I thought back for a moment. I remember Sarelle coming at me and me flipping her through a window.
“Did I hurt her?”
Carlos chuckled. “Just enough to win. You drew blood. You bruised her ego a lot more though. She’s going to be liking those wounds for a while.
I lay back down on my pillow. My head throbbed something awful.
“How did I pass out?” I asked.
“She changed on you and John knocked you down so that Reid had time to change and stop her. You hit your head pretty hard, you have a mild concussion.”
“Oh,” I said and closed my eyes. I’d won. I’d been challenged by a damn werewolf, and I’d won the fight. A feeling of pride and warmth welled up inside me. It made me feel good to know that I’d stood up for myself. Or at least, defended myself.
“I hear them coming,” Carlos said, and when I looked at him he was listening into the night. He turned his head, hearing sounds I would never hear. I noticed he was sitting the shaft of moonlight. I was willing to bet he’d opened the curtains a little on purpose.
It took a while before Reid was home. Carlos had very good hearing. When Reid walked into the room, Carlos got up.
“Alpha,” he said and bowed his head for a second or two. Then he looked at me and did the same, averting his eyes. When he left the room, I looked at Reid.
“What was that all about?” I asked. Reid smiled and sat down on the bed next to me.
“You fought for your position as the pack’s second, and you won. Which means that they respect you as the second now,” he said. Something flickered across his face that was too fast for me to read, but then he smiled.
“How are you feeling?”
“My head hurts,” I said. Reid nodded.
“Sarelle was out of line. She shouldn’t have done that. If she keeps being a problem I’m going to have to do something about her. I can’t have someone who keeps challenging authority that way. She could have hurt you.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I survived it, right?”
Reid smiled beautifully. “You did. You surprised everyone.”
“Including me. That wasn’t skill it was self-preservation. I don’t think I could do it again.”
Reid smiled and shook his head, and crawled onto the covers next to me. I turned on my side and he curled his body around mine, and put his arm over my waist. I let sleep pull me under.
When I woke up again it was much later. Morning light fell into the room, and I felt better. My head had dulled down to a light ache. Reid wasn’t on the bed next to me anymore. I wondered if he’d slept at all. I got up and padded through the house on bare feet, looking for him. He was in the kitchen making eggs and toast.
“Well, I don’t see you cooking every day,” I said, leaning against the door post. He turned and looked sheepish, like he’d been caught in the act.
“You’re up,” he said. He looked at the food and scratched his head. “I wanted to bring you breakfast in bed.”
I sat down at the table in the breakfast nook. “We can eat here, I’m feeling okay,” I said. Reid brought two plates and put on down in front of me. The other was piled with food.
“I wanted to talk to you,” he said after he sat down. He pushed the egg around on the plate, trying to find the words. “I know your response to Sarelle’s attack was self-defense, but in the wolf world an acceptance of any kind of fight is a bigger deal than it is for humans. We take self-defense a lot more seriously, because we ask for another wolf’s protection when we don’t want to fight.” He took a deep breath. “I know you don’t want this,” he started, but I shook my head and cut him off.
“I know what it means. I’ve been looking up werewolves and normal wolves and behavioral patterns and stuff. I know what I did.”
He frowned. “You’ve been studying? Natural wolves?”
I nodded. “When you’re in wolf form you’re an animal, right? I thought that was closer than what the government as issued on werewolves. They don’t really know as much as I think.”
Reid chuckled. “They don’t…”
“Besides, I got pissed off when Sarelle challenged me, again. I don’t really like her. And she’s been grating me for a while. I know that accepting means I defend my position. And I know that winning meant I earned my position in the pack.”
“And you don’t mind?” he asked. I shook my head, and it hurt a little when I did.
“I don’t mind. I’m really not going to be able to do this right from the start, but if the pack will have me, and everyone will teach me, I’m willing to learn.”
Reid took a bite of his egg and chewed, thinking. When he swallowed he asked, “what changed your mind?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it while it was all happening, but I hated her being so damn dominant. If she’s fighting for my position, she’s essentially fighting for the position next to you. And that’s my place. Don’t every challenge a woman about her husband. It’s a protective thing. She’s not even bad-looking, which just makes it that much worse.”
“You were jealous?” Reid asked.
I nodded slowly. It didn’t hurt my head. “Yes. I was jealous. I don’t want anyone else next to you, not even if it’s a male. It’s my place, so I’ll take it.”
“Even when—“
“Even when it means a lot more than I understand. Everything that goes with it.”
Reid nodded and kept on eating. He was working hard at keeping his face neutral, but I could see it. I could see the pride. I reached out my hand and put it on his.
Power erupted as soon as our skins made contacted, and it surged through me like an electric current. Reid was the one that gasped, I was guessing he felt it too. I jerked my hand away and looked at his fing
ers.
“What was that?” I asked.
“That is the power that comes with the role you’ve accepted,” he answered.
“But I’m just a human. I have no power.”
He shrugged. “I don’t how it works, but it’s more than twice what it was before you,” he said. I reached out and touched him again, and heat surged through my body, tightening it. I was suddenly aware of Reid, the planes of his face, the high cheek bones, straight nose, and his wheat colored hair that shone golden in the morning light. He looked at me and his eyes were deep and dilated.
“What’s that?” I whispered.
“That’s the bond between us. You’re taking your place as my rightful second. The bond knows it.”
I didn’t know what it was, but I suddenly wanted him. I ached for his body on mine, in mine. I got up and walked around the table, climbing onto his lap. I straddled him and kissed him, pushing my chest against his. He sighed into my mouth, and with the sound the heat increased. The energy in the room became hot and static, and I felt it like a hand on my skin, pressing in all the right places.
Reid stood up, holding me against his body like I weighed nothing. I wrapped my legs around his waist and he carried me to the bedroom. There was a sense of urgency, something wild driving me on.
And I let it go. I have into it.
I pulled Reid’s shirt of and dug my nails into his shoulders. He moaned and laid me down on the bed, he pulled down my pajama pants, running his hands up my bare legs. I was the one that pulled off my own shirt, and I was naked in front of him.
His eyes were hungry, and he looked at my body like he was physically touching it, drinking me in. I grabbed his buckle and tugged on it, and he did the rest.
When he’d gotten rid of it he crawled onto me. His skin was so hot it almost burned when I touched it, and the intensity of his stare matched the intensity of the power in the room. I gasped under the weight of it. The atmosphere was so thick I struggled to breathe.
Reid’s hands traveled over my body, tracing the rise and fall of it. His hands found my breasts and he kneaded them. His lips were on mine, his tongue in my mouth, and my body melted under his touched. I could feel him pressed against my hip bone, hungry and hard. Lust hung around us, lust and something else, something more powerful.
I grabbed onto his shoulders and pushed him to the side and then down, so that he was lying down. He understood and lay on his back. This wasn’t about him. It was about me. I didn’t know what was happening, but I knew what I had to do. This was me claiming my place.
I threw one leg over him and straddled his body, his hips between mine, his manhood right under me. I leaned forward and kissed him. His hands were on my hips, and his breathing was hard and erratic.
I kissed him like I was going to devour him. Then I lowered my hips and I found him. He gasped when he was at my entrance, and then I lowered myself down on him. He slipped inside of me and I let out a breath that sounded like a cross between a moan and a sigh as he slid all the way inside of me.
The power surged and rippled around us, swelling like a wave until I felt like I was going to drown, and then it drained a little bit again, letting me up for air. Reid’s skin was boiling hot underneath me and I felt that same searing heat inside of me.
I pushed myself back up, and the friction made me moan. Reid’s face was pure ecstasy. I sank down on him again, and as he looked at me I watched the blue flame bleed into his eyes, eating the green until his human eyes were gone and his wolf eyes were bright and powerful. I saw the beast slide behind him and I knew this wasn’t just sex.
This was claiming authority.
I moved my hips against him, moving faster and faster, feeling him slide in and out of me. It was more intense than it had ever been before. His hands traveled over my body and he closed his eyes. I did the same, giving myself over to the feeling that built inside of me. It wasn’t just heat the way it usually was.
It was power. Magic built inside of Reid, and translated to me because he was inside me. It surged through my body and it felt like it was going to rip through my skin and spill out in a burst of light. I imagined that if I had any kind of werewolf in me, it would break out now. I could feel how Reid was feeling. I touched his control over his wolf, and then I touched the animal inside, and it pushed back against me.
An orgasm built inside me, starting deep down and then filling outward, like a cup being filled with hot water. I felt like I was buried in power, and then I broke through the surface and the orgasm rocked through me. It ripped out of my extremities so violently I couldn’t tell if it was delirious or painful. I cried out. Reid cried out almost the same time and I felt him release inside of me.
With it came more power, washing through me. I collapsed on his chest, and with him still inside of me, I suddenly felt all the wolves in the pack.
I felt them like separate energies, like breaths of air. I knew where they were. I touched their power, their wolves, the same I’d touched Reid’s. My eyes shot open and I lifted my head, looking at Reid. His eyes were green again.
“Did you feel that?” he asked. I nodded. And I knew that every wolf in the pack had felt that too. We were bonded now, completely. And I was the alpha’s second, his mate.
Chapter 9
They were home for one more full moon. It was the longest stretch Reid had ever been home, as if pack matters had taken preference and the army could wait. They’d been called up to leave the day after the full moon. We would have one more night together.
For the past month the pack had been teaching me what it meant to be a werewolf. To be a part of a pack, and to be one with them. It was different after Reid and I had forged the bond. I felt in touch with every one of them. I couldn’t touch their power the way I had when Reid and I had had sex.
That had been like I’d used his power and rode it out to find his pack. It had been wild and scary, and I wasn’t in a hurry to do that again soon. For now, what I had was enough.
Even Sarelle was submissive to me. She still didn’t like me, and the feeling was mutual, but we didn’t have to like each other to fit in a pack, to work together as a unit. As long as the hierarchy was clear, no one questioned their motives in the pack. The pack was like one organism.
When the sun dropped behind the horizon, Reid stepped into the room and I could feel the power building. It was time to go. I took his hand and that familiar hum of energy surged through me.
“Are you ready for this?” he asked. I nodded. I was ready. I still had a lot to learn, but I had a pack to teach me. We walked out of the house and made our way to the forest.
At the edge of the trees Reid stopped and kissed me. Then he laced his fingers through mine and we walked into the trees. The forest was alive. I could feel Reid, feel the effect the pull of the moon had on him. He was anticipating the night, waiting for the power that was building all around us.
We stepped through the forest and it opened for us, flowing and bowing around us so that we moved like we were walking through a field. I felt liquid and alive, bending around nature until I was as part of it as Reid. I knew that all of this was because of him, because of our bond, and because he was touching me.
When he left tomorrow it would all die down so that it was just me and my normal human life. Until he came back.
We reached the clearing, and the rest of the pack was present. I felt them as we stepped into the circle of power. The unity washed over my skin in a rush of goosebumps. They bowed their heads to both of us respectively, and even Sarelle acknowledged me.
The moon was bright in the sky, and I felt the ground under my feet crawling with magic. Everything around me was bursting with life, from the wolves to the forest to the earth.
The pack dropped to the floor, and they moved toward us, crawling on their hands and feet. The action should have been so awkward, but they moved with fluid grace, like they had muscles under their skin that I didn’t have. John was the first to reach me. He touched me l
egs with his hands and then rubbed his cheek against my pants. Someone took my hand rubbed it against a cheek, and it was Maria. More wolves joined us, until we were both surrounded by people on all fours, rubbing themselves up against us.
They were being good wolves, submissive and their animal behavior didn’t scare me or freak me out.
When I thought about it again, after the full moon was over and the pack left on duty, I would probably think it was the weirdest thing. But right now it felt right, it felt like it was the way it was supposed to be. And I understood why Charlene, John’s wife, would never be able to do this.
I felt it when the first wolf gave in to the change. Maria was the first to go, and I could feel the power swallow her and draw her animal out. Her face changed, bones moved under her skin, and then she was a wolf. The others followed suit, one by one changing in front of me, until everyone except for Sarelle was a wolf.
She stood up and looked at me.
“I didn’t think you had what it took to lead us, but I was wrong,” she said before she gave into the change as well. Reid looked at me, smiling. He lifted my hand to his lips and kissed my knuckles. Then he kissed me.
“I’ll see you in the morning,” he said. I felt the wolf rip out of him as if I was the one that was changing. The pain was vivid and real for a moment, and then it passed. His wolf broke free, and he shook himself like a dog. Reid threw his head back and a howl drew out of his throat. The others joined in, singing their song to the moon.
Then Reid launched forward and ran into the trees. He made small yipping sounds that got the others even more worked up than they already were. They answered with similar sounds, and one by one, according to hierarchy, followed him into the trees. I was left alone in the circle of power.
And it didn’t drain the way it had the first time. It stayed with me, less than when the wolves were with me, but still there. When I stepped into the trees, I felt it drain out with me, and I knew that if any other human walked in there now it would just be a patch of dead earth.
I made my way through the trees, back home. I felt the night air almost like a whisper on my skin, and I could feel the power of the pack, knew where they were. I knew this wasn’t going to last, not while Reid was away. I couldn’t draw power by myself the way I could when I was with him. It was because of him.
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