Alphas for the Holidays

by Mandy M. Roth

  “Why not?” He stepped closer. “I’m not involved with anyone and you’re not either.”

  “I beg your pardon. I was planning on spending the weekend with my boyfriend.” Great, now she sounded like a prude.

  “Was being the operative word.”

  “You’re twisting my words.”

  “No, I’m trying to make you see reason.”

  Shit. As soon as Logan said the words, he knew he’d stepped over that invisible line that his mother and sister constantly warned him and his brothers about. You never, ever, tried to make a woman ‘see reason’. That had the same effect as throwing gasoline on a fire. It exploded in your face. He crossed the room to place his hands on her shoulders. She tried to shrug away from his touch, but he held firm “I apologize for that remark, Katie. I’m just frustrated that you still seem to be hung up on this guy. And that is the last damn thing I want. What I want is you in my arms.”

  “Logan, you can’t be serious, you just met me.” Oh, she’d felt the instant attraction, too. But it didn’t work that way in real life. Someone as good looking as Logan McCall did not fall instantly in lust with someone like Katie Wilson.

  “I’m dead serious, Katie. I want you more than I’ve ever wanted any other woman.” His wolf growled in approval of his words. Words that should convince her that she was his. Theirs.

  “You’re just using one of your well-practiced lines on me.”

  “This is real, Katie. More real than you know.” He bent his head, staring into her eyes. They both knew he was about to kiss her and he moved slowly, giving her time to say no if that’s what she wanted. Bemused, Katie could only stare at his full lips as his mouth got closer. Then he was kissing her with a slow-burning hunger that sparked an ache low in her belly. With a soft moan, she melted against him, loving the taste of him on her tongue. Mercy the man could kiss!

  Open mouths, deep thrusts where tongues collided. An expression of pure, overwhelming sexual awareness and instant need. As if from far away, she heard herself whimper when his teeth scraped along her bottom lip, forcing her to put her mouth wider, so he could plunder inside deeper. Her senses gave over to the overwhelming sensation of being in his arms, tasting his hard, warm lips. He pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her as though he never wanted to let her go.

  There was a sense of recognition that she had never felt before. It stunned her in its intensity and her hands came up to push him away. He moved away, reluctantly, his mouth letting go of hers. When she looked into the swirling darkness of his eyes, she knew he felt the same thing and that it didn’t seem to surprise him at all. He looked at her as if he had known her all of his life.

  “See what I mean?” he whispered roughly against her lips when he finally lifted his head. “You want me as much as I want you.”

  A shudder of longing tinged with lightning rippled down her spine. “That doesn’t make it right.”

  She gasped as his hands found their way under her shirt. Before she knew what was happening his thumbs were brushing the undersides of her bare breasts. He’d admitted he’d cut her sweatshirt, bra and panties off. Now she was going completely commando beneath her jeans and another borrowed shirt. How she wanted him to keep touching her. All of her.

  “Oh, baby, it couldn’t get any more right than this.”

  That good-girl angel that sat on her shoulder whispered in her ear that he was simply out for physical gratification. The bad-girl devil dancing on the other reminded her that seeking satisfaction wasn’t a bad thing. In fact, it could be damn good—especially with a man like Logan.

  Katie knew it was crazy to let him touch her this way and even more insane to respond to it, but her senses were drugged with desire and for once she didn’t want to fight it. She wanted to reach out and grasp what she needed. She wanted to let herself feel like a woman. A woman wanted by a man.

  Did he know what he did to her? Know that no man had ever destroyed her defenses so easily? That she wanted to pull him right down to the floor with her and forget everything but the feel of his body, hot and hard, against hers.

  She inhaled the scent of his body—the scent of him. Clean and masculine, and maybe a little dangerous. Who the heck was she trying to kid? He was dangerous. She pulled away—she had to. His hands dropped to his sides and she felt the loss of his warmth immediately. “You’re just a horny wolf, stuck in the middle of nowhere with me. That’s all this is.”

  Her hands-off warning was like fuel to Logan’s already smoldering senses. One of his hands meshed in her hair, pulling her close until they were lip to lip once again. “If I had wanted female company, you can damn well be sure I would have brought some.” A strangled sound, half growl, half angry howl, erupted from his throat.

  Heat flared in the dark depths of his eyes and Katie feared she had pushed him too far. His fingers tightened briefly on her skull and then he was jerking her forward, slamming his lips down on hers. Katie’s head bent backward under the force of the kiss. No sweetness, no ease of greeting, shocking in its intensity. Until this moment, Logan had been careful of her, careful to hide the hunger. Now, he was a predator. A wolf out to devour. Out to claim.

  He let her go a moment later and she stood there, her lips throbbing and Lord help her, she wanted more. “Was that supposed to be some sort of punishment for not obeying you?” she asked huskily, licking her lips as if trying to recapture his taste.

  “No,” he ground out hoarsely. “It was meant to show you how much I want you.” Logan groaned as the need to tell Katie the truth—that they were mates and he was not just handing her a line of bull to get into her pants—rushed through him. Never had a woman left him so torn and confused, so crazy with need. It took all of his control not to shake some sense into her. He smelt the aroma of her arousal perfuming the air and knew she wanted him just as much as he wanted her. He knew if he picked her up and took her back to his house, she would protest. He also knew those protests would die away once he had her in his bed.

  But this wasn’t about a quick weekend hookup. It was about courting his mate. Making her understand he wanted more than that. With her. So much more. Had he made it impossible for them now? Scared her with his flare of temper, the intensity of his feelings? His desire? But damn it, she was his. His.

  “We have a connection. I know it and you damn well know it. And I’ll prove it to you. Come back to the house with me and I’ll keep my hands and my mouth off of you until you make the first move. How does that sound?”

  “It sounds like you’ve got an ego as big as your dick.”

  Logan smirked down at her and Katie wished she could take back her words. “You’ve been checking out my goods have you?”

  Katie snorted, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of admitting she had been checking him out. “I could hardly avoid doing that now, could I, the way you keep rubbing yourself all over me.”

  “Yeah, but you loved every minute of it, sweetheart.” He let go of her. Reluctantly, but he let her go. For now. “This house isn’t safe, Katie. I wouldn’t feel right leaving you here.”

  Katie rubbed her arms and took a step away from him. The cabin wasn’t the greatest—okay, so it was a dump—but it was safe. There was a lock on the door and baseboard heating. She wouldn’t even have to light the fireplace. She’d just go back to the city in the morning. Surely, the snowplows would be through by then.

  “Thank you for your offer, but again, no. I’ll be staying here.”

  Logan growled, but knew there was nothing else he could do. Well, there was one more thing he could do. Give her another taste of what she’d be missing. He gave her another hard, brief kiss and left her, his wolf growling at him the whole way home.

  Chapter 16

  Deciding a run was what he needed after his maddening confrontation with Katie, Logan stripped down and stepped out onto the back deck, his feet left wide prints in the snow as he strode down the steps. At the bottom, he allowed the shift to overcome him, feeling the ple
asure as his essence mingled with that of his wolf. For a brief moment, they were one and the same.

  He took off, running into the thicket of trees behind his house. That had been the main reason he’d bought the property so far away from civilization. He came here as often as he could, but lately his duties at McCall Holdings took up way too much of his time. He wasn’t like his brother, Jarod, a born workaholic. Yeah, he’d put in the time and hours to make the businesses the pack acquired profitable, but he’d leave it—well cut back considerably—to spend time with his mate.

  His mate. He knew his brothers weren’t as driven to settle down as he was. Jarod was married to the pack and Hunter was married to the military. He smiled, knowing this storm had at least forced Jarod to acknowledge the existence of his mate. Sara had worked for McCall holdings for over six months and Jarod had realized she was his mate as soon as he’d caught her scent in the building. Now, according to his brother, they were stranded together for the weekend. He had no doubt that Sara would be claimed by the time the city returned to normal.

  Lengthening his stride, Logan loped through the snow in his wolf form, enjoying it. It was beautiful despite the burden he knew it would cause the city. Stopping, he stood for a moment, taking in the beauty of the snow-covered pines. He raised his nose in the air, sniffing. The air carried more snow. And cold. He welcomed the cold, anything to cool the raging need he had for one stubborn, curvy woman.

  As he stood there, the snow started to fall from the laden sky, quietly, silently. He held his face up to the fat, twirling, wet flakes that drifted down slowly.

  According to the forecast he’d watched before he left the house, this latest batch of snow wouldn’t be as intense here as it was going to be in central Chicago. For that, Logan was grateful. It meant he could still get around without too much trouble. Like when he fetched Katie’s ass from the cabin. He glanced at the sky, realizing only a couple of hours had passed. He had no intention of delivering her car to her. She was staying on this mountain—with him—one way or another.

  Starting to run again, he wondered how long he should give her. How long would it take her to realize staying in the cabin tonight wasn’t only going to be uncomfortable, but that it could be dangerous?

  He’d lost his temper with her, something he regretted. When she’d backed away from him, he’d smelt the faintest hint of fear. That was not the way to treat a mate. His only excuse was that the mating heat was riding him hard. He needed her with him. And by here, he meant in his bed.

  Lecturing himself on managing the need wasn’t helping. Every inch of him was still on fire. His groin throbbed to the point of pain. Part of the problem was his body knew the pleasures that awaited them both. Katie had responded to his touches and his kisses, had felt the same passion flaring between them. She wasn’t experiencing the burning mating heat the way he was, but whether she knew it or not, she was responding to the pheromones he was emitting. That his wolf was giving off.

  He could still taste that first, hungry kiss. Feel the weight of her body as their tongues stroked together. The wolf emitted that low feral growl that Logan was quickly becoming acquainted with. The wolf knew what needed to be done. Their mate needed to be claimed, marked. Knotted.

  He threw back his head and howled into the wind, he and his wolf both miserable at not being able to do any of those things yet.

  Katie sat curled up on the couch under a blanket she’d retrieved from the bed. Even though she’d turned the temperature up, the baseboard heaters weren’t able to keep up with the cold outside. She’d never admit it to him, but she had heeded Logan’s words of warning about the chimney. She’d hesitated lighting a fire, not knowing when the last time the chimney had been cleaned. Going by the rundown appearance of the cabin in general, she hadn’t wanted to chance catching the whole place on fire. That would have been the last straw on the camel’s back for her and this weekend. Ending up homeless, stranded in the snow and waiting to be saved by the wolf yet again.

  She smiled despite her dour circumstances. Her adventures this weekend were the types of stories she could tell her children and grandchildren—if she ever had any. She rarely allowed herself to think about that particular dream. Why? Because look what happened with Doctor Deadbeat. She’d caught him sticking his wick in Slutty Nurse Betty.

  But it was what she wanted, a family. A husband. That was the kind of woman she was—the marrying kind. She wanted the whole nine yards, the husband, kids, the white picket fence, even the minivan.

  Her mind immediately went to the wolf centering prominently in the fantasies she’d just had. Somehow, she didn’t see him sharing the same type of dreams. His reputation said all she needed to know. He was more the string of models, a penthouse condo, with a sports car that cost more than the national budget of some small countries, type of man.

  She took a drink of the hot chocolate she’d made. She hadn’t seen him do it, but Logan had left her some non-perishable food, including hot chocolate mix, cookies and pop tarts. Another gesture that he wanted to take care of her, even if it was an odd combination. It was probably meant to prevent her from starving to death until she ‘saw reason’. She half-laughed at that. Men could be so dense when it came to women. Even a playboy wolf shifter able to charm his way into any woman’s bed.

  Not that he was trying to charm his way into hers. Okay, maybe he was she admitted, remembering the taste and feel of his hard lips against hers. She licked her lips and the taste of chocolate reminded her of the taste of his kiss. Which brought back memories of his hand on her hip and thigh as they lay side-by-side in his big bed.

  He had offered, no insisted, that she go with him. And she knew it wasn’t just because this cabin was a fire hazard. She honestly believed he wanted her.

  For the moment.

  The woman in her, that foolish, needy feminine part, wondered what it would be like to belong to Logan McCall. To have him make love to her as though she was his and his alone.

  Logan had waited as long as he could to bring his mate back home. As soon as he’d returned from his run, he’d taken a shower and donned a pair of jeans and sweater. Giving his hair a minimal swipe of the comb, he headed outside and was on his way back to her cabin. It was still snowing and the road was a little more treacherous than it had been when he’d brought Katie to the cabin earlier that afternoon. Fortunately, his SUV navigated the snow-covered road with ease.

  Once he reached the small cabin, he cut the engine but didn’t get out. He stared at the soft glow of light spilling out from the crack in the curtains. The snow fell in utter stillness, coating his car quickly. He imagined her with a cup of hot chocolate he’d left her. He knew she’d be spending the night back at his—their—home, but he had no intention of allowing her to starve in the meantime. Plus, she was one stubborn woman. It might be well into the night before he convinced her being with him was her best course of action.

  He didn’t know why he was hesitating. He knew what he wanted. Her. With him. But he continued to wait, watching until the cold began to seep into the car and through his clothing. The wolf growled, disturbed by the man’s odd behavior. The animal knew what needed to be done.

  But Logan knew how important this next step would be. He had no intention of leaving Katie on her own tonight. He had no intention of leaving Katie untouched tonight.

  He might not claim her, mark her, and—his body went rigid at the thought—knot her. But he would have her. His wolf pushed eagerly to the surface and he realized he needed to curb the animal’s enthusiasm so to speak. Damn her nerves and hesitation. She was leery at the moment, he knew that. All because of the damn doctor who couldn’t keep it in his pants. On the one hand, he should be grateful to the dumb shit. On the other hand, he wanted to tear off his head for hurting Katie.

  But none of that changed the fact that she was distrustful that he could—had—taken one look at her and known he wanted to be with her forever.

  He wanted her and by the heavens, he
was going to have her.

  Striding up to the door, he knocked loud and hard. Suddenly driven by the urgency to see her, to assure himself that she was safe. There was no fire rising from the chimney and he was glad. He’d been worried that she’d try and start one even though he’d told her not to. She was a damn stubborn woman. He liked that to an extent. He’d never wanted a mate who wouldn’t challenge him, but he certainly didn’t want a mate who put herself in constant danger. A mate like that would soon find herself over his knee with a hot bottom and an ass full of cock. So far, Katie had endangered herself twice in a very short span of time. She was overdue for a punishment.

  He saw the curtain flutter at the side of the door. For a moment, he thought she wasn’t going to let him in. Then she opened the door and his heart kicked started. Her face was bare of makeup and her hair was pulled back into a ponytail. She wore only a thermal knit top and a pair of fuzzy pajama bottoms imprinted with polar bears. Just looking at her took his breath away. Katie watched him, wariness clouding her big brown eyes, a wistfulness edging the corners of her mouth.

  He was encouraged by the immediate hunger and want he scented as soon as she saw him.

  At last, he found his voice, though it was a roughened version. “Can I come in?”

  Katie stared at the big wolf who had showed up on her doorstep. He wore the same thick jacket he’d worn earlier today. It made his shoulders broader, his frame heavier. And again, Katie felt small beside him. Which was something she’d never felt with a man before. Brad had stood just a little taller than herself and was nowhere near as muscled as Logan. She was amazed at the lack of feelings she felt for her ex-boyfriend—except the residual anger she felt on behalf of all women who had been taken in by a philanderer like Brad. No, that was too nice of a word to use. Man-whore and jackass. That best described men who used women for their own pleasure, never giving a second thought to the woman’s feelings.