Alpha Unleashed

by Kathy Lyon

  Eventually she got tired of the silence. “So how did you get him back to base without getting shot?” She couldn’t imagine guards allowing a huge grizzly bear to zip up to the front gate.

  “There were trees nearby. I shifted to human there, then carried your brother back to base.”

  Carried? Vic must have been hurt a great deal more than a bad knee. But hell, he was talking about carrying a man through an Alaskan snowstorm while naked.

  “It’s a miracle you weren’t frostbitten.”

  “I was. But I fixed it on my next shift.”

  “But there must have been questions. And video, right? Even if the guards didn’t see, weren’t there cameras?”

  He turned and looked directly at her, surprise in the lift of his eyebrows. “I was seen.”

  He seemed startled that she could think the scenario through. She shot him an arch look. She wasn’t just a pretty face.

  Meanwhile, he nodded as if he accepted her words though she hadn’t said anything. “Enough people saw and then more when I refused to allow them to amputate my feet.”

  What? Ouch.

  “Among many shifters, that is a killing offense.”

  And now she had another thousand questions, all of them ending in an exclamation point. So she started with the most obvious. “Killing offense because you didn’t want your feet amputated?”

  He shook his head. “Letting the shifter secret out.”

  Oh. Right. “So you’d be killed for telling? Or they’d be killed for knowing?” And how soon were angry grizzly-shifters going to come for her because she knew about the fur?

  He sighed. “Both. Sometimes. That’s why I didn’t tell anyone.”

  Oh shit. “So, um, the military knows about shifters now because you saved my brother’s life?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you haven’t confessed that particular detail to your alpha.” She was guessing at the power structure among his kind, but he seemed to confirm it all with a nod.

  “Many human things are forgotten when being a bear. And they don’t come always come back.” He glanced at her. “It slipped my mind.”

  Yeah, right. “I thought you said you didn’t lie.”

  “I don’t. I came back home and everything about my clan had changed. We had a new alpha and new rules, plus there had been some sort of attack on the children.”

  “What?” A very real surge of fury went through her. She despised it when kids were targeted.

  “I was angry about leaving the army, and I would not submit to Carl. I decided since I had left the army, I didn’t have to take orders from anyone anymore.” He swallowed loud enough for her to hear. “I was very angry.”

  She heard the pain in the very emptiness of his tone. Her brother had cost him everything, and here she was demanding he help Vic again. But rather than face his pain, she shifted to her questions. “Who is Carl?”

  “The new alpha.” His gaze wandered out the window to the passing trees as he clearly longed to be outside as a bear. Which meant she had to keep him talking.

  “That’s why you went bear for so long? Because you were avoiding a showdown with your alpha?” Another guess. Another nod.

  “Carl understood that I needed to find control of something. He suggested I go to the UP to get away from clan politics. Control myself and my life up there. I don’t think he meant for me to be a bear for ten months.”

  Yeah, probably not. “And now?” she pressed.

  He shrugged. “Now I will have to submit to Carl. Or not.”

  Great. Male dominance taken to animal extreme. Not something she wanted to contemplate. But that was tomorrow’s problem after he fixed Vic. Meanwhile, she still had to keep him talking. “So back in Alaska, people figured out you could shift. Not just my brother, but the doctor. And the guards.”

  “Yes.”

  “And that means your CO, too.”

  “He said no one would tell. He certainly couldn’t put it in a report. Who would believe it? But he expedited the paperwork for me to leave the military. Didn’t like having me under his command.”

  And they were back to how Vic had destroyed his life. “So my brother’s stupidity cost you your military career.”

  “Yes.” A wealth of fury in that word. But a moment later, he started to relax back against the seat. As if he were consciously releasing each muscle one by one. “Maybe it was time for me to leave. My grizzly had been changing. The mountain was too close.”

  It sounded like rationalization. Or the beginning of acceptance. She couldn’t tell and maybe he wasn’t sure either. She opened her mouth to ask, but he held up his hand to stop her.

  “I don’t have an answer,” he said. “Mount Denali is just a mountain. But it had a wildness to it that my grizzly liked very much. It made him more aggressive. Harder to contain.”

  That wasn’t what she’d wanted to ask, but she’d go with it. “The mountain made it harder for you to stay human?”

  “Harder to keep from ripping your brother’s throat out for not listening to me.”

  She heard that. Except whenever she felt that way about Vic, it was an exaggeration. She was pretty sure Simon couldn’t say the same.

  “Then you come home, pissed off and suddenly without a career, and everything’s different. This Carl wants you to submit, but you’ve got anger issues. So off you go to UP to get your head on straight only to shift to bear and stay there. For ten months. And then I show up. Have I got that right?”

  “Yes.” The word was clipped and angry, but he didn’t elaborate. Good because when he took that tone, he scared the shit out of her. Fortunately, he made no moves. He just sat there and brooded as the miles sped by.

  She judged it prudent to let him be for a bit, but an hour later they had to stop for gas. He’d been pretty cooperative so far, but he hadn’t exactly promised to help Vic. In fact, even at his most uncommunicative, he’d said he’d be no help to her brother at all. But the gas tank wasn’t going to refill itself, so she had to take the risk.

  “I need to get gas,” she said by way of opening. Typically, he didn’t comment so she was forced to ask the question bluntly. “Can I trust you to stay with me? That you’ll go to Detroit and see if you can help Vic?”

  “I cannot help him. I’m sorry.”

  “Vic says you can.” Then she held up her hand rather than rehash the same argument. “Just say you’ll come with me to see him. Please.” She hated that she had to beg the man, but what other choice did she have? When he didn’t immediately answer, she tried for a light joke. “Besides, what else have you got to do?”

  “I have been out of touch for ten months,” he said. “There is a great deal I should do.”

  Like have a dominance fight with his alpha? No way was she letting that happen before he saw Vic.

  “But you can take a day or so, right? See Vic while you remember how to be a guy?”

  She held her breath while he seemed to think about it. And while she waited, they passed a freeway sign. There was an exit coming up with gas and fast food. She’d managed to snag a piece of pizza before it was gone, but she’d kill for a strong cup of coffee. This was the perfect place to stop, but only if he promised not to run.

  “Simon—”

  “I cannot read yet,” he said, his gaze dropping to his hands. “Numbers have come back, but the words aren’t there.”

  “So you need time to remember. I can help you, if you like.”

  He took a deep breath, his nostrils expanding as if he were pulling in her scent. “I would like your help.”

  “Deal.” Relieved, she headed toward the exit. “I’ll help you remember how to read. You see if you can help my brother.”

  His lips pulled back into a dark smile. “I will kick Vic’s ass for worrying you with this lie.”

  She’d take it.

  Chapter 5

  Simon stopped answering questions somewhere in mid-Michigan. He was more interested in separating parts of his personality
and body into categories. For the animal, all was one in a gooey disorganized mess. The man hated that. Overwhelming emotions were steadily pushed down into the bear and his cage. Certainly, he missed the bear’s contentment with sunshine and green trees, but that loss was miniscule compared to the steady quieting of confusion. Bears did not travel at eighty miles per hour down a freeway, so even though the man understood cars, the animal felt nervous with it. Pushing that away helped the man take control. As did focusing on freeway signs and the symbols they contained.

  By the time they hit Lansing, he recognized the golden arches of McDonald’s and the green splatter of lines that was the Starbucks mermaid. Other memories were coming back, too. He spent twenty miles remembering how a car worked from the headlights through the tailpipe and every part within and around the engine. Which meant that numbers made complete sense to him. Letters couldn’t be that far behind, right?

  His companion, however, remained a mystery. A female human with that intriguing nutty, pungent scent. She was drooping with fatigue and they still had several hours to go, but he didn’t have the mental skill to probe into that mystery. So his mind went elsewhere. He had been ten months unaware of the world. The man in him itched to focus on something other than the fact that he could not read.

  So he turned on her radio and tuned it to the news, but listening was a struggle. The newscaster’s voice was too different from Alyssa’s, and he had to concentrate very hard. And still little made sense until Alyssa reacted. Her body tightened and her mouth flattened into a hard line.

  Which was when he decided to ask her questions.

  “What is he talking about?”

  “The Detroit Flu.” She glanced over at him. “It’s some hideous virus that hit the city a couple weeks ago. There have been two outbreaks so far. I got it the first time and was a little cranky for a while.” Her lips twisted into a mocking smile. “Well, crankier than my normal.” Then her expression sobered. “Vic got it in the last outbreak. That was a few days ago. And he…and well, you saw what happened. That was the video.”

  Simon shook his head. “That video was not real.”

  “I shot it myself—”

  “He fooled you. That was makeup. Prosthetics. Vic can be very dramatic.”

  “Sure, he can. But he wasn’t faking that.” Her fingers tightened on the steering wheel. “I saw the change. I saw his body go from normal to that.” She turned to look hard straight into his eyes. “I saw it.”

  He believed her. There was too much fear in her for her to think anything else. And with her absolute conviction, he began to doubt. “Show me the video again.”

  She pulled her phone out of her pocket and thumbed it on. A moment later, he watched as Vic screamed while staring at an arm thick with fur. Simon let the video play through. Then he played it again, stopping and starting as he tried to find evidence of trickery.

  It took him a long time, and he came up empty. There were thousands of possibilities, but none that he could prove to her. So he kept silent and tried to think. Something was teasing at his memory. Something about hybrids and half-shifters, but that made no sense. No one could half shift.

  “Does it smell bad when that happens?” he asked.

  She shot him a startled look. “He reeks. Like the worst thing I’ve ever smelled. Why? What does that mean?”

  Simon shook his head. He didn’t know. He had no idea why he’d even asked the question. It was a memory from after he’d left the military but before he’d gone to the UP. Those few weeks when he was always angry, most times drunk, and a few times asleep. A very few times, which was another reason he went bear for so long. The animal had no trouble sleeping.

  “It’s like I dreamed something about this,” he said. “But I can’t remember it.”

  “Well try!” she snapped.

  He didn’t react to her temper. He understood she was desperate to help her brother. And he was equally annoyed with himself that he couldn’t grab hold of the memory. But that was what happened with alcohol. He’d been trying to drown out the pain of losing his place in the military. No part of him had wanted to remember anything.

  “We should listen to more news,” he finally said. “Maybe there is more information.”

  There wasn’t except for a brief statement that there had been only two new cases of the flu since this morning. The CDC hoped that this time the outbreak was contained. Weather news followed, then ads. Nothing relevant, though it gave Simon time to practice listening to other people, other voices. He also spent a great deal of time watching Alyssa.

  Her mouth remained tight and flat. The brief flare of hope when he’d asked about Vic’s smell had died into a heavy determination. Her entire body seemed weighted down, into her seat, on the steering wheel, and even her chin angled down.

  She didn’t start rubbing her fingernail back and forth over the wheel until they reached the outskirts of Detroit. Back and forth in a way that indicated anxiety. He knew it could not be him that was the cause of her nervousness. She had been more relaxed in central Michigan. Therefore, it was the approach to Detroit and what awaited them here.

  “Are you afraid of Vic?” he asked. “Do you think he will be violent?” In his experience, violence was a female’s biggest threat.

  “No, he wouldn’t hurt me.” She spoke the words slowly and without conviction. “Not on purpose. It’s this…um…flu or whatever. It makes him crazy.”

  “What does that mean? Did he hit you?” He’d intended to speak with the same measured tempo he used as a man, but his bear surged inside him making his breath forceful and the words sharp.

  She shifted her grip on the wheel, her fingers tightening as she seemed to twist against the plastic. “He didn’t touch me, but he broke a shelf.”

  “That frightened you?”

  She shot him a glare. “That terrified us both. His arm had changed and he started screaming that he was becoming a bear. He kept saying I had to find you. That you knew what to do.” She shuddered. “I had to Taser him.”

  It took Simon a moment to remember what a Taser was, and when the image of Vic being electrified filtered through his consciousness, he had a strange reaction to it. Both horror and satisfaction shot through him, and he remained silent as he analyzed the sensation. Meanwhile, Alyssa kept talking.

  “Vic would never hurt me normally. He’s a dick for sure, but he knows I’d make his life hell if he did. He’s been living in the apartment above me ever since he got home. Been studying to get his general contractor’s license, and I pay him to do repairs and stuff. There are lots of handyman jobs around the neighborhood, too, and he’s good at talking to people. If he could just follow through on what he promises without getting in over his head, he’d be amazing. But you know Vic, he’d rather talk a good game than play one. The military helped with that, so he’s better now.” Her hands twisted again. “Or he was.”

  She stumbled into silence. He saw the way her throat worked as she swallowed and that her shoulders had risen higher. She was anxious, and that made him uncomfortable.

  “You must be tired,” he said, stating the one conclusion he knew was correct. “Would you like me to drive?”

  She turned, her brows raised. “You think you can do it?”

  “If you gave me directions. I still cannot read, but I remember how an engine works.”

  “Yeah. Not letting you get behind the wheel until you say you remember how to drive. Knowing how to change the oil isn’t the same thing.”

  He had no argument for that, so he shifted to study their environment. Tight rows of houses, small brightly lit convenience stores, and sidewalks in varying states of disrepair. The land was alive with late spring and it sprang up as weeds between rocks and broken concrete. The trees were sparse and the air acrid as it filtered through the car vents.

  “Besides, we’re almost there,” she said as she turned off the radio. A part of him had been listening to the steady flow of news, but she absorbed his attention more
than anything on the radio.

  It was always this way when coming back from grizzly to man. The first person he met was the one he fixated on the most. Like a touchstone from which all other meaning evolved. It usually lasted a few hours as he reoriented to the world. But he’d never been gone for ten months before. Who knew how long it would last this time.

  It didn’t help that Alyssa was so damned interesting. Normally he fixated on Amanda at the pizzeria, and there just wasn’t much to her. But Alyssa had been a vibrant, fascinating girl when he’d visited two years ago. And now she was triply intriguing. Back then, she’d been busy with school and a job running a laundromat. The few nights she’d hung out with them, he’d found her funny and smart, two qualities he most liked in women. Sexy as hell, too, but as Vic’s sister, he wasn’t going there. Which meant he kept his hands to himself no matter where his fantasies had wandered.

  Then he’d spent the next years listening to every Alyssa story Vic had. Night after night, especially in the boring tundra of Alaska, regaling him with stories of Alyssa saying something smart, Alyssa being brave, Alyssa getting in trouble with a boyfriend before kicking the bastard’s ass. If he hadn’t been interested in her before those months in Alaska, he sure as hell was afterward.

  And now she was here with him. But she was different than he remembered and very different than the sassy, vibrant sister Vic told stories about. Now she was tense, focused, and with a dark edge to her humor. That ought to make her less appealing, but it made her more so. Life had tempered her girlish charm into steel. And nothing appealed to both bear and man like a beautiful woman who could stand up to him. Who could dig out a bullet from his side and force-cajole him into coming down to Detroit. Her choices were foolhardy, to be sure, but he had to admire the chutzpah. More than admire, his bear was ready to declare her a mate, and that was a kettle of worms he dared not open.