Secret Alpha Wolf (Shifter League Book 2)

by Leela Ash

  He seemed to read her body language flawlessly and soon, he turned her around so that she was facing the car. He leaned her against it so he could slowly help her strip. She couldn’t believe what she was doing. She was a police officer, for crying out loud. She shouldn’t be letting a man strip her naked on public property. Who knew what might happen?!

  But Achilles had extremely good senses; he would hear someone coming and they would be back in the car before anything bad happened. She trusted him to do that much, anyway. And she knew he would protect her at all costs.

  “Shit,” she breathed suddenly as he ripped down her panties in a display of dominant desire. He was not slowing down anymore, and she closed her eyes, inhaling sharply as he pressed himself against her.

  She could feel the length of him hardening against her thighs and she let out a low, voluptuous moan as he began to tease himself against her. He moved the hair from her neck and kissed it delicately, contrasting completely to the hard, assertive motions of his hips as he made himself known in other ways. He had been a gentleman up to this point, and soon found her squirming as she attempted to invite him in with her body.

  “I’ve wanted you so bad,” Achilles growled, his voice animalistic in his longing. She closed her eyes and whimpered, showing him with her body that she had wanted him too. He growled another acknowledgement, and soon, he pressed himself firmly inside, sparks of ecstasy flying from his entrance and throughout her entire core.

  Veronica couldn’t help but let out a soft shout of pleasure when he finally hilted, and he gripped her hips with satisfaction, making sure to bury himself in as far as he could possibly get. He settled there for a moment, as if reading her reaction and trying to gauge how she might want him to respond next. Suddenly, he slid himself out and she whimpered. Was he teasing her? She didn’t like to be teased. But he allowed for her to invite him in again, and this time, he pressed in hard enough that she felt his presence shock her to her fingertips.

  She let out a louder cry of pleasure and braced herself against the car, succumbing to the wild, raw craving for his body that his presence elicited within her.

  Achilles was overwhelming. Powerful. Intense. And she could feel everything about him with his movements. He allowed his arms to wrap around her and he stabilized her as he continued to furtively enter and re-enter her body. Everything he did felt incredible, and she didn’t want it to end.

  She had lost herself. She had stopped thinking about where they were and what they were doing. All she wanted was more. More of Achilles. And he provided that.

  Veronica moaned as Achilles’ lips sent more tingles of pleasure throughout her body, and she let her eyes fall closed as his gyrations brought her closer and closer to her peak. He grunted; a masculine but animal sound that drove her wild. He could tell she was close and, she could tell he was getting close too. She could feel every inch of him inside her body, and he suddenly whipped her around so that she was facing him again. His face was flushed, and his eyes flashed suddenly, a reflective green. And she knew then that she had seen the wolf in her lover for the first time.

  It didn’t last long, and soon, he had her by the shoulders, gripping her and burying himself inside of her once again, his face nuzzling the side of her neck, nibbling and biting sensually and tenderly as his body continued with its deed. He hitched suddenly, and Veronica felt tremendous ecstasy building up in her abdomen. She was getting closer. He could read her body language perfectly and somehow knew exactly what to do. Her pleasure was immense as he swelled inside of her, pushing her over the brink to her climax. He squeezed her close as a hot torrent of his seed flooded inside of her, and she let out a low moan of appreciation as her body was gratified with the height of her climax.

  He held her close as she trembled, finally breaking their bodies apart. He remained holding her steady until she was able to find herself again. The comfort of his embrace was unbelievable. She had never felt like this with a man before. And when she thought she had, it had all turned out to be a huge disaster.

  Finally, she dared to look him in the eye and found that he was gazing at her tenderly, his mouth twisted in a kind smile that made her heart melt.

  His phone pinged suddenly and Achilles frowned, digging it out of his pocket. “Shit! There’s been an attack. Atlas was hurt.”

  “Oh no!” Veronica hurried to pull her clothing into its proper position and looked to Achilles. “Let’s head over there.”

  “No,” Achilles stated. He released his firm grip on her and adjusted his clothing, hiding himself away once again and allowing her a moment to do the same. When they were standing upright, he turned back around. “This is my fault. If I had been there with them, it never would have happened. It’s my mess.”

  “But…” Veronica felt helpless as she got a sense of anguish from the man she had thought of as her lover just a moment ago.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Achilles said. “Just take care of yourself.”

  He gave her a brief nod and then headed away from her, walking down the road on his own.

  Veronica was both hurt and surprised by this, and she watched him walk, slowly ambling through the thick trees until he disappeared in the direction of the bed and breakfast.

  14.

  “Atlas, are you all right?”

  Atlas looked up, surprised to see Achilles coming toward him with a look of concern on his face.

  “Yes, I’m okay. I had some of my remedy handy. Are you okay?”

  Achilles let out a heavy sigh and turned as he sensed Apollo approaching.

  “What happened?” Achilles asked Apollo.

  “We were out in the woods and we were attacked by some Certa. But we took care of things.”

  Achilles sighed. “Why didn’t you text me sooner?”

  Apollo gave a slight shrug. “It was nothing we couldn’t handle.”

  “Where were you?” Atlas asked, frowning. He stood up and gazed at Achilles seriously, then turned to walk toward the porch swing at the bed and breakfast. He was limping and a major twinge of guilt caused Achilles’ stomach to drop. He had already begun to let it happen. The woman had gotten in the way of his responsibilities. He was responsible for letting another man he was supposed to support be injured for the sake of his ridiculous emotions. No, he wouldn’t let himself fall into that habit again. Their mission was far too important.

  They were close now. Achilles could feel it. If Veronica hadn’t managed to get him into the hospital to speak with Lester, he might never have been able to put the pieces together. But, with her help, he was so close to figuring out exactly what needed to be done.

  The relics at the old man’s place had been destroyed. That certainly helped them with the process of elimination. They had taken the Serah Stone, which might not mean anything, or it could mean everything. It was unlikely they had the location of the serpent mound, as Lester had kept his mouth shut about everything. And while there was a photo of it in his apartment the first time he had been there, the day that he went to check on Lester and found he had been attacked, it had been removed. Burnt to a crisp in the old man’s fireplace.

  That showed him that the old man might have been anticipating an unwanted visitor. Maybe he had been able to tell that the Kila were there waiting for him to show up on the day he and Veronica encountered them. He didn’t want any of the most sensitive research to reach their hands. He didn’t want them to find the key to the portals, or their location. He was doing everything in his power to help them and he was doing it right. As far as humans went, Achilles was starting to consider this man a hero. How many other humans would have so willingly put their lives on the line to protect humanity? Even after being shunned and ridiculed his whole career because the information he had learned was far too sensitive and difficult to believe for people who weren’t already enlightened…

  Lester was willing to die for a group of people who wanted to lock him up in an insane asylum and throw away the key. He was willing to ri
sk it all for people who didn’t give a damn about him. And he had safeguarded the secrets of the shifters against their biggest threat yet. There had to be something they could do to thank him.

  “I need to talk to you guys,” Achilles stated, shifting awkwardly.

  “What’s the matter?” Atlas asked, frowning.

  “The old man… The one you said probably knows about the portals... He was attacked in his home and nearly killed. He’s recovering in the hospital, but they robbed the place.”

  “How did you find that out?” Apollo demanded.

  “I heard it when I was in town,” Achilles said vaguely. They didn’t need to know he was working with the sheriff. That he was interested in the sheriff. Not yet. It wouldn’t help anything if they did know, so there was no reason to bring it up. It was terrifying enough to tell them what he knew about Lester. But he knew it was about time to involve them somehow.

  “Do you know what attacked him?”

  “There wasn’t a whole lot of evidence left behind, but his wounds were consistent with the Kaw.”

  Apollo and Atlas exchanged looks, then looked to Achilles.

  “Did you go to his house and check out the crime scene?”

  “Yes,” Achilles admitted. He was certain the others would be angry with him, but instead, Apollo nodded.

  “Good. We should go as a team, just in case there is something else happening. Did you salvage anything important?”

  “I did,” Achilles admitted again, his mind circling back to the book that was in his room. “It’s put away somewhere safe for now, though. It would probably be better to deal with that later.”

  “I agree,” Apollo said. “Come on, let’s move out.”

  Atlas and Achilles agreed, and they all headed to Lester’s apartment. Achilles was on high alert for the Kaw, or even other Kila, but it was clear, they were long gone from the place. Wherever they had gone with the fake Serah Stone, it wasn’t anywhere near here.

  “They sure made a mess,” Apollo observed. “We need to comb through all of this. Anything they saw here could have been a clue.”

  “It looks like Lester was a few steps ahead of the game,” Atlas acknowledged, nodding toward the fireplace where he had burnt several documents and references to the serpent mound. Though his companions wouldn’t know exactly what those papers were, Achilles was aware.

  “I visited him in the hospital,” Achilles admitted. “He believes in everything that is going on and didn’t tell them anything. I believe he didn’t, he has no reason to lie about it. He was scared. He knows exactly what the enemy is capable of.”

  “Does he know about the Portal Room?” Apollo asked.

  “I believe he does, but it wasn’t something we were really able to discuss, considering his location at the time.”

  “That’s probably for the best,” Apollo replied. They continued to search the place. Finally, Apollo sighed heavily and rounded everybody up in the living room. “I think it might be best to prevent any of this from happening again. We have to take the rest of the relics.”

  “You mean steal from Lester?” Achilles frowned, thinking of all the time and energy the old man had put in to collecting these things over time. How devastated would he be to come home and find that his life’s work had just vanished?

  “It was never Lester’s to begin with,” Apollo said.

  “I’m with Apollo,” Atlas said. “It makes him a liability. Not only that but he has already been attacked once. Who knows what he knows that he might end up telling them when they come back and decide to finish the job.”

  Achilles sighed heavily, and soon found himself reluctantly helping the other two in clearing out Lester’s home. They swept up all the broken pieces and fragments and put them in bags to carry out to the van Apollo had procured for their missions. It took a few hours of loading up the van before they were satisfied with the progress.

  Achilles felt terrible about it. He would have to explain what happened to Lester before he got home and realized it was all gone. He had to be able to prepare himself for that. It was only fair.

  What would Veronica think of all this? She would probably hate him if she knew. But he would probably end up having to tell her.

  He felt a knot in his stomach when he thought of her. That had been more than Achilles was able to handle. They hadn’t contacted each other since. The overwhelming reality of the work he had left to do had been heavy on his mind. He had done the exact thing he had been trying not to. He didn’t want to get her involved in any of this, and he certainly couldn’t afford to spend time on feelings and mates. Time better spent trying to prevent the ultimate collapse of civilization.

  Now that they were starting to make progress, he had to try and sort a lot of this out on his own, and with the men he was working with, to make sure everything they were doing was going to amount to something. It was hard to make progress on a case like this without his brothers involved. He had everything he needed to really start making some progress and he wouldn’t have been able to do any of it without Veronica. But that didn’t mean she should be any more involved than she already was. If the Kaw or Kila found her when he wasn’t around to protect her because she was snooping around and getting too much information, then there was no way he would be able to protect her. This was the part of the mission he took on by himself, for the good of everyone involved.

  “It’s pretty dirty in here,” Atlas said, glancing to his companions. Apollo nodded.

  “I guess some humans get too focused on one thing and don’t always remember upkeep.”

  “It’s not just humans,” Achilles said, laughing. He had met several wolf shifters in Stonybrooke who had a tendency to tune out the world and focus on their adventures, leaving their homes to deteriorate in standards of health and hygiene. The wolves liked to be out in the world and cared more about the impression they made on it than what the impressions of guests might be when they came into their dens.

  “Maybe we could tidy it up a bit for him. I mean, he’s already got it pretty rough and there’s no way of telling how long it will be before he gets out of the hospital. What do you guys think?”

  Achilles considered Atlas’ proposal and gave a brief nod. It was something he had already thought about doing himself, so having his friends there to help him take on the daunting task was something of a relief to him.

  “I think it would be good for him. It’s hard to say how long it will be before he is feeling at his best again. It might take quite a while before he is able to walk around and clean himself.”

  “You say that like he walked around and cleaned when he was able to,” Atlas retorted, wrinkling his nose as he lifted a dusty book from a shelf that was somehow still standing after the attack.

  Achilles couldn’t help but grin.

  “Sure, we can clean but I don’t know about supplies. And we should drop a load of this stuff off at base in the vault.” Apollo glanced at the other two, his eyes serious.

  “Yeah, we shouldn’t leave anything unguarded in the van,” Achilles agreed. “And we probably have better cleaning supplies than he does, so why don’t we drop this stuff off and grab the cleaning things?”

  They all agreed and soon found themselves back in the van and on their way back to the bed and breakfast. They loaded everything into the storage vault and locked it up, careful to make sure there was nothing that had followed them. Achilles was getting really on edge. Wolf shifters could sometimes be prone to anxiety, but that didn’t usually affect him. Lately, though, between everything going on with the Kaw and Veronica and Lester, he was starting to feel the effects of it terribly. He had hardly slept the night before, his mind was too intent on looking for some answers.

  The ancient wolf shifter languages were difficult to decipher, and the book was thick. It seemed like there were countless pages to sift through. And what he did understand mostly came to him by way of picture, and even then, he wasn’t confident in his knowledge. He wished he knew m
ore about the ancient language, and knew he should probably submit the book to the Elders, but then again, he had, in the past, had some unsettling conversations with the wolf shifter Elders. They had a tendency not to know who to trust on the council after everything that had happened with Thane and the bear shifter hybrids trying to infiltrate. Ever since then, he had been wary about letting anyone in on the important things, especially the wolf shifter council.

  Of course, those concerns were things he would generally keep to himself. If anyone knew he didn’t have blind and loyal trust in the council of wolf shifter Elders, they might question whether he was fit to be on the Shifter League in general. The Elders were always checking in on things and trying to figure things out for their elusive “records”. Achilles wasn’t sure anymore. All he knew was, there was a delicate balance, and if he didn’t trust someone or something, then he would be damned if he made the information available to them.

  “Maybe we should have Gavin come out,” Apollo said when they were finally finished loading the relics into the vault. “He might know more about what these things mean.”

  Achilles nodded. “That would be a really good idea.”

  Maybe Gavin would be able to help him translate that book. For whatever reason, Achilles was drawn to it. He felt in his heart of hearts that there were answers there. Important answers. And if he could only decipher them, then maybe they would be able to figure out the mystery of activating the portals.

  “I’m on it,” Apollo said, pulling his phone out of his pocket and dialing. “You two load up the cleaning supplies, okay? And grab some planks and hinges, they did some real damage to that door. We should get it repaired for him.”

  “On it!” Atlas took off toward the woodworking shop and Achilles went to the supply closet to gather a load of cleaning supplies. While it felt good to be helping Lester, he still couldn’t shake the heavy weight that was pressing on his chest. They had just stolen the man’s life’s work. And they had done it far too late for him to be safe from the Kila or the Kaw. They knew who he was. They could still get to him. They had to make sure that never happened again. And Veronica. And the portals. It was all starting to feel like too much.