Contents
Prologue
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
Chapter 14
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
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Epilogue
Note from the Author
* Stay Connected*
MORE BOOKS BY MEAGAN BRANDY:
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright © 2018 by Meagan Brandy
All rights reserved.
Editor: Jovana Shirley, Unforeseen Editing, www.unforeseenediting.com
Proofreader: Ellie McLove, My Brother’s Editor, www.mybrotherseditor.net
This book, or any portion thereof, may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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Created with Vellum
Dedication
To the one who pushes through, even when all seems lost, your bravery inspires me.
DEAR READER,
This is a full-length, standalone novel previously titled The Wrong Blaze. It is a complete story with no cliffhanger. It will make you laugh and smile, and maybe bring out a little rage…but trust me. He’s worth it, in the end.
Now turn the page and get ready to meet my very first alpha. He’s waiting for you.
- xo, Meagan.
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Prologue
Alec
Ten Years Old
My mom told me a new girl was moving to the neighborhood soon, and there she is.
I thought she’d be big, like me, but she’s not. She’s small with muddy knees and messy hair and mismatched socks.
I don’t know any girls who get dirty without whining about it, but it doesn’t seem to bother her none. I can tell ‘cause she won’t stop smiling to herself, even though she’s messed up whatever it is she’s trying to draw three times now. Every few minutes she sits back on her heels and looks over the crooked squares, bright pink chalk in one hand, Push Pop in the other, and then she starts over, moving to a new spot in the driveway.
She bends, getting ready to try again, and this time I can’t see her over the bushes, so I decide to walk over.
As soon as I step onto the cement, her voice hits me, and my feet stop moving.
The girl is singing quietly to herself. It’s not a song I’ve ever heard but I like it. It’s pretty, soft sounding. A sound that makes me want to lay back in the grass and close my eyes.
I once heard my mom call a lady dancing on TV graceful. I think that’s what she is, graceful. I step closer, and my palms begin to sweat.
She sits back again, looking down at all the squares, finding each one more crooked than the last.
I want to fix them for her.
Still, she doesn’t get upset, but glides over and tries again, still singing the nice song.
“Hi,” I speak loudly, making her jump and she quickly looks over her shoulder, red candy leaving a sticky streak across her cheek as she does.
“Hi!” she giggles, jumping up, and for some reason, I stand there and stare.
Her eyes are wide and blue like the ocean, her smile just as bright and big.
When she tucks her tangled hair behind her ear, I look away.
“Why’d you move in, in the middle of the night?” I ask, glancing behind her at all the empty boxes in the driveway.
“My dad says when it’s dark is the best time…” she whispers, trying to make her little voice sound scary. “When nobody can see our shadows.”
When I smile, she laughs again, tilting her head as she looks up at me.
My body starts to warm, embarrassed maybe, so I drop my eyes to the drawing, finally seeing what she’s been trying so hard to make. “Hopscotch?”
“Uh-huh. Wanna play?” she asks, excitedly, and I’m staring again.
She’s so … I don’t know what she is, but I like it.
She starts to chew on her lip and I remember she asked a question.
And I do want to. “Yeah, I wanna play with you.”
She grins, bouncing a little, like she’s happy to have someone to play with, like she’s happy to have me to play with.
I bend, taking her spot on the ground and lift the blue chalk, ready to draw her the best Hopscotch game she’s ever seen.
But I only get the first line across when footsteps ring behind me.
I squeeze my eyes shut, wishing him away. I just want to talk with her by myself a little longer.
“Hey, whatcha doin’?”
She jumps again, and I grin when she doesn’t share the same smile with him as she did me just minutes ago.
“We’re playing a game,” I tell him.
“You’re playing with her?”
I frown at him. “Yeah, I am.”
“You never want to play with any of us.”
He’s talking about all the other kids on our street.
“Well, I want to play with her.”
The girl smiles at her feet and I stand a little taller.
“Whatever.” He shrugs, glancing from the ground to the girl. “I’m Rowan. What’s your name?”
She looks at me briefly, almost as if she wanted to tell me first, but turns her eyes back on him. “Oakley.”
I like it.
“How old are you?”
“Eight.”
No.
“Awesome! You’ll be in my class!” he smiles.
And this time, she smiles back.
I watch, disappointed as he grabs for her hand and starts to pull her away.
“Come on, my friends – they’ll be in your class, too – are playing tag over there!”
She looks the way he points.
Oakley hesitates at first, her sandals not moving from where they’re planted, but with an extra tug, he has her beside him. She looks back once, her big blue eyes now pinched tight at the sides, but then she’s running away, her hand in Rowan’s.
I force myself not to look at them again as disappointment I’ve never known and can’t explain flows through me.
She was my friend first.
Twelve Years Old
She’s gonna fall, I know it.
Why does she always have to do boy stuff?
With a sigh, I inch closer, keeping myself far away enough so it doesn’t look like I’m following her, but close enough in case she freaking hurts herself. Again.
Last week,
she twisted her ankle trying to jump from a swing, now she thinks she can climb a metal fence ... in flip-flops.
Sure enough, she gets to the top and her sandal slips, so I dart from under the tree and catch her against the links before she falls completely.
She squeals and jerks her head back to see who caught her, her eyes widening when she finds me.
I don’t know why she pretends she didn’t know – it’s always me.
As I lower her to the ground, she moves her hands along the metal to make sure she’s steady. When she hits the grass, her eyes fly to mine and I glare.
“Why you always doing stupid stuff?”
She puts her hands on her hips like a brat. “I’m not. Rowan bet I couldn’t climb it, so I was showing him I can.”
“Well you didn’t, did you? You almost fell. And where is Rowan anyway? I don’t see him watching.”
She ducks her head and shrugs a shoulder. “Stacey and Brandon started playing cartoon tag, guess he wanted to play, too.”
“So you tried to show off for a boy who doesn’t even care and got hurt doing it. When are you gonna stop trying to make him like you?”
“He’s my friend, he likes me!”
“Yeah, but you want him to be your boyfriend and he’s not.”
“No I don’t! And I didn’t get hurt.”
When I point to her foot, she glances down with a frown, then gasps.
She tries to run off but winces and jerks her knee up.
Blood is dripping from a cut on her toe, making it hard to see the color of paint on her nails. Her eyebrows jump in panic and she looks to me, big tears welling in her eyes.
Instantly, I’m anxious – I don’t like when she cries.
I step forward, putting my hand on her cheek to keep her from looking back down.
“Stop it.”
“I can’t, what if-”
“I said stop. You’re fine.”
“Just go away,” she sniffles, and for some reason my chest starts to ache.
“No, you need me. Let’s go to the water fountain and clean it off.”
“But it might hurt.”
I shake my head, pushing her hair behind her shoulders and her eyes jump between mine. “It won’t hurt, I’ll be careful.”
“Promise?” she whispers and suddenly all I want is to make her feel better.
“Yeah.” I swallow. “I promise.”
She hesitates for a second, then nods.
When her hand slides behind my back to wrap around my waist, my stomach grows tight, kind of like it does before a roller coaster ride, and I freeze, glaring down at her.
I hate how she always makes me feel weird. Like how I always know when she’s around, as if I have a sixth sense or something. I thought maybe it was a girl thing, but it only happens with her.
Her cheeks grow pink and she goes to pull away, but I quickly grab her hand to keep it right where it is. Together, we move over to the picnic tables.
Soon as I set her on the bench, I cup my hands and fill them with water then slowly pour it over her wound.
She yanks it back but when she realizes it doesn’t hurt, she sticks it out again, pointing her pink toes right at me. I rinse it once more, then grab ahold of her foot to get a better look, seeing the cut is pretty small – a clean slice alongside the nail.
I look up, ready to tell her she’s fine, like I said, but nothing comes out of my mouth when I find Oakley’s eyes on me instead of her foot.
She does this a lot, watches me when she thinks I’m not looking. But I see her, even though I pretend I don’t.
I like it. It makes me want to run faster or throw farther when I’m playing football with my friends.
“Why you being nice to me today? Yesterday you called me spoiled and said you couldn’t stand me.”
Yesterday you were chasing Rowan around the field.
“Felt like being nice, I guess.”
The corner of her mouth lifts a little. “I wish you’d be nice every day, I like when you talk to me.”
My heart starts beating hard against my chest and I worry she’ll see it through my T-shirt.
“You-”
“What’d you do, Alec?!” comes from behind me and Oakley jerks her foot away.
I look up, finding she’s chewing her lip, eyes no longer on me.
I stand slowly, turning to look at Rowan as he runs over.
He drops beside her, picking up the foot to inspect it.
“I cut it on the fence, Alec was helping clean it...”
Rowan lifts his glare to me, then blocks her from my view. He helps her up and her hand snakes around him, same as it did to me only minutes ago, and my fingers ball into fists.
“Come on, Oaks. I’ll take care of you.”
“Take care of her? Where were you when she fell?” I shout, and he glares at me, turning her away.
“Shut up, Alec! Go find someone else to be a jerk to and leave us alone.”
They start to walk away and anger floods me, so I yell, “Like I care. Help the dumb girl who can’t even climb a fence.” Her misty eyes hit mine over her shoulder, and while I hate to see it, at least she’s looking at me. “You should stop trying to show off so I don’t have to pretend to want to help you anymore.”
I turn and walk away, forcing my feet to keep moving when I hear her cry behind me.
Eighteen Years Old
She looks good. Real good.
At the beginning of summer, I went to an agility training camp to help me prepare to start Oakley’s dad’s fire academy, and the entire time I was there, I kept wondering what she was doing and who the hell she was doing it with.
What I didn’t stop to consider was coming home to find Oakley on an entirely new level.
She’s still got the same smile and big blue eyes, but now they’re framed by longer lashes and higher cheekbones. The smile? It’s fuller, a brand new shade of pink even, a little darker, more attention drawing. And her body? It’s distracting, and not just to me.
I frown, looking from one neighborhood asshole to the next, almost all eyes locked on her hips and ass as she skips toward Rowan, holding out a piece of her birthday cake. Every damn year, she brings him the very first slice. Someone should tell her the rule when it comes to birthday cakes – the first cut is for the birthday girl, not the dumbass she thinks she likes.
It’s her birthday today and she asked the entire neighborhood to the community pool for a party.
Not me though, I wasn’t included. Maybe it’s because she didn’t know I’d be home, maybe it was on purpose. Either way, I had no invite.
Course I’m here anyway. And while she hasn’t looked my way, she knows it.
She keeps tucking her long blonde hair behind her ear, and when she laughs, she tips her head back a little farther than necessary.
She’s not fighting for my attention, not that she’d have to. She doesn’t know but she’s had it locked in since we were little, but she thinks I came here to crash, and she’s silently telling me she won’t have it.
Good for her.
I like when she fires back, too bad it’s so damn rare.
After the cake’s cleared out, everyone starts slipping back in the pool, so I move closer to the water, ready to be seen, but then Oakley jumps out, now dripping wet, and heads for the clubhouse that holds the rafts, swim games, and such.
So, I slip inside behind her.
As she reaches up for the diver sticks, my eyes fall to her bathing suit bottoms. They’re tiny, hardly covering half her ass.
It's perked up real nice, too.
I take a step closer and her arm jolts down, her back growing rigid and a smirk takes over.
Yeah, she knows I’m standing here.
She waits a second, then clears her throat and turns around.
And then she sucks in a deep breath.
Yeah, princess. You’re not the only one who’s grown.
I was five eleven when I left in June. I’m now a solid six f
oot, and twenty pounds of muscle heavier from weight training.
I look good, and she can’t hide how she agrees.
Finally, those blues pop up and her cheeks heat, but she’s fast to mask how I make her feel – always is – and she pops that newly shaped hip.
“Well, well, look who’s back.”
“Look who’s grown.”
She licks her lips and looks away, shifting on her feet. “You come here to tease me?”
“If I did?”
“It’s not nice.” Her eyes come back to mine. “It’s my birthday. Think you can wait one more day to ruin mine?”
“Would me telling you, you look damn good be ‘ruining’ your day, princess?”
Her tongue slips between her teeth as her eyes narrow.
I take a step closer and her hands hit the shelf behind her.
“Or if I said I like your choice in swimsuits ... even though I prefer it only worn for me.” I let my eyes run over her. “That’d be ruining your day?”
Her lips smash together, and she looks from me to the exit.
I take another step closer. “Or what if, I came straight here, only minutes after getting home from being gone for weeks, just to tell you happy birthday in person?” I lift my hand and place it on the shelf behind her. “Would that ruin your day, too?”
Her deep inhales grow stronger, the heavy rise of her breaths has her newfound chest pushing against mine.
It only takes a second for her nipples to set through the thin fabric, the beady points brushing over my skin with every breath she takes.
Wrong For Me Page 1