Curse of the Alpha: The Complete Bundle (21 page)

By high school, he could hardly remember that they’d been so close as kids. She would pass him in the hall with her sweet smell and her quick step, her arms clutching a stack of books, her eyes not sparing him even a glance.

Until now.

E
rik shook
his head to clear the memories.

Sunlight still shimmered on the surface of the creek like no time had passed. But he was standing here, six feet tall and sweating, all grown up. And Ainsley hadn’t set foot in this place since she was eleven years old.

And if she had her way, she never would again.

Something twisted in his chest, and he spun around and marched back down the path to his house.

There was just time to shower and then head out to patrol her house. But he had to hurry if he wanted to beat the sunset.

The hot water pounded down on his sore muscles. The sadness he’d felt by the creek began to fade as he looked forward to patrolling. Even when he didn’t see her, he felt close with Ainsley when he trotted through the woods near her house.

He changed and loped off through the woods to her house impatiently. The sweet scent of pine filled his nose.

He stopped short when he reached the edge of the woods. There was an extra car in the drive.

A Tarker’s Hollow PD car.

Clive Warren.

The meaning behind that car in the drive hit him like a kick in the chest.

Erik knew in his mind what she was doing was a good thing. It was the best thing, a heroic thing, really. And he didn’t even really want to be alpha anyway.

But somehow he still had an overwhelming urge to burst through the door and stop her.

Maybe it wasn’t the thought of losing his chance at being alpha that was bothering him.

Using every ounce of self-discipline he had, Erik managed to stay in his wolf form on the edge of the woods. He took a breath and ripped his eyes from her door and loped back through the woods.

She might be doing the right thing, but he knew he couldn’t be within earshot when she did.

That was too much.

T
he sun was going
down on Tarker’s Hollow, and Ainsley was rushing through the end of her bathing routine.

She had cleaned the house until the last possible moment. The first floor was now sparkling and fragrant as well as empty. And of course she’d made sure her room was clean, tidy and welcoming. She even took down her Harry Potter poster.

As she smoothed lotion on her legs Ainsley wondered how the night would go. She was pretty sure Clive knew what was going on, although of course he might not. He seemed like he’d grown up to be a pretty modest guy.

As she slipped into her robe to head into her bedroom to dress, a shave-and-a-haircut knock echoed from the front door. Ainsley froze. He wasn’t supposed to be here yet.

As she hesitated, the knock repeated. This time it answered itself with a two-bits knock.

It was probably just some idiot who wanted more stuff out of the house. She would chase them away quickly and be dressed for Clive in a flash.

She bounced down the stairs and partially opened the front door.

It was Clive. Oh god, it was him.

“Hey, Ainsley!” he boomed. His handsome face broke into a happy smile.

“Hi, Clive. I’m so sorry, I wasn’t expecting you for a few more minutes,” Ainsley chirped. “Please come in. I’ll just run up and get dressed.”

He walked in and they both looked at the completely empty living room and the archway into the completely empty dining room.

“Wow,” Clive said. “Some place.”

Ainsley didn’t know what to say. Clive’s family had lived in one of the 1960s split-levels down on the south end of town. Was it possible he was noticing the high ceilings and woodwork on the Victorian? Or was he making a joke about it being empty?

She covered her bases by laughing and then blurting out, “I had a little giveaway today. I was overwhelmed by so much old furniture.”

“Some of that might have been worth something, Ainsley,” Clive pointed out.

“That’s true. But I felt like it wasn’t worth the time I would need to sort it all out. It makes me a little sad, getting rid of my parents’ stuff.”

Clive nodded and she nodded back. There was an awkward little pause.

“Why don’t you..?” Ainsley began. Then realized there was not a single chair in the whole house. She wanted badly to slap herself in the forehead.

“Do you still have a picnic table out back?” Clive asked.

“Yes!” Ainsley exclaimed. “Do you want to wait out there for me?”

“Sure,” he said, stealing a glance down her robe and then looking away quickly.

Ainsley couldn’t help pulling her robe a little tighter before scampering up the stairs to her room. She dressed as quickly as he could and tried hard not to think about how it was going.

C
live pulled
out the bench at the picnic table and took a seat.

He wasn’t really sure what was going on tonight. The house was empty and he didn’t smell anything cooking. And Ainsley was practically naked.

Oh.

Clive nearly slapped himself in the forehead. Maybe Ainsley wanted to cut to the chase.

Damn.

She smelled like heaven. He could have grabbed her and kissed her and skipped the awkward conversation stuff that would only make him feel dumb.

Why did he always think of the right thing to do when it was already too late?

Now he had to sit outside where it was hot and humid, on a hard wooden bench.

Why would she give away all her stuff if she was going to choose him as alpha?

Maybe she wanted them to get new stuff together. That would be nice. He hoped she had as much money as everyone said. He didn’t have enough money on his sheriff’s salary to buy her new stuff for a house this size.

He looked around.

There was a small yard with some flowers and a white fence. It wouldn’t be too hard to jump over it if the shit ever hit the fan. Clive was always thinking of this stuff since he had become a cop. It was good to be prepared.

Of course he could also just turn into a giant wolf and do pretty much anything he wanted. But sometimes you wanted to stay a person.

The back door banged and there was Ainsley.

Wow.

For a nerd she was a knock-out. Right now she was wearing a pink dress that was the exact color of a birthday cake. It was low cut and tight on her boobs.

“You look beautiful, Ainsley.”

“Thank you, Clive.”

She blushed a little, just like all girls did when he told them they looked beautiful. He knew it was because he was handsome, not because he was witty or romantic.

But it was still nice.

He smiled back but didn’t say anything, leaving her a little off balance. Girls seemed to like that.

“Clive, I don’t have much in the house…”

That’s fine. We can just fuck. But I wish I’d eaten before I came over.

“…but I do have a couple of rib eyes from the Co-op that I can cook, and a salad. Does that sound okay?”

“That sounds great. Let me cook the steaks, you make the salad.”

She looked surprised.

“Oh no, Clive, you worked all day. Let me cook for you.”

“I insist. Steak is kind of a specialty of mine.”

She shrugged and they walked into the kitchen together. The bottom half of her dress was a little too fluffy for him to be able to see her ass.

That was a shame.

But he could smell that honeysuckle scent coming off her in waves.

“Let’s see those steaks,” he said.

He liked the way she scurried to the fridge to get them for him. When she bent down to take them off a low shelf his wolf leapt at the idea of mounting her.

He slowed down his breathing on purpose and tried to keep his cool. With what he had planned for them tonight, he was going to need his strength. And besides, when he was alpha it would be important to have self-control.

Ainsley turned, wearing an eager to please smile, and presented the steaks.

He couldn’t help smiling back and praising her.

“These look great, good job. Do you have a pan that can go in the oven?”

She got a panicked look on her face. She spun and opened the oven to find a perfect pan.

“Thank goodness. I was afraid for a second that someone might have taken it today.”

“You let them take your kitchen stuff too?”

“I told them they could have everything except what was in my bedroom.”

Clive let that thought hang in the air for a minute.

“Would you like a glass of wine?” Ainsley asked nervously.

“Sure.” He smiled at her again.

Instead of making her more nervous by watching her, Clive put the pan back in the oven and pre-heated it. He unwrapped the steaks and sniffed at them.

Delicious.

These were definitely expensive – he never got meat at the Co-op. He snuck a peek at the deli label. $34.47. Jesus. It would be fun to get used to nice things.

She seemed pleased to find a couple of mason jars in the high cupboard. She poured out wine and held out a jar to him.

Clive smiled at her and took a sip. In his opinion drinking wine was a little fruity, and he’d rather have a cold beer. But whatever floated her boat. He knocked back the whole glass.

“Nice, Ainsley. Can I have some more? Throw a little ice in this one, will you?”

Her eyes widened but she took his glass and did as he asked. She probably hadn’t been with a guy who could hold his liquor before.

Her boobs jiggled when she cracked the ice tray. His wolf ached to mount her. Again he held it at bay.

Instead he grabbed the pan out of the oven with a towel. He threw it on the stovetop and turned the gas up to high, then carefully laid both steaks on it.

They sizzled and steamed like crazy. He wished he could eat the smoke that rose from them it smelled so good. He did a slow count out loud to thirty then flipped them over. Another cloud of steam and smoke billowed out from the pan.

Then the smoke alarm went off. The high-pitched sound was maddening. A drawback to having overly sensitive ears.

“Shut it off!” he hollered to Ainsley.

“Oh gosh, I’m sorry! Let me go take care of that,” she said as she scrambled up the stairs to reach it.

A
insley dragged
the chair from her room into the hallway to help her reach the smoke detector.

She tried waving her hand in front of it, but there was so much smoke it kept going off anyway. Finally, she settled for removing the battery.

When it was done, she stood on the chair for an extra minute. Things were not going well. The only positive was that Clive seemed to like the way she looked. She hoped that would be enough.

Ainsley dragged the chair back to her room, then walked over to the mirror on the dresser and looked herself in the eye.

Ainsley Connor, you can do this.

“Soup’s on!” Clive yelled.

Well, it was now or never. Ainsley took a deep breath and headed back down the stairs.

Clive slid the steaks from the sizzling pan onto the plates on the counter. Ainsley smiled at him and he smiled back warmly.

He really was trying. And he was practically busting out of that polo shirt. That was plus.

She grabbed the bowl and added salad on their plates.

Clive carried the plates and Ainsley brought the wine and they went out to the back porch. A wall of humid air assaulted her as she stepped out the door. She was going to be a sweaty mess by the end of the meal.

Great. Why hadn’t she thought to keep the table?

Ainsley headed for her usual spot overlooking the garden until Clive cleared his throat. She looked up at him inquiringly.

“Sorry, Ainsley, I don’t like to sit with my back to the open area. It’s a cop thing,” he added, not without a touch of pride.

“Oh, um, sure.”

Ainsley glanced over the backyard. It didn’t look particularly menacing. Fireflies were beginning to hover lazily among the trumpet flowers that were trained on the white picket fence.

When she turned back he was already seated and chomping enthusiastically on a big bite of steak.

Well, if he wasn’t standing on ceremony neither was she.

Ainsley took a big gulp of wine and slid onto her bench. She cut off a small piece of meat and almost retched. It was scorched on the outside and red and bloody on the inside.

Clive was looking up at her inquiringly as he worked a gigantic bite. She gave him a little smile.

“I’ve never had steak quite like this. Where did you learn to cook, Clive?”

“Seared on the outside, rare on the inside - it’s called Pittsburg style. It’s the only way to eat a steak. Everyone knows that,” he declared and took another enormous bite. Case closed.

Ainsley realized that he wasn’t planning to have a dinner conversation. In some ways that made things easier. She concentrated on locating a well-done edge of the steak that she could nibble on. It was slow going. Finally she gave up and worked on her salad.

In any case, she wasn’t feeling very hungry. It was partly the bloody steak. But it was also the trouble of wondering what to do when the meal was over. She toyed with her last few bites of salad.

Clearly they couldn’t go straight to bed. But there was literally nothing else in the house to do.

How could she have failed to think this through?

She blamed Cressida for distracting her. Thoughts of that particular distraction made Ainsley squirm in her seat a little.

Clive made a smacking sound and she looked up to see that his steak was gone. He had eaten it - gristle and all. Ainsley wondered for a minute if he might gnaw on the bone.

He looked like he was considering it.

Clive glanced up and eyed her plate hungrily.

“Are you going to finish?”

Ainsley vaguely wondered if what she had done to the steak even constituted starting.

“No, it’s all…”

He had grabbed her plate.

“…yours,” she finished weakly.

“Thanks,” he said. “These steaks aren’t half-bad. I usually don’t go for all that grass-fed, organic stuff, but they might be on to something.”

He gave her a warm and grateful smile, then dispatched with the steak in record time.

Crap.

There was no more food. Ainsley sipped her wine and prayed for an idea of what to do next.

Clive wiped his mouth politely. Then he took her hand across the table.

“Ainsley, thank you for bringing me to your home for a delicious meal.”

“Oh, you’re welcome, Clive. Want to go for a walk? I’d love to hear about you –what you’ve been up to since high school? It’s such a pretty night.”

If you considered thousands of mosquitos and air that was so warm and heavy it was hard to breathe pretty.

Clive looked into her eyes with sympathy. Then he smiled a slow, sexy smile.

“Ainsley. You don’t need to play games. I’m honored to be here. We have the rest of our lives to get to know each other. Let’s just cut to the chase.”

Ainsley struggled for something to say. For whatever reason, she just didn’t feel ready.

“Wait, there is a bed in your room, right?” he asked worriedly.

“Yes, there’s a bed,” she assured him.

He smiled broadly and then began to look over what he undoubtedly assumed to be his new mate. He glossed over her face and eyes but he lingered on her breasts. She became aware of her own breathing. Each breath pushed her breasts tight against the fabric of the dress.

His jaw tightened and she could hear his heart began to thunder and smell his arousal.

Well, she didn’t have anything else to feed him.

And he was smoking hot.

If she could concentrate on all those bulging muscles, she shouldn’t have any problem.

She might just have some fun.