Alphy's Challenge (5 page)

Once he finished, he thanked Betty as he put
his plate in the sink, then grabbed his wallet, cell phone, and keys and headed
out. Betty had given him directions and a list. He was good with directions,
another nod to his years of military training and usage of that training, so he
didn’t have any trouble finding the town.

****

Gale was at her limit. The past three weeks had
been hell, and the trials didn’t cease. Her vehicle had a flat. They were all
the way on the other side of the country but were unable to shake the
persistent alpha whose enforcers always kept catching up and finding them. Her
brother was alive, but he was
stillhealing
. After
three days, the hospitals couldn’t do any more for him, and the whole family was
in danger from the alpha
who
was out for their blood. They
were running out of money, and they needed it all for renting rooms, fuel,
medical supplies, and food. What was she going to do? She didn’t know how to
change a tire, and no one seemed to be in the mood to stop and help.

Gale leaned over her steering wheel and
started to cry. Things were just too much for her. When would they catch a
break? She looked up when she heard gravel crunching in front of her. Wiping
her tears away, she got a look at the man as he stepped out of the truck, and she
nearly swallowed her tongue. He was tall, with an unmistakable tanned muscular
body. His brown hair was crew-cut at the bottom and around his ears, but got
longer as it went further up his scalp and spiked into a pleasant wide upside-down
V kind of Mohawk. Usually she didn’t like Mohawks, but this guy had a style
that worked. His face was perfectly proportioned with defined facial features
accented with a chin strap beard and no mustache, indulgent pink lips, a straight
nose, and soft brown eyes. She’d never seen a better looking man in her life. He
elicited many different emotions just as she gazed into his eyes, one of those
feelings being refuge. For the first time in three weeks, she felt safe. She
had no idea why. He was a complete stranger, so what was she thinking?

She saw him stop just in front of her car and
lift his head slightly, like he
was smelling
something.
Could he be a shifter?
That thought
got her blood flowing in an entirely different manner. Her stomach began to knot,
and her hands were actually starting to shake when he knocked on her window.
Gale debated opening the door. She felt so drawn to him, and felt that he would
never hurt her, but she also had the other side of her brain reminding her he
was a complete stranger. The man squatted down to her level, his soft brown
eyes looking at her through the glass. “Miss, I’m not going to hurt you. Is
everything ok?”

His voice strummed happy tingles in her belly,
and
goosebumps
actually broke out on her arms. She
looked at his face, trying to judge his sincerity. But with his voice and those
eyes, she was a goner. She sat there frozen, struck stupid by all his glory.
Then he smiled, and she discovered her butterflies had rocket launchers. Her
breath caught in her throat, and sweat started to bead across her upper lip and
forehead. Oh no, she was sweating. The hottest man on record and she was staring
at him like some wide-eyed loon and sweating!

“Can I open the door?” he asked her. She
loved hearing that voice. What else could she do to keep him talking?

I
bet I could orgasm by just listening to his voice.
She didn’t realize she was nodding until he
stood up and flipped up the door latch to pop it open. Her mind went blank as
she found herself staring right at his lower stomach and crotch.
Holy huckleberries, that’s an impressive
bulge.

Cooler air lightly suctioned past her as he
opened the door. He squatted down again, placing his large hands on his bulky
upper thighs.
I didn’t know they came in
those sizes
. Yes, she had truly lost it. This had to be some sort of
hallucination caused from her little breakdown.

“I’m Ralph, but everyone calls me Alphy.”

Oh
boy
, she thought,
he sounds even better without the window
hampering his voice.
Bad window, bad.
Her brain,
seemingly out of nowhere, clicked back on just enough to respond. “Gale,” she
breathed out. She felt the hit to the stomach from those rocket-launcher
butterflies again when he gave her a wide, bright smile. His teeth were straight
and white.
How do people actually get to
look this perfect?

“It’s nice to meet you. Now, can you tell me
what’s gotten you so upset so I can fix it or kick its ass?”

Her nerves got the better of her because she
started to laugh almost hysterically, and then she started to cry. She saw his
face fill with alarm.

“I’m so sorry,” she sobbed.

He leaned over and pulled her into an awkward
hug. It helped though, because as soon as his arms reached around her and held
her, she suddenly felt all right. She inhaled, filling her lungs with his rich
spicy scent. He smelled so good that she had to internally argue with herself
to exhale, giving up the erotic fragrance.

She felt the loss when he leaned back on his
heels but for only a brief moment until the abrasive skin from his palms
lightly grazed her dampened cheeks as he cupped her face with his giant hands.
His thumb skimmed over her cheek, and she automatically leaned into the
pleasant feeling. She cleared her throat and snapped out of her happy place.
“Uh,” her cheeks pinked, “my tire went flat.”

“I can fix that for you, but that can’t be
the full reason why you were crying. I can see you’ve been upset.” He had
gentled his voice to near whispering. It soothed her, and she began to calm.
Gale took a moment to remember what it was she needed, other than to be licked
like a lollipop by the muscular Adonis in front of her.

She held her breath for a few moments,
then
shook her head. “If you could change my
tire, that
would be great. I have a spare.”

He tilted his head and rested his arms on his
legs. “Let’s take a look to see what has to be done then go from there.” He
stood up and held his hands out for hers. She threw one leg out onto the ground
and grabbed his hands, eagerly taking them, and tried to leap up but was
promptly stopped and pulled back by her seatbelt.

Damn
it!
She covered her face in
embarrassment. She peeked through her fingers at hearing a rich sexy laugh. The
Adonis in front of her was laughing. He squatted down and reached a colossal
arm around her and pushed the button on her seat belt, releasing her. Then he
grabbed her hands and gently pulled her out of the car.

All she could do was to mutely stare up at
him as he held her hands against his firm warm chest. His thumbs rubbed over
her fingers causing more tingles.
And someone
really needs to de-arm those damn butterflies.

She managed to detach her tongue from the
roof of her mouth. “Thank you.”

“You’re more than welcome.” His voice had
lowered, rippling through to her core, provoking a shiver that galloped down
her spine. Keeping hold of her left hand, he led her around the front of the
car to the passenger side. His eyes roved over the tires as they drew around to
the passenger rear flat tire. Letting go of her hand, he knelt down and
inspected the tire, then stood up and walk back to the front passenger and made
his way around, inspecting all four tires.

His face was tight in concentration as he
walked back around to her. “I can put your spare on, but all your tires need to
be replaced. They aren’t safe for you to drive on, and I’m surprised the others
aren’t flat as well.”

Heat crept up Gale’s neck and spread into her
cheeks. She looked down at the ground and fidgeted. She felt
Alphy’s
body-heat as he drew nearer and placed his hands on
her shoulders rubbing her jaw-line with his thumbs. The act drew her sight back
up, and she couldn’t stop herself from looking up into his face and falling
into the soft brown depths of his eyes.

“Do you need help paying for them?”

The burn in her cheeks increased as she
struggled with what to say. Of course she couldn’t pay, or she wouldn’t have
gone this long without changing them. But admitting that to a stranger, whose
opinion seems to matter a great deal to her, was more than embarrassing.

He looked down at her with understanding
showing on his face. “Let me pay for it,” he offered.

She started to shake her head and opened her
mouth to protest, but it died on her lips when he leaned down and kissed her.
It wasn’t demanding or perverted in any way. It was just a light brush over
hers, enough to feel his softened heat warm hers, and then he pulled away. But it
was enough to take the strength from her legs, and heat erupted in her abdomen
and shot down to the apex of her sex. Her knees gave way, but his strong arms
held tight around her holding her securely against his hardened sculpted form.
He gave a lopsided grin.

“Let me do this for you, please.”

That
has to be the sexiest look I have ever seen.
She dumbly nodded her head. “All right, since you said please.”

Alphy gave a hearty laugh as he opened the
passenger door. He carefully sat her down and brushed his lips lightly over
hers again then started to work on the flat tire. Her eyes were glued to his muscles
in motion as they flexed and moved. It was both erotic and beautiful. When he
was done, he wiped his hands off on his pants and returned to her. She was
turned on so much that she swore she left a wet spot on the seat.

Alphy inhaled. Then his eyes turned heated,
and he growled. She thought he would kiss her again, but he just led her to the
driver’s side and pulled out his cell. After clicking on it a bit, he said, “Oh
good, there’s a tire place right next to the store I was heading to. Would you
be willing to go there, or is there another place you prefer?”

She lightly shook her head. “I’m not from
around here.”

“Oh, neither am I. I just moved here myself.
Hop in and follow me, and I’ll keep an eye out in my rear-view in case you have
any more problems.” He gave her his number and headed back to his truck.

Gale sat in her car, fighting to get her heart
rate back under control. Things like this never happened to her. She was never
the pretty one. She had a few more pounds on her than the popular girls. High
school had sucked. She had enjoyed college, until they had had to escape a
madman. And with that thought, she was face planted into the brick wall of
reality. Nothing to kill one’s libido like a lunatic of an alpha and the worthless
thugs he called enforcers. She pulled out onto the street and followed
Alphy’s
silver-grey pickup.

Chapter Four

Alphy could hardly contain his elation at
finding his mate. Thanks to his superior eyesight, he had seen a woman leaning over
her steering wheel and had thought she looked like she was crying. It had tugged
hard at him, so he’d pulled over. As he approached, his heart had stuttered
hard in his chest when he first scented her. He was way younger than average
for a shifter to find his mate. But then again, his parents had been, too.

He’d had a devil of a time not outright
laughing at her expression. He knew he had attractive features, and he was
pretty built, but he’d never cared what anyone thought of him before now. When
she’d looked at him like she was a starving woman and he was a jelly donut, his
dick jerked so hard, he swore it nearly tore a hole through the front of his
pants, and he would bet the pattern of his zipper was imprinted into his dick. At
least he was wearing his button-up shirt untucked, so it would hide the wet
spot he was sure he had.

He kept a close eye on the review mirror,
making sure he didn’t lose her. He knew she was hiding something from him, and
suspected she was in trouble somehow, but he needed to gain her trust, so he
didn’t push. She’d tell him when she was ready.

At a light, he adjusted himself. In his eyes,
his little mate was a beauty. She had long dirty blonde hair and hazel eyes,
and a curvy figure that made him want to grab hold and not let go. Ok, so that
sounded corny.
But dang it!
He
thumped his hard-on, trying to get it to go down. When the light turned green, he
continued down the streets, watching the rearview mirror more than the road. It
wasn’t a real problem as he was a pretty good driver.

They reached a tire center, which was right
next to the supermarket Betty had sent him to. He kept his senses up, more alert
than ever with his mate near. He had learned that when you achieved a victory,
that was when you were most vulnerable, so he knew to never let his guard down.
His victory was finding his mate. No matter how much anyone would mean to him,
no one would be more important to him than she was, so now would be the worst
time to let his guard down.

Alphy suppressed his giddy side as he parked
his truck and got out. She pulled in next to him, so he helped her out of the
car and arranged for new tires to be put on for her. He was eager to get to
know her better. With the sun shining, they waited outside talking. He was
keeping his conversation light, trying to draw a laugh from her. He found he greatly
enjoyed her laugh. It was melodious to him, and her face lit up. He got the
feeling it had been a long time since she had laughed, so he felt pride for
being the one to give her that happy glow.