Bonded to the Pack (Born to be Were)

The Pack: Bonded

A Born to be Were Novel

By

Donna Flynn

Copyright
2013 © by Donna Flynn

Cover
art by Paul Flynn

All rights
reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or
by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by
any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of
the author, except where permitted by law

All characters
in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to any person living or
deceased is a coincidence.

Big thanks to all of my fans who have
embraced the Born Were Series and inspire me to keep on writing. I also want to
thank my family who encourage me, and put up with the crazy hours I keep. I
love you all!

Prologue

The dark forest cocooned Mercy in its
comforting embrace, shrouding her presence as she hid amongst its rich green foliage.
Her heart beat wildly inside of her chest as she scanned the area around her
looking for any sign of trouble. She breathed a sigh of relief when Alec
stepped out of the wood line, his wolf’s amber eyes finding her instantly.
Without thinking, she rushed towards him, wanting to be close to the man she
loved no matter what form he had taken, but as she got within a few feet, a
torpedo of gray fur tore past her, tackling Alec’s wolf to the ground.

“No!” Mercy screamed, as the wolf and
her mate began viciously tearing into one another, their loud snarls and growls
filling the air around her. 

The gray wolf looked her way, its blood-red
eyes meeting hers. “Mine,” he called inside of her head.  She stifled the cry
that came to her throat with the back of her hand.

“Never!” Alec yelled, racing for the
wolf that dared to try to claim what was his. The wolf, though, was ready as
Alec launched himself at him. He raised his massive paw, his claws fully
extended and sliced clean across the expanse of Alec’s belly, tearing deeply
into the flesh there. Alec howled in pain, his body twisting away and landing
on all fours, blood dripping from the gouges the wolf’s claws had made, soaking
his chestnut fur with crimson. He stumbled and somehow managed to regain his
footing, but it was too late.  The gray wolf took advantage of his injuries and
attacked. He tore into Alec’s flesh with his long canines, ripping into his
jugular with deadly accuracy. When Alec lay unmoving, the wolf lifted his head
and howled in victory before turning to Mercy, his eyes gleaming with
satisfaction.

“No!” she screamed, backing away in
terror.

“Mercy, wake up,” Lucan said, shaking
her shoulders, trying to pull her from her nightmare. “It’s all right, now wake
up,” he murmured. Mercy fought against his hold in her sleep, her fists
slamming his body repeatedly, but he continued his efforts.

“What’s going on?” Cade asked from the
doorway, wiping the sleep from his eyes.

Mercy whimpered and cried out, her
pitiful moans filling the room. Lucan looked to his brother with a frown.
“Another nightmare,” he said tiredly.

“She’s done this every night for the
last week. We need to figure out what is bothering her,” Cade answered, looking
as tired as his brother did.  

“You think I don’t…” Lucan’s reply was cut
short, when Alec burst into the room, shoving him out of the way and folding
Mercy in his arms, murmuring soft words of love to ease her bad dreams and calm
her. Lucan watched as Mercy woke, clinging to Alec as if he was the only one
who could offer the support she needed, and turned to his brother with a sad
smile. “And so it begins.”

“It is only natural she should turn to
her mate in times of distress,” Cade reminded him. He knew Lucan was dreading
Mercy and Alec’s bonding. Their union meant the little girl he had raised was
now a grownup who no longer needed him the same way she had when she was a
child.  What Lucan didn’t understand was that although she was now confident
and ready to take on the world, he would always be her safe harbor. He was the
man who had given up everything to raise her, loved her as if she were his own,
and instilled the values that made her the wonderful human being she was. He
was her father in every sense of the word and nothing could ever make her
forget that, not even Alec. 

Lucan looked at the couple and nodded,
following his brother out of the room, confident Alec would follow behind once he
calmed Mercy down. He knew Lucan’s rule about being in her room too long
unattended, and wouldn’t dare to break it.

“What’s going on, Angel?” Alec asked
after her brothers left the room, pulling Mercy across his lap and settling her
in his arms.

Mercy looked into Alec’s chocolate-brown
eyes and felt her heart skip a beat. With his shoulder-length chestnut hair and
muscular body that made all the girls at her high school drool, he was simply
the most gorgeous male she had ever laid eyes on, and somehow, unbelievably, he
was all hers. Fate had decreed it, time had proved it, and she was now more
than ready to embrace it. “It was just a bad dream, nothing important.” She
didn’t want to burden him with her odd nightmares about their Bonding Ceremony
being interrupted and him being killed.

     “Want to tell me about it?” he asked,
his lips nuzzling the base of her neck, making her sigh and lean closer into
him.

     “It wasn’t anything important,” she
told him, lifting his chin and brushing her lips across his warm, firm ones. “Besides,
in case you haven’t noticed, we are all alone and I can think of better things
to do than talk about my nightmares.”

     “Incorrigible,” he said, sweeping
her up in a kiss that left her toes curled and her body heated for far more of
his touch.

     Mercy pulled away and ran her hand
over his bare chest with a devilish glint in her eye. “I know what would make
me feel better,” she said, biting her bottom lip.

     It was enticing the way she nibbled
her lip, and the feel of her warm fingers as they moved over his skin near
drove him insane. Somehow he managed to keep calm. That was until she leaned
into his neck and began to nuzzle him there, playfully biting and nipping his
skin as her hand moved down his torso. He growled, and flipped her onto the bed
covering her with his own body as he stared down at her, desire shining in his
eyes. “You are not playing fair,” he murmured, kissing her neck, then her
collarbone, before sliding lower to brush his lips across the swell of one of
her breasts.

     “Alec, don’t stop,” she whispered
desperately, tired of waiting for their union when she was confident he was the
one she would be with for the rest of her life. “I’m going to be eighteen in a
few weeks, and we are going to bond this fall. What are you waiting for?” It
was a dumb question and she knew full well it was the stupid promise he made to
her brothers not to compromise her until they were bonded, a commitment more
binding than human marriage to werewolf society.

     “No,” he answered gruffly. “I
promised your brothers and I won’t break that promise even if what I feel for
you is driving me insane.” She pressed herself against him and he realized
quickly she wore nothing under her tank top. He groaned and pulled back. Her
brothers trusted him, and there was no way to back out of the promise he had
made to them, so he had to keep denying his need for her.  

     “Alec,” she murmured, pressing closer,
knowing he was as hot for her as she was him and using it to her advantage. 

     “No!” he bit out in a strangled cry,
pushing her off his lap and moving across the room to calm down.

     Mercy watched him pacing the room
with impatience. They had planned to be bonded anyway during the first full
moon of the fall season, so it didn’t seem like such a big deal to her if they
anticipated their bonding. Besides that, the dreams she had been experiencing
made her anxious that something was coming that might tear them apart. She
couldn’t bear the thought of that happening and her never having known what it
felt like to be his truly. Not just in words, but in deed.

     “Alec!” Lucan yelled from the
bottom of the stairs, letting them know he was growing impatient with their
continued absence.

     “Alec, I am just asking you to consider
my feelings,” Mercy pleaded. “I love you, and I want to belong to you in every
way.”

     Alec sighed and crossed the room,
pulling her into his arms. “I want that too. You have no idea how this is
torturing me, but we have the rest of our lives to be together. Why are you rushing
things?”

     Mercy bit her lip in frustration. “You’re
right, I know, but I can’t help but think that something is going to happen and
I am going to lose you.”

     Alec’s arms tightened around her
and he lowered his head to hers. “Nothing and no one will ever make me leave
you. You are my mate and I would die before I let you go.”

     “That’s what I am worried about,” she
murmured as he pressed his lips to hers, ending their debate.

Chapter
One

     Mercy stood on the steps of her
family’s log cabin buried deep in the mountains of North Carolina, watching the
driveway for any sign of Alec’s return.  After another long weekend apart, she
looked forward to spending some time alone with him before they had to go back
to the school the next morning. He was late, though, and she was growing more worried
with each passing second.

     “He’ll be here,” Lucan said from
the doorway, feeling her concern for her mate from across the porch. Mercy was
new to being a werewolf and although she had learned so much in the last few
months, she hadn’t learned to hide her emotions yet, and that made her easy for
him to read.

     “I know, I just really miss him,”
she answered, wringing her hands with worry.  It seemed since she agreed to
become Alec’s Bond Mate he was always distracted when he was with her or
disappearing for trips back home on weekends. There always seemed to be a
problem in his pack he had to see to, and his work trying to unite all of the
packs against the rogues who sought to overtake them, kept him on the phone for
long periods of time. It seemed he was always busy, and although she understood
that as second and heir of his father’s pack, which meant he had to help his
father, it seemed lately like he was doing everything. She had also begun to
fear that maybe now that he got her to agree to bond with him, he didn’t think
he had to spend time romancing her anymore.   

     “I know you miss him, but he has
responsibilities that he put on hold to live here close to you and now, he must
get back to them,” Lucan told her. Selfishly he was glad he had been able to
spend so much time alone with her now that Alec had been gone so often but he
knew she didn’t see it that way. The time was fast approaching when she would
no longer live in his home and he dreaded it.  He had mixed emotions about his
sister’s relationship with the future Alpha of their pack. On one hand, he
loved Alec like a brother, but on the other hand, he despised him for being the
one who would take her away. It was irrational and completely stupid, but Mercy
was more like his daughter than a sister, and he couldn’t help but worry about
her future as any good father would. He had raised Mercy from the age six, held
her in his arms every night that first long year after her parents’ unfortunate
death. He had cleaned her scraped knees, fixed all of her problems, and helped
her grow into the stunning young woman that stood before him now. He was her
world until her relationship with Alec took a turn none of them had seen coming.

It turned out Mercy was Alec’s Bond
Mate, which meant she was the one female created for him alone and he could do
nothing other than to love and protect her for the rest of his existence. Lucan
certainly hadn’t been excited by the idea of finding that out while Mercy was a
teenager who had yet to taste life, but he had grown resigned to the fact he
couldn’t keep them apart. Now, as their relationship matured, she turned to
Alec for everything, and it hurt more than he could have imagined.