Hidden Alpha [Alpha Mates] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (22 page)

He watched both Devlin and Chase shiver. “That sounds like a good plan. I know I don’t want to be BBQ the next time I screw up and she gets pissed at me,” Chase said with a laugh.

He followed Devlin and Chase out to the back deck where Amalya was relaxing in a lounge chair. She looked to be half-asleep until she noticed Chase stripping. The sight of his body caught not only her attention but Gavin’s, too. He hadn’t seen either of the other males completely naked yet and was curious about what his response would be. Chase started revealing skin that looked as if he sunbathed in the nude, and Gavin had to wipe his chin to make sure he wasn’t drooling. Devlin noticed him and winked before removing his shirt.

Amalya sat up in straight in the chair. “What are you two doing? The kids are still awake. You can’t get naked out here in the open. Someone might show up and see you, or the boys could come outside.”

Gavin chuckled as he, too, removed his shirt. “Baby, anyone that would show up here would be a shifter. To shifters, being naked is normal. The boys are shifters, too. This is natural to them.”

Chase knelt in front of her. “We want to work on your shifting, if you feel up to it. The best way to do that is to show you. So, are you going to get nekkid, or did we all just pretend to be Chippendales for shits and giggles?”

She laughed but told him he was nuts and that she wasn’t going to strip out in the open. She added, “The boys see me naked, and they’ll be scared for life.”

Devlin assured her that they had shifted many times with their mother and stepfather and were used to seeing someone naked. She still argued until two small wolf pups came running out onto the deck and jumped on her lap. She petted them both and kissed them on their noses before placing them back down on the deck.

Dmytri shifted and said, “Please come run with us, Aunt Amalya. We want to show you how fun it is to be a wolf.” Then he shifted back and rolled around on the cedar deck with Adryk.

Amalya stood up. “Fine, but I’m not stripping out here. Will one of you go into the bedroom with me while I shift, and then we can come back out and run as wolves?”

Chase offered and took her hand, leading her into the bedroom and pulling the drapes closed. Devlin looked worried, so Gavin assured him, “Don’t worry. This is all new to her. She’ll get used to it. When we lived together, even though we weren’t intimate, she never liked to wear clothes. I always thought it was the wolf in her. Once she realizes that this is natural to all of us, she will be more comfortable. I understand her not wanting to strip in front of children, and I have been a wolf my entire life. If they are your children and they were raised as wolves, it’s different, but to be naked in front of someone else's children is kinda weird. Now, let’s go play.” He kissed Devlin on the cheek, pulled his boxers off, and shifted. He nudged the boys toward the stairs and led them down so if they fell he could hopefully catch them. Devlin followed shortly behind him. They were playing tag with the boys when Chase and Amalya joined them.

Gavin had to admit that she was a beautiful wolf. Her fur was the same color as her hair. It looked silky smooth and was the color of dark chocolate. She wasn’t just a plain old brown wolf. There were swirls of auburn and all different shades of browns and tans mixed in. She was breathtaking, and he almost couldn’t resist rubbing up against her. He wanted to be covered in her scent and to cover her with his. He had to resist, though. Even though they were completely sentient in their wolf form, the male always knew to let the female make the first move. He knew that Amalya hadn’t fully forgiven him yet and that he had a long road of sucking up to do. Now he had to be accepted by her wolf. If her wolf didn’t recognize him as her mate and accept him, he could never stay, no matter how much it would hurt them all. When it came to wolf shifters, the wolf played a big part in their mating. If her wolf wouldn’t accept him, he was basically screwed, and not in a good way.

Gavin stood stock-still and watched as Amalya sniffed the air around her and turned her eyes on him. Her body went completely still. Her head dipped slightly as her ears laid flat against her head. Her front legs bent slightly as her tail went straight, stiffly pointing away from her body. Gavin recognized this as the stance a wolf made right before it attacked. The alpha wolf in her was demanding his submission. He was hesitant at first to give her the submission she wanted. He was an alpha, too, and his wolf was fighting him to show his dominance. When Amalya started growling at him, he noticed that Chase and Devlin pushed the two cubs behind them. Very slowly, she took one predatory step toward him. That step forced him into acting. Instead of attacking and showing her he was the more dominate one like his wolf demanded, he slowly lowered his body to the ground and lay his head down on his paws. He was ninety-nine percent sure that she wasn’t going to attack him but wasn’t taking chances. Her head came up, and so did her tail. She was showing him who was the alpha, and it wasn’t him. He held his breath as she walked over to him and started circling him.

When her muzzle nudged against the side of his head, he knew what she wanted and complied by rolling over onto his back. Exposing his back and neck to her was a gamble, but he her needed to understand the power she held over him. He was hers and would do anything she wanted. After a few minutes of her scenting him, she gently opened her mouth and softly clamped her teeth over his neck. She growled once before she released him and licked at the spot she had just bit. He thought he heard her chanting, “
Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me
,” over and over the whole time, but he knew he was just imaging it.

Still, he thought back,
I will never leave you again. You are my mate, and I’m home.

When she jumped back and yelped, he launched to his feet and started looking around for an intruder or something else wrong. When he found nothing, he focused on her again.

This time he knew he wasn’t imaging when he heard, “
How the hell did you talk in my head?”

Gavin wasn’t sure what to think about them being able to hear each other’s thoughts, so he answered as honest as he could. “
I’m not sure, baby doll. I have never heard of this before.”
He turned toward Devlin and Chase. “
Can you hear us, too?”

Both of the other wolves nodded their heads and thought, “
Yes.”

He turned his attention back to Amalya, who looked like she was ready to either pass out or lose her mind at any minute.

“
Baby doll. It’s okay. We’ll figure this out. I’m sure there is a reasonable explanation.”

“
Yeah, like I’m a freak.”
She took off running into the woods.

Gavin started to run after her when Devlin stopped him. “
I’ll go after her. You don’t know these woods yet, and no one from my pack knows that you are here. It will be safer if me or Chase go after her.”

Gavin nodded his agreement. “
Just please bring her back.”

“I will bring our mate home. Don’t worry.”

Gavin watched Devlin disappear into the woods where Amalya had just gone. He stood and watched the woods for any signs of them until Chase came up and leaned into him. He nuzzled into Chase’s neck and then tilted his head away from the other wolf, showing his submission. He couldn’t believe, big, bad alpha that he was, that he had submitted so many times in one day.

Chase licked the side of his neck. “
Gavin, you don’t have to submit to me. We are mates. We are equals. Besides, last time I checked, you were the alpha and I the beta.”

Gavin gave a small snort as his laugh. “
I know. It just feels so good.”

“I know what you mean. Why don’t we go get the boys ready for bed? The girls should be waking up soon to be fed and changed. Then we can relax while we wait for Amalya and Devlin to come back.”

Gavin hesitated until he realized there was nothing he could do about Amalya until Devlin brought her home. He followed Chase back up onto the deck before shifting and pulling his clothes back on. As if they were waiting for a cue, both of the babies started fussing as soon as they all walked back inside. He motioned to Chase, saying, “I’ll go get them changed if you want to get the boys ready for bed. Then you can come help me feed them and get them settled again.”

Chase nodded and headed down the hall with the boys that were already complaining about having to brush their teeth. Gavin shook his head and opened the nursery door. He got both the girls changed and only used about twenty wipes, a piece, this time. By the time he was finished and was carrying both girls into the living room, Chase had heated their bottles and was ready to help. They sat together and fed the babies while they waited for Amalya and Devlin to return.

Devlin followed Amalya’s scent around in circles in the woods. At first, he wasn’t sure if maybe she was trying to make it hard for him to find her, or if she was lost. Then he remembered Gavin had told them the story of when she went for a walk in the woods alone when they were young and got lost. He had said she had no sense of direction back then, and it seemed she still didn’t. He finally found her lying by the lake. He knew better than to sneak up on a wolf, so he made as much noise as he could while he walked toward her. She didn’t turn to look at him, but he could tell by her body stiffening that she heard him. He tried to not to think anything so that she wouldn’t get more upset, but he couldn’t stop his brain. He didn’t know what else to think about, so he thought about the cartoons the boys watched every time they were allowed.

She turned her head toward him, rolled her eyes, and made a sound like she was trying not to laugh at him. He knew she was laughing when she thought, “
A yellow sponge and a pink starfish are the best you could come up with?”

He tried to shrug his shoulder and hoped she understood the gesture before he lay down next to her. “
It was all I could come up with and hoped it would make you smile, or at the least, not attack me.”

“
I would never attack you. I know none of this is your fault. I’m sorry I ran off. I just needed to get away for a little while. I tried to come back to the house, but I have no idea where I got turned around. I knew that someone would eventually find me. Gavin was always so good at finding me when I got lost as a kid. I guess I’m not a very good wolf, huh?”

“Sugar, don’t say that. This is your first day as a wolf. You will figure it all out. You have more instincts than you think. I watched the way you made Gavin submit to you. I have never seen anything like that before. To tell you the truth, I thought you were going to attack him.”

“Since we’re being truthful, I thought I was going to attack him, too. I’m just so mad at him still that I wanted to make him suffer. I’m not sure what came over me, but I wanted to jump on him and make him hurt. What’s wrong with me?”
she whined as she scooted closer and laid her head on his neck.

“Nothing is wrong with you, my love. You are an alpha. He is your mate, and you were letting him know that he wasn’t going to control you. I was actually surprised that he submitted as quickly as he did without a fight, but I think his wolf recognized you weren’t going to take no for an answer and submitted. He is trying, Amalya. He wants to make things right between you and him. Just please don’t challenge me like that. I am the alpha of the pack, and even though you are my mate and I said we are equals, if you challenge me, I’m obligated to take it as a challenge to my leadership. I will not fight you, and you will become the new alpha of the pack. I really don’t want that for you. Not that I would mind, but being a pack alpha can be a pain in the ass sometimes.”

She snuggled her body closer to him and inhaled his scent. “
I won’t challenge you. I know you are the leader of the pack.”
She chuckled. “
I don’t want to fight you. I just want to cuddle with you. The urge to rub up against you is distracting me from just about everything else.

“I understand what you’re feeling. I want to cover you in my scent and be covered in yours, too.”

Her body stiffened, and she lifted her head, looked at him, and growled. “
We are not making love like this. Right?”

He nuzzled her neck and licked her cheek. “
No, sugar. I prefer to be in human form while making love to my mate. The only things I enjoy while in wolf form are playing and running in the woods. Now, how about we head back to the house? I’ll teach you how to scent out familiar spots so you won’t get lost again.”

She nodded and stood up to follow him back the house. It took a while for them to get back, as Amalya had turned them around a few times. Devlin began to think that maybe she would get lost while in wolf form, too. Maybe it wasn’t instinct after all that they all used to find their way around in the woods.

“
I heard that,”
she thought to him as they emerged from the woods into the field behind the cabin.

He nuzzled her neck.
I’m sorry, sugar. This being able to hear each other’s thoughts is going to take some getting used to. We all just have to promise not to get mad at each other and hear the other person’s reasons behind what they are thinking.”

“
I know,”
she thought before he heard, “
I’ll race you.”