Jacks, Marcy - The Alpha Wolf Kidnaps a Mate [DeWitt's Pack 1] (Siren Publishing Everlasting Classic ManLove) (2 page)

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Marcy Jacks

tables, eyeing the people sitting in them. He probably looked like he  was sizing everyone up for a fight.

Relax, people, not what I’m after
.

He just had to keep following his nose and everything would be  okay.

Then it hit him. Yes, there it was, strong as though it had been  stuck  under his nose. That delicious cinnamon scent was coming from  this next booth, and James’s mate was sitting under the window, chin  in hand, looking out into the parking lot.

James stopped cold.

That was a man he was staring at. A blond man, didn’t look old enough to be thirty, with just enough hair on his head for James to run  his fingers through without it being long. His skin was golden,  naturally, as James smelled no tanning creams on him, and he had  high cheekbones. He was well groomed and everything, the black  turtleneck clean and fresh smelling, even if the cinnamon scent  overpowered whatever fruity thing he was using as his laundry  detergent, but this was definitely a guy he was looking at.

He must have stopped to stare for a little too long in his shock,  because eventually blondie’s head came up, noticing for the first time  that someone was ogling him.

That spike of fear that usually came with such a realization  mingled in with his natural scent, and he straightened in his teal  booth. “Can I help you?”

That voice, James wanted to hear it again and again. He wanted to  hear it as the man laughed, he wanted to hear it high pitched,  moaning, and keening, and he wanted to hear it next to his ear while  they were in bed together.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck
.

James cleared his throat. “Sorry, you look a lot like someone I

know.”

Blondie visibly relaxed, a smile touching onto his face. “A good

thing, I hope?”

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James smiled back. “Very good.”

This was good. He didn’t have anyone sitting with him, one of the few in the whole  bar, and he was looking at James like he’d never seen anything so gorgeous in his life.

Which was likely true. James was a fine specimen.

“I’m Corey…Black.” He said his last name as an afterthought, holding out his hand for James to take. He noted that the golden hairs along his arm shined in the sunlight that streamed through the window behind him.

“James DeWitt,” he replied, taking the hand and gripping it  firmly.

Corey’s heart rate picked up on contact.

That’s right, take it all in
, James thought. If this was happening  the way he thought it was, Corey was taking in his scent, falling under  the spell that occurred when a human mated with a wolf.

Corey eventually remembered to take back his hand. “Would you  like to join us? We could use some company.”

Not
 
what James wanted to hear. His insides chilled. “Us?” he

asked, voice as calm and pleasant as though he really were just  genuinely curious. He kind of was. It annoyed him that he hadn’t  taken in the recent scent of another person and realized it for what it  was, instead of brushing it off as the smell belonging to a previous

customer.

“I’m here with a…friend. He should be back any minute now.”

The way he said
friend
, and the way he looked at James when he  said it, let on Corey’s real meaning. He was trying  to politely let him,  a stranger, know that he was conversing with a gay man, and that he  had a companion on the way.

James smiled. This was his mate, and the guy had a lover. He was  not sitting there making nice with whoever it was he intended to steal  Corey from.

“That’s all right, got a friend myself over there. Not…uh, the  same kind of friend, mind you, but I don’t want to keep him waiting.”

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Marcy Jacks

“Oh, well, no problem then. It was nice meeting you.”

Shit. Shit. Shit! Of course Corey would hear that excuse and think  he was being snubbed. Small-ish town like this wasn’t exactly known  for gay bashing, but there would be just enough churchgoers that he  was probably used to getting the cold shoulder, and now he thought  James was doing the same.

“You, too. I’m new in town, and it’s nice to see some friendly  faces. Maybe we’ll see each other around?”

Corey perked up. “Maybe. I’d like to show you around if you ever  have the time.”

There was only one thing Corey had that James was interested in seeing.

They said their polite good-byes, and James turned, still pretending like he needed the bathroom.

Someone roughly pushing into his shoulder made him jerk to a halt.

James’s instincts flared into attack mode, and it took every ounce of willpower he had to not rip the heart  out of the man who dared to challenge him in this room filled with people.

As James turned to glare at him, the darker-haired stranger sized him up. The military-style haircut and tight black T-shirt gave James enough of an indicator of the guy’s personality.

They kept right on staring at each other, the bar quieting down as the people within waited with quiet breath to see if there would be a fight.

Military boy was a tough one, and James could sense it in the way the man stood, back straight, muscles tense, but James still had at least twice the body mass on him. The guy got wise to the fact that, unless he had about fifteen other guys at his back, he wasn’t winning any fights today.

“Sorry,” he muttered.

“Think nothing of it,” James replied, smile and eyes stony.

That’s right, buddy,
 
sit
.

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Unfortunately, he sat down in the same booth his mate was occupying. Not on the opposite side, either, right next to him.

It wasn’t an arm over the shoulder, or a kiss on the mouth, but in a

public place in a town that wasn’t quite big enough to have that kind  of tolerance level, it was as possessive as two men could get.

Buzz cut glared up at him when James didn’t immediately leave.  Corey shrank in on himself a little, red blush coating his neck, cheeks,  and ears.

James clenched his jaw and walked back to the bar.

“Why do you always have to do that?”

The voice of his mate, whispered and meant for the ears of the man next to him. James still heard it perfectly.

“Don’t start, Corey,” the darker man snapped back.

“What happened?” Mick asked when James got back to the bar and chugged back his soda. There was still more than half a bottle left, so his throat burned like a bitch by the time he finished. His face was probably red as all hell, too.

“Found him,” James muttered.

“Him?” Mick’s jaw hung.

“I know. I know,” James snapped. He snatched his leather coat  from Mick’s hands, threw down enough bills to cover their tab, and  made his way toward the glass doors. “We’re leaving.”

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Chapter Two

It wasn’t true that James was new in town, but the pack was situated only an hour’s drive away in Brampton. He and Mickey were only passing through for political reasons. The pack leader of this land’s mate had borne a son, and James and Mick had only stopped by to pay their respects.

A prudent thing to do if they wanted to keep the peace, especially considering the shit Deacon, an alpha from another pack nearby, was giving them over some land issues.

As an alpha, there was no way in hell he’d ever be allowed to remain in this area to court his mate. Not with another alpha already occupying the land, but that was fine. He didn’t need forever, just long enough to woo his Corey away from Buzz Cut and take him back to Brampton.

He’d had to explain as much to Mick, seeing as his second in

command had overheard his little white lie to Corey and, for a few  minutes, had thought his alpha had lost his mind.

“I feel like a creep doing this. You know that, right?” Mick asked.

“All you need is a big pair of black binoculars to go with the title  and you’re good to go,” James replied. Despite his words, he was in  no mood for joking. His Ford was not new, the AC was broken, and it  was hot as hell sitting there, even under the shade of the oak at the far  edge of the parking lot, where they waited patiently  for Corey and  his…boyfriend to finish their lunch.

James had every intention of following them home―
please God,  don’t let them be living together―
to scope out the situation.

Until then, he was still clutching his phone, waiting to get a call

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back from the  wise woman of his pack, Old Maggie.

James, and everyone else in his small group, called her that in  private, but no one said it to her face unless they wanted a kick in the  ass. She’d been wise woman since before James had been a sparkle in  his mother’s eyes, and right now he needed her to get his message  about Corey and call him back.

He needed to know if what just happened to him in the diner was  normal. Male werewolves found their mates in women. That’s just the  way it was. It was how the species survived. A wolf mated because it  was time for him to have children to carry on the blood line. For  James to be mated to a man seemed kind of pointless, all things  considered.

He thought so, anyway. Could it be possible that he was wrong?

“I really don’t want to  complain  ”—

“Then don’t,” James cut him off.

Mick kept right on talking anyway. “But I’m dying in here. Can’t  I go back in and order a drink or something?”

“No,” James said, still watching the glass doors, waiting for Corey to come out. He knew which window the man was sitting under, but even with his eyesight, reflections in the glass made it impossible for him to see his…his mate.

Getting used to this was going to take a while.

“But can’t I just―”

“No,” James said again.

He knew he was being a prick. Hell, he could smell the sweat clinging to Mick’s shirt, and it all but soaked his red-brown hair, but he didn’t even want the risk, small as it was, of Mick walking in there and the woman behind the bar, or even Corey himself, recognizing him from before and wonder why he was still hanging around.

Small risk, yes, but he was taking no chances today.

Still, it really was hot. Both he and Mick had ditched their leathers about twenty minutes ago.

“Wish they’d hurry up in there, then,” Mick muttered, rolling

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Marcy Jacks

down his window so he could lean out into the hot air and sulk.

James wished the same.

* * * *

Corey stared for a long while at his basket of french fries, taking in the information Dean had given him.

“That’s a…big step,” he said, not knowing what else to say.

He could feel Dean tensing in his seat beside him. The only thing that would keep an argument at bay was the fact that they were in a public place.

Dean prided himself on being out, but he was also a private man.  They could be inside a gay bar at happy hour in New York City and he wouldn’t dare put his arm around Corey’s shoulder.

That was fine with him, he wasn’t much for public shows of affection anyway either, but this quiet anger only let Corey know about what was to come when they were alone.

“I take it you don’t approve.”

Not a question, and spoken through his teeth. Damn.

“It’s not that I don’t. I think it would be a great thing to do, one day. I’m just not ready for that right now.”

“We’ve been together for almost a year now. People move in with

each other a lot earlier than that. They get married earlier than that.”

Corey knew that. That’s what was bothering him.

He searched for an excuse. Funny thing was, the first thing he

could think of wasn’t an excuse at all. “I guess I’m just worried about

your work coming home with you.”

Not the right thing to say, apparently.

Dean stood and grabbed his jacket from off the hook above the  booth. He shrugged it on.

“Dean.” Corey hated it when Dean did this. “Can’t we talk about  this?”

“Nothing to talk about. I’m leaving.”

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Dean threw down enough bills to cover the burger he’d been eating, but nothing else.

He knew Corey didn’t have a lot of cash on him, but now that  Corey had pissed him off it seemed that lunch was no longer on him.

Corey, as quickly as he could, pulled every small bill and quarter out of his wallet and put it down on the table. He followed Dean out before the barmaid could come on over and see that there was no tip waiting for her and shoot her accusing glare at him.