The Alpha's Choice (13 page)

Charles slid his palms beneath her knees and
shoulders and lifted her into his arms. He held her close to his
chest and whispered into her hair as he rose to his full
height.

"I'm real and so are you and the connection
between us is real. I wasn't looking for this. When I first
realized who you were and how fast this can happen, it scared the
hell out of me. I don't know if I'm ready for this. I don't know
that I'm even worthy of this." He turned and carried her across the
room to the bath.

Charles continued, his voice a
deep rumble in his chest. "My brother told me that when I found the
one, I'd know it in my soul. I laughed when he said it, but I'm not
laughing now. When I saw you stand for Buddy against those two men,
I knew it. You were so strong and fierce and beautiful. You could
be the one and if I don't pursue this, I may regret it for the rest
of my life. What I want from you Katarina Bennett is to give this a
chance and see where it takes us."

Kat wrapped her arms around his neck and
buried her face in the hollow of his throat. Here in his arms, she
was reassured that anything was possible. His magic made it real
and if his magic was her insanity, she would gladly spend the rest
of her life in such a delusion.

The tub was full and steaming.
Charles was careful as he set her into it, waiting for her
assurance that it was not too hot. He knelt beside the tub and
began soaping a cloth.

"You don't have to do this," she protested as
she settled into a more comfortable position. "I'm perfectly
capable of taking care of myself."

"I'm sure you are," he said as he
rubbed the soft cloth over her back, "But I gave you a rough time
of it last night and I reckon I owe you."

"It wasn't rough. It was
wonderful."

They'd made love several times throughout the
night and yes, in his ardor he had at times used her rather
roughly, but she reveled in the power of it and gloried in her
ability to make him feel such passion. She'd expected to be sore
this morning, but felt only the burn of unused muscles.

"No regrets?" He ran the cloth across her
shoulders and down over her breasts.

"For what we did? No, never for that. But why?
What is it that draws us together? I want to understand
it."

Charles rinsed and added soap to
the cloth again, washed her arms with it and ran it down her belly.
"Spread your knees, Kitten, and let me clean you up." He ran a
cloth between her legs and gently sponged her private parts. It was
all done efficiently and impersonally and yet it made her feel
cared for and pampered.

"What's to understand? You're
special. And me? Well…" He shrugged and gave her a look that said,
"What's not to like?" and moved on to her legs.

Kat laughed. "Were you born
conceited or did it develop over time?"

Charles laughed with her. "Hey, if I don't
blow my own horn, no one else will."

A sharp knock had them turning
toward the bedroom door and Kat felt a moment's panic. Would he
reject her again, pretend last night didn't happen in the face of
Mrs. Martin's scrutiny? One panic was replaced with another when,
with the door wide open and the tub in full view, Charles called
out.

"Come in, Mrs. Martin. It's not
locked."

Eyes averted but clearly
unembarrassed, Mrs. Martin entered with a breakfast tray with the
dishes covered by metal lids and on top of that Kat's neatly folded
clothing from the night before, pink panties on top.

"Well, shit," Kat muttered as she
sank down in the tub.

Charles wasn't bothered at all.
"Thank you, Mrs. Martin, just leave it on the dresser. We'll be
down shortly."

"You might want to hurry it up,"
Mrs. Martin said, clearly unimpressed with his more formal tone.
"Your friends just turned in the Lane. Buddy's been keeping watch
from the upper window. He's been up there all morning."

All morning? "What time is it?"
Kat asked, peeking up over Charles' shoulder and forgetting for a
moment she was supposed to be hiding.

"A little past ten. Neither of you
said what time you wanted to be called and I figured you had a busy
night…" she paused, "Paintin' that room 'n all."

It was said in Mrs. Martin's typical
straight-faced manner, but Kat was sure she heard a little snicker
in the housekeeper's voice.

"You're sure it's the pack and not the
children," Charles and asked.

"Lessin them kids is driving fancy cars, I'd
say it's pack."

Charles ruffled Kat's curls.
"You'll have to wash your own hair, kitten. Duty calls. I have to
go."

"Not until you've had something to eat," Kat
and Mrs. Martin said at the same time. Mrs. Martin gave Kat sharp
nod of approval.

* * *

"I'll take my hundred in twenties
if you have them. I knew you couldn't get it done."

Kat heard the voice from the
school room as she came down the stairs and hesitated. By the time
she'd finished her bath, Charles had finished his breakfast. He
told her he would meet her downstairs when she was finished
dressing. There was no hurry.

But of course there was. She was both
frightened and eager to see how Charles would treat her in front of
his friends. His pack? She had a whole new vocabulary to learn. And
how would his pack react to her, a human? There were so many things
she needed to learn.

"You'll get your money," Charles laughed in
answer. "I'll get it back in labor anyway, when I make you guys
help me finish the job."

"Aw, wait a minute, Boss, no one
said anything about manual labor," complained a third voice. "I
didn't become a lawyer to dirty my hands."

"No, that's what you did to dirty
your soul," a woman's voice laughed.

A woman? That surprised Kat. For
some reason she'd assumed Charles' pack would be all-male. She
stepped through the doorway and into the room and glanced guiltily
around. Mrs. Martin had obviously been busy. Not only had the
housekeeper picked up Kat's clothes, she'd put away all the
painting supplies and pulled the covers from the
furniture.

Charles, whose back was to her, turned at her
entrance and to her great relief, smiled and held out his hand to
her.

"Ah, here's the someone I wanted
you to meet. Katarina is the teacher who was hired for our
children." He drew Kat to him and continued to hold her
hand.

"
Our
children? Good Lord, Charlie, those pups aren't mine. If they
were, I'd seriously consider drowning them and then shooting myself
for having the little beasts in the first place," the woman said
and held out her hand to Kat, "Hi, I'm Joanne, Jo for
short."

"Jojo if you want to piss her off."

Kat recognized the voice of the
lawyer, a smooth, deep baritone that didn't fit the tall, skinny
man giving her a two fingered salute. "Hyatt Thomas, Attorney for
Wolf's Head Enterprises." He smoothed back his thinning hair with
long, sticklike fingers.

"Stop preening, Hyatt. She's not
impressed. You're a tax attorney, for heaven's sake. It's as
exciting as watching your six hairs grow."

The woman wiggled her fingers at
him and blew him a kiss. She was a stunning brunette, tall with a
figure that would draw a man's eyes and those eyes wouldn't be
disappointed when they reached her face. She wore a pair of jeans
so tight they look painted on, a pair of ankle high boots with
heels so long and sharp they could be declared lethal weapons and a
tailored menswear shirt that only emphasized her femininity. Her
shoulder length hair was held back with a plain silver clip that
Kat was sure was the real thing.

Her makeup looked professionally
done and her attitude reminded Kat of the pampered and polished
women who picked their children up from the Greenwood Preparatory
Academy where until recently, Kat taught the spoiled children of
people with too much money and not enough sense. Kat disliked her
on the spot.

"It's so much easier when you can
sit them in the corner or send them to the principal, isn't it?"
The man at the window, the one who'd won the bet, said of his
bickering colleagues. "I've recommended firing them, but it's not
my call. The boss is fond of them for some reason."

"It couldn't be the hassle and
money you save him." Joanne said to the tall, balding man who
laughed and replied,

"And it couldn't possibly be the millions you
make over land deals."

"Oh, Hyatt, do you think he loves
us?" Joanne asked with false excitement. "Do you love us,
Charlie?"

Charles ignored their banter and introduced
the man coming to join them from his place by the window.
"Katarina, this is Alex, my Second and yes, it's a
title."

"Like The Alpha?"

"No," Alex answered, extending his
manicured hand. He was tall, fit, and too well groomed with every
tiny spike of his salt and pepper hair perfectly gelled in place.
"It doesn't carry near the power."

Kat got the impression that Alex would like
more.

It was a power handshake, the kind
where the right hand grasps your hand and the left hand grasps your
elbow and draws you in. As they shook, Alex drew her toward him,
past the comfort zone of personal space and shifted his eyes just a
fraction to the right, glancing over her shoulder to question
Charles with a bit of a frown before he smiled at her.

"Katarina. It's a beautiful name.
Welcome to… do we have a name for this place yet?"

Kat tugged back from the unwelcome
closeness. "Hell Hall," she said without thinking and then
apologized to Charles with a laugh. "Sorry. That's what I called it
the first time I saw it. The place was empty when I arrived and
from the looks of the entry, I was sure I'd meet up with a
ghost."

"And met a Wolver instead."
Charles rescued her from Alex by pulling her to him and tucking her
under his arm.

Kat heard her heart pound in the silence of
the room and then a voice called from the front door.

"We loaded this shit and dragged
it all the way down here. I'll be damned if we carry it in, too.
Get your asses out here and give us some help."

* * *

It was like the first day of class except Kat
had no seating chart and would therefore never remember all these
names. There were fifteen of them so far, ten men and five women,
and more would be arriving later. They all worked for Wolf's Head
Enterprises, an investment firm begun by Charles and Alex and they
all lived two hours away in an upscale area of the city and by the
time lunch was over, Kat's head was spinning with talk of interest
rate risks and investment risks and rebalancing asset allocations
and principles and principals which she'd only heard of in spelling
lessons.

They laughed and argued and shouted and
called each other names sounding very much like the guys at the bar
she used to work at after a big game. The only difference was she
understood football.

As soon as she could without seeming
impolite, Kat escaped to the kitchen to help Mrs. Martin with the
cleanup.

"I've got this under control," the
housekeeper objected when she started to load the dishwasher. "You
should be in there with the guests, not in here with the likes of
me. You don't belong in here."

"I don't belong in there either. Frankly, I'm
more comfortable in the kitchen serving lunch with the likes of you
than eating it in there with the likes of them. They're all a
couple of cuts above my pay grade and all that financial stuff is
way beyond my education."

"Nonsense. You're smart and you'll catch on
quick enough and don't let the clothes and talk fool you. Most of
them came from humble beginnings that I reckon they're working hard
to forget. They're thinking that fancy talk and a fancy education
makes them better than their raisin'. It don't. It just makes who
they are sound prettier. There's not a one of them out there that
can hold a candle to you and don't you forget it."

"Thanks, Tilda, but I'm not so sure about
that," Kat sighed, thinking about Joanne and the other two women
who came in with the second wave. They were all dressed in
expensive weekend casual. "Even in my best slacks and sweater I
look cheap next to them."

Tilda hmphed. "Clothes don't make the man,
nor the woman neither. You've got something none of the rest of
them do."

"Yeah? What's that?"

"You can make the Alpha smile the way nobody
else can and I'm thinking he ain't done much genuine smiling in a
long, long time." Tilda closed the dishwasher with a swing of her
bony hip. "Now you get back in there and show 'em what you're made
of."

Chapter 13

Kat had to admit the Wolf's Head Pack knew
how to work. Right after lunch Charles set them to it, moving
furniture, painting walls, and scrubbing floors and windows until
the whole house shone. Granted, there was a lot of grumbling and
complaining, but for the most part it was good-natured.

Some of their initial hesitancy wore off as
the afternoon continued and Kat worked with them side-by-side. She
did lose points however, when she insisted the sunny parlor be used
as her classroom.