Shapeshifter
Werewolf Romance: Bring her Wolf
Michelle Fox
Copyright 2013.
All rights reserved.
Chloe
is a wolf with a problem: She can't shift and if her wolf doesn't come soon,
pack law demands she leave the only home she's ever known.
Then
temptation comes calling...
Hot, hunky werewolf, Jackson promises Chloe he'll make her howl. He’s been pining for her from afar and won’t
miss a chance to claim Chloe for his own.
The
bad boy alpha will have Chloe howling before she knows it.
Psst...if you want bigger font etc... try reading on your tablet, netbook or laptop instead of a phone.
Psst...if you want bigger font etc... try reading on your tablet, netbook or laptop instead of a phone.
Bring
Her Wolf
I raised the wine bottle in a toast. “Happy twenty fifth birthday to me.” My living
room was empty, so no one answered or looked at me funny when I went on to say,
“And to being run out of town.” With a morose frown, I tipped the bottle back
against my lips and let the fruity wine flood my mouth. Using a glass was an
unnecessary formality when drinking alone.
Taking another slug from the bottle, I
contemplated my immediate future. Tomorrow I would load up a moving truck and
go out to make my life among humans. Even though I wasn’t one. Technically. But
those were the rules and I didn’t belong in Huntsville. Not anymore.
A knock sounded at my door.
“Pizza’s here,” I said. Talking to
myself kept me from being lonely. I fumbled with my purse and extracted the
requisite twenty. Flinging my front door open, I accepted the box from Peter. He
was seventeen with a lanky frame still waiting to fill out. He’d been my pizza
guy for at least a year. “Thanks, Pete.” I offered the money.
He held up his hands. “This one’s on me,
Miss. Stark.” He looked at me with pity. He knew. Hell, they all knew. I was the talk of the town. The
only null in four generations, and the horror that kept the parents of
Huntsville up at night. The frightful aberration they used to make children
behave.
Clean
your room or you won’t change either.
Eat
your peas or you’ll be homeless too.
I blinked and swallowed back the
bitterness. “Thanks.”
“Good luck, Miss Stark.”
“Luck has passed me by, Pete.” He didn’t
know what to say to that and shifted uncomfortably, staring at his feet. I
saved him further discomfort by slamming the door shut, and retreating into the
living room with the pizza.
I’d taken two bites when there another
knock sounded at the door. I froze, my brow furrowed at the noise. The knock
came again. I finished chewing and went to the door, irritation creeping up my
spine.
I flung the door open a little harder
than I’d intended and it bounced off the wall, forcing me to keep it from
closing with my hand. “What is it, Pete?” My tone was hostile.
“Hello Chloe.”
I would never mistake that deep baritone
for an adolescent pizza delivery boy.
My breath caught in my throat and I looked
up, up and up to meet the gaze of
Jackson Swift. There are bad boys and there’s badass. Jackson was very much the
latter. He’d moved to Huntsville at the invitation of the pack alpha. I’d given
him wide berth because staying out of pack business was expected of me and a
new wolf was definitely pack business.
We’d worked together for a bit at the
one bar in town. I’d waitressed there ever since I was of age, and, six months
ago, he sweet talked his way into bartending. I’d seen it happen. My boss,
Sheila, had swooned like a flower in a wind storm. She was putty in his hands.
Whenever we worked the same shift, he’d
watched me like he was hungry and I was raw steak. It weirded me out, and I
avoided him every chance I got. A few times he had even tried to talk to me,
but I had just turned around and gone the other way, heat burning my cheeks.
Soon whatever interest he had in me cooled and he’d focused his attention on
Allison, the bar slut. She went home with everyone.
For the record, I never went home with
anyone.
Mostly because no one wanted me.
“What are you doing here?” My eyes
narrowed and I shifted my weight back, ready to step into the house and slam
the door for a second time that night. Yet despite my wariness I couldn’t help
but drink in the sight of him; handsome as rock star and built like a fireman.
He should be on a stud-of-the-month calendar, not my front porch watching me
with eyes the color of chocolate streaked with caramel.
“I heard you’re leaving.” His gaze tracked
my every movement, no matter how small. It was unnerving.
I shrugged. “I’m twenty-five. Cal said
it was time.” The pack alpha had been
kind to me. Given me extra time, but I was a null, a dud, a nothing. The little
town of Huntsville tucked in the rural hills of Appalachia had rules about
people like me. You had to fit in or leave. I didn’t belong and I never would.
I wasn’t a wolf.
“Where you going?” He sounded like my
answer mattered and the sincerity caught me by surprise.
“I don’t know. What do you care?” I
watched him as carefully as he watched me. The hair on the back of my neck
rose. He was trouble. I could smell it even with my stunted senses.
He lifted his head and sniffed. “You got
pizza in there?”
I nodded, my expression guarded. He wanted
something from me and I didn’t want to get suckered. I was no flower in a wind
storm.
“I’m starving.”
I stared at him, refusing to give in.
The last thing I needed was to tangle with a wolf like Jackson. He’d chew me
up, spit me out and think nothing of it. After Allison, there’d been Susan,
Polly, Jenny and who knows how many other girls made their way in and out of
his pants. The circus clown car had nothing Jackson’s love life.
“You’re not going to invite me in?”
Shock registered on his face. It was possible I was the first woman in history
to tell the man no.
“I’m not looking for anything you got.”
I crossed my arms, leaning against the door jamb.
“Fair enough.” He stepped closer, crowding me, our bodies
almost close enough to touch. His voice dipped down into a husky whisper that
seemed to reach out and stroke my skin. “What if I could help you?”
Note: The story is NOT over. Due flamin' hawt content, we had to put the rest of the story on Michelle Fox's site. It's still a free, instant download, but we have to avoid drama with Facebook which is picky about landing pages and has a lot of 'puritan bots' that freak out over little things like romantic fiction.