Beauty and the Werewolf (Entangled Covet) (San Francisco Wolf Pack)

This lone wolf falls hard…for his enemy.

Unmated werewolves don’t normally live past three hundred years old...and billionaire Jack MacGrath is cutting it close. Sure, he has almost everything—the respect of his peers, a mansion in San Francisco, a private jet, and fast cars. But without a mate, Jack’s in trouble. Then he sees her. Gorgeous, proud...and his enemy.

Isabelle Connelly is good at hiding things from her father. Like her success as a painter, or the incredibly intense attraction she has to Jack MacGrath. After all, she’s royalty and falling for anyone lesser—to say nothing of a rival pack—would be, er,
unseemly
. Now she must choose between her duty to her family and her pack...or her perfect fated mate.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by Kristin Miller. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Entangled Publishing, LLC

2614 South Timberline Road

Suite 109

Fort Collins, CO 80525

Visit our website at
www.entangledpublishing.com
.

Covet is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.

Edited by Candace Havens

Cover design by Louisa Maggio

Cover art by iStock

ISBN 978-1-63375-306-8

Manufactured in the United States of America

First Edition August 2015

To Justin

For making me feel like the most beautiful woman in the world,

every day for the last seventeen years.

For man, as for flower and beast…

the supreme triumph is to be the most vividly, most perfectly alive.

—D.H. Lawrence

Chapter One

P
ainting in the middle of the night wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.

To the average non-shifter, it might’ve been the two-hundred-year-old werewolf howling at the full moon that spoiled things. He might’ve appeared frightening—the ridge of his back arching high as streams of golden moonlight glinted off the sharp points of his canines.

But no.

To Isabelle Connelly, it was the weather kinking her plans.

Gusts of winter wind whipped over the Cliffs of Moher and slammed into Isabelle, freezing her to the bone. She clutched her paintbrush tightly and swiped gently across the canvas to accent the slope of Neil’s tail.

“If you don’t stop twitching,” she said, staring down her furry subject over the top ridge of her clipboard, “I swear to God I’ll paint you with a chipmunk tail.”

We’ve been out here for hours, and the weather’s only getting worse,
he said through the Irish Wolf Pack communication process of mind-speak. His voice, smooth in its lilt, hummed through her head.
I’m freezing my arse off.

Toughen up,
she projected back.
At least you’ve got your coat to keep you warm.

Well, she had a trench coat on, but nothing blocked the wind like layers of fur. Isabelle knew firsthand. Being born to werewolf parents meant she could shift at whim—full moon or not. And although the pull of the moon tugged on something in her middle, urging her to shift into a wolf and join Neil, she resisted.

We should go before someone sees us,
he said.

We’ll be fine.
She adjusted the portable LED light illuminating her palette.
The tourists are long gone.

Even in human form, she could propel her thoughts into Neil’s mind. He could block her if the urge struck him, but he’d be stupid to obstruct the mind-speak of the Alpha’s only daughter.

Besides,
she continued, standing back to admire her work,
I’m almost finished.

Kinking her neck and narrowing her eyes, Isabelle focused on the dark-haired wolf, his hunched back and striking blue eyes set against the stunning backdrop of shadowed cliff and raging sea. She tapped her brush against the canvas, creating a haze of black fur around his tail.

A few more minutes.
She dabbed the brush, whipping the tip to give Neil’s tail a stronger emphasis.
The fear of being caught out here is part of the thrill.
She stood back after a final stroke.
Okay.
You can give it a look.

Thank God.
Neil bounded away from the rocky ledge of the cliff. He gave a full body shake as he approached her side and set his gaze on the painting.
It’s amazing, Isabelle. My mum is going to love this.

I’m glad,
she thought, and swiped her hands on her painting pants.
She’s been so kind to me over the years, it’s the least I could do.

Neil’s mother had worked in Connelly Castle as one of the serving maids when Isabelle was young. Mary had been the only female figure in Isabelle’s life—all 107 years of it. Since Neil was Mary’s only son, he’d grown up in the castle, too, and had become more like a brother than a friend.

He looked up at her with wide wolf eyes.
You sure you don’t want me showing it to Mr. Connelly?

“No.” Her voice broke the silence of the night. “My dad doesn’t want anything to do with my art.”

She may’ve been little Isabelle Connelly to her father, but she was Bella Nolan to the art world. Her paintings of werewolves in majestic settings had been sold worldwide, sometimes for hundreds of thousands of dollars. There weren’t many who knew the truth.

But you’ve got a magic touch with those paintings of yours. You’re a rising star in London.
He padded his paws around the dirt.
Probably America, too. Wouldn’t Mr. Connelly like to know before he—

“I’m working up the nerve to show him,” she interrupted, removing the canvas from the board. “But I want to do it on my terms, and in my own time.”

Neil didn’t know, but she’d already set in motion the plan to reveal the truth to her disapproving father. She’d spent the last year hunting down her paintings from all over the globe. She’d tracked the auction circuit, noting buyers’ addresses, and making them offers they couldn’t refuse.

Money wasn’t a problem.

Not when time was slipping through her fingers. She didn’t have long to show her father what she’d accomplished with her art. He’d been sick for a little more than a year; a rare form of cancer that affected only werewolves had spread from his lungs to his lymph nodes. Wolf pack doctors had given him less than two years to live, though they couldn’t know for certain how long he really had left.

Grief trickled into her heart and summoned tears to her eyes as she slipped the canvas into her bag. Even though it’d been a year since her father’s diagnosis, the pain stung as strongly as it had the first day.

Her father had told her the sickness was a blessing: every werewolf had to die when its time came, but this way, they could experience every moment as if it were their last. Their days would be lively and bright, heightened by the imminent loss. He’d told her to tie up loose ends. Say what needed to be said before his final breath.

Before he was gone.

But there was still one thing left undone, one thing she couldn’t say. More than anything, she wanted her father to see all of her artwork together, in one place, before he closed his eyes and succumbed to the eternal sleep.

Maybe then, when all thirty pieces were together again, he would understand the depth of her passion, the fire in her heart, and the talent in her hand. The world had embraced her paintings, even if they didn’t have a clue werewolves existed. Why couldn’t her father, the Alpha of their Irish Wolf Pack, embrace them—and her—too?

But you might not have much time left,
Neil projected.
My mum says it’s getting worse by the day.

“I know.” Fighting back tears, she scrawled her pseudonym on the bottom right hand corner of the picture, the way she always did. Large
B
, illegible “ella.” Long, swooping legs of the
N
, scribbly “olan.” “I’ve spent the entire year rounding up my paintings. I’m storing them in Dublin, in a room at the National Gallery of Ireland. I don’t have them all yet, but I’m close.”

When you’re ready, let me know, and I’ll have my mum drop this one off, too.

“Thanks, Neil. That means a lot.”

Neil huffed in approval as puffs of condensation rose in front of his face.
How many Bella Nolan pieces are still in the wild?

“Twelve, I think.” She gathered up her painting supplies and tried not to think about how long it would take her to find the last few pieces of art. “Well, thirteen, if you count the first painting I did of my father. But that one is long gone now.”

What happened to—

Her phone bleeped from her bag, interrupting him, thank goodness. She didn’t want to delve into what happened with her first painting. How could she explain the story, yet hide the pain? Her father had said painting was a waste of time. An Alpha’s daughter should spend her days and nights studying tradition and pack policy. How could she express the shame she’d felt when her father flung her precious first piece of art into the hearth?

It hadn’t been lit when he’d chucked it, but after she’d left his den crying, she’d heard his order for the fires to be lit. She’d felt the warmth spread through their mansion outside the city. The sharp, shameful burn of disgrace smoldered deep in her heart, even now.

Her phone bleeped again, silencing the thoughts of her father’s disapproval. She yanked the cell out of her supply bag and read the text as it flashed over her screen:
Found another Bella Nolan piece in San Francisco:
Werewolf in Venice
.

“Thank God.” Jolts of elation shot through her. “Finally found you.”

Werewolf in Venice
had always been one of her favorites. She’d painted it fifteen years ago on her third trip to Italy. She could still remember the fluid lines of the water, the fanciful stone dwellings, and the sleek form of the gray werewolf as it stood proudly in the center of the bridge over Rio di Palazzo.

She read the next text as it popped up:
Up for auction next Saturday, 10:00 a.m. McDougal’s Auction House in San Francisco.

She wouldn’t have to mess with a buyer or collector, offer a price, and negotiate until she was blue in the face.

No, this would be easy.

Werewolf in Venice
was about to come home.

Deep inside her, something tugged.

Her father had always loved Venice. It was where he took her mum for their final anniversary before her death. She couldn’t wait to see her father’s face light up when he set his eyes on all her work displayed in one place. In Dublin. Their hometown.

“I hate to cut this short, Neil,” Isabelle said, gathering the last of her things. “But I’ve got a plane to catch to San Francisco.”

Sounds like a good time,
Neil projected, nudging the bag of brushes closer to her foot.
Just make sure you don’t leave your heart there.

“What does that mean?” She turned to him.

You know, like the song.
His big, furry head swung from side to side.
I left my heart, in San…Fran…Cisco.

“Just so you know, Neil,” she said, slinging her bag over her shoulder, “You don’t sing any better as a wolf. Still tone-deaf.”

He bumped her playfully, and she laughed.

Where will you stay?
He rested on his back haunches.
The San Francisco Wolf Pack doesn’t welcome us anymore. Not after your father’s last visit with the late Mr. MacGrath.

“I know,” she said, thinking about the bad blood between the MacGraths and the Connellys. “But I’m not worried about it. I doubt I’ll run into anyone from that family, actually. I’m going to get my painting back, and get home as quickly as possible.”

Nothing was going to stop her.