Midsummer Heat
Stratton Wolves: Book I
Midsummer Heat
Mina Carter
June 2012
Published by Summerhouse Publishing. Copyright, Mina Carter. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author.
Summerhouse Publishing
http://summerhousepublishing.com
Editor
Chris Stout
Cover Artist
Mina Carter
This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogues in this book are of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental.
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“Well, hello there, gorgeous,” Kelli Copeland said as she pulled the rental car to a stop and rested her hands on the steering wheel to look at the town laid out below.
Stratton, North Carolina. The very epitome of small town America complete with a picture perfect motel and diner, library, store and garage. No school. Instead, kids had to take the bus to a nearby town, and for colleges even further. For the adults there was Honey’s Bar and Grill, on the other side of town on the road to Katy.
Like many small towns out in the country where the running was good and a person could get back to nature by stepping out of their back garden, Stratton was a shifter town. Many types made their home here. Bert who ran the store in the centre of town was a cat-shifter, and Miriam at the library was a bear, but the main pack, her pack, were wolves.
She sighed as her gaze wandered over the familiar buildings, hit by a pang of homesickness that surprised her in its depth. She’d been born here, grew up here, but ten years ago she’d left for the bright lights of the big city. Her thoughts darkened a little as she put the small car into drive and started down the hill.
She hadn’t left for a job, or to pursue fame, even though her temporary job had turned into a career. She’d left because the new pack alpha, Max, had decided that she was his. Worse, he had decided that he was going to claim her in the eyes of the pack during the midsummer run. Forget human marriage, a midsummer claim bound two wolves together for life. Until death. No divorce, no separation, nothing. All without asking what
she
wanted. He’d just assumed that she’d be delighted, honored even, when he rearranged her life without so much as a by-your-leave.
Asshole.
Sexy as hell,
ripped
asshole, but asshole just the same.
A growl spilled from her lips. Kelli Copeland, grand-daughter of a pack alpha herself, didn’t do orders, not even for cuties with cut abs and a dangerous charm. Not even for the sexy alpha’s son she and the rest of the pack females had sighed over when they were teenagers. Cute did not excuse arranging someone’s damn mating without speaking to them. So when Max said jump, she hadn’t asked how high, she’d just given him the proverbial finger and hightailed it out of town.
Alpha’s, as a rule, didn’t like being disobeyed. And Max, all six foot three, alpha wolf still stamping his authority on his new pack, a pack his family had only held for a generation, certainly hadn’t liked it, as several terse messages on her voice-mail had testified.
She snorted as she passed the first buildings on the way into town. He’d always been bossy, and the promotion to alpha after his father’s death had only made things worse.
It had taken her little brother’s wedding to bring her back. The thought brought a smile to her face. Riley. Her baby brother, he of the tumbling golden curls and the cherub-like smile, was actually getting married. The thought kept the smile on her face as she drove through the center of town, feeling curious eyes on the unfamiliar car. Off the main routes these days, through traffic was minimal and, in the nature of small towns, everyone knew everyone else’s business.
Which meant she wasn’t surprised when Bert, out sweeping the front of his store before it closed, openly peered through her window. His expression cleared, filling with recognition as he waved. Kelli waved back as she swept past, taking the next left. The news she was back for Riley’s wedding would be all over town within the hour. That was if her little brother hadn’t already let it slip that she was due to arrive today.
Max would know within the hour.
It didn’t matter, she reassured herself as she drove up the tree lined avenue. She’d been gone ten years this fall. There was no way a man like Max had waited around for that long. He had to be married, with a passel of brats, by now…and bald. Yeah, he totally had to be bald by now. How old was he? Thirty-four, thirty five? That was old enough to start with the receding hairline. Her PA was only twenty seven and already his hair was thinning.
The thought made her feel better as she took the turn that would lead up to her childhood home. Two stories, with white siding and a porch, it was similar to the other houses along the road but the rest didn’t elicit the surge of memories and warmth, nor the swift flash of irritation as she realized the place was dark.
Riley was out, and as her mom had moved in with her new boyfriend over in Katy two years ago. Which meant the house was empty.
Great. Just what she needed after a long drive.
Pulling up behind her brother’s truck, Kelli put the rental in park and reached for her purse. It didn’t matter, she had a key for the place on her… She stopped, hand in the depths of the bag and dropped her head back against the rest with a groan. She
had
had a key, her mom never letting go of the hope that Kelli would move home, but a break-in last year had forced Riley to get the locks changed. She had the old key, not the new key.
“Way to go, Riley. You’d forget your damn head if it wasn’t screwed on,” she muttered as she dug around in the purse for her cell. He’d obviously forgotten she was driving down today. Typical of her brother. Her fingers closed around the familiar edge of the phone and she drew it from her bag with a smile of triumph.
It was dead.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake!”
She shook it, and clicked the power button at the top, hoping beyond hope that the screen would flick on. It shouldn’t be dead, she’d charged it overnight, but nothing she did made a difference. If a blank screen could look smug, this one was managing it. She dropped the useless thing back into her purse.
Could today get any worse?
Sighing, she put the car into reverse and backed out of the drive. There was only one place Riley could be.
Honey’s bar.
It didn’t take long to drive across town, and before long Kelli pulled the small car into the parking lot in front of the bar. As usual for a Friday night, the place was full, forcing her to park on the scrub behind the lot. Kelli’s lips curved into a smile as gentle amusement filled her. Even ten years later she recognized some of the cars lined neatly side by side. The more things changed, the more they stayed the same.
Honey’s looked the same as always, with the sign on the front repainted in the same design it had sported for as long as she could remember.
Grabbing her purse, she locked the car and paused for a second to check her hair. Shoulder length and dark, it had a habit of escaping. She snapped the clip free, shook it out and ran her fingers through it to get it in some kind of order. It was the work of a second to twist it up into a pleat and shove the clip back in, pinning the heavy weight up away from her neck. A final check in the window of the car got a nod. There, at least she didn’t look like she’d been dragged through a hedge backwards.
A smile still on her lips, she approached the building. The door in front of her opened, spilling a group of young men out onto the asphalt of the parking lot. The first stumbled, laughing at something as he looked back over his shoulder. Quickly he righted himself, turning as the group registered Kelli waiting to go in. Interest flared in his eyes as he looked her over, a quick flash of heat in the blue as he smiled.
Her wolf picked up their scents. Wolves. Young ones. Like the forest after the rain, or the wind across the plains, the scent of a shifter was unmistakable to another. Humans, with their limited sense of smell, couldn’t pick them out. Apart from the new owner of the bar, or so Riley had told her in one of his infrequent emails, who seemed to have a knack of knowing who was a shifter or not.
“Hey there, darlin’,” the young wolf who’d stumbled drawled, laying on the charm. “Where have you been all my life?”
Oh, he was young, probably no more than early twenties, but with all the arrogance of a wolf. Alpha potential for sure, provided a real alpha like Max wasn’t around. She narrowed her eyes. Something about him was familiar. “You the Roberts boy… Kyle Roberts?”
The surprise on his face made her grin. “Yeah, that’s right, Ma’am. Do I know you?”
“Used to. I babysat you when you were like four or five. You would never sleep until I let you watch re-runs of Scooby Doo.”
“Oh my God… Kelli? Riley’s big sister?” His face cleared as she nodded, and he swept the hat off his head as the group around him dispersed, heading around the side of the building for a smoke. “I’m sorry, I didn’t recognize you. Didn’t mean nothing by my comment, Ma’am. I swear.”
She waved dismissively. “Don’t worry about it. Speaking of my brother, have you seen him?”
Kyle’s eyes flicked back toward the bar. “Uh, sure yeah. He’s in the bar. It’s his bachelor party…”
Ah, the light dawned. With a night of alcohol and the possibility of a stripper or two, management permitting, no wonder her brother had forgotten all about her.
“No problem, I’m not staying. I just need to grab a key from him. You all have a good evening,” she waved over her shoulder as she headed into the bar.
* * *
Not staying. Famous last words.
An hour later her charming little brother had persuaded her to stay by refusing to hand over the key to the house until she’d had at least one drink. Kelli was on her third…or was it fourth?…Long Island Iced Tea, and Kyle Roberts was regaling her with gossip from the years she’d been gone. Most of it revolved around the garage he worked at over in Katy, but he was amusing and charming with it. Pity he was way too young for her. She had a rule never to date anyone younger than her baby brother.
Didn’t mean she couldn’t look though, she thought as she took a sip from her glass and checked him out from under her lashes. He was cute, the sparkle of mischief in his eyes the same he’d had as a kid of five, begging her to let him stay up and watch TV. He didn’t look five anymore. Tall and broad, he’d filled out nicely in a way any red-blooded woman could appreciate.
“…this shit’s so funny, you can’t make it up.” Kelli wiped the corner of her eyes at the last of his tales, which involved a broken pickup, a skittish were-bunny and a drunk goat. She wasn’t sure the last part was accurate, but it had been so funny tears were leaking anyway.
“Would I lie to a pretty lady like you?” Kyle replied, his grin wide as he shifted his chair closer. She shook her head to herself, recognizing the signs of a predatory male. He’d already angled himself with his back to the rest of the group, his attention solely on her as he subtly cut her off from the others.
“I think you’d tell me anything to get me where you wanted. I told you before, you’re way too young for me.” She chuckled and emptied the last swallow from her glass.
“Ha! She’s got you there, Kyle.” Her brother laughed, leaning over to punch his friend in the arm. The blow was affectionate, but they were both wolves, which meant a light tap for them would have broken a human arm. “Casanova here has a very loose relationship with the truth at times. Especially where women are concerned.”
“Lies! You wound me!” Kyle clasped his hands over his heart dramatically, giving her a wounded look that was just designed to be cute and sexy. She waited a second. Yeah, there it was, the sexy little pout.
