Shifter Alpha Claim 1-6 Omnibus (18 page)

Merck

Talyn walks to the sink, fills a glass of water and downs it. All the time her eyes shoot daggers at me.

She drinks the last of it, popping the glass down hard on the pure white quartzite countertop. She brushes by me like a guy that wants to begin a fight and strides to the bathroom.

I follow her, stopping when she opens and shuts the door in my face. I press my fingertips to the door. I listen to the sounds of running water, a toilet flushing.

The door swings open and my hand flies to the jamb. Glad I'm holding on to something.

Talyn's naked.

“Like what you see?” she asks with bite.

I do. Very much, recovering nicely from my shock.

But her manner doesn't work. It's not her. It's like someone's invaded Talyn, and an imposter is in her place, using the shell of her body.

She shoves off my chest with her palms, and I move back of my own volition.

“What are you waiting for?” Talyn calls over her shoulder.

I follow, tracking the smooth sway of her wide hips, round ass and wasp waist. She's a female made for birthing pups.

I keep that tidbit to myself. The mere mention of which, would secure my castration. I smile at the thought. 

Talyn moves to my bedroom, a straight shot from the bathroom.

She tears off the covers. They float downward, puddling on the smooth poured concrete floor. She lies down on the bed, spreading her legs.

I halt like I've been sucker-punched.

I
really like
what I'm seeing now.

“Go to it, Merck. Stick me with your Lycan weenie and make me a wolf.” She lifts her head up, eyes lasering on me. “Do it, you coward.”

I blink.

My dick's a limp noodle. I've never been less turned on in my life.

Talyn's spread open, pink, wet and ripe in front of me, and I can't bring a boner to life if it was my dying wish.

“Cat got your tongue?” she asks in a purr.

Hell yes it does
. I open my mouth, can't speak. My eyes dip to her ripe pussy, her fleshy thighs are mouth-watering.

I want her.

But not like this. I'm a Changer. If I tell myself that enough times, maybe I'll believe it, and do my fucking job. She's splayed out before me, ready and waiting.

Her wolf howls for me. Not in the space where anyone can hear, but in the space of my head.

My heart.

And it's cramped. “Talyn,” I begin, clearing my throat, “I
do
want to change you.”

“Then get to it.” Acid drips from every syllable.

“I won't rape you.”

She lets her head fall back and laughs. “
Everyone
wants to have sex with me, and then when I offer the all-you-can-eat-buffet, you're not hungry? You get cold feet? I mean—cock?”

I shift my weight, my uncomfortable stiffy like a flagpole between my legs. I put my hands to my hips. “My wolf knows if you're truly willing. And while your wolf wants this—what I offer. You, the woman, doesn't.”

Talyn spreads the folds of her pussy and I look, helpless not to. She slips a finger deep inside herself and I groan, my dick twitching.

“Still wondering if I'm ready?” She works her finger in and out, groaning. Talyn's needy—for a relief only a Changer can give her. My cock hardens further, my intellect departing.

Moon dammit.

I have to think of Talyn, and how opposed she was to the Change. How her best friend Arden just died. How alarmed I should be that I don't want to turn her over to Charles.

My Alpha won't have soft feelings for her. She'll be a breedable Lycan female. Better yet—a Lanarre. They've been known to throw moonless changers. Keeping Talyn is not only an illegal act, but a deficit to Lycans as a species.

She mines her depths. The very place I want my mouth, my cock.

I lick my lips, wavering.

How can I admit something to her I'm not willing to admit to myself?
I take a step toward her, the delicious smells of her arousal hitting me like a physical slap.

My eyes stay riveted to her pumping finger. I blow apart when her hips lift, highlighting the entire show.

Growling, I cover the distance between the door and the edge of the bed in two strides.

Her finger slides out of her glossy wetness and she lifts her hips high. I dive forward, my little head thinking for the big one.

I don't wait, grabbing the globes of her ass, I stab my tongue inside her.

“Ah!” Talyn screams into the space. “So good.” She spears her fingers through my hair, pushing my face deeper between her legs and the heat I've been wanting.

I don't resist, planting my fingertips on either thick thigh, I push them wide and her tenseness melts. I lap at her entrance, and she shudders.

The fingers of my right hand release her thigh, walking their way to her clit. They land, tweaking and rolling the slick little nub of flesh between my thumb and index finger as I work her rhythmically.

I don't go down on Changes. But Talyn isn't a change for me.

She's a mate.

I can't ignore the beat within my own brain. I don't want to transition her.

I want to claim her. 

Narah

“So now what?” I look between the two of them, shoving my singed braids behind me.

Drake surveys the smoking remains of the Mutablesʼ hangout.

Rape-station.
My eyes narrow on the place, and I can't say I'm sorry for its destruction.

“We locate the client?” Murphy suggests automatically.

“You
know
I'm trying to hold onto the hope you're smart, right?” I ask him.

Drake whistles. “You're a bit of a shrew, Enforcer Adrienne.”

I flip him off. “Yeah, I know. I grow on people.”

“Like a wart,” Murph comments.

I cross my arms. “Okay,” I hold up a palm, “I can be a bit of a bitch.”

Murphy's mouth pops open, his black eyes disbelieving.

I take a deep breath, let it out. “Or maybe more than a bit.”

Sirens begin to wail.

Smoke rises in a lazy spiral, coals like orange eyes stare unblinking back at my perusal. “Let's split,” I say, tapping Murphy's arm.

“And me?” Drake asks, brows like arrows above his glittering eyes.

My eyebrow sweeps up. “You don't seem like you do a lot of milling around.”

His lips quirk. “You have mates.”

“Yeah.” I sound sullen, even to myself. I tip my head to look at him, he's so tall.
Like my guys
. I sigh. “You've got a keen sniffer,” I say for the second time. He smells that I'm pregnant—he scents my mates, plural—on my person.

Drake says nothing for a moment then, “And you carry their child.”

I nod, flicking my eyes away. Bastard. Guilt rushes in. Crippling, horrible.

The sirens grow louder. “Why are you unhappy about this news?” His eyes crinkle at the corners, a puzzled smile strapped to his face.

He's a pretty man, for a dragon.

I tell the truth to a stranger, when I can't even admit it to myself. “Because I live for being an enforcer. But now I'm all fucking expecting and that.” My shoulders jerk high enough to hit my ear gauges then drop.

He folds his arms, chuckling.

Nothing funny about my news.

Why didn't I kill him when I had the chance?
Oh yeah, I got knocked out in the blaze. My eyes narrow.  “Let's go. You can yuk it up after we're out of here. I don't want to explain this mess to the local law.”

His eyebrows hike. “You avoid your own?”

I jerk my head back, a sour pucker slapped on my face. “Ah—newsflash—they're not ʻmy ownʼ.”

“Then what are they?”

“I'm an
enforcer
. They pick up the low level criminals. We get the ones who go before the Magistrate.” Even saying the
M
word curdles my stomach.

A hand lands on my shoulder.

I lay my own over Murphy's, deeply grateful for his presence.

Drake watches us closely, his gaze noting the intimacy. But he's never been the sire to a youngling. Until he is, Drake can keep all that assload of judgy I see swarming his face to himself.

Blue and red lights can be seen in bright rhythmic flashes in the distance.

“Narah,” Murph says softly, squeezing my shoulder once.

I nod. “Let's go.”

I toss a look at Drake. “You can come. Where we're going, it's safer than just standing here with a bunch of BBQ'd Mutables.” I shudder. “What a paperwork nightmare.”

Murphy frowns. “What do you mean?”

“It's an expression. I just meant, I don't want to dick with the  documentation. My thumb'll get sore.” I'd be pulsing for a day straight.

I wink, sprinting toward Sioux Falls. I know Murph will follow, and I don't give much of a shit if Drake the dragon does.

Talyn

My wolf doesn't give a good
goddamn
about shame. She's all about breaking free.

Becoming.

She tears at me, forcing my hips into Merck's face. I fight. Lose
. I just can't resist.

The little seed that makes me Talyn Phisher remains. Buried in the need of this
thing
I'm changing into.

But that part of me germinates. Taking root.

I'm not going to assimilate into some Lycan cult. Where they pass off women to whatever man they deem worthy.

I'm not becoming the star attraction for their orgy.

But right now it's all about Merck's wet attention to my throbbing sex. He kisses my labia, taking his time on each fleshy ribbon of sensitive skin that lines my entrance. His tongue pumps as his fingers pinch my clit.

I moan, my breathing changes—my entire body flushing with broiling heat. Deep down, I know that Merck bringing me pleasure won't change me.

I need his seed deep inside to make me whole. My womb will open, and accept the cooling relief only a certain male can give. Talyn, the woman, doesn't know that.

But the wolf hiding underneath my skin does.

His tongue leaves me and I feel the edge of my orgasm hovering on the precipice of my pleasure. I want to rip his tongue out of his head because Merck doesn't care.

Because I'm using him to change me so I can become this thing. Maybe I'll escape the role they so neatly carved out for me.

Merck crawls up my body. Those blue eyes never leaving my face.

I drown in his gaze as Talyn tries to swim to the surface.

Somehow his jeans are long gone.

Something large and stiff skims along the flesh of my stomach. He curls his body protectively around me, ignoring what must be the biggest case of blue balls in the universe.

Because that's what Changers do, my struggling intellect inserts into my thoughts like a tossed SOS ring.

They sex women and turn them into wolves.

I stiffen and Merck cups his hands around my face. “I won't change you unless you want it. And right now,” he gestures at our bodies pressed so tightly together, “this is what you've been fighting since the moment I met you.”

I nod wordlessly, silent tears cascading down my face. My wolf shimmers over Talyn, through her, superimposing her needs over my own.

I gasp at the sensation of overlapping beings.

I can still survive this. I have sex with Merck and I become.

What does it matter?
Arden's gone.

My life's a shambles. I lift my chin. “I want it.”

I slide my hand between our bodies and grab the steely length of him, squeezing hard and he groans.

His head dips, eyes blazing from underneath hooded lids. “Yes,” he says in a whispered breath.

What I couldn't have known, is how much I wouldn't want to leave him after we had sex.

Narah

“I can't just take a dragon shifter into Final Enforcement.” I flick my palm at the office. “They're kinda sharp—enforcers. They're gonna
notice
.” I don't hold back on the sarcasm.

Come to think of it, I never really do.

“That's not an issue, Enforcer Adrienne.”

I toss my wrecked hair over my shoulder, the scorched ends light against my back. “Lose the scales or we can't have the pow-wow, Drake.”

“Jesus, Narah...”

“Can it, Murph.” My eyes are targeted on Drake like a big six foot seven inch bulls-eye.

He smirks.

Then like water running down a drain, the scales stop shimmering, becoming dull and flat-looking. The hard edges disappear, going to smooth, then the rigid texture of each scale wavers, flattening and finally ending in a dusky, flesh tone.

Drake's ears shrink, the tips melting from pointy, to nubs, then flattening against his skull and just becoming ears again. Steam stops rising from the less-interesting orifices of his body, his nostrils narrowing to within human norms. He stands there with his stunning greenish-gold eyes, sandy hair and striated ropes of muscle.

And I'd thought to kick his ass?
Hell yeah,
I did. The bigger they are, the harder they fall.
Right?
“Wow,” I say softly.

“Spectacular, yes?” Drake says, admiring his shift to human a little too much.

I wince. “I'm not gonna lie—kinda choking on the self-love, Drake.”

He ignores me, whirling to face something unknown in the dark corner of the alley between Dakota and Minnesota Streets.

“What?” I say so low only Murphy can hear me.

Drake answers, “Vampires.”

Marvelous.
Awesome hearing too.

I hiss a warning. Letting whatever vamps may be lurking around that I mean business.

In the next moment a tug hits me hard in my center, and I know. I straighten with a grin, sauntering into the gloom. Drake's hand is suddenly on my arm, and I yelp like a girl. That makes me want to kick my own ass on principle.

Along with the hormonal overload, I guess I have a case of the jumpies.

Murphy laughs.

I eye him up, and sullenly realize he's too far away to hit.

“It's my mates,” I tell Drake.

“Get your hand off her shifter, or lose it,” Matthews says, suddenly in front of me.

My hand moves to his arm. “He's okay, Matthews.” I never call him by his real name. He doesn't like it. He likes it fine when I shout it out while his tongue is on me.

Rolling to my tiptoes, I put my mouth beside his ear, “John, it's okay—he's okay.”

His eyes stare down Drake. “Don't ever touch our female again.”

I sigh.
Males.

Aeslin runs his finger along my nape.

I shiver.

A small smile graces his lips—he knows the effect he has on me. His eyes slim on Drake. “What is your business, shifter?”

“I am Drake.”

Aeslin waits—and so do I. Because my night's gone to shit, it just wouldn't be normal if another shoe didn't fall.

And I'm right.

“What are you doing with Narah?” Matthews ignores his introduction, pulling me tight against his body.

Only a very small part of who I am allows me to feel protected when I'm with the men. I've spent so many years fending for myself, I'm still not totally accustomed to their compete devotion. But I realize with a little spike of fear—I'm liking the process more than I ever thought possible.

My eyes meet Murphy's, his reflective gaze shines back at me. Potent.

Ominous.

I feel something build, and I'm too fucking late to stop it.

Drake opens his mouth and sticks his spiked tail in there. Whole. “I hear congratulations are in order,” he says, grinning broadly, clearly thinking he's breaking the ice with some great shared news.

I blanch.

Murphy stuffs his hands in his pockets, studying the rough asphalt at his feet.

Drake looks from Aeslin to Matthews, his grin fading to nothing in an instant.

I sort of think dying would be great about now.

Matthews carefully rotates me, his eyes traveling from the top of my ravaged hair to the tips of my combat boots. “Is this shifter—is he telling us—your
mates
, that you are expecting young?”

Oh baby Jesus.

Wordlessly, I nod.

Aeslin ignores Drake, moving past him he comes to stand beside Matthews.

Two sets of condemning vampire eyes glare down at me. And I deserve their anger.

My avoidance has cost trust, putting a firm wedge between us.

“Tell me they knew, Enforcer Adrienne,” Drake says with soft realized horror.

“It's Narah,” I correct needlessly, “And no, they didn't.”