Wanted by the Alphas (An Extremely Sensual Paranormal Shifter Romance) (12 page)

The thought of having to leave Lucien now
that she has found some measure of happiness is devastating.
Besides, another handsome face is lurking in the corner of her
mind. Kirk. She likes her boss. She feels very comfortable around
him.

She doesn’t want to leave this place.

Is it possible they can all coexist?

She can’t put a reading on the werewolves.
Are they willing to share their territory, or will it be all- out
war the next time they meet?

Maybe Jared won’t be alive the next time
they meet
.

But maybe she is overthinking this. Maybe
they won’t ever meet.

Her cellphone rings in her purse and she
jumps. She retrieves it.

“Lucien?”

“Good time to call?”

“Yes. I’m home now.”

“You OK? You sound a little winded.”

She desperately wants to tell him about
everything that has happened, but she doesn’t know how he will take
it. Does he know there are werewolves in the community?

“Sorry.” She tries to make her tone light. ‘I
was just running in from outside.”

“You have to be careful out there in the
fringes, Shannon.”

“I know.”

“Don’t go out there at night, OK? There are
wild animals there and there have been attacks on people.”

“I know. I’ve heard about them.”

She wonders if he is trying to give her a
subliminal message. It is so difficult when you are just starting
to get to know someone. You don’t know how much to say. What would
scare them off? How much information would be too much
information?

She senses he is going through the same thing
with her. Maybe all of them have secrets that are buried too deep
within their families to share. Lucien would be very repulsed if he
learned that she had slept with Jared back when they were lonely
and alone and teenagers. They had clung to each other because they
thought they were the only two abnormal people in the world.

“I’d feel a lot better if you moved out of
there,” Lucien says seriously. “Look, I’ll find you another
property. One that isn’t by the forest.”

That is one no-no for Jared, she knows. He
needs the forest. That is part of the reason why they moved out of
Arizona. Because he needs new hunting grounds.

“No. Jared likes it here. We’ll be all right,
Lucien.”

Wherever they move to, Jared will always need
forest territory, so he will have to carve out his own place one
way or another. Either he will have to share it, or he won’t.

Lucien pauses. Again, she knows he is
wondering how much to tell her, just as she is doing the same. But
they can’t always be there to look out for each other, just as a
parent won’t always be there to help a child cross the street.

“Just be careful, OK?” he says.

“OK.” She is starting to feel more at ease
now. Maybe she is worrying too much for nothing.

“What are you wearing?” he says in a low
seductive voice.

She laughs, and all is well in her world
again.

For now.

FAMILY

In the next few weeks or so, they arrive into
some sort of unspoken co-existence. Jared does not encounter the
werewolves again. Maybe they are circling in different hunting
grounds, or maybe they are avoiding one another.

Or maybe they have come to an understanding
of shared territory.

There are so few of us shapeshifters. We
are not animals. There is plenty of forest for all of us. We don’t
have to fight one another to death to claim it like real
animals
.
We don’t want to incur investigations from the
police or they will hunt us to the ground.

At least, Shannon hopes that is the
reasoning.

It would make total sense.

Lucien and she have also come to a serious
dating cycle. They would meet several times a week. He balks at
waiting for her outside the clinic due to his unspoken feud with
Kirk Fitzpatrick, but he doesn’t mind picking her up from home.
They would go out to the fanciest restaurants in Dolphin’s Bay and
the surrounding towns.

Shannon has had boyfriends before, but none
who have feted and wined and dined her as covetedly as Lucien
Walker.

She is falling in love with him, God help
her. Although Lucien has never mentioned the word ‘love’ to her
even once, he appears to show it in his every gesture and act – in
his concern for her wellbeing and happiness. She gets that he is
not a man who banters the word ‘love’ easily around, although she
can clearly see the struggle in his blue eyes. This is why she
appreciates him all the more for what he is doing.

He has never proclaimed that they are
officially ‘dating’ either. Romance words are not in his
vocabulary. But it’s OK. She is willing to go with the flow right
now. Why push something that is going so wonderfully, right?

So many relationships are tripped up at the
inopportune moment because of this kind of thing. She does not want
to be the kind of girl who demands commitments from someone who
isn’t used to doling them out.

Besides, she isn’t sure she wants a
commitment herself right now.

So the ‘L’ word doesn’t creep out from either
of them. Neither does the ‘C’ word.

Not saying it isn’t at the back of her mind
every second.

*

It is only a matter of time before Kirk
Fitzpatrick finds out who she is dating.

It happens when she and Lucien are at a café
one Sunday morning. They are having a lazy Sunday brunch of gourmet
cereal with milk when Kirk walks in alone.

He stops when he sees them.

Shannon is seated facing the entrance and she
is the first to see Kirk.

Uh oh
.

Keep calm, she tells herself.
You’ve done
nothing wrong.
And really, she hasn’t.

Lucien turns.

“Great,” he mutters. “What have I done to
deserve this?”

Kirk pauses at the doorway. Everyone in the
café looks up. Conversations immediately stop, and Shannon realizes
that more people in town probably know about the Walker-Fitzpatrick
feud than either Lucien or Kirk gave them credit for. Either that,
or the presence of two antagonistic and very handsome men in the
room gives everyone pause.

It is very clear that they are antagonistic.
Kirk’s shoulders are drawn back and he proudly strides into the
room like a gunslinger. Lucien is as still as a statue. The air
between them crackles with electricity, and not of a good sort.

Instead of going up to the pastry display
like she expected him to, Kirk walks to their table.

“Hi, Shannon.” He smiles broadly. “Fancy
meeting you here.”

She doesn’t quite know what to say.

“Hi, Kirk.” She stands up. After all, he is
her boss.

He holds up a hand. “No, no, please don’t
stand on my occasion. I didn’t mean to interrupt your
breakfast.”

Everyone around them, including the
waitresses and the cashier, is watching them with undisguised
interest.

Lucien says, “Then don’t.”

Kirk tenses.

Uh oh, Shannon thinks. She doesn’t know
whether to stand or sit.

“Don’t what?” Kirk demands.

“Don’t interrupt our breakfast.”

“Lucien,” Shannon begins, but he wards her
off. He does not get up but glares at Kirk balefully from his
seated vantage.

Shannon doesn’t know what to do but to look
from one to the other fretfully.

“I haven’t forgotten what your family did to
my brother, Walker.”

Now Lucien stands up. “My family didn’t do
anything to your brother. I am very sorry for your loss.”

“Maybe we should take this outside.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

“Please, don’t!” Shannon cries. She is afraid
that if they do take this argument outside, it would escalate into
a fight. At least in the café, in the presence of so many people,
they are forced to maintain a semblance of civility. Or so she
hopes.

“You may not be personally responsible for
his death, Walker,” Kirk continues, his entire stance in fight
readiness, “but I won’t rule out the rest of your clan. Everyone in
town knows what you people are.”

“What my ancestors were has nothing to do
with who I am or what my family is today. So don’t you go accusing
people of witchcraft. I can land you with a lawsuit so fast that
you’d be forced to close your clinic down.”

“You want to sue me? Go ahead. Let’s see what
secrets my lawyers will dredge up from you.”

“I’m not the only one with secrets,
Fitzpatrick. Let’s see what this town will think of you when they
finally understand what you and your family really are.”

The two men become suddenly aware of everyone
listening in.

“Please,” Shannon says again. “Don’t do this
here. I’ll leave.”

Kirk looks at her. “No, I’ll leave. Sorry for
interrupting your breakfast. But I’ll have to say this, Shannon. If
you’re dating this guy, be very careful.”

“Who are you to tell her who she can and
cannot date?” Lucien bridles.

OK, this is not going anywhere good. Shannon
picks her purse up.

“I’m sorry both of you can’t be civil in a
public place, so I’ll just go.”

“No!” Lucien says.

“You don’t have to go, Shannon.”

But she walks out of the café, her heart
thudding painfully against her ribcage. Behind her, she hears
Lucien say to Kirk, “Now look what you did.”

She breezes through the door, and Lucien is
immediately beside her.

“Look, Shannon, I’m sorry. Don’t go, just
wait for me here. I’ll pay and then we can do whatever you
want.”

“He’s my boss, Lucien.”

“I know.” He does appear contrite. “I’m
sorry.”

Kirk comes out after them.

“It’s OK, I’m going,” he says. “I’m sorry,
Shannon. I’ll see you at work.”

A few people who are about to enter the café
look curiously at them. Shannon can’t help but be shaken. She hates
confrontations.

“OK,” she says to Kirk.

They watch Kirk walk towards his Tahoe, get
in and rev away.

“Shannon,” Lucien begins, but she wheels on
him.

“Look, I don’t know what really happened
between your families, but you can’t keep going on having this
feud. You’re both like tin cans waiting to explode. Someone is
going to be hurt real bad if you don’t solve it, especially if you
say your family is innocent of the crimes he is accusing you
of.”

“It can’t be solved,” he declares. “His
family accused mine of something we didn’t do and they can’t prove
we did it either.”

“What exactly is it then? You want to keep me
out of this, but I am already involved. I need to know.”

She thinks she knows. Kirk has hinted at it,
but she wants to hear it from Lucien.

His face is an unreadable complexity of
flitting emotions. Then he says abruptly, “OK, I’ll tell you, but
don’t blame me if you don’t believe me. Most people would say it’s
a pretty tall tale.”

“Try me.”

He pauses. “I’ll go in and settle the bill.
Then we’ll go for a long drive.”

THE DRIVE

The route Lucien decides to take in his
Mustang is a scenic one, but then, most routes in Dolphin’s Bay and
its surrounding towns are scenic. The air is crisp today, and the
sun is actually out, although scudding clouds on the horizon
indicate there may be rain later. The mountains, blanketed with
forest, are on one side, and Shannon finds herself wondering what
Jared is doing on a bright day like this.

“I didn’t want to involve you in all this,”
Lucien says.

“I think I am already involved.”

He glances at her. “Not even a surface
scratch. There’s a lot of iceberg under the water you can’t even
imagine.”

“No metaphors, please, Lucien. I am not a
child.”

“No, you’re not.” He sighs. “I’m torn between
telling you everything and wondering what to leave out.”

She wants to say, “So don’t leave anything
out”, but it wouldn’t be fair because she doesn’t tell him
everything about herself and Jared either.

Lucien says, “It was two years back. My
father and I were at a meeting with a client in the Chatterly when
Alison Fitzpatrick, the eldest of the Fitzpatrick siblings, burst
in with two of her sisters. I don’t know how much you know about
the Fitzpatricks, but they are like the Irish, except they are not
Irish. They are a family of seven children, and they have cousins
and more extended relatives than you can count on a dozen
hands.”

Five girls, two boys. Shannon remembers the
photo in Kirk’s room.

“Alison pointed at my father with an accusing
finger and said, ‘You killed him, didn’t you?’

“Naturally, we were all concerned. My father
and I excused ourselves from our client and went outside with
Alison.

“‘We didn’t kill anyone,’ my father declared.
‘Who do you mean?’

“Alison Fitzpatrick was incensed. ‘Don’t
pretend you don’t know,’ she accused my father. ‘It had your mark
all over it.’

“I was rather concerned myself at this
point.

“‘We don’t know what the hell you’re talking
about,’ I said. I felt like throttling her at that point. ‘Who
died?’

“She rounded up on me. ‘My brother, who
else?’ she said.

“She has only one brother that I know of who
lived here then. He was Kyle Fitzpatrick. Younger than she was by
five years, but clearly the leader of their clan since their father
died.

“‘I haven’t seen Kyle in months,’ I said
truthfully.

“My father said pretty much the same. We live
in a small town, and sometimes you bump into some people, and other
times not. The Fitzpatricks and the Walkers do not cohabitate in
the same social circles. I don’t mean that in any sort of
derogatory way. It’s just that my father is more used to country
clubs than kiddie care.

“Alison glares at me as if she would like to
murder me on the spot. Then she tells us what happened. They had
found their brother, Kyle, in the woods. He was naked and very
dead. But there were no marks on him. No stabs or puncture or
bullet wounds.”