The Alpha’s Other Woman

Carrie

Another busy day in the pack had passed, buried in paperwork relating to our hearing at the Alpha Assembly. Jason was utterly sick of dealing with it, and while I seemed to have a bit more patience, I wasn’t far behind him. The whole thing was just nitpicking, when I had actual important work I could have been doing instead.

Still, the consolation of my long day was the hour when I finally went back to bed with Jason. As always, he pleased me like I had never even imagined was possible, and afterwards pulled me close to him. My heart ached sweetly, and made me want to profess dangerous sentiments that I didn’t know how I could already feel. I’d barely known him more than a month, and already I felt like I couldn’t manage without him. I knew that it was the bond, but was it only the bond? Did it even matter if it was or not?

I turned my head to look at him. I didn’t think I’d ever get tired of that perfect face, of looking at it, of kissing it.

He raised an eyebrow to go along with his smirk. “What are you thinking about, babe?”

I wasn’t going to inflate his ego more by telling him how attractive he was, so instead I said, “Theodora.”

“You’re staring at me and thinking about Theodora?” That smirk did not fade, if anything it grew wider.

“I was staring into space, and you just happened to be in the way.”

“Okay, fine, let’s pretend I believe you. So what about Theodora? I’m guessing whatever it was you needed West for this morning.”

I nodded. “Yes, she’s pregnant.”

“Oh, good for them.”

“Yes. But, she’s worried about Bluegorge.”

“Pretty common theme around here lately. We had two near misses on the job site, probably from their minds being elsewhere.” Jason frowned. “I don’t know what the hell his problem with us is.”

“Alpha King’s a small-minded bigot, I think.” I shook my head. “And it’s personal for Theodora, plus she’s worried. Maybe we should hold off on talking about pups until things are settled.”

“Do you want to wait?” he asked.

“Why’s it only matter what I want?”

“I said I’d follow your lead on this one, since you’re the one who has to do all the work to produce them. I’m happy either way. Either I get more time with you alone, or I get kids. Both are good.”

I pecked him on the cheek.

“You’re really bad at following directions, Carrie. Proper kisses, remember?”

I rolled my eyes. “It’s not like that took the place of one of your so-called proper kisses, it’s technically a bonus, so I don’t know why you’re complaining.”

He just chuckled and ran his mouth down over my mark. I shivered and that familiar heat began to build again.

“I can’t help that I’m insatiable. It’s not really my fault, though. This didn’t happen until I met you. I was completely serious before.”

I smiled and raised my eyebrows incredulously. “Completely serious?”

“Well, serious about work and pack. I’ve always been this hilarious.”

“And modest too, I imagine.”

“Modesty’s a waste of effort when I’m just stating facts.”

I giggled and snuggled closer to him, giving him another unsatisfactory kiss, because it was amusing to see his reaction when I didn’t comply. “I still want to have pups, and I don’t want to wait any longer than I have to. It’s like I keep telling the pack, they can make our lives difficult, but they can’t actually stop us. This pack has potential.”

“Glad you see that.”

“And I’ll send petitions to the assembly until they see it too.”

“More paperwork, huh?”

I laughed at his disgusted face. Maybe he had rescued me from a life of isolation, but it was a fair trade, because I had rescued him from a ton of paperwork.

—————

Over the next couple of weeks we had two more small groups of rogues come to join us, one a group of three males and a female, and one another mated pair, putting our numbers including potential members to thirty-eight. The mated pairs’ story of a pack wolf going rogue with their mate was turning out to be a surprisingly common one, I was finding. Most packs would take in a rogue if they were mated to a pack member, but there were lots of exceptions.

If I had found Jason earlier, would I have been forced to leave Greenwoods to be with him? Likely, especially since Dane probably wouldn’t have been thrilled if I left him to be with my mate. Even if he would have been reasonable, the situation would have been complicated and dramatic.

Would Jason and I then have been like these wolves who no one was willing to take a risk on? Probably. I’d hardly had any luck finding a new pack, but I had assumed my difficulty had been due to the bad terms on which I had left Greenwoods. While that likely was a factor, I now suspected that my mere status as a rogue was as likely a cause as the drama in my former pack.

Knowing what I now knew about the plight of rogues, it only made me want to find a way to incorporate them more into the pack, and find ways to do so efficiently. My head was swimming with ideas, but I couldn’t start anything until we won the challenge against our pack.

Jason and I were sitting in the office planning our strategy for the Alpha Assembly, when we were interrupted by Porter’s voice in our heads. “We’ve got a couple of visitors on the territory. You’re going to want to see them, Jason. Is it safe to come in or are the two of you...?”

“You can bring them in now,” Jason said.

“That’s not all we do,” I muttered.

Jason smirked at me. “It’s a lot of what we do.”

“Don’t look so self-satisfied. Porter just has terrible timing.”

“Well, that’s also true. He must love interrupting us.” Jason still looked far too pleased with himself, as if chasing me around like an animal in rut was some sort of great accomplishment.

It wasn’t exactly like I was beating him off with a stick, but I ignored that inconvenient little fact.

About ten minutes later, the door opened and Porter came in with a pair of werewolves. The black-haired male looked dour and watchful while the blond female’s eyes went instantly to Jason. They lit up with an expression that made my wolf growl in discontentment. How dare she look at our mate with such familiar affection?

Jason grinned back at her. I didn’t like it, even if I was being irrational.

“Jason!” She rushed forward, and threw herself at him.

“Andrea!”

I took one step forward, in an unconscious attempt to rip the little bitch away from my mate, before I stopped myself. I was the luna, so I had to act like the luna. Assaulting a visitor for touching Jason was the opposite of luna-like behavior. Even if she was being completely inappropriate.

She finally stepped back. “I really thought you all were dead, until Max stopped by our pack, Jason. Or, Alpha Jason, is it now, I hear?” she asked, her voice gratingly bright and cheery.

“Well, it’s something like that.” Jason glanced at me, as if suddenly remembering that I, his mate, was there in the room with him. “Carrie, this is Andrea, and...?”

I had almost forgotten that the male was also there in my overwhelming irritation with the female. He was frowning as if no more pleased by the display than I was. Him, I liked.

She stepped back and linked her arm through his. His face instantly relaxed. “This is my mate, Trevor. He’s a fighter from Kemptruin,” she said. “He found me when I was running away from...” Her face fell for a moment.

“Don’t be jealous, babe. She was the Glenhaven beta’s daughter, so I worked closely with her father. Zero romance, I swear. She was always like this.” Jason pulled me towards him, and I relaxed, too. “I just recently found Carrie when she trespassed on our territory a little more than a month ago,” he explained.

“Trespassed on formerly unclaimed land that had no sign it had been claimed,” I clarified, giving him a look to show my displeasure at his inaccurate summary.

He just returned his typical shameless grin.

Andrea laughed. “Congratulations! I’m so happy for you both. I know finding Trevor was the best thing that ever happened to me, and just when I needed him the most. I don’t know what I’d do without him now. Anyways, when I heard that you were starting a pack, Jason, I just had to come and visit. Hopefully it’s a good surprise. And now I have to get to know your mate. It’s great to see that Glenhaven wasn’t entirely destroyed. It lives on in us, and our children.”

“Children?” Jason asked, a smile in his voice.

She grinned. “We’ve got twin toddlers, and another on the way.”

“Congratulations to you too, then,” he said. “That’s the best news.”

What I could feel of his emotions through the link between us was happiness, but also longing. I turned to look at him more closely. He had been so nonchalant during our conversation about pups of our own, but maybe he wasn’t willing to admit how much he wanted them. Probably trying not to pressure me. My resolve to let nature take its course on my next heat grew. Really, I was past ready to have my own.

Andrea was still talking. “We didn’t want to trouble you too much, so we’ve got a room at a hotel on the main highway, but I was hoping we could get a little tour of what you’re doing here. And maybe you could join us out for supper tonight? It could be like a double date—oh, I’m sorry, Porter. I mean, you’re invited as well, of course.” She cringed and shot him an apologetic look.

“It’s fine,” Porter said, in a voice that sounded like it meant exactly the opposite. Things definitely weren’t going smoothly between him and Amanda.

Andrea floundered for a second, obviously belatedly realizing that she’d hit a touchy subject, and she didn’t even know the half of it. I was about to step in and rescue her, but her mate beat me to it. “No, you should come, Porter, since I’m sure Kain won’t want to be left out, either. Andrea has spoken about him nonstop since she heard he survived. Apparently he’s a really cute kid.”

I could only imagine his disgusted expression at hearing that description.

She brightened up at the reminder. “I would have liked to see Max, too, but I hear he’s off searching again. Poor Max. I wonder where Lillian ended up. I was so worried for all of you when we were released, but I couldn’t think of anything that could be done. It was terrible, leaving you all and Kylie behind, but I could tell she wanted us to go.”

“She did seem to want us free,” Jason commented, his face not giving any reaction.

As Andrea continued to chatter, Jason asked me privately, “Are you up for supper tonight?”

“Sure. We still need to eat.”

“Want to come along on our tour right now?”

A huge part of me wanted to go along just to keep an eye on the female who touched Jason way too much for my liking, but I knew I was worrying about nothing. Seeing an old pack member clearly made him happy, and I didn’t want to stand in the way of that. “I should keep working, I think. Maybe invite them to eat lunch with us and the pack as well? I’ll join for that.”

Jason kissed me in response, and then turned and led our visitors away.