Page 3 of Fated to the Alpha

Shane was the first to break eye contact long enough to search for a nearby sheltering bush. He trotted away to hide, leaving Kimberly to wait again as he took the time to shift from wolf to man.

She blocked out the sickening crunch of bones and the audible struggle in the transformation, typical of all shifters. A couple of moments later, Shane stood to his full height behind the bush, one strong arm braced against the trunk of a tree. Sweat dampened his sun-bleached blonde hair, thick, curled strands plastered to his forehead. Even in the dark, his bright, robin’s egg blue eyes stared at her, her own disbelief mirrored in their depths.

Memories rushed back at the sight of his clean-shaven face. Adulthood had hardened the soft edges of his jaw and cheekbones. Dirt and soil speckled his skin, tanned from years of working outside, and glistening with droplets of sweat in the moonlight. Lean muscle across his arms and chest had beefed up since they were teenagers, making her pulse race just a little faster. Teenage cuteness matured into full-blown hotness, and her mouth went cotton-dry.

Shane, however, had no problem finding his voice, though raspy with fatigue from the shift. “Kimberly … What are you doing here?”

Her lips parted. His voice had grown up, too, but still sent a shock of warmth through her chest the way it used to. He sounded so much like home, like her childhood and all the good things she lost. There was a time when she would have given anything to hear his voice just one more time. Now, conflicting emotions crowded in to spoil the moment.

“I live here,” she replied, words more biting than she intended.

Whether it was the tone or her answer, Shane jerked. “You … live in Tolstone?”

Kimberly only nodded, then became painfully aware that Shane was completely naked behind the bush, and she wore no underwear under her dress. Her seventeen-year-old self would have been a giddy, nervous mess. Ten years and a wealth of trauma later, she was a bundle of nerves, but for a different reason.

Shane must have understood her hesitation and pushed himself off the tree to look around. “Can we go somewhere?”

Somewhere public. Somewhere safer.

When she didn’t offer up a response right away, Shane looked wounded and confused. “Are you actually there, or have I finally lost my mind?”

Kimberly blinked and shook off the last of her brain fog. “I’m here. You’re not crazy … or at least, you weren’t the last time I saw you.”

Shane cracked a smile, that same dazzling smile that made her knees weak. “It’s been a long time…” His gaze slid up and down her body, assessing and intrigued.

He must have noticed how she had changed too, how much she had grown into a woman.

She knew how this looked, how her dress and the way the moonlight emphasized the outline of her curves might reveal that she wore nothing else beneath her dress. Under his stare, she felt more vulnerable, and that sent her thoughts spiraling again.

Shane Snyder had been one of her first childhood friends, her first crush, her first boyfriend, her first kiss … and her first heartbreak. A few seconds ago, when she first laid eyes on Shane, something had lit up inside Kimberly. Like a diamond mostly buried in the desert that caught just enough sunlight to send out a rainbow kaleidoscope.

But now, as her memories replayed, a sandstorm came to cover up all the splendid things she used to cherish about Shane. Now, all she could see was red.

“Seriously,” he said. “Can we go somewhere? I’d love to catch up. Maybe coffee or—”

“No.”

Shane blinked but seemed unbothered by the harshness in her answer. “Well, maybe ice cream? I know there’s a place in the town square that’s—”

“No,” she said again, firmer and a little louder. If she had any dominance, she would have used it to get her point across. She wasn’t going anywhere with the boy who abandoned her, and whose father exiled her family from the only home she had ever known.

*

Shane was almost too distracted by Kimberly Ross, standing there in the moonlight, to understand her at first. Her long, loose brown hair drifted on the breeze, the same breeze that made the fabric of her dress flap and cling to her womanly frame. It had been ten years since he last laid eyes on her, and those years had been good to her. Backed by the rippling sparkles of the river, she was a smoking hot vision.

They had grown up together in Warrington, Kansas. Shane couldn’t remember a time when Kimberly wasn’t in his life, up until their last year of high school. Whether they were chasing each other around his backyard as kids, going to the movies together as friends, and then sharing a milkshake when they started dating, Kimberly was always there. She was the antidote to his father’s lectures.

As the son of the pack’s alpha, Shane was molded and shaped from a young age to take his father’s place when the time came. That time came sooner than anyone would have expected, but as a teenager, Shane was too obsessed with every stolen moment with Kimberly to care about the exact day when he became alpha. Kimberly’s sweet smile and kind voice were the balm to his fractured spirit after his father was done with him.

Harsh lessons about how to be a real alpha, how to discipline the pack to keep them in line, how to maintain his authority when he was questioned, all of it felt too tyrannical and something out of the medieval era. Though his father’s pack did appear loyal and orderly, Shane saw the cracks in the perfect façade. Not every wolf was content to be under his father’s rule, and bullying just didn’t make sense to Shane, even at a young age. Part of his beliefs, he owed to Kimberly, whom he couldn’t ever imagine treating with anything but compassion and respect, something his father knew little about.

But here, in the middle of Larson Caves Park, he had yet to see that calm and gentle soul he used to know. Night sucked the color from much of everything, but Shane could see the sharp glint of anger in Kimberly’s green eyes.

“What do you mean, no?” he asked.

Kimberly’s face scrunched in disbelief. “I mean no! I’m not going to get coffee or ice cream with you!”

Shane pointed at her. “That’s right! You don’t like coffee. It’s too bitter. You like tea with milk instead, right?”