AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I pressed my lips together.
“You’re allowed to have a bit of fun, you know.”
“Fucking makes you vulnerable. I don’t need to have sex to have fun,” I said hotly.
“No, no, that’s not what I mean. I’m talking about any kind of fun. You cut yourself off from just being human. You’re the alpha, but you forgot you’re not just your animal, you know. Delaney would have wanted you to—”
“Don’t tell me what Delaney would have wanted,” I growled, snapping at Felix. “You don’t fucking know.”
Felix held up his hands. “I’m sorry. Calm the fuck down, Jameson. All I’m saying is that it’s not wrong for you to indulge. Holding back isn’t going to bring her back from the dead.”
I spun around with lightning speed and pinned Felix to the couch cushions.
“I think that’s enough out of you,” I said. “You. Don’t. Know.”
“Okay, okay,” Felix said. “You’re right, I don’t know.”
I held onto him, my lips pulled back from my teeth, my magic trembling on my skin. My bear was just under the surface, aching to be let out and wreak havoc. Felix was an asshole, was my friend. Hell, there’d been a time when he’d nearly been my brother-in-law.
I let go of Felix, and he tugged at his shirt before he stood.
If there had been shifters around to see me, they would have expected me to kill him. These days, everyone seemed to think I was out to kill for fun, to make my shifters fight, to punish and to cause pain.
Where had that come from? I hadn’t been the one to bring all this pain and death to my pack.
“I’ll see you later,” he said.
I nodded once, and the door opened. Felix left before the door shut again, and I settled back down, staring at the dancer.
My cock was hard in my pants, staring at her curves, the way she bounced her ass and slid her pussy up against the pole. Looking at a naked woman would do that to a man, but I wouldn’t fuck her.
There had been a time when I’d worked my way through the women in LA, fucking shifters and humans alike, having as much as I wanted until I was satiated, but when I’d gained and then lost my little sister, everything had changed.
She’d been an anomaly, a freak of nature. Powerful, with all the magic in the world… and she hadn’t had an animal to shift into. It didn’t happen often—shifters without an animal were rare, but she’d had the defect, and it had torn her up. She’d wanted to find someone who could bring her animal to the surface, who could reach in and create what wasn’t there…
Until it had killed her.
Carletta had stopped shifting altogether, a tribute to Delaney.
I’d stopped doing anything that brought pleasure—most of all fucking—because there was no way in hell I would be the same as my dad, fucking without a care, leaving a trail of broken people behind. I should have been there for her after he’d ditched her. I should have handled it differently, treated her better. I should have just let her talk to me, to tell me what was wrong so that I could have helped her rather than trying to set up new rules and try to fill the fatherly role that my dad left gaping.
I shouldn’t have been her alpha. I should just have been her brother.
I should have done a lot of things that were impossible to do now.
Hindsight was 20/20, and it was a bitch.
The song ended, and the dancer kneeled in front of me.
“What else can I do for you?” she asked in a sultry voice.
“Get out,” I said.
Her eyes dulled a little, but she kept her smile in place.
“Of course.” She didn’t argue with me. I knew she’d hoped I would fuck her, but she should know better. They always tried—more now than ever before.
It wasn’t going to work.
