Taking the Beta Male

He smiled down at her. "What? Sort of a constitutional monarchy within the pack?"

She kissed him firmly, savoring the taste of him. "Maybe. He was a good man. Too good, maybe. God knows he should have kicked Tate out on his ass when he asked to join the pack."

"Or maybe he was giving you an opportunity," he said. "Stay here with me?" he continued, pulling the blankets up and around the two of them.

"Try to get rid of me," she replied. As the warm quilt settled around her body, she closed her eyes, feeling more safe and secure than she had for years.

*****

"What did you mean?" she demanded the next morning.

"Huh?" Cal looked up, his expression somewhat bleary, from his morning coffee. She hid a smile. Even after only a few days, she had learned that he was not by any stretch a morning person.

"Last night. You said something about Graham giving me an opportunity."

"Oh." He frowned, blinked, and frowned some more, then took a long swallow of coffee. Just as she was about to shout in exasperation, his expression cleared. "Right. Is there anyone up on the mountain who could challenge your buddy Tate and have a chance of winning?"

"No." Her response was immediate. She scowled, running through the candidates in her mind, and shook her head again in confirmation. "They're too old, too young, too weak, too cowardly, or too much in his pocket. There isn't a one of them who has the bloodline, the guts, and the sheer strength to take Tate down."

"Which is why you should do it."

"Me?" She goggled at him, then sank into a chair, her legs strengthless. "You're out of your fucking mind. Don't you remember how you found me? That's what happened the last time I went up against that monster."

His expression was unimpressed. "When you were taken by surprise and outnumbered. What would happen if you went against him one-on-one?"

She scowled. "He's huge. You've never seen him. He's a damn monster. A good forty pounds heavier than I am in wolf form. Thick fur, nasty teeth. He took Graham down in a matter of minutes."

"Graham was, by your own admission, old and tired. I wouldn't use that as a yardstick. So Tate's really big. How is his speed?"

She chewed her lip. "Slower than me. Lots slower."

"Really? How...interesting."

"But, Calvin," she protested. "There's never been a....a female alpha before. The rest of the pack would never accept me. Hell, they barely tolerated me when I was Graham's lover. If I tried to pretend I was in charge, I'd have every hand raised against me."

Part of Calvin wanted to tell her to do it, to challenge her to take the pack and mold it in her own image. It wouldn't be the gang of brutal thugs Tate wanted. Or even the quasi-democracy Graham seemed to have been struggling toward. It would be something more, something better. But he would never risk this amazing woman in the service of his own ego. "Well, maybe not," he allowed. "But, Laura, you say the leaders of the other packs are coming here after Tate anyway. If he has them all as firmly under his thumb as you suspect, then he might order them to go after all those other alphas."

Her face went pale. "War. Death. Slaughter. And other packs, suddenly leaderless."

"But what if," he leaned forward intently, "his authority was stripped from him in the most embarrassing way possible? What if Tate lost a battle for alpha. And not just lost, but lost to a woman?"

"Oh." Laura felt her lips curve in a vicious smile. "Wouldn't that be terrible?"

*****

The next day, Cal drove his truck up the barely-navigable trail up Lupe Mountain. Laura had given him directions, but it didn't take much skill to follow the dirt track.

He pulled into a clearing, a building made of rough-hewn timbers in front of him. From the signs, it looked like someone had taken considerable effort to make it habitable. To his eye, it looked like an old lumber camp, or a particularly crude hunting lodge. His keen gaze picked out the telltale sign of an old diesel generator, off to one side of the building. Other, smaller buildings, some no better than shacks, were scattered in the distance. He thought about the bitterly cold temperatures that occurred in the winter, and shivered in mute sympathy.

He got out of the truck, making sure the nose was pointed back downhill, away from the other vehicles, and that he slammed the door loudly enough that no one could miss his presence. He needn't have bothered. As soon as he got out of the cab, people began to drift in around him; some from the lodge, others from the surrounding forest. Most were in human form, though his eyes could pick out a few ghostly shapes of wolves among the trees.

"I'm looking for Tate," he said, keeping his voice level and calm. Don't show fear, Laura whispered in his ear.

A man stepped forward. "I'm Tate," he growled. "What do you want? We don't like strangers up here."

Apparently you don't like baths, either, Calvin was tempted to shoot back. The man was huge, easily six-six, with broad shoulders and arms and legs corded with muscle. He was also half-naked and filthy, his coarse black hair matted to his bullet-shaped skull. Dirt was ground into his jeans, and the stink of him reached across the clearing. An outward sign of his inner decay.

"I have a message," Cal continued. "From Laura Hudson." There was a gasp, off to one side, and Cal's eyes flicked that way, catching a woman maybe ten years older than himself. Her face was covered with bruises. Cowering behind her were a pair of girls, the oldest perhaps fifteen. Maybe less. They looked at Tate with a combination of fear and hate which made his stomach roil.

Her eyes filled with hope, and Cal gave her a tiny nod. "Laura's heard what's going on up here. She's challenging you for leadership of the pack. She told me to tell you she'll be at the clearing tomorrow at noon."

Tate's mouth fell open. He spun to the side. "You told me she was dead!" he snarled at a pair of men who flinched at his visible fury. Cal's eyes found another young man, trying to stay hidden behind a pine tree. What was his name? Lowell. The one at the ranch the night before. Apparently he hadn't told Tate about his failure, or Laura's warning.

Now that he saw the hulking brute in front of him, Cal couldn't blame the kid. "So little Laura lived, huh?" he said, facing Cal. "Who are you?"

"Just a friend," he said easily. "She was busy, or she would have come up here herself."

In truth, Laura was ensconced with the three alphas who had shown up on his doorstep not long after dawn, wanting to hear the details of Tate's misdeeds. Even she, he thought, had been surprised by the swiftness of their response. But Graham, it seemed, had sent out a warning before his death. Under no illusions about Tate, he had told the other alphas steps might have to be taken.

Tate moved, astonishingly quick for a man his size. Before he knew it, he was being lifted up by his shirt-front, his charnel reek rising around him like a miasma. "And what's to stop me from crushing your neck, kid, and leaving you to rot?"

He smiled down at the huge man, keeping his hands well away from the revolver, hidden in a shoulder holster inside his jacket, that Laura had insisted he take along. Pulling it now would raise the stakes far too high. "Before I came up here, I told a lot of people where I was going. If I'm not back by sunset, steps will be taken. Starting with the Jackson County Sheriff's Department. Then the Interior Department, who owns the land up here. You're a big man, Tate, but can you take on the federal government? You don't want this to turn into another Waco, do you?"

"Humans," Tate spat, but released him. He started to chuckle, which grew into an obscene laugh. "So little Laura wants to die, does she? Fine. Tell her to come on up here. I'll be happy to kill her. A female alpha," he roared. "What a joke."

Cal walked over to his truck and climbed in, trying to hide the way his knees were shaking. "I'll tell her," he said. "By the way," he shot out the window, as he brought the truck to life, "she's great in bed. Too bad you'll never know."

He grinned as he drove away, Tate's howls of fury in his ears.

*****

Actually, he and Laura hadn't actually had sex yet, a thought which bothered him not at all. They had fooled around late into the previous evening, and if they hadn't gone all the way, they had both been drowsily content when they had drifted off to sleep. He had woken with her warm body curled up with his, and when her glorious green eyes flickered open and met his, he thought his heart would break with love.

"Good morning," he whispered, leaning in for a kiss.

"It is," she smiled at him, taking his hand and moving it to her breast. She sighed in contentment as he hefted the wonderful warm weight of it in his palm. He circled her nipple with his thumb, watching with interest as it firmed under his touch. "Mmm," she smiled, her hand reaching down to stroke his hardening cock. "Looks like someone didn't get enough last night."

"I don't think it's possible to get enough of you."

"Smooth talker." She moved closer, until his rod was pressed between the two of them, the bare skin of her mound rubbing the underside of his shaft. She kissed him again, deeply. "Maybe we should do what we didn't last night?" she suggested, her teeth nipping at his lips.

It had been then that his doorbell rang. Laura had lifted her head, her nostrils flaring. "Shit," she swore fervently. "They're here already." She sprang out of the bed and darted into her room, dressing in seconds. Before Cal could do more than blink in disappointed confusion, she was welcoming three strangers into his house.

"So how did he take the challenge?" The leader of the Pine Ridge pack asked as he entered the house. A small, wiry man of about fifty, he bore the unmistakable stamp of his Native American heritage. His skin was a deep copper color, and his hair was black as ink, knotted in elaborate braids.

"Shit, Clark, I'm surprised he's back in one piece." The alpha of Lodge Creek gave Cal a respectful nod. "From what Laura's told me, and Graham before he died, this fella's plumb loco. It took a lot of guts to go up there without any backup."

"He'll be there," he replied, answering the first question. His lips twitched in a ghost of a smile. "He thought you were dead," he said to Laura, who had hugged him as soon as he came in the door. "I don't think the guys who kicked you off the back of that truck are going to have a pleasant day."

"Channing and Blaze," she snorted. "Those two could fuck up a one-car funeral."

"So, Laura," said the third alpha, a tall, quiet man from the Medicine Bow pack, the closest to Larkspur. "You've told us what Tate's done. And we agree he has to go." A hint of deadly anger crossed his face. "We can't afford another Waco. We managed to get the government to cover that up with the Branch Davidian nonsense, and the press bought it. Thank god Reno managed to talk Clinton out of what he had planned." He made a disgusted sound. "Stupid hick. He should have known better.

"But what are we supposed to do with the Lupe Mountain pack once we kill their alpha? From what you tell us, they're half-feral already, and getting worse. Graham had some good ideas, but shifters need a strong leader. Do we put down the whole pack? You're talking about mass murder. Or do you intend to take over?"

Laura shook her head, her blond hair flying. "No. Graham was right about one thing. Lupe Mountain would never accept me as alpha.

"What Graham wanted..." her voice caught as she fought past the grief of his death. "He wanted one of his grandsons to take over. Probably Alex, his oldest daughter's oldest son. But he's only seventeen."

"Too young," Lodge Creek said flatly. "By at least fifteen years. The best thing to do would be to break up the pack and integrate the members into several others."

"What, as permanent second-class citizens? They'll never do it," said Clark Two Horse, from Pine Ridge.

"Do you have a better idea?" The tension in the room seemed to rise subtly.

"We could bring in a new alpha. Someone we know."

"Oh, come on! You know that won't work!" Medicine Bow snapped. "No one would respect an alpha who was given his position."

God, three alphas and the most headstrong woman I've ever met in the same house. "Can I make a suggestion?"

"Sure, kid."

"Do any of you know this Alex fellow? I mean, do you think he'll make a good alpha when he's old enough?"

"Garrett? He's your nephew."

The Lodge Creek alpha rubbed the back of his neck. "I think so, when he's old enough. He's a lot like his mother. Steady. Smart. Strong. Doesn't rush into things."

Cal drummed his fingers on the table. "The way I see it, there's no perfect solution. Laura can't do it, seeing as how she suffers from the terrible sin of being a woman." His eyes caught a glitter of amusement in her expression. "Alex can't do, since he is too young. And anyone you bring in will be resented as an interloper."

"Yes, boy, we know. Do you have a point?"

He bit back a sharp reply. "Back in Russia, before the communists came to power, one way of governing was called the troika. Especially when you had flawed candidates. The other two would help out the third.

"Laura's a woman. Bring in two men. Alex and another man who you trust. Alex is too young. Have Laura, who knows the pack, and this second man, who would ideally be old enough and strong enough to lend him his authority. The second man would be a stranger. But with Laura's help, he could guide Alex until he's old enough to take over."

Garret pursed his lips. "So basically, you're proposing what they used to have in Europe, when the king died young. Someone to rule while the youngster grew up, who would then step aside when he was old enough."

Thank god for smart people. "Exactly."

"Huh. That's an interesting idea. Clark, weren't you bitching to me a few weeks back about how Howie Duncan didn't have enough to do and was getting bored?"

Clark nodded slowly. "Yeah. I give him six months, a year at the outside, before he challenges me. And I'd hate to kill him." He bared his teeth in a grin which had nothing to do with amusement, and Cal shivered. "It would solve a lot of problems, especially if I told him that if he did a good job up here, I'd step down in his favor when the time came. Say, in about ten years."

His glance flicked to Laura. "You've chosen a good man, girl. Make sure you keep him."

To Calvin's secret amusement, Laura blushed scarlet. "I'm not..."

"Please." The older man got to his feet. "I can smell you all over him. Don't try to bullshit a bullshitter. Boys, I think it's time we checked into that nice hotel and left these kids alone. We'll meet you here tomorrow morning."

*****

"'You've chosen a good man, girl,'" Laura mimicked Clark's deep bass voice as the three drove away (each in their own car, of course). "God. Arrogant bastards. They think they're the lords of creation."

He grinned at her from his seat at the table. "Sounds like someone doesn't like the sound of condescension."

"They're just so...so..."

"Alpha?"

"Yes!"

He caught her hand as she stalked by, pulling her into his lap. She spun, straddling him, her eyes only inches away.

"It's Saturday, you know," he observed. "I don't have to go in to the clinic. No calls out in the boonies." He slid his hands up her denim-clad thighs.

"Is it?" she said, though her eyes twinkled. "Amazing."

He moved his hands higher, up under the hem of her shirt, finding the smooth skin of her back. He pulled her towards him, watching how her eyes dilated with pleasure, how her breasts flattened against his chest. She moved against him, slow and sensuous, her hips grinding her denim-covered cleft against his crotch, which was an aching bar of heat inside his jeans.

"Laura," he said. "Tomorrow you're going into battle. I might lose you." His voice quavered, and he forced it to steady. "You're the most wonderful thing that's ever happened to me. But before you go, I want to make love with you. Just once."

She smiled down at him, though her eyes shone with unshed tears. "Just once? Silly beta." Her voice was filled with affection.

"We're going to do this more than once."

*****

They moved to the bedroom, where Laura moved away from Calvin. "Undress for me?"

"What?"

"You heard me. I want to watch you get naked."

Calvin opened his mouth to protest, then shut it. Really? A gorgeous woman tells you to take your clothes off, in your own bedroom, and you think you might have a problem with this? You're an idiot.

Instead, he kicked off the work shoes he had worn up the mountain, barely heeding their clatter as they tumbled across the carpet and bounced off the legs of his bureau. He only had eyes for Laura. As he moved his hands up to the top button of his shirt, he caught her gaze. He had meant to make some half-witty quip, but he bit his tongue.

She was gorgeous. Even dressed in plain jeans and t-shirt, her feet encased in a pair of low-heeled sandals, she took his breath away. And her eyes burned with a fiery intensity that almost frightened him.

He undid the top button of his shirt, then the next. He almost regretted that he didn't know how to dance, or he would have been tempted to try a strip-tease. As it was, he let his body sway from side to side, and slowed his movements. When he undid the next button, he saw the tip of Laura's tongue dart out to wet her lips. Then he noticed that her breath was quickening, the wonderful curves of her chest rising and falling rapidly.

I'm arousing her. This wonderful, sexy woman, who could have any straight guy in town, and she wants me! The thought was intoxicating, and blood rushed to his cock, engorging it. He felt it swell, a bar of heat down the inside of his left thigh.

From the look on Laura's face, she could smell his arousal. She swayed forward one small step, then two, as he finished with the shirt and dropped it in a small heap on the floor. "The jeans."

It was Calvin's firm belief that there was no graceful way for a man to get out of a pair of jeans. Women were different. They could shimmy and shake and wiggle, and it was absolutely delightful. Men, on the other hand...he pulled off his belt, then unsnapped the button and lowered his zipper. As soon as he did, his cock jumped up, straining at the fabric of his boxers. It jutted straight out towards her, and he colored, feeling, as he always did in these situations, vaguely ridiculous, as if his erection was something to be ashamed of.

"Those, too," Laura whispered. While he had been intent on his own personal vendetta against his jeans, she had removed her shirt. The golden globes of her breasts stood proudly out from her chest, and her nipples were turgid and erect. "God, you're so beautiful," she whispered, her voice dark with desire. "I get wet just looking at you."

He blinked at her. "You think I'm beautiful?"

"Of course I do, you idiot." Her voice was full of fond affection. Not dissimilar, he thought darkly, of a loving owner of a cute but not terribly bright puppy. "You're gorgeous. Your skin is nice and tan." She drew a finger down his stomach, making him jump. "Not pale like some office worker who never sees the sun. You've got a decent chest. Nice muscles. And a fantastic ass." She reached around and squeezed.

She moved closer still, until their bodies were almost touching. "And have I mentioned your cock?" she asked, reaching down to stroke him through the thin cloth of his boxers.

"No," he breathed, closing his eyes. Damn it, if this was going to be the first time they were going to make love, he would not blow all over her hands like some stupid teenager.