Mated to the Pack(2)

Cassie threw back her head to laugh, except it came out once again as a  howl. Raging, laughing, exulting, she howled long and loud.

Apparently her alpha mate's bite had worked after all. Oh, hell yeah.

"Nothing," she said in a growl, lowering her sleek wolf head to pin Aliana with a coldly furious stare, "is ever impossible."

God, this felt so perfect. So right. Everything seemed different. She  felt bigger, bolder, more sure. Completely at home in her own skin. Four  huge paws anchored her to the floor of the ledge. Scents filled her  nose with a sharp intensity she'd never before experienced. Her vision  was so clear, it felt like she could x-ray the stunned wolf crouched  before her.         

     



 

Cassie was a wolf shifter, full on, and it was fucking amazing.

"You want me, bitch?" she snarled at her enemy. Her voice was low,  fierce. Nothing like her, but completely her. "Here I am. Come and get  me."





Chapter 2



Trevor gawked at the bizarre scene playing out below them, riveted by  Cassandra. His Cassandra. His beautiful, sexy, strong, tempting mate. A  wolf. A wolf.

Growing exultation filled him as he watched her shake herself, then  point her nose up for a triumphant howl that pierced the mountain air.  Her sleek golden form shone like a beacon as the sun fell completely  beyond the horizon, taking the lucidity of light with it.

It had worked. His alpha powers to create another wolf shifter had worked after all.

He had not failed his mate.

Tamsin, still in her human form, shrieked with stunned joy and jumped up  and down beside him in a highly unusual display of silliness. Together,  they peered over the edge, Tamsin's fingers clutched in his fur with  tense excitement.

Cassandra crouched in the pose familiar to all predators. Waiting for  her cowardly prey to make the next move. Prepared to leap and parry,  slice and claw. Trevor could just barely make out her tail lashing the  tiniest bit at the end. She stared at Aliana with merciless focus, just  as any predator should when faced with a threat.

His mate was a glorious, stunning wolf.

Despite his exultation, a sense of nervous restlessness returned. Yes,  his mate was a wolf. But she was a brand new one, facing off a cunning  wolf who had been born a shifter. Unease tickled over him He skimmed the  cliffside with a sharp glance, looking for a way they could descend  more safely than free-falling through the air to the ledge a hundred  feet down. He hardly knew how they had done it and survived, although it  seemed suspiciously as if Aliana had known precisely what she had been  doing. Tamsin was right. He could not fling himself off while in a  blind, raging panic and hope to land in the same spot also intact. The  fact his glorious mate had managed it was an incredible twist of fate.

Fate, the fickle thing that never seemed to arrange herself with  positive intention on his side. Right now, Cassandra seemed to be  harnessing fate's impressive power. Yet while she possibly could hold  off Aliana while the other wolf still froze from shock, Aliana was a  wolf shifter through and through. She would regain her faculties and  more than likely overcome Cassandra if their battle became earnest.

Trevor paced the top of the cliff. "Strike now," he urged his mate in a  growl, despite the fact she would not be able to hear him. He was too  far away, and her every sense was narrowed in on the threat before her.  "Strike while she does not expect it."

Tamsin's laughter fell away. Trevor caught a whiff of sudden anxiety as  she leaned forward a little more, watching the wolves below them. "She  is the alpha's mate. She will be fine," she said. Her tone, however,  belied sudden doubt. "Won't she?"

Trevor felt the rage of helplessness rise in him again. He had no  answer. Yes, humans could be turned into shifters by the deliberate bite  of an alpha. It happened now and then, particularly in other parts of  the world-within this country, in fact-where packs were less bound by  ancient rules. Rules that Trevor knew were in place for solid reasons.

Most humans, however, simply were not meant to be turned. The rules kept  shifter packs secure from an influx of weaker human blood, which if  allowed to proliferate would eventually drive out the animal side and  leave only human genes behind. Yet any human who was deemed truly worthy  could be made into a shifter if the alpha decided it was to the benefit  of the pack.

"She is mine, and she is now fully the pack's as well," he whispered,  feeling the inexorable truth of those words. He had made the wise  decision. He had to have. Cassandra was his mate. It made impeccable  sense to turn her into one of them. He'd thought it had been either his  failure as an alpha that his bite had not taken.

He thanked every deity he didn't believe in that he'd just been proven wrong.

But...what if this unforeseen showdown would reveal with wrenching  clarity the reasons for reserving an alpha's bite only for truly  exceptional cases? The shock of the fall, then the shift itself, had  most likely left Cassandra vulnerable enough that she would not be able  to meet Aliana's pure-blooded wolf status with matched strength.

As Aliana's stance became one less of startlement and more of  calculation, Trevor spoke to his sister, though his gaze never left the  tableau below them.

"I have confidence my mate is my mate because it was meant to be," he  said, demanding the words be true even as he spoke them. "That she is  strong, cunning, and resourceful. However," he added, growls wracking  his body as his fur edged up along his back in powerless anger, "you  must go back to the estate. Run. Bring back as many wolves as you can.  Just in case," he said, his voice so grim it almost hurt.         

     



 

His words hung empty in the air, for Tamsin had already turned and  bounded away, the sound of four paws leaping and striking the earth in  huge surges echoing in Trevor's ears as he tried to contain his fury,  his self-questioning.

Worst of all, his gripping fear as he watched his mate prepare to fight for her life while he was unable to protect her.







Cassie held herself so still she could hardly believe it. Not a single  time in her life had she ever managed to not move even the tiniest  muscle for so long. But this felt effortless.

Oh, hell yeah.

She kept her gaze firmly on Aliana's face, unblinking. Her heartbeat  seemed fast yet steady, her body ready for action. Ready to leap at any  moment. She was strong, coiled like a snake ready to strike. Her focus  was tremendous.

She was a wolf. A wolf. The words, the knowledge, rattled around in her  head, but the reality of it didn't phase her in the slightest. It was  simply too normal. As if she had always been meant for this moment. This  life.

Aliana still stared at her, eyes not quite as big but still surprised.  Her head was warily cocked, as if waiting for the next  rabbit-out-of-a-hat trick.

Of course. How often did one get to see a human being fall off a cliff,  turn into a wolf mid-air, then somehow manage to land on a ledge that  just barely hugged the side of the mountain?

Yeah, not too often.

Cassie lifted her lip in a snarl. The movement was easy to control, as natural as if she'd been doing it all her life.

This time, though, Aliana didn't shy back in startlement. This time, she  lifted her own lip, revealing her sharp teeth meant to instill terror.

Tough. Cassie's fear had finally, truly vanished the second her entire life literally shifted.

"My, what big teeth you have. The better to bite me with, my dear?"  Cassie heard herself snap in response. Where these tough-ass words were  coming from, she had no idea except that it had something to do with  being a goddamned amazing wolf. Something inside her was battling for  her very life. Something she'd never known she had, but it sure as hell  was here in full force, ready to rumble.

Aliana's lip didn't drop back down, but Cassie's words clearly jolted  her a little bit. As Aliana stood her ground, lip still curled up,  staring with fierce tension, Cassie noted the creamy tan tints to her  coat. She had to concede Aliana was a pretty wolf. Obviously very smart  and patient as well. She probably was a reasonably important member of  the pack due to those qualities, she thought with a sharp, analytical  part of her mind.

Really, it was almost too bad she'd come to her reckoning now.

Without warning, Aliana sprang at her.

Breath oomphed out of Cassie when the other wolf landed on her. An  enraged howl spilled down from the cliff above, but she couldn't spare a  thought for her mate. She was in a battle for her life, and she damn  well knew it. Aliana's jaws closed over the nape of her neck as her  weight smashed them both the ground.

Cassie ate dirt. Spitting, biting, and snarling, she went after Aliana  with all the pent up anger she hadn't even known she had. Heaving with a  mighty effort, she managed to throw the other wolf off of her, even if  only by a few inches. Aliana lost her grip just a bit, her jaws slipping  even as her paws scrabbled for purchase beneath her. Then she managed  to grab hard onto Cassie's neck again.