Alpha Curves (Paranormal BBW Shifter Romance): Wolf Clan Book 3 Read online

  About Alpha Curves

  Alpha Curves

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Pesky Legal Junk

  About Alpha Curves

  This is the third book in the Wolf Clan series. Titles should be read in order, starting with Wolf Curves.

  Nine months have passed since the influx of latents onto clan lands began. For Cade Mercer, the time has been a season in purgatory as he leads his team on a series of dangerous runs to locate mates for other shifters -- a sour, jagged pill to swallow when his own mate disappeared more than a dozen years ago.

  When the current rescue goes south in a hurry, Cade is more than a little tempted to follow his teammate’s suggestion and throw the woman they seek back into the "latent pool."

  Until he smells her and all hell breaks loose...

  ********************

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  Alpha Curves

  Rain fell on Columbus in thick sheets, muting the city's odors and chasing the last of the natural light from the sky. Head sticking out the van's passenger-side window, Cade Mercer inhaled slowly, filling his lungs to capacity as his face grew wet. Nostrils flaring and twitching, he searched for something -- for someone. A female, maybe a wolf cub or human and older.

  Immediately west of downtown in an area called The Bottoms, he discreetly stuck the tip of his tongue out, cautiously sampling the flavor of the surrounding area and its inhabitants. Palpable emotions of fear and anger coated his taste buds and soured his stomach. Beneath it all, he detected lingering traces of feminine appeal, but none felt like the woman he had been sent to collect.

  He jerked his head inside the van and closed the window. Whoever the target was, he didn't want to find her in a neighborhood like The Bottoms.

  Mathis, his driver, shoved a paper towel at him. "Damn, boss, you look like you just stepped out of the shower."

  "Thanks." Grunting, Cade dried his face then grabbed the radio set. "Tanner, anything on your end?"

  Cade shifted restlessly in his seat as he waited for the man's reply. Counting his own warm body, he had a four-wolf team split between two tactical vans. More than a hundred miles from clan lands in a city of almost a million humans, he didn't like the numbers for the night's mission.

  Hell, he wasn't sure he understood the mission.

  Tanner's gravelly voice crackled over the radio. "Nothing, boss."

  "Keep looking." Cade dropped the radio into the cup holder.

  "Gotta take a piss." Mathis signaled a right turn half a heartbeat before he pulled into the parking lot of a coffee shop. "You think she's wrong on this one?"

  "She" was Esme Foster, soon to be Esme Gladwin once her bonding ceremony with the new leader of the Tennessee clan occurred. Cade had known Esme and Dana from childhood. Both had been outcasts the first time he met them -- a round, pretty witch-in-training and the orphaned cub always at her side. Now they were among the most powerful people in the seven North American clans. Certainly, Esme was the most powerful witch across all the clans, this generation or any other.

  He grunted at the memory of his last conversation with the witch. Powerful, lovely to look at and bossy as hell, Esme had all but ordered Cade to Columbus in search of a mystery woman.

  "Can't imagine her being wrong." Seeing that the rain had stopped, Cade opened his window as Mathis parked. "We just need to wait until the target settles down for the night. Once she does, Esme will be able to cast better coordinates."

  "So it is a latent we're looking for?" Mathis' voice dropped in speculation and a small grin pushed up one bristly cheek. "Maybe more than one?"

  "Who the hell knows, but I haven't heard Esme this excited about finding someone before."

  She also had never been so vague, a fact that had its cold fingers wrapped around his intestines. Forcing the unease away with a shrug of his shoulders, Cade stepped from the van to stretch his legs. "She said something was way off about the energy -- maybe more than one latent, maybe even a female cub."

  The grin on his driver's face disappeared at the mention of a cub. Too many orphaned wolves had been found in the last few months, every last one of them male. No one could identify the boys. They appeared out of nowhere with memories as clean as the day they were born.

  No question about it -- Mathis and the rest of the team would much prefer to find a nubile woman who didn't realize she had enough shifter DNA in her genetic makeup to mate with a werewolf and bear his children. Finding a cub would add another layer of dread to the already immense cloud hanging over the clans.

  The thought had been rolling around inside Cade's head like an iron-spiked bowling ball the entire drive. He shoved it aside as he closed the passenger door and nodded at Mathis. "Hey, get me a triple with extra cream while you're in there."

  "Sure thing, pussycat." Mathis disappeared into the coffee shop wearing a fresh smile.

  Cade used the time alone to pace, loosening muscles that had cramped on the two-hour drive and a third hour spent searching the city with little guidance from Esme beyond a twenty-block sector in the worst neighborhood Columbus offered. He paced for several minutes, circling the van half a dozen times before Mathis exited the bathroom and ordered the coffees.

  His cell phone vibrated in his pocket as he completed his seventh slow circuit of the van, jolting him from the mental haze into which he had prowled. He fished the phone from his jeans and opened it to find new GPS coordinates from Esme. The twenty-block area had narrowed to one precise location. Stomach dropping like a load of bricks, he sent the coordinates to Tanner.

  Each extraction carried its own unique risks. The latent could be unwilling or she might have drawn Hunters to her. Powerful enemies skilled in magic and murder, Hunters were out to harvest the energy in wolves and latents before driving both to extinction. Two vans carrying two shifters each left no margin of error if they encountered Hunters on the mission.

  The timing of the run made matters even worse. The missions were coming faster than the witches could keep up with the crafting of charms that kept his team and any cubs or latents they encountered shielded from Hunters off clan lands.

  They would be going in bare.

  Feeling the hairs rise along the nape of his neck, Cade climbed into the van and plugged the coordinates into the GPS unit. The route appeared with a few lines of text next to it. He read them, a fresh growl rumbling through his chest. No cub tonight -- not when the destination was a strip club. So a latent, in a bar, surrounded by men and liquor with bouncers at the door and nothing to shield his team from the killers who wanted them dead.

  Fan-fucking-tastic.

  Apprehension ghostwalked the length of his spine before it settled in his testicles. If he was lucky, the woman wouldn't be compatible with any of the men on his team. Otherwise, all hell would break loose if a wolf's mating response was triggered while some guy had a hand on the chick's ass. Heaven forbid a lap dance was in p
rogress -- the scent of arousal from the human male was as good as a signed death warrant.

  Mathis opened the driver side door, interrupting the scenario running through Cade's head. He handed a coffee to Cade then climbed into the van. "Got anything?"

  Bringing the cup to his lips, Cade nodded and tapped the GPS screen. "New location -- looks like a latent."

  "Yummy." Mathis pulled the seatbelt across his chest before noticing the scowl on his alpha's face. "Problem, boss?"

  "She's at a strip club." Cade couldn't keep the snarl from his voice.

  "Totally not a problem." Mathis laughed the location off, his face splitting into a glittering, wolfish grin. "You know what all the latents say -- once you go wolf, you never go back!"

  Seeing that the joke hadn't cracked Cade's stony façade, Mathis tried again. "Come on, boss. This might be your night to find a mate."

  "Just get the van moving before the night gets any worse." Cade checked the sidearm under his jacket then fastened his seatbelt. "I want to know what we're dealing with before Tanner and Remus show up with their dicks out and guns blazing."

  "Seriously, dude, you should at least try to get some pussy before the decade is over." Mathis threw the van in reverse, grumbling as he pulled from the parking space. "We'd all be a lot happier if you did. I mean--"

  Cade responded with a side glare that abruptly ended the conversation. Satisfied Mathis would remain quiet until they reached their location, Cade eased back against the seat and kept one eye on the GPS while he argued with the beast inside him.

  Unlike all the other latent runs the team had made over the last eight months, his wolf had been twitching since Esme's call to action that afternoon.

  The latent doesn't interest us, he reminded it.

  A tail flicked inside his skull, the fur soft as silk and caressing him in a way that reminded Cade of his hand in the shower that morning.

  We're just here for the extraction.

  The soft tease of fur turned to nails scratching along the back of his sternum. He grabbed his wolf by the nape of its neck and gave a hard shake.

  She's not ours.

  Ours is gone.

  The wolf quieted at the reminder and Cade sighed. With regret, not relief. No matter how many women Esme located, he held no illusion that he would find one with whom he was compatible. He'd met his mate when he was six. The she-wolf had rejected him and left the clan when he was twenty. A dozen years' distance didn't make her any less his mate. He couldn't unpromise his heart -- even if she had never really wanted it.

  Chapter Two

  Lights strobed red and blue against the brick façade of the Pony Express Gentlemen's Club. A crowd had gathered near the entrance, drawn either by the cop cars with their flashing lights or whatever had drawn the police.

  "Tonight just keeps getting better." Mathis drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. The menacing rumble underlying his words contradicted the chipper tone. "Maybe we just throw this one back in the latent pool. What do you say, boss?"

  "You know we can't. If she's a latent, then she's discoverable and it's only a matter of time before the Hunters locate her." Stepping from the vehicle, Cade pushed the radio set at Mathis. "Tell Tanner and Remus to hold position. Keep the engine running while I--"

  The instruction died on Cade's tongue as he caught his first whiff of the female they sought. Even unseen, she defied all expectations -- not a latent nor a cub, but a she-wolf in heat.

  Heat…

  A meaty chuckle vibrated low in his throat as his cock surged a hard line to kiss at his navel. "Heat" was the wrong fucking word, one better reserved for the tepid breeding periods of the last decade among the clan's females. Inhaling, he growled. This was not heat. The woman's scent scorched his face and made his tongue and balls sweat.

  Hearing Mathis open the driver side door, Cade growled. "I said stay."

  Mathis challenged the order with a low snarl.

  Cade turned and glared his subordinate into an uneasy submission. The situation was far beyond the worst-case scenario Cade had imagined earlier. The scent told him that the woman was not only in heat, but was a female alpha. As rare as they were, an alpha she-wolf didn't need a signature match with an unmated male to fiercely attract his attention, she only needed to be in her breeding cycle without a life mate of her own.

  Instead of one lust-filled wolf, he would have four -- surrounded by cops with guns and rifles.

  Cade stepped away from the van. A dozen more steps and he heard the rustle of Mathis close behind. Cade issued another growl, the sound far below the range of human detection and meant to snap like jaws around Mathis's neck and throttle the other man's wolf until it turned belly up and whined in submission.

  "We can't rescue her like this," Cade warned in a fierce whisper. "Get in the damn van and start the engine before I take your head off."

  Mathis hesitated then his gaze flicked toward something beyond Cade's shoulder. With a grunt, the driver returned to the vehicle.

  Pivoting toward the club, Cade noticed the approaching police officer. Forcing the tension from his muscles, he waited for the cop to reach him.

  "My girlfriend's in there," he said before the man could open his mouth. "Please tell me the girls are okay."

  "Yeah. Can't say the same for the bouncer with a knife sticking from his gut." Straining to see over Cade's shoulder, the cop eyeballed the van. "Who's your girl?"

  "Mandy." Plucking the name from thin air, Cade managed a smile. He couldn't do anything about his throbbing balls or rigid dick, but his canines had retracted to human length. "I'd tell you she was the blonde with the really sweet--"

  His hands came up as if balancing two heavy watermelons, and then his fake smile split wider.

  "Yeah, that would describe half the ladies in there." The cop laughed. "It'll be an hour or more before the homicide detectives release them. You need to park your vehicle if you're gonna wait. I'll see if I can get a message to her for you."

  Cade nodded, his mind running in one direction while his senses ran in another. The she-wolf's scent was on the cop, along with a dozen human women and as many males. His wolf dug past the distracting odors to find the only one that interested him.

  He inhaled, his testicles swelling bigger. She smelled like the finest cut of meat dressed in oranges and cloves.

  Oranges and cloves.

  The scent punched Cade hard in the gut. He knew her smell like he knew his own face.

  "Iris…"

  Walking in the direction of the club, the cop stopped, his attention caught on the name Cade had whispered and the questioning tone he had used. Returning to Cade, the cop's gaze narrowed at the same time his hand eased to the firearm attached to his belt. "You know Detective Wilkes?"

  Detective?

  Wilkes?

  Cade blinked for a few seconds, each flick another layer of the complicated situation processed. He had riled the cop's suspicion by apparently saying the name of a cop. Iris -- Iris North. His Iris, the eighteen-year-old she-wolf who had disappeared from Cade's life a dozen years ago without explanation or even a good-bye.

  But why Wilkes instead of North? If it was for a fake ID, why not change both names? Had she married?

  The last question struck him like a chainsaw in the chest. He blinked with a stunned slowness as he forced his canines to retreat once more. Cade smiled at the cop, his voice a low rumble as he spoke. "Yeah, I know Iris. Take me to her."

  The cop caressed the butt of his gun just as the woman in question exited the building, her nose discreetly pushed up to scent the crowd. Beyond the intoxicating fragrance of her wolf and heat, he recognized the dark russet waves of thick hair and the creamy rounded flesh he had once caressed and nibbled at in trying his damnedest to coax her willing surrender to his wolf.

  Iris North...his mate...in heat...surrounded by her fellow cops and the unmated wolves of his team...out in the open, exposed to the threat of Hunters...

  Chest tightening even f
urther, Cade nodded beyond the cop's shoulder. "There she is. How long has her last name been Wilkes?"

  Iris froze, her nose lifting a little higher as her expression widened. Cade knew she had to have a full snout of him at that point. Would she recognize him or merely think there was an unknown male shifter in her vicinity? Joints rolled and popped along his body, the urge to transform running just below the flesh at the unwelcome idea of his mate scenting him as if he were a complete stranger.

  Heat hissed low in his belly and he growled at the human in front of him. "I asked how long has she been Wilkes?"

  Staggering backward, the cop reached for his gun just as Iris spotted Cade. Her expression widened and she quickstepped toward him. Her body deep in heat, each step closer magnified her primal draw on him, her wolf calling to his, her heat curling around his cock and sucking at his flesh until he thought he would explode.

  Coarse hair popped along the back of Cade's neck and along his knuckles as he fought to restrain his wolf. Feeling his nails sharpen to lethal points, he eased them out of the cop's view.

  "Show me your hands!" the man screamed.

  Cade ignored the order, every microgram of his attention focused on Iris. Her heat was his to claim. Not another wolf's and certainly not the human male protectively trailing close behind her, his soft body draped in the kind of inexpensive dress suit standard for police detectives.

  Behind Cade, Mathis started the van.

  "Turn the vehicle off!" Hysteria coated the cop's voice. Raising his gun, he pointed it at Cade's head. "I said show me your hands, you stupid motherfucker!"

  All hell was about to break loose but Cade just grinned. His hand darted out at superhuman speed, twisting the gun from the cop's grip and making the man squeal. Now fully aware of their brother cop's distress, patrol officers started shouting as more guns were unholstered and drawn.

  Beneath the chaos, Iris tried to get Cade to submit, her high-frequency supplication broken and clearly out of practice.

  Calm down and I'll get you out of here.

  Cade growled again. His canines extended. The urge to bare them at the patrol officer and the male detective felt like hooks gouging and raising his top lip. Iris was out of her mind if she thought she could disappear without a word for a dozen years then issue orders to him.