But Trey was larger, Taryn soon found out as she watched him shift into a seven foot long and approximately thirty-two inch high gorgeous silvery grey wolf. He looked just as intimidating and overawing in wolf form with his powerful build, his heavily muscled neck, and his robust limbs. His hackles were raised, his angry eyes were drilling into Roscoe, his ears were upright, and his lips were curled back, exposing fangs and gums. The growl emitting from him sounded more like a boat motor.

Abruptly the sandy wolf sprang from his crouched position and rushed forward at the grey wolf, coming up short just to snap his teeth together. The grey wolf didn't move a muscle, just stood looking large and fearsome, making a clear point that he was the more dominant animal in this situation. The sandy wolf reversed slowly only to once again rush forward aggressively and snap at the other.

Apparently the grey wolf had then decided that the other had had his chance to back down and he wasn't going to stand still any longer. Growling, he began circling the sandy wolf, who then copied the move so that they were circling each other. Maybe because he was stupid or maybe because he was just suicidal, the sandy wolf growled at Taryn. That was when her mate went feral.

The grey wolf lunged at the other wolf and they came together in a clash of claws and teeth. As shifters had superior speed and strength, it was like watching a recording in fast-forward motion. There was growling, there was body slamming, there was scratching, there was biting, and there were side swipes as each wolf fought to pin the other to the ground.

Taryn winced when the grey wolf bit down hard on the other's hind leg, making him yelp loudly. The yelping faded to whimpering until the grey wolf yanked hard with his powerful jaws, snapping the sandy wolf's leg. d.a.m.n, that had to hurt. When the injured wolf tried scooping himself off the floor, the other wolf slammed into him and knocked him onto his back. Then, in a typical wolf shifter killing move, the grey wolf slashed open his opponent's midsection with his claws and simultaneously closed his jaws around his throat. With one sharp yank, he'd torn out his challenger's throat.

As much as it had seemed like forever before it was over, it couldn't have taken more than a minute for the feral wolf to have overpowered the sandy wolf. Overpowered was a mild word. h.e.l.l, the grey wolf had the other's lifeless body by the throat, shaking it like a rag doll while growling loudly.

Several more minutes went by and the grey wolf continuing to attack the carca.s.s, showing no signs of tiring or calming or any willingness to part with it. It was clear that he wasn't coming out of his feral state any time soon.

"One of us is going to have to do something," said Taryn.

Dante shrugged. "When he gets like this, you just have to leave him to tire himself out."

Trick nodded. "At least he hasn't charged at any of us this time."

"But he's injured, I need to heal him and I can't while he's in wolf form." She was going to regret this, she knew she was. "Let me see if I can calm him down."

"Whoa, now hang on a minute," began Dante, palms out to ward her off. "Taryn, you can see the state he's in, right? That's not Trey. He's buried way down deep, very much aware of what's going on, but with no way of taking control for as long as his wolf is feral. If you go near him, he'll see you as a threat and he'll attack you just as he would anyone else."

She rolled her eyes, implying he was being dramatic. In actuality, he was dead on. "He won't hurt me. I know it's not Trey, I know his wolf is in control, but his wolf considers me his mate just as Trey does."

"She's got a point," said Trick, sighing. "She's the person he's least likely to hurt. He usually shows signs of calming by now."

"His mate was threatened. That's why he's like this." Marcus gestured at him, as anxious and fidgety as the others. Whenever an Alpha was unstable it leaked out into the pack link.

"I can't just stand here." When Dante again blocked her path she growled. "Move out of my way."

"Taryn, come on, I'm Beta he'll kill me if something happens to you."

"And I'm temporarily Alpha female, which means I outrank you, but even if I wasn't Alpha, I'd still expect you to move the h.e.l.l out of my way. So do it."

"What if he hurts you? It'll distress him to know he's harmed his mate. Have you thought about that?"

She huffed impatiently. "He won't hurt me."

"You're sure about that?"

Of course not. "Yes, I'm sure. Now move."

Finally he did, signalling for the others to give her some s.p.a.ce, but without going too far. Very slowly she took a few steps toward the wolf. She knew there was no point in calling Trey's name and appealing for him to come back. The wolf wouldn't respond to the name, wouldn't understand the words. The only way that Trey could overcome his wolf was if his wolf came down from his feral state. And that wasn't going to happen until she got him away from that carca.s.s. The smell of the blood would only be making him worse.

As she couldn't exactly go over there and s.n.a.t.c.h away his prize, she decided her best bet might be to distract him from it. As an idea formed in her mind, she removed her denim jacket and balled it up. Hoping like h.e.l.l this worked and didn't just act like a red flag to a bull, she gently threw the jacket so that it landed to the side of the carca.s.s. Instantly the feral wolf dived on the jacket as though it was a rabbit or a hare. Picking it up with his jaws, he shook it just like he had the carca.s.s.

And then he seemed to pause and his growling eased a little as if he recognised the scent on the jacket. Hopefully he recognised it as the scent of his mate and not another threat.

"Hey Cujo," she called in a soothing voice. His head whipped around to face her and he snarled while at the same time standing over the carca.s.s and flattening his ears outwardly, warning her away from his prize. There was no logic or rationality in those eyes. "Now that's not very nice," she said in the same gentling tone. She knew he wouldn't understand her, that the words would be indistinguishable, but her hope was that he might recognise her voice and find it calming.

His head extended toward her and his nostrils flared, scenting the air. He let loose a low whine, and she had the feeling that he acknowledged who she was but wasn't sure how to calm himself.

Feeling rea.s.sured by him recognising her, she moved another step toward him but then halted; she wanted him to come to her so that he was away from the dead wolf. Easier said than done, of course. "Come on, big guy, you don't want to play with that nasty carca.s.s. If you can hear what's going on, Trey, then let me just tell you that you'll be buying me a new jacket. This one's now covered in foam, fur and blood."

Tao took a step toward her. "Taryn -"

"Don't," she ordered, but the grey wolf had already seen the male approaching his mate and he wasn't too pleased about it. With her jacket still in his mouth, he began to advance on Tao who very smartly froze. "Cujo," she sang. "Hey, remember me."

The wolf's gaze darted from her to the carca.s.s to Tao repeatedly. Clearly he was torn on whether he wanted to continue playing with his new toy, go see his mate, or attack the male who dared talk to her.

Knowing she was about to make herself vulnerable to attack but not sure what else to do, Taryn squatted and tapped the ground with her fingers. "Come here, come on." He took one tentative step toward her, but then glanced back at his carca.s.s. "Seriously you don't want to keep that. Come on." Again she tapped the ground, knowing he could feel the vibrations through it.

Flicking a disgruntled look at Tao, the wolf slowly took a few steps toward her before halting to whine at the carca.s.s.

"No, we'll get you another toy. Get your furry a.s.s over here." Still at a sluggish pace, he covered those last remaining steps between them and dropped the jacket at her feet. "Hey there." The wolf rubbed his cheek along hers and buried his nose behind her ear to inhale her scent. Then he took to happily licking along her jaw. "Ew."

She now considered it a good thing that the foam and blood from his mouth had transferred to her jacket. Rather the jacket than her face. She winced when she saw that he was injured in several places. It was nothing fatal or even anything that would cause him much pain, but the healer in her wanted it fixed.

Allowing the wolf to continue rubbing himself against her, she turned her head toward the ma.s.s of wolves that Roscoe had brought along, all of whom were still waiting. Not even one of them appeared to have moved a muscle. Keeping her tone light so as not to startle the animal, she asked, "So which one of you considers yourself Alpha now, because I'm pretty sure you all had this sorted before you got here?"

They gave her 'I'm not sure what you mean' looks.

"Come on, don't play dumb. Not one of you looks even the slightest bit bothered that your Alpha is dead. I really don't care one way or another how you feel about it. I just want to know who I should be talking to when I ask if we should be expecting retaliation over this." The challenge was fought fairly, but it wouldn't be the first time that someone who was sour about the loss decided to take revenge.

The three males at the front of the ma.s.s glanced at each other and then the one in the center stepped forward, identifying himself as the Alpha. "There'll be no retaliation. We didn't agree with him coming here to try to separate mates, but he was set on having you."

"And you were following orders. Nothing wrong with that, just like there's nothing wrong with you not being prepared to die for an ill cause." The wolf, apparently not liking that he didn't have her full attention, nipped her chin. She rubbed her cheek against his rea.s.suringly and then turned back to the new Alpha. "Now that Roscoe's gone and there's no animosity between the packs, I don't see a reason why there can't be an alliance."

The new Alpha's expression was a mixture of shock and eagerness. "An alliance would be acceptable," he said coolly, seemingly trying to hide his excitement and look the composed Alpha.

"We can't exactly discuss it properly now for obvious reasons," she said, flicking a look at the Alpha male of her pack who was still very much in wolf form. "We'll call it a temporary verbal contract, one that will expire in thirty days if you don't contact us to lay out the details with Trey."

Looking apprehensively at the grey wolf, the Alpha said, "You'll be there too, right?"

She smiled. "Don't worry, I won't let him eat you. Once we're inside, you can take Roscoe's body." At the Alpha's surprised look, she said, "We're not trophy killers here." His nod communicated respect.

With that, she slowly stood and began to walk toward the caves, signalling for the rest of the pack to keep a fair distance away so that Cujo didn't feel threatened and turn feral again. She didn't have to encourage him to follow her. He remained at her side, half-companion half-guard the entire time.

Once they had pa.s.sed through the main entrance of Bedrock, she went to the living area and sat down on the large rug. The wolf sat between her legs, closing his eyes as she ran her fingers through his fur.

"Trey, I need you to come back now or I can't heal you. I don't want to hear any macho s.h.i.t about Alphas not needing healing. If you expect to have s.e.x ever again, you won't fight me on this."

It was something like twenty seconds later when the change began and suddenly Trey was back in his human form. Instantly he flopped to his back, breathing hard.

"Someone get him a bottle of water," she called out as the living area filled with people.

"I'm okay," he wheezed.

"Sure you are, Flinstone." His wounds actually weren't that bad, but they were ugly and would most likely scar if she didn't heal them.

Greta appeared, growling. "Now if you'd have just handed her over, Trey, you'd be fine."

"Not now, Wicked Witch of the East," groused Taryn.

"Here." Grace placed a bottle of water beside Taryn.

She offered Trey the bottle but he shook his head. "Hey, you still have some blood on your mouth and I'm not going near said mouth to heal you until you've washed your face at the very least."

"Why would you need to go near his mouth to heal him?" asked Rhett in that curious tone of his.

Turning to see that Trick was the one standing closest to the window, she asked, "Trick, would you open that for me?"

"Why?"

"So I can gaze lovingly at the sun. Will you just open it?"

Grunting, he did as she asked while Trey finally drank down some water and wiped his face.

"Now be still." She was pretty sure he only did it out of curiosity. Taryn placed her hand on his forehead and watched as several patches of his skin suddenly illuminated where there were scratches and bites. She heard a few gasps, a 'Whoa' and a 'Holy s.h.i.t' coming from behind her, but ignored them.

Leaning down, she placed her mouth at Trey's and inhaled deeply, taking the foulness from him and then blowing it out of her mouth through the window. She repeated the move over and over until, finally, the last luminous patch faded. "I'd say you're done." With that, she allowed herself to flop backwards onto her back much as Trey had five minutes ago. She almost laughed as she opened her eyes to see several faces all peering down at her. Then suddenly she was s.n.a.t.c.hed from the rug and was being cradled against Trey's chest.

"You shouldn't have done that, you look worse than I did."

"I'll be fine, you ungrateful a.s.shole. I just need some water and maybe some sort of sugary food."

"You got it," said Grace as she dashed out of the room.

"You do know that was awesome, right?" Dante's grin was almost as wide as Marcus' clown grin.

"More like unnatural," muttered Greta.

"Did you just use the word awesome?" Dominic asked Dante, chuckling.

"Come on, she totally calmed a feral wolf and at the same time negotiated an alliance before then doing some weird healing stuff. That's some seriously cool s.h.i.t."

Trey strangely felt a twinge of pride for her, though he still wanted to spank her a.s.s for going near his wolf while he was feral. "My wolf could have hurt you."

"Yeah, I know. Blame Dante, he told me I should go for it."

Dante spluttered. "That's not I didn't She -"

"You should see your face." Her chuckle was interrupted by a cough. Her throat always felt a little hoa.r.s.e after she used her healing gift. At that moment Grace handed her a bottle of water and an energy bar. "Thanks."

"Never again are you allowed to use that gift," stated Trey firmly, not liking how pale she was. His wolf wasn't happy about it either.

"Don't be a goof. Of course I'm going to use it. I wouldn't be much of a healer if I didn't."

"You look like a corpse."

"I'll be fine. Just plonk me on that monstrosity of a sofa and let me have a twenty minute nap and I'll be just as lively as I was before." She wouldn't have even needed the nap if Trey hadn't had so many bruises and wounds. "Just a little power nap and I'll be fine."

Trey couldn't help smiling at the way she curled up on the bulky sofa in a fetal position five minutes later. She looked even tinier than usual, but still not fragile. There was too much steel in her for that.

"Ryan just called," Tao informed him. "They've gone."

Trey nodded and then watched in surprise as some of his pack gathered around her. Dante, Grace and Rhett sat on her left while Lydia, Marcus and Cam sat on her right. Trick, Dominic and Tao then all sat on the floor with the back of their heads resting against her legs. It was a gesture of support, comfort and acceptance as well as an indication that they intended to guard her as she slept. She had earned the respect of each of them in the short time that she had been here.

A strange pang struck his chest unfamiliar and unnerving. "I'm going to take a shower. I'll be back in a few minutes." They nodded but were focused on Taryn who had gone out like a light. He and his wolf were comforted by the knowledge that they would stay with her while Trey removed the streaks of blood and the lingering scent of the dead wolf from his body. The dead wolf who was now no longer a threat to his mate or their mating.

It was as Trey was showering that he thought back to how he had felt when, forced to be nothing but an observer, he saw Taryn tentatively trying to gain his wolf's attention. The anger, the frustration and the anxiety rushed back. There had been something else in that c.o.c.ktail of emotions. Fear. Trey had actually felt fear.

It wasn't that he hadn't experienced that emotion before. Of course he had. Having an underdeveloped conscience and an explosive temper didn't mean he didn't know fear. What was bothering him right now was that he had felt such fear for Taryn, had feared she would be seriously hurt and feared she would be taken from him just like that and at his own hands. He couldn't even say it was his wolf's fear. His wolf had been going through his own s.h.i.t right then. No, that had been all Trey.

It had to have been a direct consequence of the natural crazy-possessiveness and crazy-protectiveness that came with mating. It was obviously age-old instincts pushing to the forefront, taking over. Trey understood that the mating would be temporary, but his instincts to protect his mate were obviously going to override his thoughts. Obviously. Just like his instinct to mark his mate and make her submit to him had overridden his true indifference to those things.

Yeah, that was all it was, all it could be. Obviously. That didn't improve his mood any because there was another issue that was bothering him. Taryn shouldn't have been able to calm his wolf.

When a wolf shifter went into feral mode they behaved a lot like a rabid animal. They attacked senselessly, they felt no emotional attachments, they lost all sense of reason and logic. And yet her scent and voice had reached his wolf even through that fog.

Trey had felt how quickly his wolf had recognised her as his mate, how quickly he had switched from wanting to kill to wanting to protect. The only reason his wolf had been reluctant to leave the carca.s.s was because he still hadn't been stable enough to understand that the sandy wolf was dead and no longer a danger to Taryn.

If his wolf was this attached to Taryn now, what would he be like in three months? What would happen when she left? Trey's wolf growled his objection, confirming Trey's suspicion that his eventual separation from her could be more problematic and uncomfortable than he had antic.i.p.ated even though they hadn't imprinted.

Unlike with true mates, a relationship between imprinted mates could wither over time. For an unhappy imprinted couple it wasn't simple for them to shake hands and go their separate ways because of the metaphysical bond that existed between them. The pain of that kind of separation was on a psychic level just as much as a physical one.

For most wolves, it meant constant migraines, a lingering sense of emptiness, and slipping in and out of depressive states for a few years, if not longer. Some wolves even retreated within their human half completely, unable to function without their mate. The worst case scenario for any wolf separated from their mate was that they turned rogue, remaining in wolf form and turning completely feral, attacking anyone they came into contact with like his mother had.

After his dad had banished him, his mom who had been a submissive wolf had for the first time in her life rebelled against his dad's authority. When he refused to reconsider his banishment, she had left with Trey and the others, believing that she would cope with the separation because her bond with his father had been through imprinting as opposed to them being true mates. However the separation had proven too difficult for her, most likely because she had been a submissive wolf. Within six months she had turned rogue...and Trey had been the one to kill her.

There was no way that he was prepared to go through something like that again. As long as he and Taryn didn't imprint, there was no risk of either of them suffering any of those effects when they separated, but it was obvious that his wolf was already becoming attached to her. And that spooked the h.e.l.l out of Trey. So instead of going straight to Taryn to check on her like he wanted to, he shut himself in his office.

Another thing that spooked him was the knowledge that if she hadn't been with him in that Mediation meeting, if she hadn't kept him calm with her touch, he would have most definitely lost it and went for Darryl's throat. Never had he been able to truly rely on another person. Never had there been someone for him to draw strength from. But that had been okay because he hadn't wanted to need anyone. He hadn't been the type of kid who craved physical affection which had been a d.a.m.n good thing since he'd never gotten it.

He had always prided himself on not having that weakness of needing anyone or anything. Having a mate, having a connection that came with mating, was f.u.c.king with that. Not that he believed for even one minute that the mating connection could override the way he functioned and had always functioned, but he didn't have any interest in encouraging the cravings for his mate by feeding them.

Maybe if he distanced himself from her, spent little time with her, didn't touch her, it would ease the matter and ease his wolf's attachment to her. He needed to ignore these urges he had to be with her, to touch her, to mark her entire body, to ensure his scent was all over her. Those urges had nothing to do with Taryn as a person and everything to do with the fact that she was who he had mated. If she had been someone else, things would still have been the same.

Would they really though? a voice in his head questioned, a part of him who thought he was talking out of his a.s.s.

Of course it would. That wasn't to say that he didn't like Taryn. He did. And he respected her which said a lot. And yeah, okay, there was that weird thing between them, that primal hunger. And she made him laugh, and she was refreshing because she wasn't afraid of him or to speak her mind in front of him, and she Dammit, no! No, the attraction was mostly just due to their mating. It was just his instincts driving him, not his regard for Taryn. Trey wasn't at the mercy of those instincts or his wolf. He had a mind of his own and that mind was going to rule how he behaved from here on out.

Unless the situation required him to touch her like when they were posing as mates he would resist doing so. It would probably be best not to have s.e.x with her again given that he could never resist the urge to mark her whenever he was inside her, but he couldn't guarantee that s.e.x wouldn't happen because if she made advances he very much doubted he'd be able to ignore them.

To satisfy his overprotectiveness he would allocate her a bodyguard. No his wolf wouldn't like her spending large amounts of time with another male, but his wolf would just have to deal with it because Trey was going to get a handle on this situation and he was going to start now.

Taryn jerked awake at the sound of laughing. Three heads that had been leaning against her legs swerved around.