Kalen Read online

  Ally reached back and rested her hand on one of Milly’s paws. “Don’t worry, Milly. We’ll find him. Wherever he is, we’ll find him.”

  They finished the ride in silence. Kalen turned off the highway onto a less traveled road, then turned off onto a dirt road after that. “We’re almost there.”

  Good, Milly said, her voice filled with pain. I don’t want to change here in the SUV and arrive at your friend’s house buck-naked with my ass hanging out the window.

  Ally fought the urge to laugh. She’d always thought Milly was a character. Now, she knew that her friend had been a young soul in a seventy-year-old body.

  “Hang on for a bit and we’ll get you into a bedroom where you can change in private.”

  Milly chuckled. That phrase takes on a whole new meaning now, doesn’t it, sweetie?

  “Yes, it does. And you’re going to have to stop calling me sweetie, or people are going to start thinking you’re odd. After all, you don’t look a day older than me now.”

  I don’t know if I can get used to that. I’ve been old for so long now, seeing the younger me just seems wrong somehow. She paused, then stood up when Kalen brought the vehicle to a stop. I wonder what Gerald will think when he sees me. If I don’t look a day older than you, then I look younger than I did the day he disappeared.

  “We’ll make sure you’ll find out.” Kalen opened his door and slid out of the vehicle. Moving to the back door, he opened Milly’s door and waited for her to jump down.

  We’ll have to find him first.

  “I think we have a good idea of where he is.”

  Ally gasped. “That lunatic who calls himself a doctor must have him.”

  “Exactly,” Kalen muttered as he grabbed their suitcases from the back, leaving Ally’s laptop bag for her to carry. “How else could he have perfected a serum to change humans into werewolves? He must have a pureblood in one of his facilities. All we have to do is figure out which one.”

  Ally grabbed the bag he left her and he pushed the button to close the door. “It shouldn’t take too long to figure out where they’re holding him. I wouldn’t think they’d risk carrying him too far from where they captured him. A pureblood would be difficult to drug and even harder to restrain.”

  He led the way to the front door where a beautiful redhead stood next to a tall and muscular male.

  Ally inhaled sharply at the scent that surrounded the two. It was as though the air was charged with sexual energy and electricity. The atmosphere around them nearly crackled with power.

  “Alpha, Carly,” Kalen said as he approached the door. “This is my mate, Ally Morgan and her friend, Milly Jenkins.”

  The two moved to the side so they could enter and Kalen set his burden down on the floor. “Do we still have people working on the disk we acquired from the last laboratory we raided?”

  “Yes, my cousin is still working on that during his house arrest.” The alpha moved to sit down on a chair, pulling his wife into his lap. “I’ll call after you’ve been debriefed and see if he’s found any helpful information.”

  “You can trust him?” Kalen moved to sit on the sofa motioning for Ally to join him.

  Instead, Ally sat in the chair across the room and held her hands in her lap. She wasn’t ready to share any type of relationship she and Kalen had with anyone at this early juncture.

  We are mates, they at least expect us to sit next to each other. Look how comfortable Carly is with her mate.

  Yeah, and she’s probably been with him for more than a few days, too, hasn’t she. She wanted to smile at his sheepish expression.

  Carly sat up in her mate’s lap and looked at Milly. “I do hope that we can find your mate for you. We had a female cat with us when Bastien and I first met. She, too, had been under the impression that her mate was dead, until we found him. The doctor held him captive and experimented on him.”

  Milly groaned and Ally remembered she’d wanted some privacy. “Is there a place where Milly can go change? She would like some privacy and her suitcase.”

  “Oh!” Carly jumped up and Bastien stood.

  “Which one is hers?”

  “The large gray and black one is hers, the dark blue one is mine.”

  Bastien picked up the two suitcases and led them up two flights of stairs. “It’s a good thing that homes of this size are easy to find these days. No one wants to have to pay to heat them in the winter.” He strode down the wide upper hallway until he reached two doors across from one another.

  Opening the door on the right, he strode in and dropped Milly’s case on the floor. Leaving the room, he led them across the hall to the other door and set Ally’s suitcase down.

  “Your things are in here as well, Kalen.” He flicked a glance to Ally. “Figure out a way to accommodate your mate, or you’ll be sleeping on the couch.” He turned to Ally. “And just so you know, ma’am, the walls are sound proofed.” With one last look at Kalen, he walked way.

  Milly wandered into her room. If I concentrate on changing back into a human, it won’t hurt as much?

  “No, ma’am,” Kalen replied. “You should find it easier than Ally did. With age comes more control over it. At least, it usually does. I’m not sure about your case.”

  Thank you. Milly pushed the door closed with her nose. Give him a chance, Ally. He seems like a nice boy and he does care for you.

  “Hey, Milly,” Kalen called out after her. “You might be surprised to find out that I could call you a little girl.”

  Milly didn’t answer. The only thing his comment managed to do was make Ally wonder exactly how old he was.

  Kalen followed her into the room and set her case on the floor. “How old are you, exactly.”

  He cleared his throat and tried to avoid answering. He pointed at a door to the right of the room. “The bathroom is right through there and there’s a TV in the armoire.”

  Ally just crossed her arms and glared at him. “I can forgive lots of things, Kalen. I can come to terms with the fact that you’re older than me.” She gave him a wry smile. “Waaaay older than me, even.” She shook her head. “But I won’t forgive you if you withhold information that I have deliberately asked you for.”

  “Ninety-seven,” he replied without hesitation.

  “Ninety—” Ally closed her eyes and shook her head. “Man… I never would have thought you were that old.”

  “You make me sound decrepit.”

  She shrugged. “I wouldn’t say decrepit, but you are definitely a cradle robber lusting after me.” She grinned. “I’m seventy years younger than you are.”

  “It sounds like a lot by human standards, but by our standards, you could say that I’m not really that much older.”

  “I guess not, if someone who’s more than one-thousand still looks thirty,” she said dryly.

  “That’s only because he’s pure blood. The rest of us are not. We don’t age quite as slowly.” He moved closer.

  Ally moved toward the bathroom. She wanted a shower and she wanted one now. Holding out her hand palm up, Ally nervously licked her lips. “Wait a minute. I want a shower and I want something to eat—in that order.”

  “Then, by all means,” Kalen said as he waved toward the bathroom. “Avail yourself of the facilities and I shall return with a delicious dinner for two.” After a sexy smile and a wink, he left her alone.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Kalen left the room and wandered down the hallway to the shared bathroom. After a quick shower, he went downstairs to find them something to eat.

  Bastien sat at the table, a cup of coffee in front of him as he stared at his phone on the table. “It’s strange that we have the power to shift our shape along with our added strength and excellent hearing, but we can do nothing but wait for information we need.” He raked his fingers through his hair. “I’ve been sitting here willing this damned phone to ring for the last fifteen minutes.”

  He scrubbed his face with his hands and shook his head. “I called Lu
ke who’s still working on the software along with one of the MacDonald brothers. They think they’re close to opening up a file that may tell them where Milly’s husband is.”

  He waved toward his laptop. “According to all of the most popular search engines, the headlines from the time he disappeared put the two of them at a campground in upstate New York.” He opened the laptop, entered a password, then turned the screen to face Kalen. “According to that story, Gerald Jenkins disappeared as though into thin air forty-two years ago.”

  “You think they have a facility near there?”

  “They’d have to, wouldn’t they? After all, they were humans capturing a full-blooded werewolf. They couldn’t have been able to keep him unconscious for long and regular bonds wouldn’t have held him. They would have had to keep injecting him with tranquilizers and we both know that’s just not practical.”

  Bastien was right. It wasn’t practical or smart to attempt to keep a werewolf sedated for very long. Sooner, or later, he could learn to metabolize the drug faster than expected and overtake his captors.

  “So you think they’re in New York?”

  “Either that, or Canada.” He shrugged. I’m just waiting to hear where. When I do, we’ll be on the move again.” He took a drink of his coffee. “I’m sorry. Did you come down here for something specific?”

  “Yeah,” Kalen said with a chuckle. “I came down to get something to eat. Ally’s hungry and, well, so am I.”

  “In more ways than one, I’ll bet.”

  Kalen grinned. “I’m sure you remember how it is.”

  “Boy do I. As I recall, I walked around with a raging hard on for weeks.” Bastien waved his arm toward the refrigerator. “Go get something to eat. There are some cold cuts in there, and an assortment of salads and other things. Help yourself to whatever you find and try to convince your mate to put your balls out of your misery,” he said with a grin.

  Kalen stood and strode over to the refrigerator. Inside, he found an assortment of food they could eat cold. That was a good thing. He sucked at cooking. He grabbed a container filled with fried chicken, some cheese, bread and a couple of dishes of macaroni and potato salad, fixed two plates and headed back upstairs with a tray full of food, a bottle of wine and two glasses. Maybe, if he was lucky, he could get his mate drunk and have his wicked way with her.

  Kalen opened the door with a smile and stopped dead in his tracks. He felt his mouth drop open, but for some reason, his brain just wasn’t functioning well enough to shut it.

  “Don’t just stand there with the door open.” Ally leaned to the side to make sure there was no one standing behind him. “Please shut the door.”

  Kalen wasn’t sure how he did it, since his brain wasn’t functioning as it should, but he reached out with his leg and kicked the door closed with such force, the vase on the chest of drawers against the wall rattled.

  It was probably a good thing every other muscle in his body froze when he walked into the room. Otherwise, he might have dropped the tray full of food he held out in front of him with a death grip.

  Ally stood in the center of the room wearing nothing more than a matching lace bra and panty set. He wasn’t sure if she wore it for him, or if he’d just had such wonderful timing that he managed to walk in on her as she dressed.

  The expression on her face would indicate she had meant for him to see her dressed as she was, especially since she didn’t rush to cover up. Instead, she moved very slowly while she dug around in her suitcase to fine a flimsy robe that she put on to cover her beautiful and curvy body.

  Kalen swallowed thickly and moved to the table for two by the window and set the tray down. The glasses chinked together as he removed the contents and set the tray against the wall.

  “Dinner is served, milady,” he said with a bow. God that sounded corny. He fought the urge to close his eyes with mortification. What was the matter with him? He got a mate and he turned into the clichéd idiot who made a fool of himself at every turn in an attempt to look as though he could do it all.

  “Thank you, kind sir.” She grinned at him, showing him the cutest little dimple.

  Kalen’s cock jerked in response to her reply and suddenly, his trite behavior seemed like the right thing to do.

  She sat while he held her chair. Kalen inhaled deeply at her scent that smelled slightly of lilacs and aroused woman. He closed his eyes and took in the wonderful aroma of her arousal, loving that she seemed to have come around to the fact that they were mates.

  With another of her smiles, she reached out and pulled his arm. Bending down, he was shocked to feel her soft lips against his cheek and her warm breath in his ear. “Are you going to join me?”

  “Of course.” What else would he do? He certainly wasn’t leaving this room. Every muscle in his body tensed with anticipation. Every cell, every hair follicle stood at attention, awaiting her acquiescence. Kalen knew he would be a fool to leave this room now.

  Moving to the other side of the table, he sat down, then opened the bottle of wine. “Would you care for some?”

  “Yes, please.” She held her glass out for him to fill it.

  After he poured the wine, he watched her lift a fork full of potato salad and took a small bite.

  “This is good. I wonder who made it.”

  “I think it’s store-bought. It was in a two pound container in the fridge.” Kalen watched helplessly as she swirled her fork around in the potato salad and took another bite.

  He then looked down at his plate and closed his eyes. He didn’t know how much more he could take. His stomach grumbled and he took a bite of his food. It could have been sawdust as much as he tasted. All he wanted to do at that moment was eat and get it over with because he was certain he’d explode if he had to wait much longer to touch his mate.

  Never before had he felt this way. Not once had he ever wanted a woman as much as he wanted Ally. Her eyes, her scent, her very soul seemed to call out to him.

  He needed the woman sitting across the table from him more than he’d ever needed anyone. He thought back about how he fought the urge to mate and wondered why. This woman was the only one who could give him everything his body could ever want, or need. She was his life, his very soul and he wondered why it took him so long to realize it.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ally sat across the table form Kalen and wondered how long it would take for him to pounce. He ate his food so fast, just watching him almost made her laugh. After a few bites of food, she was done, her stomach protesting the small amount she ate.

  She wasn’t sick. Ally knew that. No, she was on fire. She burned for this man as she had never burned for another. She wanted him with a desperation that she was certain would kill her if he didn’t make a move soon.

  It wasn’t as though she couldn’t make her own move, Ally knew that, but something inside her stilled her desire to jump his bones. Unsure, she sat still waiting for him to finally decide he wanted her. If the look on his face when he entered the room was any indication, Ally would have bet yes.

  She took a long sip of her wine, tempted to gulp it down for false courage, but knew it wouldn’t work. How many times over the years had she attempted to pick up a man at a bar? After several drinks, she couldn’t do it. Perhaps her opinion of herself was too high, or maybe she’d just been waiting for love.

  Kalen stared at her over their glasses of wine and she wondered if it was that simple. Her mind and her body had waited for love. Well, here it sat before her in the guise of a beautiful man with passionate gray eyes who couldn’t seem to look away from her.

  It was difficult to believe they had known each other for only about twenty-four hours, but it felt like forever. Still, it wasn’t long enough. It would never be long enough.

  She could know this man for a lifetime and still not know all of his secrets. He stared at her through those shuttered eyes, making her want him with every passing moment and she did nothing but sit across from him and need.

 
; Her tummy flip-flopped when he stood and moved around the table to stand before her, his hand out. When she stood, he pulled her into his arms and swayed back and forth as though dancing, but there was no music.

  Desire flowed through her blood, burning a trail through her blood straight to her middle. Moisture wept from her womb and moistened the lace of her panties and she closed her eyes.

  This was what she’d waited for all of her life. This man, this room, this night, what was left of it, was what she’d wanted.

  Her body tingled as his hands skimmed up and down her back. The heat from his palms scorched her through the thin material of her silky robe.

  She’d known what she was doing when she let him catch her undressed. In fact, she had wanted him to see her in state of undress that would drive him wild. Too many people had come in and out of her life for her to throw away a chance at happiness with this man just because he was different. Hell, even she was different now.

  What difference did it make that he was a werewolf? Even if that crazy doctor hadn’t changed her, she would feel the same. Nothing mattered at this moment but the feel of his warm body pressed so tightly against her own.

  She took a deep breath, loving the masculine smell of him. The mixture of the soap he used when he showered not so long ago, the slight musky scent of man and his desire.

  It shocked her that she could smell that and knew what it was. Ally felt her face heat and wondered if he could smell her own arousal. Then realized she didn’t care if he could, it would only expedite matters.

  Tilting her head back, she looked up into his eyes, those beautiful changeable eyes that looked steel blue when filled with desire. “Kiss me.”

  The words had barely formed before he lowered his head and pressed his lips against hers. Liquid heat rushed through her, soaking her panties. She wanted to press her legs together to ease the throbbing of her clit, but Kalen moved her fluidly across the room. Damn, the man was born to dance.

  Her heart raced as he swung her around, dancing to the music only he could hear. Heat and desire rushed through her, coursing through her veins like her life’s blood. When he finally reached the bed, Ally wanted to scream, Yes! Instead, she let him pull her tighter against him, his lips slanting over hers as he thrust his tongue into her mouth.