BAD BOY ROMANCE: DIESEL: Contemporary Bad Boy Biker MC Romance (Box Set) (New Adult Sports Romance Short Stories Boxset) (135 page)

“Tomorrow we’ll be home and you can push all of that happiness into Charlene for a change,” I said. The others murmured agreement. They’d all seen the photo.

“When are you getting started?” John asked me. Allegra and I were the only other couple in the pack. The other two females were just dating.

I chewed my food, stalling for time, trying to work out an answer.

“I don’t know. Not anytime soon, I think,” I finally said. “I’m away from home too often. If I had a son I couldn’t let him grow up without a father.”

John nodded, looking into his food. He’d just gained a little girl, but he looked offended.

“I also don’t think I have what it takes to be a father,” I added.

“But you’re pack leader,” Charlie said. He was the quiet one in the group, he didn’t speak up often. “Isn’t your job like being a kind of father figure to us, in a way?”

Carlos snorted. “That’s the worst analogy in the world, bro,” he said. Charlie shrugged.

“I was just saying. He takes responsibility and looks out for us and keeps us in check. It’s almost the same thing.”

“I don’t want to know what your dad was like,” Carlos said again and everyone laughed.

Except me. It stung a little, to be honest. But Carlos was right. Being an Alpha was nothing like being a father. I took another it of my food and let the men bicker back and forth about the topic. The only other quiet one was John. He was a father now, so no matter what the definition was, he was going to have to own up to it.

“To be honest with you,” I said to him while the others weren’t paying attention. “I don’t even know if we want kids.”

He pulled up his eyebrows, pausing his fork in mid-air.

“How can you not want kids?” he asked. I shrugged. It was hard to explain.

“I just wouldn’t know what to do. Allegra is human. That means that the baby will be human. And if it is a boy? Or even if it turns out to be a girl, I wouldn’t be able to relate to it. I wouldn’t be able to be there for the child and tell them what life should be like, how they should act. I’m essentially and animal. How can I teach humanity?”

John looked down at his food. “Well, isn’t it the same with us? Little Carla is human too.” I realized that was what they’d named her. “And I can still be there for her, protect her, teach her how to stand up to the world. Charlene can do the human side. She’s the other half of the parent unit anyway, and she’s going to be around Carla the most. It shouldn’t be a problem.”

“But Charlene is just a human. You and I both know that even though Allegra isn’t a werewolf, she’s a lot closer to being one than Charlene is because of her position in the pack. Because of the bond. I can feel her as we get closer to home. I can feel the power spilling over to her. We can’t raise a child in that.”

John shook his head, not looking at me. “You’re wrong,” he said. “You can, and every child only knows what he knows. If your kid doesn’t know any other life, why wouldn’t he be happy? Allegra is a good woman. She’ll be a fair mom and do everything she needs to.”

“But it’s not fair on her,” I said. I was a wolf, after all, and she’d had to deal with enough of that already without having to focus on bridging the gap for someone else. “Look at what she’s done for us.”

“That’s the point, isn’t it?” Abdul chipped in. I hadn’t realized they’d fallen quiet and started listening to our conversation. “She does what she needs to do every time. She did it even when she was terrified, because she listens with her heart. She can do this. You’re not giving her enough credit.”

Maybe I wasn’t. Maybe she would be great at it. Hell, she probably would. She was a good woman, and everything about her was brilliant. She would be able to adapt to motherhood just like she’d adapted to the pack. I’d been hiding behind her though.

I knew very well that all the excuses I’d made was about her because I couldn’t admit that I was terrified of even the idea of being a father. I just couldn’t do it. I didn’t want kids, and that was as simple as that. But I couldn’t tell the pack that. I was their alpha, I should have been able to handle anything.

Parenthood? That was the smallest thing compared to what we dealt with. And I couldn’t do it. I shrugged and carried on eating, and the men started talking about other things, moving about from the subject. I was relieved. I was tired of hedging all the time. Only John knew, and he glanced up at me. I looked away before I had a chance to feel stupid, guilty about what I was thinking and feeling.

Homecoming day was finally there, and we got on the bus that took us back to base. Allegra would be there. She was always there when I arrived, without exception. I couldn’t wait to see her.

Since she’d become the alpha mate, the second in our pack, seeing her was that much more intense. Especially after we’d been apart for so long. The power rippled through us every time and it made me feel like my strength was channeled, rerouted and then brought back to me, more powerful than when it had left me.

Having Allegra as part of the pack was the best thing I could ever ask for.

I wanted her to come with us into the woods during the next full moon. She could handle it, I knew she could. The way she moved through the trees now was like she could feel the forest the way we could. She stood in our circle of power when the moon called our wolves out, and it was like she could almost hear its song.

And I wanted to share it all with her, wanted her to feel the rush of the night when we ran through the trees, when we were animals all the way through, and the human disappeared completely.

I shook my head. I had to remember that being human was all she had. She couldn’t let it go the way we did, because she didn’t have anything else.

The bus stopped in the drop-off zone, and soldiers peeled out everywhere. The square was filled with uniformed officers and rangers, looking for their significant others.

I felt her before I saw her. Her presence crept over my body in a rush of prickles, and when I turned around her dark eyes met mine and drew me in. She smiled, and her eyes were drowning deep. When I walked up to her I dropped my bag and wrapped my arms around her, folding her against me.

The power surged through me and into her, and she gasped against me. It came back at me in a wave that was much stronger, and filled me to the brim until I was squirming with its intensity. When she pulled away her cheeks were glowing.

“I still have to get used to that,” she said in a breathy voice. I smiled. I wasn’t going to admit that I had to get used to it too. She laced her fingers through mine and I picked up my bag with my free hand. We walked to the car together.

“Did John tell you about Charlene?” she asked. I took a deep breath and forced a smile, nodding.

“She’s beautiful, isn’t she? Charlene is so happy.”

“He showed me the photo,” I said. In all honesty I didn’t really want to talk about John and Charlene another time, but Allegra was beaming. She was beautiful when she was excited, and I let her ramble on.

“You should have seen her, hardly any labor and I swear she didn’t even feel pain once that baby was in her arms.”

“You were there?” I asked. She nodded and smiled. “Someone had to take John’s place, and I’m your second after all.” She looked happy about being able to step. And the idea that she took her role in the pack so seriously made me happy. But I was uncomfortable with all this baby talk. And I had a feeling I was going to get a lot more of it before I went back on duty.

Chapter 3

Allegra

Homecoming used to be a time when Reid was physically home, but he was usually on the battle field with his mind and it was like a shell sitting at the table with me. I always tried to be encouraging and supportive. I’d known what it meant to be a military wife before we’d gotten married, I’d known what I was letting myself in for.

Since we’d fixed everything between us, and after the horrible uncomfortable time when I’d refused to accept my role as the alpha’s mate, things were perfect. More than perfect. When he came home was really home. Yes, there were times when he struggled, I could see the war behind his eyes, see the haunted shadows cross his face when we had conversations about mundane things.

Sometimes he woke me up with his nightmares. But he was really home despite that. And this time was no different. We were hardly in the front door when he dropped his bag and kicked the door closed with his foot. He had his body against mine in the blink of an eye and I melted into his arms. The power surged around us, the dominance of the alpha claiming his mate, and shivers marched down my spine.

He kissed me like he meant it, mashing his lips against mine and I opened my mouth, letting him slip inside of me, taste me, explore. I ran my hands up his pecks, over his muscular shoulders and around his neck. A sigh shuddered through my body.

His body was strong and muscular. His arms held me in place, locked around me but gentle at the same time. Everything about him was trim and toned, screaming with strength and sex appeal.

He moved his head to my neck, his lips kissed a trail of fire down to my collar bone and I made a small whimpering sound. Sounds affected Reid. It was an animalistic thing. Werewolves responded to sounds, a whimper, a growl, a scream, a cry of ecstasy. He was so strong he could break me, and when I whimpered and made small moaning sounds that he drew from me with his sex, it was like it fueled him more.

He groaned and it reverberated through his body almost like a growl. He ground his hips against me, and I could feel him hard and hungry through his pants, straining at his buckle.

I reciprocated, answering his urge with my own, pressing my body against his. My body ached for him. It had been months since I’d had him so close, and even though I hadn’t struggled without him, I was dying to have him inside me, all over me, right now.

He broke away from me, looking into my eyes. He was breathing hard, his chest rising and falling, and his eyes were the blue flame that they turned to when his wolf was rising to the surface. The beast slid behind his eyes, begging to break free. It came out in moments of passion, rage, sorrow. Any strong emotion set it off. And I’d come to love it, because it was always accompanied with a surge of power, and me feeling like I was right there with him, even though I didn’t have my own animal that could crawl out of me.

Reid wrapped an arm around my waist and all but carried me to the bedroom. In the room he turned me to him and kissed me again, pushing his hands under my t-shirt and pulling it over my head. He kissed me as soon as his could, his large hands trailing over my stomach, my ribs, and finally cupping my breasts. He covered my chest completely with his hands. I always felt small when he was with me, but he always treated me like I was delicate.

And I felt like I was when I was with him. These were the times when I felt the most beautiful.

His hands slipped around my back and he unclipped my bra. I shrugged it off my shoulders and it dripped to the floor. His hands were on my bare skin now, and his fingers traced me, finding the spots that drove me wild.

I undid the buttons on his shirt one by one and peeled it off his shoulders. I could feel the dips in between each muscle, feel him flex against my hands when he moved, the muscles rippling underneath his skin. I pushed up the vest that he wore underneath, exposing his washboard abs, and I bent down and kissed them. His skin tasted clean and male, and he smelled like Reid, oozing power and sex.

I undid his buckle and he climbed out of his pants, kicking off his shoes with it. His hands went for my pants and he pulled them off me. He picked me up and laid me on the bed, crawling over me. He was completely naked and so was I, and it was right, the way it should have been.

He looked me in the eyes, and I could see his wolf hiding behind his irises. The wolf was here too, and everything was how it had to be. Making love to Reid wouldn’t have been the same without his wolf. It was a part of him as much as it had become a part of me.

His hands trailed down my body, over my breasts, then my ribs and stomach, down the side of my body falling into the dip where my waist narrowed and the out with my hips. He traced the V and cupped me where it came together in the middle. His hand was hot and I squirmed in his grasp.

His fingers worked magic, he pushed his fingers down and into me, and I gasped. A trickle of magic poured into me with his touch and I gasped. I worked his fingers against my body and built something hot and wanting inside of me. When I thought I wasn’t going to be able to hold it anymore, he stopped.

This was what I loved the most. When he was back, and he was paying so much attention to me, to pleasing me and being in charge and in control, that he was completely present.

My body screamed for him. My breathing was shallow and erratic. I put my hands on his shoulders and tried to pull his body toward me. He was stronger than I could ever be and if he decided no it wouldn’t have mattered what I did. But he rolled his body over me, pressing up on his arms, and positioned himself at my entrance.

He was hard and big, I knew him as well as I knew my own body, and I whimpered in anticipation. It was all he needed. He pushed into me, and my body curled around his. My walls stretched and yielded, making space for him, and I gasped.

When he was in all the way he kissed me, long and sensual, before he pulled out again. He pushed in again, and my body responded. Goosebumps covered my body like a sheet. Reid moved his hips against mine, building a rhythm, and then his body took over. His hips bucked against mine and I was rendered useless under his body. His face was in my neck again and he licked small circled up and down, taking my earlobe between his teeth now and then.