Page 24 of Cruel Alpha Beast
But then I hear it. The sound of arguing outside the house. Perhaps evil is much closer than I thought.
Shea looks up from her drawing with great curiosity in her beautiful eyes. “Mommy, why are people yelling?”
I cross the carpeted floor and find the bay window in the living room. Outside, there’s a crowd amassing in the street. I press my knees into the wide windowsill and see that the throng of people is surrounding two men who are both going purple in the face. They scream, pointing fingers at each other’s wild eyes,and it doesn’t seem as though this fight is going to end on either one of their accords.
Grabbing the dark window curtains, I pull them close together, hoping they’ll at least dampen some of the sounds. I turn to Shea and give her a smile.
“It’s alright, little one,” I tell her. “Just some adults having an argument. Now, why don’t you go play in your new big-girl bedroom?”
Shea’s face lights up, the fighting in the streets gone from her radar. She abandons her supplies and runs across the floor, disappearing up the stairs.
“That was a close one,” I murmur to myself.
Once I hear her feet land on the floor above, I cross the living room and go into the kitchen, where I open the front door to the house. I slide through the jamb, hoping not to attract any attention, and try to get a better feel for what this argument is about.
“I said I was walking here!”
“Well, I’m walkinghere!”
My mouth hangs open. These two grown men are fighting over their place on the sidewalk?
The crowd surrounding them starts making noise—some people try to stop the fight, while others goad them to take it further. My stomach rumbles with anxiety. This is not good. But what can I possibly do?
I consider taking my phone from my pocket and calling Greg. He’s wise. He would know. But before I can even think to move my fingers, the two men’s yelling turns into growling. They’ve shifted. And now half of the crowd is cheering on the two wolves, gnashing their teeth at each other.
I watch in horror as the claws come out. This is going to get bloody, but I can’t move. I can’t even scream for someone to help.
Then, a third wolf comes barreling down the street, chestnut fur gleaming under the bright sun. He leaps through the throng of people and disappears between the fighting wolves. There are several loud howls, and then three men rise, cut up and bitten, but largely okay.
“Enough!” Sawyer bellows. “This needs toend! Both of you! Go on your way! Everyone else—go home!”
As if trapped in ice, every person aside from Sawyer freezes where they stand. Then, one person leaves the crowd, followed by another, followed by three more, until only the two men who started fighting remain. From my place on the front porch, I can see the men coming down from whatever frenzy led them to argue like this.
“I-I’m sorry,” one of the men says, nursing a nasty bite on his arm. “I don’t know what came over me, man.”
“Me either,” the second one replies, blood dripping from his nose.
“Sawyer,” the first one says, as if finally noticing that the alpha is standing there. “Something’s going on. Why does this shit keep happening? We’re going to kill each other.”
“I’m going to figure it out, hopefully before that happens,” Sawyer says. “Both of you, stop by the infirmary. Get your wounds checked out.”
As he leaves, Sawyer turns to look at me, and I can see a small scratch on his cheekbone. A tiny trickle of blood snakes its way down toward the scruff on his jawline, but he doesn’t seem to notice it.
He steps closer, his chest and shoulders still puffed out. With darkened eyes and this heightened energy, I can’t help thinking that he’s the most handsome he’s ever been. My stomach flutters as he stalks closer. A very strong part of me wants to jump into his arms and consummate the marriage right now…
But no. Even if this was the right time, I’m still angry with him. He’s hurt me too deeply for lustful, passionate sex.
My mouth still waters, despite the logical part of my body trying to shut my heat down. I swallow hard and wait for Sawyer to climb the steps.
“Inside, Lacey,” he tells me in a commanding voice.
I nod my head silently and enter the kitchen once more. I make quick work of finding a clean cloth and running hot water over it. Sawyer sits in the same chair he sat in this morning for breakfast, tensing and relaxing his bulging muscles.
He’s not making this easy on me, is he?
Once I wring out the excess water, I come to sit in the next seat at the table. “Don’t move,” I murmur, pressing the cloth against the scratch on his face. Sawyer grimaces in pain, but allows me to clean his small wound without complaint.
“So, has this sort of thing been happening a lot?” I ask, remembering my visions of fighting in the street.
