Page 4 of Big Bad Alphas

“No!” Patrick roars, his muscles flexing as his nails elongate.

My wolf rushes to the surface, sensing that Patrick is about to shift. We’re all on edge now, and my wolf is ready to break free and fight them. Unfortunately, Patrick and Ezra are also seconds away from lunging at my throat.

“She belongs to me,” Ezra snarls possessively.

All of the noise must have made our mate curious. I see the front door of her house open out of the corner of my eye. Everything in me stills, my wolf momentarily forgetting about the other men vying for our mate’s attention. I turn to face her, smiling as I step toward the most precious woman I’ve ever seen.

She’s staring at us with wide green eyes framed in dark lashes. Her rounded cheeks are tinged with pink, while her cute little nose is turned up slightly at the end, making her look like a goddamn doll. My mate is dressed down in a pair of black leggings that hug her thick thighs and a loose pink tank top that does nothing to hide her ample curves. My mouth waters at the sight of her, and an image of my hands tangled in her long brown hair as I drag those bee-stung lips down to mine fills my head, and my wolf howls inside me.

We want that.

She seems confused, and I’m sure that it must be a little weird to have three big men yelling at each other in her front yard. I want to cup her cheeks and tell her she’s perfect and that she can forget about the two other oafs staring at her since I’m the only one who will be claiming those curves.

Ezra and Patrick step toward my mate, and something in me snaps. I lunge for them, and we go tumbling down onto the grass in her front yard. We’re a mass of swinging arms and tangled limbs.

Patrick or Ezra are shouting and grunting that she’s theirs, and I respond in some garbled threat that doesn’t even make sense to my own ears. It’s hard to tell who is saying what or who is hitting who. I throw an elbow into the mix, making contact with someone’s skull. Ezra growls and my wolf smirks inside my chest, knowing we caused damage.

The three of us manage not to shift into our wolves, and I wonder if it’s because we can all smell that my mate is human. Even on some subconscious level, I know I need to protect her and ease her into this complicated situation. More complicated than I could have ever imagined, apparently.

The brawl continues until the sound of the front door slamming shut breaks us apart. The lock clicks into place, and we all freeze, looking toward the now-closed and locked door.

“Shit,” I mumble.

“We have to stop. People could walk by and see us,” Patrick scolds as if he weren’t an equal part of the whole scuffle. I glare at him but push to my feet at the same time as Wade.

“Shit,” I say again, trying to brush off the blades of grass and loose leaves that are sticking to me.

I look up to see Patrick and Ezra glaring at each other. My wolf is still on high alert inside of me. I glance back at the house and swallow hard. I can’t help but wonder if we just messed things up with our fated mate before we ever even met her.

Not “we,”my wolf reminds me. I blink a few times. I didn’t even realize that I thoughtweinstead ofIandourmate instead ofmymate.

Things are happening so fast. Never, not once in all my years dreaming about my mate and then searching for her did I think I’d have to share her. Why can’t I be fated to one person like almost everyone else I know? I always thought my mate would be another shifter and, more importantly, she would belong to me and me alone. She’d help me run my pack, and we would be the perfect team. We would be happy together.

My wolf is just as conflicted as I am. On the one hand, we’re over the moon excited that we’ve finally found our fated mate. On the other hand, though, we don’t want to share her. This was never part of the plan. It was supposed to be me and my fated mate, not me, my fated mate, and two other Alphas who are just as possessive and protective as I am.

I stare at the little house where our mate has locked herself inside and let out a slow breath. We need to figure this out soon. I don’t want to spend one more night without my mate now that I’ve found her. I just need to convince Patrick and Ezra that they’re wrong and she’s meant to be mine.

I take a deep breath before I start to turn back to my friends.

“What the hell are we going to do now?” I ask them as I turn to face them fully.

CHAPTERFOUR

EZRA

No one seems to have an answer to Wade’s question. It’s hard for me to think clearly with my wolf screaming at me in my head.

I’m still in shock, unable to process the reality of this situation. I’ve played out a dozen different scenarios over the years of meeting my mate for the first time. Never in a thousand years did I imagine sharing her.

My wolf and I spent the last year looking for our mate on and off. I’ve been everywhere and never caught even a hint of her scent. I had pretty much given up on ever finding her, and now,BAM!Here she is.

Along with her two other mates, apparently.

I look over at Patrick and Wade. They both look like they’re ready to start foaming at the mouth or lose their skin and start fighting again. I wonder if I look just as crazed as they do.

Who cares? Go get our mate!my wolf screams at me.

I glance back to our mate’s house. The place is quiet, and I scan the windows for any sign of her. She’s probably inside, freaked out and worried about what the three of us will do next.

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