Page 48

LUKAS

L ukas’s phone rang from where he’d left it on the couch. He didn’t rush to get it. He was busy staring into his bathroom mirror and seeing a stranger.

It was still him, of course—even after all the pomp and circumstances of his coronation—but the face that had opened so many doors now had him trapped.

Ring!

He tapped his fingers across his high cheekbones. Dragged his thumb along the defined angle of his jaw. Peered into his own pale blue eyes. If he was being honest, he didn’t hate the way he looked. It was what lay beneath his features that he truly hated.

Ring!

Females from other clans might come to Clan Bakken because of his physicality, but his looks wouldn’t matter as much without his superior gene pool. And there was nothing he could do to rid himself of that.

Ring!

With a deep sigh, he pushed himself away from the bathroom sink and strode into the heart of his den, heading for the couch and his phone.

Before it could ring again, a fist pounded three times against the door. Lukas’s heart seized. He knew the knock. He knew the frustrated berserker behind it. Corbin Knight . His secretary.

Was it that time already? Ice water trickled through his veins. How long had he been staring at himself in that damn mirror?

Lukas went to the door and opened it while his phone rang for the last time.

Corbin stood in the hallway wearing a grim expression—the same expression he’d worn on their first few meetings, none of which had gone well. Today, his face was tense and his back straight. A vein throbbed in the side of his neck.

Lukas might have commented on it if Corbin had been alone. But he wasn’t alone. Right beside him stood the blond, blue-eyed Ingrid ?sterdahl, dressed in a white robe.

She looked nervous but not like she’d come under duress. Lukas had pledged to himself that before any matings, he’d have a serious conversation with each female to make sure their fathers—or mothers for that matter—hadn’t forced them into the situation.

“Sir,” Corbin said through a tight jaw. “Miss Ingrid ?sterdahl.”

Lukas drew in a deep breath, then made a low bow, saying, “I’m very pleased to meet you.” The formality felt awkward and strange.

“Alpha Bakken.” She bent her knee and, because Corbin was standing so close, her body brushed against his as she descended into her curtsy.

When she reached the bottom, Corbin bent his wrist so his fingers could touch the back of her neck, then drift down her spine as she rose to her feet.

Ingrid had no reaction to his gentle touch—no negative one anyway—and when Lukas realized what was going on, his eyes snapped to his secretary. These two knew each other. They liked each other.

Corbin looked like he could spit nails, and they all stood there like that, at the threshold, for several seconds before Corbin’s expression turned from one of restrained hatred to confused annoyance. “Are you going to invite her in?”

“Of course,” Lukas said, realizing his error. “My apologies. Come in.”

He stepped aside to let them pass through the doorway.

Corbin put his hand against Ingrid’s lower back and steered her into the alpha den.

“Sit,” Lukas said. Then he added on impulse, “Both of you.”

Corbin and Ingrid looked up at Lukas in surprise. The three of them might be new to all of this, but everyone knew enough to recognize that Lukas’s invitation was highly irregular. An alpha’s secretary was supposed to escort the females, then leave.

Corbin clenched his jaw. “If you don’t mind, sir , I’d rather not stay.”

“Please,” Lukas said. He gestured toward the couch.

“Is our new alpha into threesomes?” Corbin sneered.

“Don’t be a dick,” Lukas retorted, though he was glad the forced formalities were over.

“Corbin, please,” Ingrid said, and she squeezed his wrist. “Let’s just… sit and… talk .”

At her touch, Corbin visibly relaxed, at least a little, confirming Lukas’s suspicions .

“You two are in love,” he said, getting right to the point before either of them took their seats.

Ingrid sucked in a breath.

“Engaged,” Corbin said. “The wedding is planned for the spring.”

Christ. It was worse than Lukas thought. But if that was the case…what was Ingrid doing here? Corbin was as much an heir as he was. They might have had different mothers, but his gene pool was no less impressive.

That confusion must have been written on Lukas’s face because Corbin answered his unspoken question with a throat so tight his words barely made it through. “Ingrid’s father would like her first born to have a claim on an alpha’s seat.”

Lukas bowed his head in understanding. No wonder Corbin was so pissed—even more so than when they were younger—because Corbin wanted the alpha’s seat not purely to satisfy his own ambition. He wanted it to avoid this exact situation.

“Don’t worry,” Lukas said. “I won’t put either of you through this. We’ll come up with a different plan.”

Lukas assumed they’d both be relieved, but Corbin’s eyes flashed with anger, and Ingrid’s face went pale.

“You can give her an heir, and you will,” Corbin said. “There will be no other plan.”

“You can’t possibly want this,” Lukas said, looking back and forth between their faces. “Miss ?sterdahl, you know this isn’t right.”

“Right now, what Corbin and I want is inconsequential,” she said. “There are more important things to consider.”

Ah. Lukas understood that on a very personal level. When was the last time anyone cared what he wanted out of life?

“Still,” Lukas said. “I won’t?—”

Corbin’s body went tight. “Are you going to send Ingrid home to tell her father the new alpha rejected her?”

Ingrid drew in a deep breath through her nose, then swallowed hard.

“You’d shame her like that?” Corbin pressed, his face going redder.

“You want me to fuck your fiancé?” Lukas shot back, thinking the bluntness of his question might shake some sense into them.

Corbin’s hand shot out and wrapped around Lukas’s throat.

“Corbin, no!” Ingrid cried. “Let him go.”

But Lukas merely smiled as his alpha wolf rose within him, responding to Corbin’s physical challenge. It took a brave, or possibly stupid, beta to launch an attack against an alpha in the alpha’s own den.

Whichever Corbin was—brave or stupid—Lukas didn’t care. He wanted the fight.

With his hockey career over, he hadn’t had a venue to release his pent-up frustration. Now, he needed to feel Corbin’s attack as much as he needed to respond to it.

“I’ve noticed you haven’t answered my question,” Lukas goaded when Corbin’s grip loosened around his throat. “So, I guess you weren’t lying. You do want me to fuck her.”

That did it.

Corbin’s eyes widened, and a wolf’s snarl escaped his lips. He pushed Lukas across the room until his back smacked against the wood-paneled wall.

Lukas grinned, loving every second of it.

“You will not dishonor her,” Corbin warned, and claws protruded from the ends of his fingers, digging into Lukas’s neck.

“You’re making me dishonor her,” Lukas said, trying to ignore, for just a little while longer, the tingle running along his spine.

“You’ve been away from the clan for too long,” Corbin said through clenched teeth, “because it sounds like you’ve forgotten what bought the clans’ peace.”

“Yeah,” Lukas snarked, his grin spreading wider, “this scene is looking real peaceful.”

Corbin must not have liked the sarcasm because it flipped yet another switch. Sharp canines elongated from his mouth, and he dropped to his hands and knees.

Lukas’s wolf rejoiced at the sight. The restraints had been lifted, and his own feral instincts took over.

He fell forward onto all fours, his nerve endings on fire as his joints popped, and his arms and legs extended. Coarse hair pushed through his skin.

The whole metamorphosis was over in seconds, and the two wolves stalked through the debris field of their tattered scraps of clothing, closing the gap between them, circling slowly.

“Corbin,” Ingrid implored. “Don’t do it. He’s your alpha.”

Corbin let out a low growl, then he and Lukas simultaneously reared onto their hind legs. Attack!

Lips curled. Teeth bared and clashing. They tangled their front legs and swiped with their claws.

“Corbin!” Ingrid screamed.

For a second, Lukas thought she might join the fray. She was, after all, a berserker wolf herself. But, as with all creatures, there were aggressors and there were submissives.

She plastered herself against the wall and likely would have run for the exit if there weren’t two large snarling males, wrestling and rolling around on the floor, knocking over furniture and blocking her path.

Lukas’s fur bristled down his back as he pinned Corbin to the floor. Teeth bared, he prepared to sink them into Corbin’s neck—not to kill him. God, no. But Corbin did need to remember his place.

Like it or not, Ingrid was right. He was Corbin’s alpha. And if Lukas declared he would not be getting between a clansman and his promised mate, then the whole fucking clan—and the ?sterdahl clan to boot—better get on board.

Corbin twisted and writhed, but Lukas—especially in his wolf form—was bigger and stronger. There was no way for Corbin to escape.

The door to the den flew open, and a male voice shouted, “Enough!”

Lukas’s head snapped toward the intruder, and he let out a menacing growl when he saw his father storming in, his graying head lowered and his teeth clenched.

The former alpha clutched a few sheets of rolled paper in his hand, like he meant to swat them with it.

“Let him up,” Gray Bakken said.

Lukas let Corbin go and, after a few moments of heavy panting, they both shifted out of their wolves.

Corbin lunged for the cashmere throw that lay draped over the arm of the couch and dutifully tossed it to Lukas—his alpha—so he could cover up. Lukas wrapped the blanket around himself while Corbin continued to stand there naked.

“Corbin,” the old wolf growled. “Ms. ?sterdahl. Leave us.”

Gray Bakken no longer led the clan, but he still commanded respect, and old habits were hard to break. Corbin slid his arm around Ingrid’s back, and they hustled out of the den.

Lukas let out a sigh of relief, feeling as though—at least for now—he’d dodged a bullet when it came to Ingrid, not to mention his future relationship with Corbin.

“Do you think this is funny?” Gray asked with a sneer.

Lukas had no idea what his father was talking about. Yes, he was relieved, but there was nothing funny about his clash with Corbin.

“How long have you known?” Gray asked, and a crooked bulging vein ran down the middle of his forehead.

“Known what?” Lukas asked.

Gray waved the papers he was holding in Lukas’s face, then flung them to the floor, yelling, “Did you know?”

“Know what?! ” Lukas yelled back.

Gray raised his arm and cocked his elbow. What happened next happened so fast, Lukas made no attempt to dodge the blow that shattered his eye socket.