Page 17 of Running with the Alpha’s Son (The Alpha’s Son #3)

“What the fudge is that?!” I shriek, dropping the bedsheets and leaping backward.

Right smack bang in the middle of the bed is a scorpion, sitting with its tail raised, its black limbs all sharp and dangerous pressing into the mattress, two orbs on its head looking like demonic eyes.

“What is it?” Jasper says, appearing in the doorway in a tank top and boxers, his toothbrush shoved in his mouth.

I point an accusing finger at the intruder. “How did that get in here?” As if sharing a bed with Jasper for the first time since we officially became a thing wasn’t nerve-racking enough…now we’re contending with venomous critters?

“Oh, that little guy?” Jasper is nowhere near the right level of freaked the frick out.

“Yeah, that treacherous little bed-devil with the poison stinger.”

Jasper shoots me a look before disappearing back into the hall. I listen as he spits and runs the faucet, then he’s back, wiping his mouth with a facecloth. Much to my dismay he moves straight to the bed, reaching out both hands and scooping the scorpion up in them.

“This breed doesn’t have enough poison to do much damage to a werewolf—not with how quickly our healing ability counteracts the venom.”

He heads from the bedroom back to the living room and I follow, terrified he’s about to be stung and fall over dead before we’re one night into our vacation.

“Plus, they react to fear. If you’re stressed they get stressed,” he says, very unstressedly. “Do you mind?” He gestures from me to the door with his head.

“Huh? Oh sure.” I trot to the door, running through it as Jasper passes a little too closely with the scorpion in hand.

Crouching down, he gently shakes the death-bug off his hands and into the soil, then claps his hands together at a job well done.

“See?” he says, turning to grin at me all smuglike. “Nothing to worry about.”

I gulp, because now that the scorpion is dealt with, there’s no escaping that Jasper and I are about to share a bed.

“Ready for sleep?” he asks.

“Uh, yeah.”

I slip into the bathroom on the way back to the bedroom and shut the door behind me. The person staring back at me in the mirror looks different than I remember him. His hair is a little messier, his face a little more defined, his shoulders a little more square. He’s not unattractive, not by a long stretch, but still, his smile is sort of lopsided, his front two teeth are a little too large compared to the rest of his chompers. I run my hands down my chest and onto my stomach. It’s not not flat but it’s not a rock-solid wall of muscle either, like I expect Jasper’s to be. Cringing, even at myself, I lift the bottom of my T-shirt and survey the state of my abdomen.

“You all right?” Jasper calls from the bedroom.

I sigh and drop my shirt. Guess I’ll have to do.

Back in our room, Jasper is sitting up in bed, leaning on the rattan headboard, holding a book. He’s lit by a single dim lamp, which accentuates his sharp jaw, his muscled arms. I gulp, suddenly aware of how incredibly quiet it is out here.

“What are you waiting for?” he asks, and I realize I’m lingering in the doorway like some weirdo.

“What are you reading?” I ask as I move to my side of the bed, lifting the sheets and slipping under.

Jasper glances at the cover of his book. “It’s uh…”

“Is it for school?”

“Actually, no.” Okay, blushing. Why is Jasper being coy about his book? “It’s a romance book. Well, a fantasy actually—a fantasy with romance in it.”

“A romantasy?” I ask.

“Yeah, I guess. But with lots of battles and swords and dragons,” he says, increasingly flummoxed. “It’s pretty lame.” He quickly deposits the book on his nightstand.

“Sounds fun.”

My shoulder blades press against the headboard and we both sit quietly for a minute, like we’re waiting for something to happen, or for the other to make the first move. Should I kiss him? Hold his hand? Ask him about the plot of his novel? The silence is suddenly deafening and I long for the buzz of cicadas, the chirp of crickets, a damn coyote howl, anything to break this awkward silence.

Suddenly we both erupt at the same time:

“We don’t have to—”

“Is it okay if we don’t—”

We turn to face each other, laughing a little at how awkward we’re being. I can’t help but sigh with just a smidge of relief. Jasper runs a hand through his hair. I guess he’s feeling the pressure as well.

“It’s not that I don’t want to…” he begins, struggling with eye contact but forcing himself to meet my gaze. “I do.” He places his hand on mine. “I really do.”

“Same,” I interject swiftly. “I definitely want to.” We both huff a little laugh. “It’s just our first night out here and…”

“Let’s not rush,” he says, lifting his free hand to cup my face. “We have forever.”

His lips find mine and he kisses me slowly, tenderly. “Is this okay?” he asks, pulling back for just a moment.

“Very,” I say, and go back in for more.

We slip down the headboard and roll onto our sides, kissing all the while. His body is super firm under my touch. My hand slips over his waist onto his back, pulling him a little closer. He slips one hand up under my T-shirt, making me gasp gently. My body is telling me not to wait, screw patience, but my mind is telling me this is enough, more than enough. I’m out in the desert, alone with Jasper Apollo, and we’re making out under the covers. Through the ceiling the stars are shining down like the souls of every wolf who’s ever existed. And we’re together, connected like never before. I don’t need anything more––for now, this is absolute freaking bliss.

After a while, Jasper pulls back. His eyes remain closed and his tongue slips along his bottom lip, as if he’s savoring the taste of me.

“I could do that all night,” he says, his eyes fluttering open ever so slightly.

“Me too.”

“ Buuuut we should get some sleep.”

“Yeah.”

“Big day tomorrow.”

“Is it?” I ask. I didn’t know we had plans beyond more of this.

“Mm-hmm,” he purrs. “Tomorrow we run.”

I don’t know what Jasper means but before I have time to ask he’s kissing me again, his thumb playing with my earlobe, his feet tangled up in mine.

“Good night, Max,” he says, pulling back with a sharp inhale.

“Good night.”

He wipes the hair from my brow as if he needs a clearer view to study my face, then he kisses my forehead. I spin around so that his arm is draped around me, pulling my back against his chest, and drift off almost immediately.

Rested is an understatement. I wake up the next morning feeling fresher than a newly sprouted spring flower. Sure, it takes a moment or two for me to open my eyes—the bed covers, pillows, and mattress are so soft and warm, and they envelop me in such an amazing way I could probably lie here forever—but eventually the smell of brewing coffee rouses me. I sit up, stretching my arms over my head and yawning. Jasper’s side of the bed is empty but an indentation in the pillow sits where his head would have rested last night, and the sheets are still warm.

Content and reaching an acceptable level of alertness, I fling back the covers and swing my feet over the edge of the bed, glancing back one more time at the ruffled sheets. I can’t believe we get to stay here. I can’t believe I got to sleep in Jasper’s arms, and I can’t wait to do it again. For now though I want to know where he is, so I stand and move lazily through the house.

Jasper is in the kitchen, wearing only his boxers—to be fair it is warm already—poking at a frying pan with a spatula. He’s so busy cooking, grabbing a pinch of salt, adding what look like chili flakes and scallions to the pan, and continuing to stir its contents, that he doesn’t notice me in the doorway. I lean on the doorframe and watch him for a moment. He moves from the pan to one of those hourglass-shaped glass pour-over coffee contraptions and tips some of the freshly brewed brown liquid into a stout ceramic mug, adding a dash of cream and sipping slowly. The toaster pops and he snatches out the piping-hot slices of thick, crusty bread, tossing them from hand to hand in the most adorable way, and goes about buttering them. The muscles in his back pop and move with each swipe of the butter knife.

As he turns back to the pan he must catch sight of me in his periphery, because without looking over he grins and says, “Enjoying yourself?”

“Just appreciating the view,” I say with a laugh and move from my spot in the doorway, crossing the living room to join him in the kitchen. “This smells amazing.”

“Hungry?”

My stomach rumbles on cue. “Totally.”

“Help yourself to coffee,” he says, switching off the gas burner and arranging the toast and what I can now see are the most perfectly fluffy, yellow scrambled eggs on two plates. Lastly, he grabs a large, deep-green avocado from a well-stocked fruit bowl and slices it in half.

“When did all this food get here?” I ask, pouring myself a mug of coffee.

“This morning. We had it delivered. You slept through the whole thing.”

“I was wiped.” The scent of the coffee wafts into my nose and I take a long, deep whiff. “Heaven.”

“What was that?” Jasper asks, spinning with two stacked plates of breakfast in his hands.

“Oh.” I blush. “Nothing.”

We head to the table outside, because as if we’re about to eat indoors when the weather is this nice. The sun is already hot and bright, and in the shade of the veranda the air is the perfect temperature. Jasper places my plate in front of me and sets his own down at the spot next to me.

“Nearly forgot,” he says, dashing back inside and swiftly reappearing with a bottle of hot sauce. “This stuff will blow your socks off.”

“If only I was wearing socks.”

He hands me the bottle and our fingers graze each other’s, sending sparks of electricity through me.

“Maybe it’ll blow something else off,” he says, making me nearly choke before I’ve even touched my food.

Jasper seems unfazed as he sits and goes about carving the flesh of his avocado half and mushing it into a cream on his toast. I do the same, although nowhere near as coolly.

Delightedly, I shovel the first fork of eggs and avocado toast into my mouth. “Thanks for cooking,” I say with my mouth full.

“No problem. I take it you slept well?”

“Like a baby.”

Jasper smiles and eats and I can’t help thinking something seems sort of different about him. His movements are more fluid, his posture looser, his rigidity gone, his hair more unkempt. He chews his food slowly, relishing each bite, as he stares out at the desert with big, open eyes. He seems…relaxed. And it occurs to me how strange it is that I’ve never seen him properly relaxed before.

“No wonder,” he says, then takes a large inhale. “It’s the air out here. It’s just different.”

So are you .

Beyond the shade of the patio sits the pool, looking perfectly blue and stupidly refreshing against the dusty-yellow backdrop. It’s the first time I’ve taken in the view in the daylight and it’s even more stunning. The pale, sandy-colored earth is dotted with green tufts of desert grass, spiky cacti rise like lizards leaning into the sun, and in the distance sit these amazing stone structures, like pebbles made smooth by rushing water—only on a much larger scale and in the most arid of climates. Farther off mountains, mauve-colored in the haze, line the horizon, and all of this rests beneath a vast, cloudless sky.

“I could stare at this forever,” I say, suddenly itching to grab my sketchbook and document this ridiculous landscape.

“Just wait,” Jasper says, “it only gets better.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, after breakfast we’ll go explore. How is it?”

“I don’t know what you put in these eggs but they taste like crack,” I joke. “Honestly so good.”

“It’s cheddar,” Jasper says. “You grate it in before you whisk the eggs, makes them extra flavorful. My mom taught me that.”

“Delicious.”

After breakfast, we wash our dishes and I’m about to grab my sketchbook when Jasper moves to the back door. “Ready to explore?” he asks, a devilish glint in his eye.

Why do I somehow think he’s got more than exploring on his mind?

“Do we need to plan a little before we go hiking?”

“We’re not going hiking,” he says, raising a brow like he’s challenging me

“Then what are we—”

Before I finish he’s slipped out the door. What is he up to?

“Jasper?” I ask, following him outside.

He steps from the tiled patio onto the dusty ground. The sun hits his tanned shoulders, making them shimmer like gold. He glances over a shoulder and eyes me eyeing him.

“Time to run,” he says.

I step forward, unsure and completely confused. “It’s kind of hot for running, isn’t it? And you’re not wearing shoes.”

“We don’t need shoes.”

He’s sort of scaring me, the way he’s talking in riddles, his voice eerily calm, like he’s in some sort of trance. I move to the edge of the patio area and Jasper walks farther toward the open expanse of desert.

“Come on,” he says, then to my complete dismay he drops his boxers.

I try not to but can’t help staring at his pert ass, enjoying the way the sun hits the curve of his hip, the muscles as they move. Surely he’s not about to go running naked into the desert. Maybe that scorpion did sting him and he’s having some sort of poison-induced psychosis. Maybe the heat is melting his brain.

“What are you doing?”

He turns back one last time, grinning from ear to ear.

“Time to let the animals out.”

With that his whole body convulses, his shoulder blades poke agonizingly toward the sky, nearly tearing through his skin. Fur sprouts at his feet and rises up his legs until it’s growing all over his body. His hands crunch and curl in on themselves as razor-sharp claws push from his nail beds. Jasper drops to all fours as his wolf emerges. Onyx-black fur covers his body, his limbs crack and twist as they reconfigure within his muscles. His face is the last to change, his nose lengthening into a muzzle, his teeth dropping and sharpening into dangerous fangs. His eyes remain as emerald green and piercing as ever. Finally, when the transformation is complete, Jasper—or Jasper’s wolf self—stands before me, majestic and so at home in the wild countryside.

He snaps his jaws at me, twisting his head as if encouraging me to do the same, to shift into my wolf form and join him.

But I haven’t let my wolf out since the blood moon, since I shifted involuntarily and almost maimed a bunch of my friends and Rocky Pack wolves. I’ve been worried about what would happen—that like the last time, I wouldn’t be able to control myself, that my new wolf powers might be amplified to the point I can no longer stand it.

And yet my skin is tingling, my fingers twitching. Clearly, my wolf wants to burst out, to be free, to run wild and carelessly with his mate.

Jasper growls and lifts his muzzle toward the desert.

I pull my T-shirt over my head and step forward into the sand.