Page 2 of Wild Alpha (Cold-Blooded Alpha #12)

PRESENT…

I nudge the man’s shoulder with my nose.

He doesn’t move.

I do it again.

Backing up, I keep a close eye on him in case he tries to grab me.

Just because I'm a wolf and he’s human doesn't mean he's harmless. Three years have shown me why wolves stick together in packs. To be a lone wolf is to be prey.

I turn away.

Three steps later, I stop.

The man is too close to the creek running through this forest. He could drown in it.

The first time I came here, I saw a man in a dark blue apron standing outside the grocery store in town. I’d hidden in the forest. I didn’t have clothes to shift into my human form and approach him.

His brown eyes sparkled as he loaded boxes of food into the back of a truck, clapped another man on the shoulder, and waved goodbye to the driver of the truck as it pulled away.

Something about that man’s smile made me feel warm when I had gotten used to crawling into bushes and shifting to my wolf form so I wouldn’t freeze to death.

I’d returned to the forest, back to living as a wolf more than as a girl.

Now I’m faced with a decision I have to make. Walk away from this injured man or save him.

If I leave him, he will die.

I’m not the only predator in these woods tonight. I’m not hungry, but others would see him as an easy meal.

I turn around.

He’s still lying face down just inches from the creek that winds through Hardin State Forest, arms spread out. Did he fall? Trip? Was he attacked like in those TV shows I used to watch before I decided that life as a wolf was preferable to life as a human?

As I walk around him, I take a good sniff. He mostly smells like dirt and earth, but I pick up a slight hint of dog that makes my nose scrunch up.

It's only when I’m certain he’s completely unconscious that I reach for my human self and rise to my full height, standing on two legs.

I’m shaky. I’ve been a wolf for…

How long have I been a wolf?

Two or three days?

Longer?

I shake my head. It doesn’t matter.

Bending, I grip the man by his shoulder and turn him.

The breath catches in my throat.

Him .

It’s him.

He’s more attractive up close. A bit older than me—mid to late twenties—with curly dark brown hair, a defined jawline, and tanned skin.

He looks slim under his hiking jacket and T-shirt, but I’ve seen the muscles in his arms flex as he was lifting boxes into the back of that truck. He’s lean, but strong.

But it’s not his body that draws my attention and keeps it there.

The lines around his mouth and the corners of his eyes suggest he smiles a lot, but I already knew that from the first time I saw him outside the grocery store. Curling my fingers, I lower my hand, press my arm against my side, and order myself not to touch.

He is not yours to touch, Averie. Keep your hands to yourself.

The cut on his temple, slowly seeping blood, reveals how he lost consciousness. I don’t know the start of his story, but I know how it ends.

His breathing is steady. He won’t die while I’m here.

Khaki pants, a black rain jacket, and brown boots suggest he was out here for a hike. I've seen others dressed like him pass by so close that they would have run screaming into the forest if they’d known a wolf was hiding just inches away in a bush.

Because he’s a hiker, he must have a bag somewhere.

I go looking for it.

I find it leaning against a tree, two feet away.

If I hadn’t known he was a local from this town, I would have thought he had come to the forest to live for the next five years.

It’s almost as big as I am, but shifters are stronger than they look. I’m just over five feet four, but I barely strain as I lift it onto my back.

He hasn’t moved.

Night is setting in, and as I put down his heaving bag, I take in my surroundings.

Close enough to the creek that animals will pass through this area. Not a good place for an injured human to stay.

I need to move him.

Camping is harder in real life than it looks on TV.

Moving an unconscious human is easy. Doing it alongside the bulging hiking bag is also easy.

I dig through the bag and pull out a small first aid kit packed in a bright red pouch. Inside, I find a Band-Aid to cover his cut, which proves to be the simplest task of all.

Hunting a rabbit for the injured human to eat when he wakes takes minutes and requires hardly any effort. Gathering a pile of sticks to start a fire is child's play.

But starting a fire? The task I thought would take two seconds?

Endless frustration.

My search for matches or a lighter turns up empty in a bag with countless pockets, zippers, and pouches. And somehow, this injured human has managed to pack every single pocket with stuff.

So. Much. Stuff .

And none of it is even the slightest bit interesting.

Shivering in the cold, my wolf fur gone, I turn to glare at him, muttering, “I'll never understand humans.”

But it’s not him I’m mad at. It’s me. For being completely unable to start a simple fire.

Abandoning my plan to set fire to the pile of sticks I collected, I pull out a sleeping bag, shake it open, and set it down on the ground.

After carefully moving the unconscious man onto the sleeping bag, I cover him with a blanket I dig out, and stand over him for a second, chewing my lip and wondering if I should try to wake him.

If he’s hurt in ways I can’t see, he might heal faster—and better—if I let him sleep.

Nodding to myself, pleased I’ve done all I can for him, I back up.

Sinking to my hands and knees, I shift into my wolf form as in the distance, a piercing howl echoes through the air, sharp and clear.

It takes everything I have not to sprint off in the opposite direction from that howl.

Coming to Hardin, Colorado, home of the cold-blooded alpha, was a mistake, but I had nowhere else to go, and the only shifter with a worse reputation than Xavier lives here.

In the two weeks that I’ve been living like a wild wolf in his backyard, he and his pack could have scented me, hunted me, and ripped me apart like the rogue wolf I am for daring to enter his territory.

Don’t I know all about his reputation as a killer?

Haven’t I, like shifters everywhere, learned about how he ripped apart his last alpha with his bare hands, killed women and pups from his own pack, and rules over the rest with an iron fist?

The only reason I’m here is because of that reputation. The safest place for me to hide is in the backyard of a killer even more notorious than Xavier.

By the unlit fire, the injured man stirs, letting out a pained groan.

Something about this man keeps me near him, making it impossible to slip away into the night.

I’ve failed to light a fire. I settle down close beside him, hoping my fur will help keep him warm so he won’t freeze during the night.

With my head resting on my paws and ears tuned in for any sound of predators daring to come closer, I watch over him.

There isn’t much I can do anymore. Protecting an injured human is something I can do. Tonight, he will be safe.

He will live.