Jennifer Ashley - Mate Claimed

Eric watched in pure enjoyment before he fluidly shifted and ran after her.

Graham McNeil watched the humans shrink back in a satisfying way as he walked into the meeting room at the courthouse. They tried not to react to him, pretending they had all the power, but Graham knew he’d rule this room.

The only person who didn’t look intimidated was Eric Warden, the leader of the Vegas Shiftertown. Not leader for long, if Graham had anything to say about it.

The humans didn’t like Graham’s buzz of black hair, the fiery tatts down his arms, and his motorcycle vest. Eric had a tatt as well, jagged lines that started somewhere under his short-sleeved black T-shirt and wove down one arm.

Eric was going to be a problem. He was a strong alpha and had been leader of his Shiftertown for more than twenty years. As soon as Graham walked in, Eric’s jade green gaze fixed on him and stayed there.

The shithead wanted Graham to look away. To acknowledge that Graham was going to be second, maybe way less than that. Pussy.

Graham wasn’t about to look away. Neither was Eric. Graham felt his hackles rise, the wolf in him ready to shift. Eric’s eyes flicked to his cat’s, slitted and very light green.

They’d have stared each other down across the room for hours if a clueless human male, with no idea that a dominance fight was in progress, hadn’t walked between them.

“Mr. McNeil,” the man said. “Sit down, please.”

“Graham’s fine.” He’d rather remain standing, a better position for facing an enemy, but humans had a thing for chairs.

They wanted Graham to sit next to Eric. Idiots. Eric proved he wasn’t stupid by walking to the other end of the table and planting himself in a chair, leaving Graham to sit at the opposite end.

What did the humans expect Graham to do? Shake Eric’s hand, give him a big hug, wait for Eric to say, Welcome to my territory, let’s be friends?

They did, the morons. Amazing.

Graham’s Shiftertown had been tucked inside a mountain range south of Elko, a long way from anywhere, and he and his people had done pretty much what they wanted. A man with a check sheet came around every once in a while to make sure Shifters were behaving themselves and not eating people or whatever they thought Shifters did, and then he’d go.

But then someone in an office way back east, who’d never been to a Shiftertown in his life, had decided that times were tough, budgets had to be cut, and there was no reason to have two Shiftertowns in Nevada. So why not shove all the Shifters into one? The Shifter bureau could keep a better eye on them all that way.

Graham was used to the vast emptiness of rural Nevada, a place where a wolf could shift and run and run, never see a human for months if he didn’t want to. In this effing city, there were humans everywhere. They smelled like shit. Even Eric smelled wrong.

Graham had seen, on his way to the meeting, a sign on the top of a taxi advertising Shifter women dancing nude in clubs just off the Strip. Shifter females, taking off their clothes for human males. And Warden sat back and let it happen. That needed to stop.

He felt Eric’s eyes on him again. Graham returned the look with as much determination. You’re going down.

The trouble was, Graham was getting the same message back from Eric. This was going to be a long, bloody fight. The humans in this room had no idea what they’d started.

Eric took the seat on the opposite end of the table from Graham, not only to keep himself from ripping out Graham’s throat, but also to prevent Graham smelling Iona on him. It had been two days and many scrubbings since Eric had chased Iona in the wild land north of town, but he didn’t need Graham to catch any lingering scent.

Her sexy scent. Eric had dreamed of her for the last two nights, the dreams so vivid that he woke up surprised he was alone in his bed. He woke up hard and sweating, groaning as the sheets brushed his aching cock. He was like a Shifter in mating frenzy, but Eric had conquered that a long time ago, right?

Iona was made for mating frenzy. He thought of her with her long limbs curled around herself as she’d gazed at him in the moonlight outside the cave.

Eric needed to protect her, yes, but he also wanted to go to her, wrap himself around her, declare her his mate, keep her away from all others. A Shifter’s primal need was to hole up with a female for weeks at a time, keeping her safe while they sexed themselves mindless, nature’s way of ensuring that cubs came.

Times were more civilized now. Females could reject the mate-claim, and they all lived in peace and harmony.

Bullshit. Whenever Eric looked at Iona, or scented her, or felt her warmth, civilization went to hell. He wanted Iona, wanted to be naked with her, nothing more.

Those thoughts were dangerous while Graham McNeil watched him from the other end of the table, but he couldn’t stop them coming.

One of the humans cleared his throat, calling the meeting to order.

The humans in the room were nervous. The smell of fear was rank, and Graham didn’t hide his disgust. But at least their fear scent would cover any residual one of Iona’s.

The talk moved instantly to housing, a bone of contention.

“Every effort is being made, Mr. McNeil,” the leader of the bunch said, a shit of a man called Frank Kellerman.

Kellerman was the head of the Shifter liaison committee, and the only one of the humans who wasn’t sweating hard in his suit. The rest eyed Graham in outright fear if they could bring themselves to look at him at all.

Kellerman went on, “The housing being built will equal that which is already in Shiftertown. For now, your families will have to adapt to boarding with others.”

Graham balled his hands on the table. “I’m not putting my wolves in houses with a bunch of fucking Felines or bears. His Shifters can double up. We’ll take the houses they empty.”

“I agree,” Eric said. All gazes shot to him now, including Graham’s. “Shifters have a tough time living with strangers,” Eric went on. “The Elko Shifters should occupy houses together, and our Shifters will move in with their own clan members.”

Kellerman gave Eric his smooth smile. “The point is that the Elko Shifters and the Las Vegas Shifters need to integrate as quickly as possible. Bunking together will induce camaraderie and make the transition painless.”

What an idiot. Eric kept his face straight, but Graham rolled his eyes. When strange Shifters found themselves thrown together in a tight space, the natural instinct was to go into a dominance battle.

Who controlled each house was as important as who controlled Shiftertown. Members of the same clan or same community already knew who was dominant. There would still be conflict, but exponentially less.

Eric said, “You shove us together without letting us get used to each other first, and there’ll be a bloodbath.”

“But you have Collars,” the nervous man who’d called the meeting to order said. “Shifters can no longer fight one another.”

“Then you’ll have a crapload of Collar-shocked Shifters all over the place,” Graham said from his end of the table. “We’ll fight for dominance, Kellerman. It’s instinctive, and it won’t be pretty.”

Eric stared down the table at Graham, willing the guy to shut up. Graham wasn’t used to dealing with humans. Eric had learned to let the humans understand just enough Shifter business to keep them happy, and how much to keep from them.

Graham met Eric’s gaze, but instead of subsiding, he sat up straighter, meeting the challenge. Dumb-ass. Challenging for leadership in this room would only get them both arrested.

“An even better solution,” Eric said, still looking at Graham, “would be to get the houses built before the wolves transfer down.”