Animal Behavior

  Animal Behavior

  Gabrielle Holly

  Book 1 in the Wolf’s Mark series.

  Alex and Gwen are both desperate for change. They find it in an unexpected place.

  When shy veterinarian Alex turns to dark magic to cure his awkwardness around women, a botched spell transforms him into a werewolf. By day he’s the star of TV’s Dog Talker and uses his powers to communicate with pets. Under the full moon, he becomes a man-beast driven by his unquenchable need for sex.

  Gwen is running from a string of bad relationships and a failed business venture when an unexpected inheritance brings her to the tiny northern Minnesota town of Talbot. She’ll soon learn that her grandfather left her much more than just his home.

  As Alex struggles to keep his insatiable libido under control, Gwen stumbles into his life and complicates everything. Until she understands the werewolf pack—and her unique role in it—Alex must be on his best animal behavior.

  A Romantica® paranormal erotic romance from Ellora’s Cave

  Animal Behavior

  Gabrielle Holly

  Chapter One

  Present

  Since his change, Alex’s senses had become incredibly acute. Over the past few years, he’d learned that his supernatural powers waxed and waned with the lunar cycle. At their strongest, they seemed like more of a nuisance than an advantage.

  It was almost moon week, and even with the convertible top down Alex could smell sex on the woman in the passenger seat. Their two scents mingled together usually turned him on, but today it just pissed him off. It was a reminder of what he’d become—of what he’d chosen to become. Most days he felt as if he’d hit the lottery—anything he wanted was his for the taking. But every once in a while, the last stubborn bits of Old Alex struggled to the surface to remind him of what he’d left behind when he’d escaped his life of mediocrity.

  New-and-improved Alex glanced at himself in the rearview mirror. The hazel eyes were the same, but almost everything else about him—inside and out—had changed. Sometimes he missed the shy, nerdy, slightly awkward guy he’d been and the small circle of friends who had adored him in spite of it. Now it seemed the only ones who gave a damn about Alex didn’t really know him at all.

  To the fans he was the handsome, confident television star. To the network executives he was just a source of revenue. It was unlikely that any of them would have given Old Alex the time of day—and he wasn’t sure he could blame them. He spent a good portion of his obscene salary trying to bury that guy under fast cars and sex. Why wouldn’t that part of him just die and let him enjoy himself already?

  Alex swiped the beads of sweat from his forehead, and adjusted his sunglasses. Even the perfect California weather annoyed him today and he couldn’t wait to get back to Minnesota. Up north, the leaves would be changing and the nights would be crisp. They still had to film the last Dog Talker episode for the season, do a little post-production work, then he could head home and take a break.

  He gunned the engine and swooped around the show’s tour bus, ignoring the frantic honks from the vehicles around him. From the corner of his eye, he could see Charlene swivel in the passenger seat and look over her shoulder. Her fear seeped from her pores and the chemical signals filled his nose. It agitated him even more and he was beginning to wonder if their arrangement was worth the trouble.

  Three months ago, it had seemed kind of perfect. He needed someone to fuck on a regular basis and she was more than willing. They’d even made the whole thing legit by filing a “consensual relationship agreement” with Human Resources and having the network lawyer draw up a litigation-proof contract. Alex got an almost-daily fix and a marginally efficient production assistant in the deal.

  The physical attraction between Alex and Charlene was undeniable. She’d assured him from the start that she was only interested in a fuck buddy, no strings attached. Alex had believed her, but knew that sometimes sex could turn into something more.

  When he’d suggested a legal contract she’d agreed without hesitation. Either one of them could sever their business or personal relationships without repercussions. Charlene’s employment with the network would be based solely on her job performance and her arrangement with Alex would be based on mutual desire. The guys on the crew all drooled over Charlene. They made horny comments to each other about her enormous fake tits, tight round ass and all around “rockin’ bod” . Alex didn’t give a shit about any of that. He just needed a willing receptacle to keep him out of trouble.

  Just before leaving for the shoot, they’d had a quickie in the editing bay. The bleached blonde had been wagging her ass at him all morning and he was happy to oblige. They kicked the editor out of the dim little room and pulled down the shade on the door. She tried to kiss him—she always did—but Alex wasn’t interested in her mouth.

  His cock had been rock-hard by the time he lifted her onto the console—pushing coffee cups and empty chip bags aside to make space. He shoved his hand up under Charlene’s short skirt, tugged aside her thong and fingered her shaved pussy. She was ready for him. She was always ready for him. He unzipped his jeans and rammed into her so hard that she cried out in shock.

  Alex liked to fuck her from behind and when she had tried to kiss him again, he’d pulled out, yanked her to her feet, spun her around and pushed her, chest down, onto the laminate worktop. Digging his fingers into her hips, he thrust into her. The editing bay echoed with the sound of his body slamming into hers and the slurping of her dripping sex. She reached back and grabbed the edge of the counter to keep from being pushed into the blinking stacks of video-editing equipment.

  He was merciless, pounding into her fast and hard. The cadence of her breathing had quickened and he’d felt her climax building. Not that it mattered if she came or not. This arrangement was all about what he needed.

  The walls of her pussy clamped down around him in crazy spasms. He loved the way her hot flesh squeezed his rod. When she cried out, he was sure the crew could hear her. He didn’t care. By then his own orgasm was building and he’d shut out everything around him. His balls tightened and he slammed into her hard, filling her with his cum.

  Alex draped himself over her back and used her body to support him while his breathing returned to normal. When he regained his senses, he withdrew from her, pulled a handful of tissues from the box by her head and wiped off his still-throbbing cock.

  The high hadn’t lasted long. It never did. The all-too-familiar shame started gnawing at him immediately. He knew that wouldn’t last long either. Soon his need would build again and the whole, endless cycle would start all over.

  Charlene stood and yanked down her skirt and he’d held out the tissue box. “We should get going. We’ve got a shoot,” he’d muttered.

  He left without looking her in the eye and headed to the john.

  An intern had been coming out of the men’s room just as Alex walked in. The kid gave him a knowing nod and held up his hand for a high-five. Alex had left him hanging, too agitated to celebrate his “score”.

  Alex was convinced that this mindless fucking was a necessity, but it was getting old. He’d entered into this supernatural adventure with naïve good intentions. All he wanted was to gain enough confidence to talk to women and eventually find a partner. Instead, he’d wound up with a raging libido that kept him constantly on the prowl.

  The urges gnawed at him endlessly and grew only stronger as the great orb waxed. Like a man trekking across the desert, Alex tried to satisfy himself at every oasis. He knew he had to get what he could now. During moon week, when his urges were at their worst, he just couldn’t risk it.

  From the beginning he’d been warned about that time in the lunar cycle. His strength would be at its p
eak but his self-control would be unmanageable, at least for the first few years. It had been nearly three years since his change and he still hadn’t gotten a handle on the impulses that consumed him nearly every waking moment.

  Admittedly, Charlene had helped slake his needs, but he was never satisfied. He’d definitely gotten more than he’d bargained for when he’d gone seeking a cure for his lack of confidence. Now he wondered if the cure for shyness was worse than the affliction. Hell, the cure had become the affliction. There was no going back now, not that he was sure he wanted to.

  Someday he would be able to master his sexual drive. In the meantime, he’d have to concentrate on the positives. He’d become strong and imposing. His career had catapulted to heights he couldn’t have even imagined before, and he had more money than he could spend. And the way women looked at him now was a rush. Only part of the attraction was his physical appearance.

  He knew he was exuding something they couldn’t even perceive. The pheromones rolled off him in waves that caused women to stop what they were doing and look up when he walked by. Even though he was sure humans couldn’t actually smell the sex chemicals, their influence was undeniable. It was a primal signal that couldn’t be ignored.

  Alex could have had a different woman every night, but the risks were too great. There was no way of knowing when a one-night stand might turn out to be a psycho stalker. And the human part of him had no desire to leave a trail of broken hearts in his wake. Charlene was an indispensable tool for keeping him out of trouble, even if she didn’t fully understand her role.

  Alex fucked her nearly every day, but he knew he wasn’t the only one. He could smell other men on her from across the room. She tried to mask it with soap and water, and he supposed she wasn’t even aware that she reeked of sex. It didn’t matter. Their agreement said nothing about exclusivity.

  If he’d had romantic feelings for Charlene, the thought of her mating with another would have driven him crazy, but he didn’t. She could screw every guy in Los Angeles for all he cared. It wasn’t as if he was going to catch anything. He couldn’t get sick, and if he smelled disease on her—as he could on others—he would have sent her to the doctor and kept his distance until she was fixed up.

  After their encounter in the editing bay, Alex had stood at the men’s room sink and washed her sticky juices from his hands, straightened his clothes and splashed water on his face. That would hold him for a while. When he’d looked at himself in the men’s room mirror, his stomach contracted with the phantom hint of remorse.

  An hour later, he glanced at his image in the convertible’s rearview and had the same gut-wrenching reaction. I am such an asshole. The thought was a vestige of his former self—the one who would have felt guilty for using another human being the way he was using his assistant. But that was before. He wasn’t the same man he’d been three years ago. The reflection smirked. You’re not a man at all.

  * * * * *

  Gwen Chaney wound her way through the stacks of boxes, searching for the packing tape. She found it in the dog bed—along with two tennis balls, a kitchen towel and the red lace bra she’d been searching for all morning. Gwen lifted the golden retriever’s paw and gathered up the stash. “Seriously, Jez? You’ve got a hoarding problem. At least you’re not a chewer.” The dog thumped its tail.

  Jezebel was built like a barrel with legs. Gwen had had high hopes for turning her companion into a lean, mean, Frisbee-catching machine, but after two years in L.A., the dog still waddled when she walked and wouldn’t run after a flying disk if her life depended on it—unless, of course, it were made of bacon.

  Gwen’s plan to reinvent herself had fared about as well. Her skin was still as pale as the day she’d left the Great White North and her figure would always be Rubenesque. She loved her curves, but she wouldn’t be roller skating down the Venice Beach boardwalk in a crop top and short-shorts any time soon.

  In all respects, their West Coast adventure had been a complete bust. Gwen had dreamed up a picture-perfect new life under the California sun. As soon as her online store had started to show a positive cash flow, she’d decided to load up her rusty Jeep, chuck the cold Minnesota winters and head to the coast. She’d found a small apartment within walking distance to the beach, set up an internet connection and gotten back to hawking her wares in cyberspace.

  By this time she should have been able to move into a bigger place, get a better car and have a steady boyfriend. None of those things had happened. Gwen had never had a head for finances and she hadn’t taken into account the increased cost of living. As she’d watched her bank balance dwindle, she’d had to admit to herself that selling her upcycled, shabby-chic furnishings on the web just didn’t have enough of a profit margin out here.

  Back home, she could buy an end table for a couple of bucks at a yard sale, strip it down, fix it up with some decorative paint and turn it around for a little cash. But in paradise everything cost twice as much—the garage-sale prices, the gas to prospect for hidden treasures and the supplies she needed to make them magical. Her tiny third-floor walk-up was not ideal for storing and working on inventory, but it was all she could afford.

  Shutting down her virtual storefront had been bittersweet, but the timing was right. Gwen was somehow relieved that she’d refurbished her last diamond in the rough—at least for the foreseeable future. Lugging her final piece—a solid-oak nightstand—up two flights had earned her a wrenched back and by the time she’d finished giving it a faux-distressed crackle coat, she’d been choking on paint fumes. The piece had sold fairly quickly, but with hardly enough profit to keep the lights turned on. Just the morning before she’d lugged it back down to her car, driven to the shipping station and sent it off to—ironically—Minnesota.

  Gwen unspooled a length of clear tape and secured the flaps of the last cardboard box. She wrote Kitchen on the side in permanent marker and tossed the tape and pen into her purse. “Well, that about does it, Jez. Wanna go for a ride? A really, really long ride?”

  Jezebel thumped her tail then struggled to her feet with a groan. Gwen rummaged through her purse for her keys and her fingers touched the edge of a padded envelope. She pulled it out and read the return address for the hundredth time—”Jacobs, Jeffers and Callahan, Attorneys at Law”. She pinched the envelope to make sure the keys were still inside, and shoved it back in her purse.

  It had been six months since her grandfather died. With no other living relatives, the ironclad will had been uncontested but it had still taken a while for the executors to transfer the property to her. She’d been left the house and outbuildings on twenty-seven acres, an old pickup truck and enough cash to start over.

  Her grandfather hadn’t been a rich man but what he’d bequeathed to her would change her life. Starting over—again—sounded pretty damn good right now, even if it was back in the Land of Lakes. Her new home was far north of the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. In fact, it was less than a half-day’s drive to the Canadian border. It was quiet all summer and buried under feet of snow in the winter, but Gwen thought that was exactly what she needed at this point in her life.

  Maybe someday she’d sell the property, but for now she would use the time and the solitude to figure out her next move. Hopefully this new chapter of her life would read a little better than the last.

  She’d thought by now she would have settled down—at least have a steady boyfriend. Turns out, Gwen’s instincts about men were about as deficient as her money management skills. She had gone out with only three guys in the past two years. The first was a one dater, after she found out he was married with kids.

  The second guy, Jack—an electrician she met when he’d come to fix the light over the kitchen sink—lasted two weeks and twelve orgasms. Since him, she’d gotten wet every time she saw a tool belt. The handyman had been great in bed, but was not the brightest bulb in the chandelier. He could barely carry on an intelligent conversation and she’d finally called it quits when she’d
had to explain to him that Minnesota was not covered with snow year ‘round and was in fact part of the United States—not Canada.

  The third romance had lasted a couple of months. Jeremy was a barista at the coffee shop down the block. She’d been attracted by his hippie vibe, long ponytail and big blue eyes. He turned out to be egomaniacal narcissist and a lousy lay. She’d kept him around for sheer companionship—simply to avoid being alone. Their breakup had been ugly, but the worst of it was that he made the best mocha latte in town and now she had to walk four blocks to get a caffeine fix.

  “Well, good riddance—huh, Jez? Maybe we’ll open our own coffee shop up north. Wouldn’t that be cool?” Jezebel didn’t give any indication whether she thought the new business plan was viable or not. “How about a bacon shop?” At the sound of her favorite word, the dog began to wiggle madly, her tail playing a bongo beat against a box marked “Winter”.

  Gwen laughed and pulled a bag of bacon-flavored treats from the canvas tote that held the doggie travel items. She flipped one across the room and Jezebel snapped it easily out of the air. “Oh sure, that you can catch!”

  The “Winter” box had remained sealed since she’d left Minnesota. There hadn’t been any need for cold-weather gear in California and her designer coat and boots only reminded her of her penchant for extravagant spending. Gwen had always had champagne tastes and a beer budget. That personality quirk was just as responsible for her dismal financial predicament as anything else. As she lifted the box of overpriced goodies, she made a silent promise to herself that she would be careful with her inheritance.

  Jezebel followed Gwen down the stairs, and wriggled up into the Jeep. She flopped on the backseat and lounged while her mistress made several more trips up and down. Gwen packed the last box into the back of the car, dropped her apartment key into the caretaker’s mail slot, slid behind the wheel and took a long swig from her water bottle.