: Aimee Harding
: Mounted by the Alpha I Refused at the Altar A Runaway Mate Enemies to Lovers Possessive Alpha Werewolf Romance Novel
: Publishdrive
: 9798905166358
: 1
: CHF 3.10
:
: Fantasy
: English
: 200
: DRM
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB

Three years ago, I refused my fated alpha at the altar.


In front of two packs, allied alphas, and every wolf who expected me to become the perfect Luna, I looked at Murdoch MacLeod and said no.


Then I ran.


Norway gave me distance. Silence. A camera in my hands and a life that belonged only to me. But it never broke the bond. Every moon still pulled at my bones. Every lonely night still reminded my wolf that somewhere in the Scottish Highlands, my mate was alive, powerful, furious… and not mine.


Then my father calls.


My birth pack is under attack. Wolves are bleeding. Someone is coordinating rogue strikes against omega bloodlines, and my lunar gift may be the only way to track them.


Murdoch will help.


On one condition.


I have to come back.


Back to his territory. Back to his fortress. Back to the alpha I humiliated, the mate I abandoned, and the bond that still burns like a brand beneath my skin.


Murdoch MacLeod is not the man I left behind.


He is colder now. Harder. More dangerous. The warm alpha who once looked at me like I was his future has become a king with winter in his eyes and pain sharpened into command.


He says I will stay in his quarters because I am under his protection.


He says I will obey pack law while I am in his territory.


He says I do not get to run this time.


But I did not refuse him because I did not want him.


I refused because I was terrified that becoming his mate would mean losing myself.


Now every touch reminds me what I ran from. Every command makes my wolf tremble. Every moonlit night in his territory drags us closer to the bond we never completed.


And while rogues circle the borders and betrayal spreads inside the pack, one truth becomes impossible to deny:


Murdoch was never my cage.


He may be the only alpha strong enough to let me be wild— and still call me his.

CHAPTER 2: THE ALPHA'S RECKONING


The alert came through Murdoch's radio while he was reviewing territorial defense maps with Tavish, his beta and the only wolf in Highland Ridge who'd dare to comment on the tension radiating off his alpha like heat from a forge.

"Alpha, Kamari Omondi just crossed the boundary."

The coffee mug shattered in Murdoch's hand before he registered the pressure of his grip. Hot liquid and ceramic shards scattered across the map table. Blood welled from a gash in his palm, but he barely felt it. Every nerve ending in his body had gone incandescent with a different kind of pain—the bond, dormant for three years, roaring to life like a sleeping dragon waking.

His wolf surged against his skin. The shift clawed at him with an urgency he hadn't experienced since he was a teenager learning control. Eyes flashing silver, canines elongating, the overwhelming imperative to run to her, find her, claim—

"Murdoch." Tavish's hand landed on his shoulder, grounding."Breathe."

He couldn't breathe. She was here. After three years of silence and distance and the constant low-grade agony of an incomplete bond, Kamari was on his territory. His wolf could feel her like a beacon, the omega signature calling to every possessive instinct bred into alpha bones.

Mine, his wolf howled. Ours. Go to her NOW.

"Give me a minute." Murdoch's voice came out strangled. He gripped the table edge, using pain to focus through the haze of need. The wood splintered under his fingers."Just... give me a minute."

Tavish withdrew tactfully, but Murdoch felt his beta's concern through their pack bond. Everyone in Highland Ridge had learned to tread carefully around their alpha's temper these past three years. The rejection had done something to Murdoch, carved out pieces of him that hadn't quite grown back right. Made him harder, quicker to dominance displays, less tolerant of challenges.

He'd become what he'd needed to be to survive having his mate walk away in front of the entire supernatural community. But it had cost him softness, cost him the easy confidence he'd once carried. Now he ruled through controlled intimidation rather than natural charisma.

And she'd done that to him. Sweet, fierce Kamari with her dark eyes and fierce independence and the way she'd looked at him sometimes like he was her whole world—right up until the moment she'd shattered his world instead.

Murdoch cleaned the blood from his hand with mechanical precision, his wolf pacing beneath his skin. She came back. The thought repeated like a mantra. She actually came back.

But immediately followed by the bitter truth: She didn't come back for you. They forced her.

Her father had negotiated terms with Tavish because Murdoch couldn't bear to hear Kofi Omondi's voice without wanting to rip something apart. Crescent Valley needed Highland Ridge's protection. Highland Ridge demanded Kamari's presence as the price. A simple transaction, nothing to do with the bond howling between them.

She would have stayed gone forever if she'd had the choice.

The realization steadied him. Anger was easier than hope. Rage was more useful than the pathetic desperate longing he'd been carrying like a wound that wouldn't heal. If she wanted to come back to his territory under sufferance, then fine. He'd make sure she understood exactly what she'd walked away from.

"Tell the gate to expect her," Murdoch said, voice returning to the flat command that made his pack jump to obey."I'll meet her at the entrance."

Tavish hesitated."Maybe I should—"

"No. This is between her and me."

He walked through the fortress with measured steps, each one a choice not to run. Pack members sensed his mood and cleared his path, conversations dying as he passed. By the time he reached the main entrance, his expression was locked down, his wolf caged behind iron control.

But inside, everything was chaos.

The bond pulled tight as a bowstring, singing with proximity. He could feel her approach like pressure against his sternum, could track her progress through the gate and up the drive by the way his entire body oriented toward her like a compass finding north. Three years. Three years of silence and then suddenly she was here, real, close enough to scent on the evening breeze.

Vanilla. Moonlight. His mate.

Murdoch positioned himself at the entrance and waited, stillness absolute. An alpha's dominance display—make t