“For God’s sake, will you just let it go!”

“You can’t tell me he satisfies you, Jaime. A human can’t give you what you need.”

“He satisfies me just fine. Not that it’s any of your business!” Suddenly everything seemed deadly quiet.

Again, those words did something to him and his wolf. Dante stepped closer and arched a brow. “What was that?” His tone dared her to repeat it.

She should have felt claustrophobic having his big build towering over her, but it strangely sent her horniness level rocketing, which made her even more pissed off. “It’s. None. Of. Your. Business.”

That was when Dante lost all control.

Jaime gasped as strong hands threaded through her hair and a demanding mouth was suddenly taking hers. Dante ate at it, possessed it, and devastated it. She groaned into his mouth, and he swallowed it before releasing a groan of his own. The kiss quickly became so hungry and carnal it was animalistic: lips smacking, tongues twining, teeth biting.

She grunted as suddenly her back met the SUV. Then her hands were being held above her head by one of his, and she struggled against his strong, possessive grip. He growled warningly into her mouth and dug his h*ps into hers, pinning her lower body still. She got the message; he’d let her go when he was ready, not before.

Inserting his thigh between her legs, Dante used his free hand to cup her ass—and what a luscious ass it was—and make her ride his thigh, grinding her cl*t against it. Moaning into his mouth, she didn’t fight him as he rocked her hips. He loved how responsive she was, how he was controlling every single movement she made. A growl of masculine satisfaction rumbled out of him and into that plush mouth.

He’d wanted this mouth, been obsessed with it, since the second she appeared on pack territory a few months ago. He’d wanted to taste it and bite it and leave prints from his teeth on it.

Right now, what he most wanted was to leave a print of himself on Jaime; he wanted to be the one she thought of when she needed to come. If lust hadn’t been blurring his thoughts, he might have questioned his motivation. But this second, he was preoccupied by the need to feel, hear, and watch her come.

Any other time Jaime might have been happy to let him overwhelm her mouth and body like she’d always wanted him to…but it was all wrong. There was anger in the way he was kissing her and touching her. He was punishing her for what she’d said, for daring to defy him.

Her wolf, too, could sense his anger and suddenly saw him as a threat. She charged at her confines, battling to surface. But the effort to fight was as hopeless for her wolf as it was for Jaime.

While raw, primal lust was crushing her defenses, Jaime could do no more than feel as he completely took her over. She sucked his tongue into her mouth, and a growl of approval rumbled its way up his chest, making her already-beaded ni**les tighten even more. The friction to her cl*t was driving her insane, keeping her cl**ax just out of reach.

In an urgent movement, Dante tore open the buttons of her jeans, and his hand dove inside her panties, cupping her. He growled at how wet she was, at how wet she was for him. Without any preamble, he sank two fingers inside her. So tight and hot. With every hard thrust, he sought out her sweet spot, making her squirm and buck, determined to show her just what she was missing by settling for a human. Determined to show her that Pretty Boy could never give her what she needed.

Determined to make her come harder than Pretty Boy ever had.

His wolf was urging him on, wanting more, wanting something that Dante might have ignored if feverish need and bubbling anger weren’t driving him. So when he sensed her orgasm was close, he tore his mouth from hers and ordered, “Come for me, Jaime. Right on my fingers.” Then he licked the crook of her neck and bit down hard. Satisfaction filled both him and his wolf as her pu**y clamped and rippled around his fingers and she came with a loud, husky cry.

It took at least ten seconds for Jaime to collect her thoughts. When she did, rage like she’d never before experienced shot through her. She’d just had one of the best orgasms of her life from a guy who didn’t even want her—the bastard had not only used her lust for him against her to punish her for rebelling, he’d done something worse.

He f**king bit me!

Dante forced himself to withdraw his fingers, but he couldn’t quite move away from her, couldn’t quite remember why he shouldn’t be doing this. He was thinking of dropping to his knees and tasting her when he suddenly found himself flat on his back on the ground and the breath gushed out of him. More shocking than that, a loud growl was coming from the female who was sneering down at him, her eyes flashing wolf. Even more shocking, dominant vibes were coming off her in waves, smothering him. What. The. Fuck?

“You marked me, you son of a bitch! Maybe you didn’t hear me before, Popeye, but I’m none of your goddamn business! Being my Beta doesn’t give you the right to mark me! I could have been your business, could have been yours to mark, but you don’t want me! Well someone else does, and if I want to f**k him, I goddamn motherfucking will!” With that, she got into her car and slammed the door shut on a gaping Dante. Jerk.

CHAPTER FOUR

During the baby shower, Dante observed Jaime through narrowed eyes. All night he had thought about the way she had yelled at him in the parking lot, the way her eyes had flashed wolf, and the way she’d managed to put him on his ass. Now sure, submissive wolves experienced anger just like everyone else; they had tantrums and brawls, they slammed doors, and they could do some seriously good combat moves. But they did not stare a pissed dominant wolf in the eye. They did not feel challenged by a dominant wolf’s anger or behavior. What they definitely, definitely, definitely didn’t do was release dominant vibes.

So he could form only one logical conclusion: Jaime wasn’t a submissive wolf at all, she was a dominant. And a very strong one at that. He wasn’t just a dominant wolf. He was her Beta. And yet Jaime had borne the weight of that and disabled him.

There was really no other explanation. But what he couldn’t understand was why she was hiding the truth. If it had been anyone else, Dante would probably have solved the puzzle by now, but his intuition gave him no help where Jaime was concerned. Maybe her magnetic scent messed with his mental processes, or maybe his need to be inside her was too great for him to pick up much else.

He didn’t know, in which case he was highly frustrated with this female for whom he had a lot of questions. At the same time, he was feeling rather smug. He’d been right; there was much more to Jaime Farrow than she let anyone see. He would soon find out what exactly “much more” was.

Also irking him was that Jaime was pretty much ignoring his existence. She had to know that he was now more than suspicious of her, and yet she didn’t appear to be the slightest bit nervous. Nor was she showing any signs that their little encounter last night had affected her. No, she was standing by the table with Dominic, laughing about God-knows-what. The clown was basking in the attention, though, surprisingly, he wasn’t being flirtatious today, as if he suspected that Dante wouldn’t handle it well right now.

Dominic would be right to think that. Dante could acknowledge—begrudgingly—that this was all about more than just an ego blow. But he’d already known that, hadn’t he? The truth was that he had never wanted a woman as much as he wanted Jaime Farrow. He wanted to watch her come again, wanted to know what it felt like to be inside her, wanted to see this rebellious female submit to him.

But he couldn’t have any of those things. Even if she wasn’t off limits as part of his pack, he would have been sure to steer clear of her. His past had taught him that getting involved with a female he craved that strongly could only bring trouble. Of course none of these facts helped the situation, because forbidden fruit was so much more tempting.

As his gaze again roamed over her body, Dante’s c*ck twitched. He couldn’t help remembering how well they fit; she was almost as tall as he was, which meant that her body was aligned nicely with his, chest to chest, h*ps to hips. He remembered how hot and wet she had felt around his fingers. And when she’d come apart all over his hand…Fuck.

He still couldn’t believe that he’d marked her. His wolf had been enraged at the time, knowing she was going off to meet another male, and had had a primal urge to bite her, to place his mark on her to warn off the other male. Never before had Dante lost his self-control like that. The female was dangerous to him.

He’d noticed that Jaime had covered the mark with makeup this morning. Clearly, she wasn’t wearing it with pride. There was no denying that she was justifiably angry with him. Hell, he was angry with him. But the fact that she’d concealed the mark nettled him and his wolf. Dante should have been relieved—it meant that the pack wouldn’t see it and then start launching questions. Instead, he wanted to wipe away the concealer. Wanted to see his bite on her flesh. His gaze repeatedly traveled to that spot on her neck, as if drawn to it. This was messed up.

The ideal thing would be to stay away from her, but he had questions that needed answering.

This time she was going to answer him honestly or, by God, he’d blister her perfect ass with the palm of his hand.

Jaime had never been to a baby shower before, so she hadn’t really known what to expect. Okay, yeah, she knew that they were little parties thrown for expectant moms, but that was pretty much the extent of her knowledge. What she hadn’t expected was to enjoy herself. Jaime wasn’t much for parties, but she was actually having a great time.

Earlier, while Taryn was having her afternoon nap, Jaime, Shaya, Grace, Lydia, and Hope had hung up all the decorations. The Winnie the Pooh theme matched the baby’s nursery, though the Alphas planned to keep their baby in their room with them for the first few months.

Taryn had been so delighted that she’d cried. Not that it took much to make Taryn cry these days. Every time Trey tried to comfort her she hit him, which was fun to watch. The buffet was fabulous, particularly the cake—most of which had been eaten by Marcus—and the games that Shaya organized were fun.

When it came time for Taryn to open the gifts, there were more tears. It was clear that it wasn’t just the hormones; she had been genuinely touched and grateful. Possibly the best gift had been the one that Shaya had given her. It was a photo frame that held three photographs. The space in the center was empty, but on either side were photographs of Taryn and Trey as kids.

“You can put a picture of the baby in the middle so you can see the resemblances between you,” Shaya told her Alphas. Unsurprisingly, Taryn cried again.

Possibly the worst gift was Greta’s. The old dragon actually gave Taryn a maternity dress that she’d made out of an old tablecloth. What kind of messed-up shit was that?

“She’s a dysfunctional woman,” Gabe commented as Dominic rushed over to steer Greta away from a murderous-looking Taryn. “Um…is there a reason why our Beta has been staring at you throughout the entire party? He looks…suspicious, I guess you could say.” She couldn’t really expect anything else, could she? Undoubtedly he’d have plenty of questions

—none of which she had any intention of answering. She knew why Dante hadn’t approached her to begin his quiz yet; he would never risk spoiling Taryn’s baby shower. Why did he have to have a sweet side? Jerk.

She felt an urge to touch the bite on her neck, just as she had at least a hundred times today.

Like those times, she ignored it. She hated that he’d done it. She liked that he’d done it. Her wolf was just as torn about the whole thing; she was infuriated with him for the possessive act, but she also liked the depth of his dominant streak.

“So what happened?”

“I sort of, um…I yelled at him last night. And growled. And hurt him.”

“Oh.” He sounded amused. “So then he’s probably wondering how a submissive wolf could challenge his dominance like that.”

Yes, particularly since there was no way he wouldn’t have picked up her wolf’s dominant vibes. She was surprised that he hadn’t told Trey and Taryn. Surely the fact that one of their wolves had been lying to them was something worth mentioning to their Alphas. For whatever reason, he appeared to be keeping the information to himself. She had to wonder if it was to make her nervous, to keep her on her toes. If so, it was working. “What do I say?” she whispered.

“How about the truth?”

“You know what will happen if I do that.”

Gabe shrugged. “It’s not for sure that they’ll ask you to leave.”

“I can’t risk it. I won’t.”

He raised his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Okay.”

Seeing that he was glancing at Hope, who was smiling at him and blushing like crazy, Jaime asked, “Something going on between you two?”

“Not yet. But hopefully there will be.”

“If she can resist you, there’s something wrong with her.”

“You have to say stuff like that, you’re my big sister.” He cocked his head, giving her an odd look. “Thank you.”

She frowned. “What for?”

“After what happened with Mom and Dad…Our aunt and uncle might have housed us, but it was you who did the rest, you who did the parenting. And you had your own problems to deal with. I don’t think I ever thanked you.”

“You don’t have to.”

He rolled his eyes. “Will you just accept the thanks? I’ll probably never say it again, so you should really take advantage of this moment.”

“Fine. Thank you for the thank you.”

“So how are things going between you and Shawn?”