[My sneak peek today is from Annabeth Leong's new shifter tale, Not the Leader of the Pack. I love Annabeth's writing. You might, too! ~ Lisabet]
Not
the Leader of the Pack
By
Annabeth Leong
Blurb
Rival
alphas Juli Gunby and Neil Statham want to tear each other apart —
but will they do it in battle or as mates?
When
Juli Gunby left Missoula, Montana, she didn’t intend to come back.
Not to her exacting alpha werewolf father, and certainly not to Neil
Statham, the beta who rejected Juli’s girlish advances. Her father,
as usual, has other ideas, using his dying breath to pass pack
leadership to his daughter. Juli resolves to carry out her duty to
her father and her pack, but the one man she wants on her side has
made himself her enemy.
After
years of loyal service to the pack, Neil expects to take over as
alpha when his mentor dies. As good as it is to see Juli again, he
knows he can’t trust her. After all, she abandoned both him and the
pack years ago and never looked back. Neil determines to fight for
his rightful position in the pack, even if that means going up
against a woman who fills him with an overwhelming urge to mate every
time she walks into the room.
Someone
needs to lead, and the more Neil and Juli fight, the more they
attract interference from those who would control the pack and
destroy the ties between them.
Excerpt
"Juli.
We're the only pack members who saw your father pass that ring of
leadership to you." He paused to allow the significance to sink
in, the bar noise around them rising to fill his silence.
"You
have another life in Lewistown. You have a career. You've made it
clear you're not interested in this pack. We can say whatever we want
about what took place in that room. He could have passed the ring to
me as far as anyone else knows. No one would question that."
He
would have kept talking, except that Juli wrenched herself violently
out of his grasp at that point. "Not interested in this pack? We
can say whatever we want?" He heard her just fine over the music
despite the new distance between them. In fact, he worried who else
had heard her mention the pack. And who else had seen that furry paw
she'd thrust into his face.
They
both froze for a second, staring at her latest lapse of control.
"Damn
it." Juli's curse came out more as a growl than as words.
"We
need to get out of here," Neil said. "You just focus on
staying cool." She knew better than to argue with him. He
grabbed her hand and pulled her out, leaving their beers behind. They
could finish this conversation in his truck.
They
ran for the truck like the rest of the world was on fire, and slammed
the doors behind them once they got there. Juli writhed in her seat,
gasping, her wolf form rippling just on the other side of her skin.
Neil panted in response. He didn't normally have trouble controlling
his shift, but with her beside him, so close, too much of him wanted
to meet her in a place of complete abandon. He wanted to run with her
under the moon, fight her for supremacy until neither cared who wound
up on top or on the bottom. Then, with one last vicious pounce, he
wanted to surrender to the merging of their bodies. He swallowed
hard.
Stats.
He ran through the winning World Series teams for the last three
decades. He tried to calculate his total career RBIs. The stream of
data calmed Neil down. He started the car. "I'm going to drive
us somewhere a little more private," he told Juli. "Just in
case."
"Back
to the hospital."
"You're
in no shape—"
"Back
to the hospital." She showed fangs. Neil didn't need that so
soon after he'd regained his own control. He stopped arguing and
pressed the gas. They'd go somewhere. He just needed to be driving so
he had something to concentrate on besides the idea of Juli giving
herself up to the beast. He needed a really good reason to remain in
human form.
The
truck's cab filled with her labored breathing. Neil turned on the
radio to distract himself from the sexual images the sound called up
for him. He'd always avoided being alone with her, afraid to give
even the appearance of impropriety. Right then, Neil wasn't sure if
he was grateful for the trouble he'd saved himself or sorry as hell
for what he'd missed. The instinctual attraction he felt for her was
off the charts.
He
got so caught in his reverie that only Juli tugging at his sleeve
alerted him that her struggles had become sobs. "Neil, can you
pull over?" Her voice sounded deflated. "I'm sorry I
insisted about the hospital. I'm not ready to go back there yet."
Her
obvious misery immediately pierced his sexual fog. Neil pulled the
truck into a convenience store parking lot and looked at her. "Do
you want a minute? I can go get some water."
"No,
it's okay." She hesitated, chewing on her top lip. "I'm
obviously way out of control."
He
watched her face carefully. "About what I said in the bar... I
didn't mean to offend you."
"You
just think I don't care about any of this."
"Well,
do you?"
Her
head snapped up and a bit of the wolf flickered behind her eyes
again. "How can you ask me that?"
Neil
blew out a long breath. She wanted him to make his case? He could do
that. "You know being pack alpha doesn't pay. What about your
fancy job in Lewistown? The one that was so important you couldn't
come back here to visit your dad?"
She
rubbed her eyes. "Can you try to keep the venom out of this,
Neil? Jeez, you're so bitter, you'd think I failed to visit you."
Bingo. But Juli continued speaking, oblivious. "Gabriel's not
going to like it if I resign. He talked a lot about developing new
talent when he hired me. But it's not like the Council can't run
without me. This was my father's last request. Besides, the pack
probably needs me more."
He
swallowed, unable to believe she had the nerve to say these things.
"Maybe I'm underestimating how good you are at walking away from
things. Foolish of me, since I have personal experience." Neil
shook his head, uncertain if the anger surging through him was
directed at himself or at Juli. "The pack needs someone really
committed, Juli. Not someone who will leave again the next time it's
convenient."
She
snapped her gaze to his, her eyes widening with understanding. A wave
of fear rushed through him. He'd revealed too much of his personal
feelings. They needed to decide about the pack first. "You were
the one who rejected me, Neil," Juli said, her voice so soft he
almost couldn't hear her. "All I did was move on."
Buy
Links
All
Romance:
https://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-nottheleaderofthepack-1216512-149.html?referrer=5148b13c78ae0
Breathless
Press:
http://www.breathlesspress.com/index.php?main_page=product_free_shipping_info&cPath=13&products_id=452&zenid=nipaehvv20bbjv9041ico7epf1
Bio
Annabeth
Leong has written romance and erotica of many flavors -- dark, kinky,
vanilla, straight, lesbian, bi, and menage. Her titles for Breathless
Press include Not His Territory,
Not the Leader of the Pack,
and a contribution to the Ravaged
anthology. She enjoys writing about the tension between passion and
control that werewolves embody. Unfortunately, when Annabeth loses
control of herself, she does not gain the power to change shape. She
lives in Providence, Rhode Island, blogs at
annabethleong.blogspot.com,
and tweets @AnnabethLeong. She loves talking books on Goodreads, too:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5295946.Annabeth_Leong
2 comments:
Thanks so much for posting this, Lisabet! I appreciate you spreading the word. :)
Hi, Annabeth,
When Lucy sent the word out about your blitz, I jumped on the chance to host you. Actually, I tried to get in on the actual blog tour, but it filled up so fast I didn't have a chance!
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