Free Karly's Wolf (Hollow Hills Book 1) by Maren Smith, Penny Alley Page B

he knew it. Dropping into a tackling position, he glared straight across fifteen or so feet of open grass and dirt to where his immediate opponent crouched in anticipation of meeting his charge.
    To any outsider, this might look like a ragtag game of touch football, skins versus skins with no clear-cut team lines drawn, but it wasn’t. There were nine packs in the Hunt this year. Nine. If that wasn’t a record, Colton couldn’t remember any year that beat it. They might square off as if there were two opposing sides, but in this game, it was every male for himself, with pack brothers loosely joined together in an effort to monopolize the ball. It was all about proving oneself the fittest, the strongest, the most aggressive, dangerous. And virile. Females lined the ropes, watching, sometimes cheering, mostly just picking out who they might like to run for later on. As the hosting Alpha, Colton knew more than a few were looking at him, but as he settled into the next line-up and hunkered down into position behind the quarterback, his eyes searched for only one person: Karly. She hadn’t even noticed he was here yet.
    “Hup!”
    The ball shunted right. Only half the players chased it; the other half went straight for targeted competitors. Colton went straight for Jax. One of his pack brothers tried to run interference, but too late, Jax realized his intent and he took the young boy down. It was a hard landing, one made infinitely harder when Colton rolled to slam him facedown into the dirt and pin him there.
    “Be careful,” he growled into the young whelp’s ear. He didn’t need to say anything more. Shoving back to his feet, he let the boy go.
    Jax rose to his knees slowly, a scrape on his chin and blood pouring from his nose. Raw fury lit his eyes; they were so yellow, Colton barely suppressed his own inner wolf’s answering surge.
    “Be very careful,” Colton warned again, and then he turned to walk away.
    Gabe’s shout a half second later sounded tinny, like the echo of a cry at the very end of a long tunnel, and Colton didn’t need it to know he was being attacked. He felt it, that electrified prickle of all the tiny hairs rising on the back of his neck a half second before the hard pound of Jax’s feet charged the ground directly behind him. His instinctive response was all savage—a hard duck right, pivot and grab. Hands locked on Jax’s throat and then his groin. Colton heaved, flinging the reckless youth up into the air before slamming him down again, flat on his back in the grass and dirt, faster than the boy’s expression could even register the failure and then the subsequent pain.
    Colton pinned him by his throat this time, pressing the force of his defeat and the pain into every inch of Jax’s wiry frame, looming so close over him that all Colton could see was his own reflection and the flicker of fear that flitted through the younger man’s eyes.
    “When you find your balls,” he growled, “come and challenge me again. But next time, do it right. Come at my back again and, Deacon’s pup or not, I’ll kill you.”
    In a move so slight, Colton doubted anyone else might even see it, Jax lifted his chin. A symbolic flash of throat, an act of placating submission that was neither honest nor reached as far as the younger volka’s eyes.
    Colton stood up slowly, giving Jax plenty of time to decide if he wanted to lash out now or later. Jax didn’t move. He waited until Colton was far enough away before sitting up, then wiped his bloody nose on his arm.
    Later it was.
    Turning away, Colton stopped when he saw Karly and Mama Margo, standing side-by-side at the pennant-dotted rope that walled off the field. They were staring straight at him. Karly’s eyes were huge and she’d covered her mouth. Why couldn’t she have spotted him while he was strutting his stuff, running the ball down the field, naked from the waist up, a strong male in his absolute prime…no. She had to wait until he was