Free Her Alpha Protector by Gwen Knight Page B

fingers rose to his shirt and tore it off. Seth was by no means an unattractive man, but there was something about him that had always affected Angel—his cruel personality, the way he handled her, forced her to do things she abhorred.
    “You mean to challenge me?” Hunter laughed mockingly. “Would you like a moment to think this through?”
    Seth’s mouth thinned and he jerked his chin toward her. “I win, she leaves with me.”
    Hunter paused, his back stiffening the moment he realized she was here. “You’ve learned nothing ,” he snarled. “But if this is how you want to do it, Angel goes free if I win and your second takes over your pack. I want nothing to do with that mess of yours.”
    Angel’s breath caught with Hunter’s words, her ears flicking up. He could have claimed her right here, made her his reward, as Seth had done, but instead he’d guaranteed her freedom should he win.
    Seth’s eyes tapered but with a sharp nod, he called his wolf forth and fell to all fours in a burst of fur and magic, with Hunter only seconds behind. If their previous activities and his two shifts were weighing on him, Hunter made no indication of it.
    Slowly, they began to circle one another, an uncomfortable reticence settling over both packs. Angel’s eyes were all for Hunter, watching with bated breath as he hunted her former alpha. His movements were liquid and dangerous, his eyes alight with rage and savage strength. Where Seth made grandiose swipes at the air and menacing growls, Hunter remained silent. It was the quiet wolves that were to be feared. Vicious, calculating—and Angel could see exactly that.
    A broken howl from Seth shattered the eerie silence of their pack mates, and she gasped, her claws digging into the soil to restrain herself from rushing forward. Another howl, an unfamiliar one from one of Hunter’s wolves. Her wobbly knees shook, her ears flattening against her head as she listened to what was beginning to sound like war breaking out in the small clearing.
    Seth struck.
    The movements were far too quick to follow and Angel’s heart raged against her ribs as her eyes darted over the clearing, struggling to see what was happening. The two wolves began the dance of death, neither willing to back down.
    She whimpered when a canid scream found its way to her ears and a splash of blood darkened the soft ground. Her paws skimmed over the surface of the earth as she unknowingly moved toward them. One of Hunter’s wolves leaped before her, his teeth catching gently at her ear before he stepped on her paw. Hunter could do this, she knew that, but she also knew how dirty Seth fought. She couldn’t lose Hunter after finally finding him, after so many years of dreaming about him. His soft touches, gentle words, they all turned her knees to mush. For an alpha he was certainly a man of contrasts, and she would not lose him to Seth. That bastard had taken everything from her; he could not have this.
    The two remained locked in their endless struggle and Angel grimaced with every strike Seth landed. Hunter’s side was a mess of matted fur and she watched breathlessly as tiny rubies of blood splashed to the ground. Seth was no better, a garish gash having nearly claimed his eye, yet their battle continued, snarling and howling with each lunge, their claws and teeth deadly accurate.
    Fangs bared, Seth leaped into the air and came down on Hunter’s back, his claws tearing into his side where a glaring wound already lay. Angel gasped and it was only the heavy press of the other wolf that kept her back where she belonged. They didn’t understand—this was not Hunter’s fight! It was hers, and the cold fear that Hunter might just lose settled into her gut. She couldn’t go back with Seth— wouldn’t —and she knew that if Hunter lost, her life would be forfeited as well. There was no way she could just sit back and watch Seth kill him.
    Paws dancing against the ground, she shifted back and forth, clouds