Curse of the Alpha: The Complete Bundle by Tasha Black

debate.”
    She giggled. He stroked her back gently with his fingers. They both sighed.
    Ainsley wondered how she would get out of the sticky embrace and clean herself up without offending him.
    Sex was lovely in the moment but if you thought too much about all the bodily fluids it was not very nice.
    “You know,” he whispered. “I love cuddling but I’ll be happier when I have fresh linens for you to sleep in and I’m not so sweaty. Would you mind if I showered?”
    Ainsley smiled a genuine smile.
    “Me too,” she said. “Meet you back here in fifteen minutes?”
    “It’s a date.”
    She headed up to the second floor bathroom as he went to the first floor. By the time she was showered and back he had changed the sheets and had a fresh T-shirt laid out for her as well as a pair of Calvin Klein boxer briefs. She slipped into them and then into Julian’s arms. He wrapped a sheet around them.
    For a long time she lay against his chest, listening to his heart beat lazily.
    She was sure he didn’t actually expect her to stay the night. It was time to let him off the hook.
    “Julian, this was lovely, but I should probably head back now. I have a long day tomorrow. I’m sure you do too.”
    She waited for his weak argument, masking a secret relief. She didn’t get it.
    “That is a dreadful and unthinkable idea. Ainsley Connor, go to sleep immediately.”
    She was too tired to argue. She fell asleep with his hand softly grazing her back. Her last waking thought was to hope absently that she wouldn’t drool on his chest as she slept.

Chapter 21
    A t about 2 :00 AM, she woke with her heart pounding.
    Sometimes this happened. It was her wolf. She had restrained it too much tonight. The wolf always liked to run in the night and now it was insistent.
    Ainsley eased herself out of Julian’s embrace and pulled a scented note card and pen from her purse.
    Thank you for a lovely evening , she wrote neatly. I’m sure we’ll see each other around town sometime. –Ainsley Connor
    It was a non-committal note but she didn’t want to show her hand too much. And besides, something about all this felt like it was too much, too fast.
    She slipped out of his T-shirt and shorts and put on her own things. Her poor dress. She was really going to have to go shopping tomorrow.
    She headed out into the woods at a swift walking pace. By the time she got close to home she was trotting. Once the wolf got going it liked a long, loping stride.
    Ainsley was a little worried about what that might look like if she bumped into anyone in town in the middle of the night. Though what anyone who wasn’t a wolf would be doing out at 2:00 AM in Tarker’s Hollow she could not begin to imagine.
    As she pulled out of the woods behind her parent’s house she immediately sensed that something wasn’t right.
    Then she saw it.
    The back door of the Connor house was wide open. Ainsley Connor did not leave doors open. A shiver went through her and her wolf’s hackles lifted.
    She slowed her pace and her inner wolf pricked up its ears and lifted its nose to the breeze.
    From inside the house, she heard a tremendous howl.

Episode 2

Chapter 1
    A insley sprinted across the open space between the woods and the back of her house, following the sound of the howl. Anger ripped through her body, bringing her wolf dangerously near the surface.
    Who would dare invade her family home in the middle of the night?
    The howl told her it must be a wolf. Given their obsession with lineage issues, maybe it was finally time for her to pull rank.
    Someone was going to be sorry.
    She bounded up the back steps two at a time and burst through the open kitchen door.
    A familiar smell hit her nostrils as her feet touched the linoleum floor. Before her eyes could adjust to the deeper darkness, she felt the presence of a wolf. She froze in her tracks and let her eyesight shift, the wolf’s form taking shape before her.
    The creature was enormous, even on all fours it was almost