An Excerpt From: JAMIE'S CHERUB

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Chapter One

Jamie MacKelvin ambled into the lovely old colonial church and glanced around. It was the right address, but there was only one live body visible and she was dangerously perched atop a tall ladder at the front. The ceiling wasn't vaulted as high as some of the more modern structures but, still, it was too high for the little human up there with no one holding her ladder. As he silently moved down the aisle, his appreciation grew for the enticing cherub industriously hanging filmy stuff up above the altar. There was a heavy scent of lemon wood soap wafting off the rows of pews, blinding his sense of smell for a few seconds before he neared her.

She was ridiculously high to be leaning over like that. He would have frowned if the position hadn't given him a look at the sweetest ass he'd ever seen. It was plump and round and, well, something about it required he squeeze it. Then she twisted to grab another do-dad from the tray on top of the ladder and he froze. As much from fear any distraction would startle her as from the heart-stopping view she now gave him. In that bent and twisted position, her waist disappeared and she was all tits and ass.

Saints preserve us! Her breasts were all the ass was and more. Much more. The heavy, round globes strained her tank top and threatened to spill out as she grabbed her item and swung back around. Didn't the little daredevil realize how dangerous it was to swing that much weight around up there? The ladder shifted and he used his inherent speed to silently race up the aisle to grab it. She leaned over toward the wall once more and continued her task.

In the dash to the ladder the beast within inhaled deeply and knowledge exploded through his body. Mate! His unbelieving eyes widened in shock as he dragged in more air. Her passionflower scent was a full-bodied aroma that wrapped its heady fragrance around him with mouth-watering temptation. It kicked him in the groin as it unfolded into the long-searched-for promise.

His hands closed over the ladder rails and he felt every molecule of his body expand. The urge to howl was barely bitten back as he looked up at the only female who could complete him. Searching for her had taken almost four human lifetimes. Finding her here unexpectedly rocked him to the pit of the dark wolf he was. The astonishing fact that she was endangering her life atop this ladder enraged him. She was the most precious female on Earth! Didn't she know she had no business taking her luscious self up on such a dangerous thing as a tall ladder?

From below, the visual she presented was lush curves and an indistinct face. However, her scent was all the identification he needed, the woman was his in every way that mattered. A priceless gift he'd treasure until he died. There atop that ladder stood every wish and hopeless daydream a lone wolf could ever have. Containing the whirlwind of emotion she ignited in him, he cleared his throat to get her attention in the most civilized way he could manage right now. She jerked as he'd expected and would have tipped the whole thing over if he'd not been holding it.

"Oh!" Her breath whooshed out as she looked down at him and clutched the top of the ladder for balance.

The tall man below her with shoulder-length, rippling black hair should have looked effeminate with his deep blue eyes and perfectly sculpted features. Long black lashes could be seen even from a distance as he gazed up at her. Emma almost felt dizzy as she gazed into the clear blue eyes those lashes framed. The stunning eyes were part of a face whose strong features were stamped with rugged male beauty. His square chin was tilted up, showing her the corded neck and a tuft of black hair curling out of his casual shirt. From her angle, all she could see was his face and impossibly wide shoulders. But it was enough to send a little shiver of appreciation through her loins.

"What in the name of..." he was forced to pause as her beautiful face registered for the first time "ah, what are you doing up there?" he demanded, muscles flexing to control impending catastrophe.

It wasn't really a strain for him, the power thundering through his body at that moment could have lifted a Mack Truck. Mate! His body surged with heat, need and overwhelming strength. She triggered every one of his primal instincts, producing a dizzying rush of adrenaline. Pressed against his belt buckle was the part of him that insisted it needed her most. He'd not been this hard in public since he was a pup.

"Hello," she beamed at him with a radiant smile. "I'm just finishing up here. You must be looking for Jack MacKelvin."

Cheerful green eyes twinkled in an angel's face. Framing her expression was a mass of sable hair held back in a haphazard ponytail. Loose curls escaped the confines of her hair band, surrounding slightly flushed cheeks. A pert little nose sat above the most edible set of lips he'd ever seen. 'Course it didn't really matter what she looked like to a wolf. It was simply another thing to drive him insane at this point.

"All the guys are already out back. The groom's dinner is going to be a bar-b-que so they're doing the pit. Just through there," she pointed to the left, "and out the back door."

He stared at her blankly, absorbing her into his world. The wild rush of possessive anger he'd felt over his mate being perched atop a wobbly ladder seemed to fall out the back of his brain as he looked up at the adorable goddess.

Her figure was full and the most hedonistic, sexy thing he'd ever seen. There wasn't an inch of her that wouldn't be a pleasure to squeeze, lick or pet. She'd melt into a male like thick cream flows over hard chocolate. Oh, Jesus, thinking about her and cream was a mistake. His body clenched even tighter as he floundered through that thought.

"How'd you know who I was looking for?" he asked dumbly, mostly to keep her talking while he absorbed her scent and analyzed it. She was human, fully human. That was a shock, but immediately dismissed as unimportant next to the fact he'd found his mate. Nothing mattered when weighed against that.

"You're big, beautiful and male. You've got to be one of the groom's men. As I said, they are all right through there." She pointed again, her fingers flicking to move him in the right direction.

Emma could appreciate all of the beautiful male below her, but he seemed a bit dense. What did she expect when he was a poster child for the Mr. Wet My Panties Club? She had far too much to do to worry about Lost and HandsomeÃ¢ÂÂs inability to figure out direction.

"Yes, ma'am. I won't be going through there until you're off this ladder." He responded to her shooing motion. Tightening his grip on the ladder, he braced his legs as she turned again to pick up another pretty piece to attach to the arrangement over the altar.

"Don't mind me," she called down as she worked swiftly. "This is almost done. Go on and have some fun." Yep, dense, she mused to herself.

"Certainly. As soon as you're done," Jamie responded, recognizing she wasn't about to come down. Little angel had no idea he'd never be leaving her again. Intellectually he knew she didn't have the ability to know him immediately as he recognized her.

She chuckled and suddenly leaned back, rocking the whole thing dangerously again. "Suit yourself, young man. I'll be a few minutes more though." She felt amused, not threatened by the big, lovely lug holding her ladder. That was a huge step for her and Emma was proud of herself. It had been a long road to be able to appreciate a stunningly good-looking man and not feel the instant rush of terror at the sight of him.

Jamie frowned as he realized her statement had that dismissive tone one used on someone much younger. His eyes tracked over her round bottom again and he rejected the urge to shake his head. She might think she was a few years older than he, but not so much that it mattered. Her figure was certainly lush as only a mature woman's can be, but there was nothing old or tired about it. The beast within started pacing, a wolf looking up at treed prey.

Her fascinating scent had changed as soon as she saw him and he knew she'd been honest when she called him beautiful. That was how she saw him. Her little rush of excitement confirmed it, but then she'd dismissed him somehow. Genetically, a Lykosapien could not dismiss attraction such as this, and it irritated him that her scent was normal again, as if he wasn't even there. Not the response his body screamed for from its mate.

Lykosapiens as a species had been present on the planet as long as humans. True shape shifters, they were a blend of wolf and Homo sapiens in every way. With the advent of Christianity and the ensuing hunts for devils, witches and all manner of evil, the species had blended into the human world for safety. Which didn't mean one bit of their natural, instinctive responses had been blunted. The danger of being exposed had sharpened the animal side over the generations. Where once they;d been predatory, they were now fiercely dangerous if discovered. Survival of the pack depended on it.

Methods of concealing species differences from humans had become many and detailed. Packs no longer lived in obvious pack formations, but moved around their vast territories in fifty to eighty year increments. That way they were always their own heirs, finally coming to claim the property of their ancestors. Since wolves could easily travel long distances fast, the members spread out over a hundred-mile radius when they moved. Never arriving in the vicinity at the same time, but always aware of every member's location.

No whisper of their existence was allowed to remain in human records. Save one, the one legend they hadn't been able to control. It was so far from the truth it didn't really matter. The human story of the werewolf was the result of a single wolf, a sick, deranged soul who'd been disposed of long ago.

"I'm Jamie MacKelvin," he stated, mostly to get her attention. "You are?"

At the mention of his name, her head jerked down to look at him. That was much better, his ego crooned, except her scent changed again. Fear. Jamie frowned as he looked up at her now pale face.

"Hey, don't be afraid. I'd never hurt you." He immediately tried to soothe her. The wolf within froze, eyes locked on what it wanted, aware that any move might spook the woman he could not afford to lose.

She smiled tightly. "Sorry, can't hide an instinctive reaction from your family, can I? You must be related to Jack?" Emma berated herself for not recognizing that immediately. It didn't matter how dense studly might be, he was a wolf. She'd known she'd be meeting a lot of wolves at this event, it needed to stop being a betraying shock. The sniffy bastards knew too much about a person's thoughts. She was well aware of how to cover her scent but hadn't thought to use it today, expecting the day to be full of ordinary errands and mostly humans until tonight.

"Yeah, cousin." Jamie confirmed. "You obviously know Jack well. Why the fear?"

"Emma Claybourne, mother of the bride," she said, and turned back to her task. It was surprisingly difficult not to keep glancing down at him. He wasn't helping her with the irritating questions, which were none of his business.

Jamie watched her work, inhaling deeply to make sure he was right. The fear had lessened, but it remained a subtle spice to her natural passionflower self. "Emma?" his deep voice rumbled. "Does that work on your people?"

"What?" she asked absently.

"Ignoring the question. Do they let you do that?" He smiled as she glanced down.

"Yes. It is called not prying into things that are none of your business." Suddenly she shifted again and pulled back from her arrangement. "There, all done." She surveyed her work critically a moment then started backing down the ladder.

Jamie gripped the rails tightly as she moved down. With her back to him, his nose traveled up the back of her legs to nirvana. She didn't pause, but he knew she heard him drag in a deep breath as her ass passed in front of his face. He actually felt dizzy as her concentrated scent invaded his body. It was pure female as he'd never smelled before. His mouth opened to breathe it in across his tongue. Oh, God. There wasn't a scrap of male marker on her. She was single and had been for a long time.

Relieved there wasn't someone else on his territory, he closed his eyes and wallowed in her. His arms imprisoned her in front of him facing the ladder, he didn't even realize what he was doing when his head bent to lick his tongue lightly across the soft spot where neck met shoulder. Her taste rocked him as much as her scent. His mouth instinctively opened wide over tender flesh to clamp down in a mate hold.

"No," a whispered moan stopped him cold. Fear permeated her scent and taste, wrenching him out of the feral reaction he'd been unable to control. It shocked him to find himself pressed to her back, rubbing his erection into that scintillating, luscious bottom. A deep growl escaped his chest as he fought the drugged condition his mate sent him into.

Jamie released the ladder and jumped back. It was the only way to contain the beast rippling beneath his skin in protest to physical separation from her. She went to his head like the kick of aged whisky. Damn it to hell. She was shaking as she pressed into the ladder and clutched it desperately. He just knew her eyes were squeezed shut as she waited for pain.

"I'm sorry, damn it, Emma, I'm so sorry," he apologized quickly. "I didn't mean to trap you. You affect me more than any female ever has, it was an instinctive reaction." He tried to explain as she remained rigid with her back to him.

Emma straightened slightly away from the ladder and squared her shoulders. Almost visibly inserting an iron bar down her spine as she grabbed the flannel shirt from the bottom rung and shrugged it on, clutching it closed over her breasts as she turned to face him. She felt almost sick with terror as she looked up at him. Knowing he knew it added to it. Damn! She cursed herself, wolves always take down the weak one. Be afraid and you will be given a reason to fear. That phrase repeated over and over in her brain.

"Fine. You've had your sniff and taste. Now leave me alone, please." She looked him in the eye as her body radiated controlled terror. The trembling, determined stance melted his heart as he saw in her face what she feared with courage and dignity.

"Look, that was a one-time reaction," Jamie assured her. "I wasn't prepared for the smell and taste of you. It'll never happen again, don't let it frighten you."

"As you know very well, it does frighten me. So would you please just leave?" she calmly asked again. "You're part of the wedding party, I assume, since you are Jack's family. We have a long weekend to get through and I'd like to at least appear civil for Laura's sake. She'll know if I'm afraid every time you step in the room and it'll upset her. So stop giving me a reason to be afraid and leave me alone." She might be terrified of him, but he still seemed a bit dense. This was the very reason she'd stayed away from his kind. Almost all of them were just too used to women falling all over them. Spelling it out slowly for him, she waited for a response.

Jamie frowned as that little speech unfolded in his mind. "Your daughter is one of us?" he asked just to confirm the puzzling facts.

"Obviously, only half," Emma snapped. "But she seems to have all the gifts. So back off and stay away." Oh, he was a prize. Just went to show looks couldn't buy brains, she thought in disgust.

"You were mated?" he asked in amazement. Jamie hadn't smelled even a hint of another wolf on her. The mate bond would have changed her scent to reflect her mate forever. Even if her mate died, his scent should have remained on her, marking her as his. There were no second chances for his species. Each only had one mate to procreate with. If a wolf was unlucky enough for his mate to be from a different species who didn't mate for life or wouldn't mate him, well, he was done.

A Lykosapien never took chances with the mate urge when he felt it. Every one of them understood it was a male's responsibility to secure the female. She was the only one who would ever enable him to father children. If he messed up and lost her, he could fuck the planet, but he'd never breed.

"No," Emma stated flatly, and clamped her lips shut as she looked up at the confused wolf. What more did the idiot need? She was certain as soon as he grasped the facts he'd lose interest. It might prick his ego when he finally understood that every human female on the planet wasn't frothing and ready to lay down for him, but he'd get over it and move on.

Her chubby self wasn't of any real interest. His eager reaction was probably the same with every woman he managed to get close to. He was a very good reminder for her of what happened when you became careless. She knew she should have used the scent suppressor today, it was foolish not to. Spending the majority of her time with Jack and his family had lulled her into a false sense of security.

"That's impossible!" Jamie scowled. She scrambled his brains with her enthralling scent and taste. She purported to have had a baby by a wolf who wasn't her mate. He suspected she was telling the truth, or what she believed to be the truth. There was no hint of lie or deception drifting around her. It was getting tough to keep up and he'd only known her a few minutes.

"Apparently not." Emma frowned and edged around him. "Are you going to cooperate this weekend?" she demanded as she gathered up her things.

Jamie shook his head in an effort to clear it. He needed his attention on one astounding fact right then and to ignore the impossibilities surrounding it. This was his mate and she feared him. He didn't have time to figure out how this might have occurred, except for the part that made her shake with terror when he touched her. That part he needed clarified quickly. Getting the information and soothing her at the same time was a combination he'd yet to figure out. Fuck! Elation, frustration and impatience seethed through him.

Jamie grabbed the ladder and waited with the huge thing tucked under his arm. Holding the weight easily as she glanced at him and raised her brows.

"Does that work with wolves?" Emma asked calmly, and picked up her basket of materials. Turning on her heel, she started across the podium.

"What?" Jamie questioned, puzzled as he followed.

"Ignoring the question. Do they let you get away with it?" Emma smiled as she mimicked him and her scent lost some of its bite. This was worse than she'd first thought. He obviously was a "special" wolf. His inability to follow the conversation actually made her feel sorry for him.

Jamie grinned sheepishly to show her he got it. "Ah, no. I wasn't ignoring you. I had several other things on my mind and forgot the question. "Sorry." He cleared his throat past the sudden constriction. Finding a mate was a monumental moment in a wolf's life.

He wasn't sure what to do next. Being Prime Alpha made him demanding and dictatorial. A tactic that was exactly wrong in this situation. He'd never needed to work at attracting female attention. They usually paraded past him with tails in the air, if they had tails. If they didn't, well, they tried real hard. Mate to Prime Alpha was about as high as a female could go. Bitches came from Europe, Asia, Africa, South America and, well, every continent, just to see if they were the one. Here she was, a prickly little human who would rather see him drop off the planet than let him touch her again.

"Are you going to cooperate?" she gently asked again.

"Ah, exactly what do you mean by cooperate," he wanted to know as they exited the sanctuary through the side door. Coming to a closet, she opened it and deposited her basket there, grabbed her purse and motioned for him to store the ladder, then turned to face him.

The reason he was the Prime Alpha was a combination of size and heritage. Heritage hadn't secured him the position, strength and cunning had. His heavily muscled body towered over her five-foot-seven-inch person. He attempted to put a gentle smile on his features for her, but wasn't sure he'd succeeded. She didn't smile back as she had when he'd come in.

"Promise me you'll stay away from me. I don't want Laura to get wind of how you affect me. This is her weekend and I will not let anything get in the way of that." Emma continued. "If you say you will, I'll relax. I know your family and they've never lied to me. I'm going to extend that trust to you, Mr. MacKelvin, just for this weekend." Repeating herself slowly and using what she thought were simple words she tried to reach him again. He was a huge, muscle-bound problem. He didn't seem able to control his wolf, which she understood now. It took the ability to reason to do that, so he became a hormone with no one home in the lighthouse.

"Emma, I can't stay away from you." Jamie frowned as her fear spiked again. "Damn it, woman, I am not threatening you. I am telling you that I'll be around wherever you are. I will not interfere with the wedding.

"I'll just help you as much as I can. You couldn't have lugged that ladder back here. I'm a handy guy to have around." It seemed wise not to explain why he couldn't leave her. Perhaps she'd missed that part and would not make him explain it.

"See! As soon as you said that you knew I panicked," she said. "What do you think will happen when there is a crowd of your type around? They will demand to know what's happening." Emma blinked back tears as she stared up into the chiseled features of the most beautiful idiot she'd ever seen. "Mr. MacKelvin, I am begging you, don't ruin my daughter's wedding." Once again she was becoming truly afraid. His simple mind was fixating on her.

Jamie stared into those watery eyes and discovered the one thing that could destroy him, tears in the eyes of his mate. Physical pain shot through his chest, there was nothing he wouldn't do to take the tears away. Swiftly Jamie dropped to his knees in front of her, gently grasping her trembling little hands, he held them tightly.

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