STORY EXCERPT

A small movement of ragged brown fabric to one side of the circle caught Ben’s attention. He watched from the edge of the trees, his eyes never leaving the figure in brown. He caught sight of a small pale face glancing out from behind stringy hair.

The dirty strawberry-blond hair was not what caught Ben’s attention. Nor was the length, which seemed to go on forever, from the top of the young man’s head to just below the soft curve of his ass.

It was the huge sky-blue eyes that peeked out between the thick strands of hair. They were the most expressive eyes Ben had ever seen. Then the little man smiled at him, and Ben felt a strange tightening in the middle of his chest.

The world around him simply disappeared. It was only the young man and him. No one else existed. But as quickly as it had come, the smile disappeared, along with the beautiful eyes that had seemed to see into his very soul.

Ben leaned up on his feet to get a better look at him. At six-foot-nine, he stood taller than most men. In fact, he had never met anyone who was taller than him. There was nearly nothing that could make Ben leave the safety at the edge of the party. But the body was huddled down behind the horde of partygoers, and Ben couldn’t get a good look. He felt a need to find the young man.

If he had been truly thinking about it, he would have questioned this obsessive need to find the man hiding on the other side of the circle. And then he would have run for his life. But all he could feel was an unnatural desire to hunt down the brown fabric and meet the man who smiled at him.

Ben left his safety at the edge of the trees and began working his way through the crowd, his eyes never leaving the young man. He knew the man could see him walking to him by the slight turning of his body toward him. He seemed to be waiting for Ben. From the small smile on his lips, Ben assumed the man would be happy to see him.

As he got closer to him, Ben could see more of his stature. He was small. He might reach Ben’s sternum…if he stood on a stool. Otherwise, he would barely reach Ben’s chest. The man couldn’t have been more than five-foot-ten or so. His thread-worn outfit was definitely not made to look pleasing on him. There seemed to be no contours or soft places on him. On a whole, the clothing seemed to hang over him more like a sack than a shirt. It was not made to entice anyone, which was strange considering that’s what tonight’s gathering was all about.

The smile fell from the man's lips as Ben drew nearer to him, fear began to form in his deep blue eyes. Ben slowed his quick stride. He felt sorrow in his heart as he realized that the little man was afraid of him. Ben stopped a mere foot from him. He wanted to give the man the opportunity to flee from his side before he said anything to him.

As he tried to form the words that might keep the stunning man where he could look at him, Ben noticed that the man’s gaze was not on him but on some unseen person behind him. He slowly turned as he felt a cold shiver creep up his spine.

A man walked slowly toward them, a look of triumph plastered on his thin lips. He was a vampire. Ben could tell even from here. He looked back down at the young man. His fear was almost tangible. Before his eyes, the man began to shake.

It came suddenly to Ben that the little man wasn’t afraid of him. He was afraid of the vampire walking toward them. He wasn’t even looking at Ben. His entire being was centered on the man coming toward them, and his body was readying itself to flee.

“Dane,” the little man whispered, terror lacing his thin voice.

Ben wondered if an eternity from know he would understand why he did what he did, but for now, it was a complete mystery to him. He only knew that he had to get the young man to safety, to protect him. Reaching out, he grabbed his arm and began dragging him through the crowd. The man gasped as he was pulled along.

Ben stopped suddenly when the smarmy-looking man stepped in front of him. He felt the smaller man plow into his back and reached around behind him to place a steadying hand on him.

 “Are you claiming Stefan?” Dane asked.

Ben suddenly realized what he was doing. His only thought was to save Stefan, not to claim him. His stomach rolled just by the thought of it. He couldn’t have a mate. “Why do you ask?” Ben growled.

“Because if you do not claim him, I will,” Dane said as he stepped around Ben and reached for Stefan. “Stefan, come,” he stated triumphantly.

Ben could feel the terror filling Stefan by the shaking in his body. “You will not!” he snarled as he stepped between them. He didn’t know why, but he knew he could not let this man take Stefan from him. “He is not your mate.”

“If you do not claim him, then he is fair game for the rest of us,” he said as he reached for Stefan again, grabbing his wrist. Stefan seemed to make his body as small as possible as he pressed up against Ben.

“Touch him and die!” Ben snarled as he pulled Stefan from the man’s grasp, wrapping an arm around Stefan’s waist and pulling him back against his larger body.

“Ben,” said a strong voice behind him “What goes on here?”

Ben turned toward the voice, knowing it was his alpha. “Nothing goes on here, Daniel.”

The man beside him sputtered, “That’s not true, Alpha Nash. This man is refusing my claim on Stefan.”

Alpha Daniel Nash looked over at the arm that Ben had wrapped around the waist of the cowering man. “Ben, if you do not claim this man, then you must give him up to he who will.”

Ben’s body went stiff at his alpha’s words. He didn’t want to claim Stefan. He always believed that he would spend his life alone. Then he heard a small whimper come from the frightened man pressed against him. He knew his choices were gone.

“Then I claim him.”

ADULT EXCERPT

Stefan opened his eyes slowly. For a brief moment, he wondered where he was. Then, as the events of the previous night filled his head, he quickly turned, looking for Ben, only to find the other side of the bed empty. Where was Ben?

Sitting up, he looked around the room. It was deserted. Stefan threw the blankets back and crawled from the bed. He quickly went to the bathroom to see if Ben was there. Finding it vacant, he slowly walked through the rest of the house.

He walked into the kitchen and found Ben sitting at the table. He held a cup of coffee in one hand, a newspaper in the other. Stefan took a moment to just look at him. Ben truly was magnificent.

He was dressed in nothing but a pair of jeans, his chest and feet bare. The mere width of Ben’s shoulders was stunning on its own. He looked like he could carry an entire house on his shoulders, not to mention the sheer size of his arms.

Stefan didn’t know if he was a minority or not, but Ben’s size was more arousing than anything he had ever encountered before. It made him feel safe and protected, something Stefan had never experienced before. He seemed to spend his life being afraid.

The sight of Ben’s naked chest, smattered with dark chest hair, plain out turned Stefan on. He wanted to run his fingers through that hair and discover where the small trail going down the man’s abdomen led to.

“Did you need something, Stefan?” Ben asked without turning his head.

Stefan could feel his face heat up as he walked toward Ben. Guess he had been caught. However, he wasn’t embarrassed enough to stop looking. Or to not climb on to Ben’s lap and try to get a feel of that glorious chest.

Devlin told him that he would be attracted to his mate, but Stefan had no idea he would feel obsessed like this. He couldn’t stop looking, stop wanting to smell the man. If this was what being mated felt like, Stefan was all for it.

As Ben looked up at him in confusion, Stefan swung his leg over Ben’s lap, straddling his legs, his hands coming to rest on Ben’s wide chest. He rubbed his hands over Ben as he slowly raised his eyes to meet Ben’s golden ones.

“Good morning.” Stefan giggled at the sight of total shock on Ben’s face. He felt pretty sure his usual shy demeanor hadn’t prepared Ben for this. Stefan couldn’t explain it beyond the fact that Ben was now his mate.

He wanted the man. Everything about Ben aroused Stefan to a fever pitch, from the top of his gorgeous dark head to the bottoms of his big feet. The man was truly breathtaking, and just knowing that Ben was his nearly made Stefan melt.

“Is there—did you need something, Stefan?” Ben asked again, his voice going low and deep, filled with apprehension as he gazed down at Stefan.

“I imagine there are lots of things I need, but there is only one thing I want,” Stefan replied as he leaned up to press his lips against Ben’s. As he tried to push his tongue past Ben’s lips, he felt Ben’s hands press against his shoulders, pushing him back. With a deep heavy sigh, Stefan leaned back and looked into Ben’s eyes.

“Stefan? Do you know what you’re doing?”

Stefan’s lips curled into a small grin as he grabbed Ben’s hands from his shoulders and moved them down to his ass. “Yep,” he whispered just before he leaned up to kiss Ben again. He wanted his mate to claim him. Now!

Ben opened his mouth and kissed Stefan back. Stefan could feel Ben’s large hands clench his ass through the thin material of his shirt. Never letting his lips leave Ben’s, Stefan reached down with his hands and grabbed his shirt, pulling it up until Ben was holding bare flesh in his hands.

He could feel Ben’s response in the tightening of the man’s hands on his ass, the soft moan that came from Ben’s lips as his tongue moved out to brush against Stefan’s, and the hard throbbing of Ben’s cock between his legs.

“Stefan,” Ben growled as he ripped his lips from Stefan’s. “Baby, you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“I know exactly what I’m doing. I’m asking—no, I’m demanding that my mate claim me.”