Under the Alpha's Protection (Steamy Werewolf Shifter Menage Romance) by Willow Wilde Read Free Book Online

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    Getting used to the ranch hands being around wasn’t much of an adjustment, although I could sweat that I would see Brad smile at me out of the corner of my eye, or his gaze linger on me from time to time. Whether or not I was imagining it, I couldn’t help but smile inwardly. The kinds of guys who usually paid attention to me were typically nothing special, but it felt more substantial when it came from such handsome, rugged strangers…strangers who believed in being a real man, living off the land…
     
    They immediately took over the laborious stuff, as Uncle Jack had noted. I still woke up early to cook breakfast for everyone — in fact, I woke up a little earlier than before just to make sure there was enough to go around. After seeing them off, I took care of all the house duties, cleaned up the mud room, and polished the boots from the previous night. Since there were four of them now, they rotated out boots to keep me from falling behind on the workload. It usually took about an hour and a half to clean all eight boots, clearing off all the caked mud, and then polishing them afterwards.
     
    I usually found myself with about an hour of television time before I had to start preparing dinner. I tried to keep it as varied as I could, although I quickly learned that I could probably cook them their own boots (with a little seasoning, maybe) and they would have been happier with Uncle Jack’s own concoctions.
     
    Sundays were the lazy days, although I still had to have my uncle bring me into town to do all the grocery shopping for the week. We frequented a farmer’s market that sprawled out in the rural little village, picking up only the freshest vegetables and nicest cuts of meat.
     
    “Why don’t you grow your own vegetables, Uncle Jack?” I asked him on one of these trips. “You’ve got a whole ranch, it seems like you’d save some money and satisfaction with that…”
     
    “If you want a garden, build a garden. I never had the time or patience for that. Tried a few times, killed damn near everything.”
     
    That was my uncle for you. He was always straight to the point, willing to embrace his own flaws, and apparently less nurturing and hospitable than a desert.
     
    I didn’t spend much time with the ranch hands, despite their increasingly obvious interest in me. They seemed to stick close to my uncle with whatever they did, and I silently begged to be left alone with them, to see if I had been reading the signals correctly.
     
    And one night, out of the blue, I got my chance…
     
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    I couldn’t sleep that night, easily a month into my trip, and decided to kick on some clothes and take a walk around. Uncle Jack had warned me to be careful if I wandered around after dark, but I knew I was a big girl, and that there weren’t any major predators near the ranch.
     
    The whole property took on a somewhat mystical feeling after dark. Always being inside after they came back in, I’d never bothered to walk around under the moonlight, and the whole place just seemed alive with the settled dusk.
     
    Wondering what to do, I remembered a small lake nearby — more like a pond, in all actuality. Thinking myself ready for a midnight swim, I carefully navigated my way towards the soft lapping of the water, through the brief, brisk layer of trees between it and me. I knew these woods stretched on for miles in either direction, but there was a stone crag that jutted out near the right way, acting as a natural landmark.
     
    Soon, my boots found the right path, and I slipped onto the trail and towards the water. Excitement filled me. I’d never been skinny dipping before, especially at night, and I was excited to live a little and enjoy the privacy of the lake under the stars.
     
    Try doing THIS back home , I smugly smiled to myself.
     
    Once I found the