Christmas Alpha Read online

  An Alpha series novella

  CHRISTMAS ALPHA

  by

  Carole Mortimer

  USA Today Bestselling Author

  COPYRIGHT

  Copyright © 2014 Carole Mortimer

  Cover Design Copyright © Glass Slipper Designs

  Hot Damn Shots

  Editor: Megan Stevens

  ISBN 978-1-910597-01-9

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  All Rights Reserved.

  DEDICATIONS

  For my husband Peter, who has always believed in me.

  My son Josh, for all of his help and dedication in

  making this possible.

  Sue and Lynn,

  for your friendship and support.

  And to all of you, for taking the time to read and

  enjoy my books.

  Chapter 1

  “Just go down the hallway and through the door on the left, take your clothes off and get settled on the bed. I’ll join you as soon as I’m finished with this call.”

  Eva was left standing on the doorstep, no longer even aware of the heavy snow swirling coldly about her, her cheeks now blazing with indignant color.

  Her eyes widened as the man who had opened the door now turned and walked barefoot back down the carpeted hallway, his cell phone still pressed against his ear as he carried on with his angry conversation that her ring on the doorbell had obviously interrupted.

  A man who was only wearing a pair of faded denims resting low down on his lean hips.

  The front view had been impressive; tanned and muscled chest and defined abs, including the two veeing down to his groin. And the reason Eva knew that was because the top button of those faded denims had been left unfastened, revealing not only that he was commando, but also the thick, dark, silky curls about an impressive—and very pretty—cock.

  Eva had barely recovered from that visual shock before he turned and walked away, leaving her to notice that his back was almost as drool-worthy as his front. His messy dark hair was long enough to brush the tops of his wide shoulders, every muscle and sinew in play across the broad width of his back as he paced restlessly down the hallway.

  “How the hell did that happen, Jack?” he growled into his phone. “Don’t keep apologizing—just tell me what you’re going to do about it!”

  The snow was falling heavier than ever outside, but even so Eva had no intentions of stepping into the house of a half-naked and angry man.

  Let alone taking her clothes off and waiting for him in his bed.

  It was eleven o’clock in the morning, but the fact that he was already half undressed would seem to imply he had already started without her—at least, without the woman he was expecting.

  Which wasn’t her.

  Eva rang the doorbell again just as he disappeared at the end of the hallway.

  He returned back around the corner so fast Eva almost slipped on the snow as she took an involuntary step back from those blazingly angry—Irish blue?—eyes as he now strode back towards her. “What the feck is your problem—” He came to an abrupt halt halfway down the hallway as he looked at her more closely, those blue eyes narrowing suspiciously. “You aren’t the woman I hired from the agency.”

  Eva raised surprised brows. This man was probably aged in his early thirties, several inches over six feet tall and spectacular looking. He also oozed sensuality from every pore of that magnificent body. This huge manor house, set in its own grounds in the Welsh mountains, meant he was probably quite wealthy too.

  So why on earth would he need to ‘hire a woman’ from an ‘agency’ to go to bed with him? Unless he was into the kinky stuff? Whips and paddles?

  Maybe that was the reason he lived out here in the middle of nowhere; so that the neighbors wouldn’t be able to hear the screams!

  “You’re right, I’m not,” she confirmed warily.

  “My battery is low, Jack, I’ll talk to you about this again later.” Those bright blue eyes remained fixed on Eva as he ended the call without waiting for an answer, glancing irritably at the screen before slipping the mobile phone into the front pocket of those hip-hugging denims. A move guaranteed to draw Eva’s gaze back to what that unfastened button revealed. “What happened to the woman I hired?”

  Eva dragged her gaze up to his face. “I have no idea.” If the other woman had any sense, she would run as far and as fast as she could in the other direction. As Eva intended on doing as soon as she had done what she had driven through the snowstorm to do. “Are you Mr. Devlin?”

  “Who the feck else would I be?” he growled impatiently.

  That really was debatable, as far as Eva was concerned.

  “Don’t just stand there gaping, come inside and close the damned door.” He scowled darkly. “We need to get started. Time is money, you know.”

  Oh smooth. Very suave. She would just bet he attracted a lot of women with that line. Or maybe that was his problem, and the reason he had to ‘hire’ women for sex.

  “For God’s sake move, woman, you’re letting all the cold air into the rest of the house!” This time he didn’t wait for Eva to respond but grabbed hold of her arm and pulled her inside the house, closing the door behind her.

  Eva immediately realized why he was wearing only faded denims; it was as hot as hell inside the house. The jumper and jacket she was wearing, to ward off the cold and heavily falling snow, both felt uncomfortably hot within just seconds of stepping—being dragged—inside the house.

  “You’ll need to strip off completely so I can see if you’re what I want before we do anything else.” Devlin was now looking her up and down as if she were a bug under a microscope.

  Eva shifted uncomfortably under that critical gaze. She didn’t exactly look the part, dressed in a woolen hat pulled down low over her ears, a scarf wrapped around her neck, and her fleece jacket zipped up to her chin above fitted denims and heavy walking boots.

  “You’re a little shorter than the original woman,” he noted critically. “But I don’t suppose that’s going to matter once you’re horizontal.”

  Oh yes, ‘suave’ was definitely this man’s middle name.

  Her chin rose. “It so happens that 66 inches is the perfect height for someone who is 5’6” tall.”

  “What...? Never mind,” he snapped in his irritation. “I don’t suppose your height matters as long as you have firm thighs and pert tits. Why the hell do you have so many clothes on...?”

  “Maybe because it’s snowing outside?” Eva’s cheeks were blazing hot again, from anger as well as embarrassment now.

  Firm thighs and pert tits, my ass! That was firm too, if he really wanted to know. Not that he was going to get the chance to look at a single one of them.

  “It is?” He glanced out of the hallway window, eyebrows rising as he obviously saw the heavy snowflakes falling outside. “How long has it been doing that?”

  Too good-looking for his own, and any woman’s, good. Sexy as hell with a body that could—well, he could give a woman a lot of pleasure with a toned body like that. Unfortunately he was also rude, obnoxious, and more than a little odd if he hadn’t even noticed it was snowing outside. “About six hours or so,” Eva grimaced.

  “Really?” He moved to stand by the window. “How the hell did you get here through almost a foot of snow?”

  “Skill, flair, style?” she quipped dryly.

  “Was that meant to be funny?” He didn’t even turn and look at her as he frowned out the window.

  She shrugged. “‘We come to you,
we get through’,” she quoted the company slogan parrot-fashion. “How can you stand it in here, it’s almost as hot as a sauna!” She pulled the woolen hat off her head, allowing her hair to fall down onto her shoulders. Stripping off didn’t sound like such a bad idea right now. “Wouldn’t it be a good idea to put some more clothes on and turn down the heating?” She took off her scarf and pushed it into the pocket of her jacket before unzipping it to pull the roll-neck of her sweater away from the dampness of her throat.

  “I wanted it to be warm for when you took your clothes off—holy hell!” Finn said as he turned from the window and saw the woman’s hair.

  It was black as moonlight and completely straight as it fell in a thick, glossy curtain almost to her waist.

  He had already noticed her eyes, of course; they were the color of fresh moss, surrounded by thick dark lashes and tilted exotically at the corners. Her complexion was ivory smooth, and those pouting rose-colored lips were just perfect for wrapping about a man’s cock; if she had a body to match then they were in business!

  “Take off your jacket,” he instructed gruffly. “Let’s see what you’ve got under there.”

  She backed up a step. “Now just a minute, Mr. Devlin—”

  “Finn,” he corrected distractedly, stepping around her as she now stood tense and still in the middle of the hallway. Her bottom looked firm and taut, and her legs were slender too in those tight denims. Now if her tits were—

  “I don’t care what your name is—I am not taking my clothes off!” She glared at Finn as he completed his circle and came to stand in front of her, that glorious midnight black hair seeming to crackle with the same anger he could see in those flashing green eyes and could hear in the husky rasp of her voice.

  He frowned. “Didn’t the agency explain my particular requirements before they sent you here?”

  Eva was having more than a little trouble, now that he was standing so close to her—far too close—in keeping her gaze any higher than what was being revealed by that unfastened button on his denims.

  How could she possibly be expected to think straight, let alone follow this strange conversation, when she had over six feet of pure, sensual male standing in front of her, and she was being treated— literally—to a bird’s eyes view of his dark pubic hair and tantalizing glimpses of—

  She was not going there, Eva instructed herself firmly as she gave a shake of her head to clear it of the sexual haze. “I don’t care what your particular—peculiar—requirements might be, Mr. Devlin, my clothes are staying exactly where they are!”

  “And just how do you expect me to do my thing if you’re fully clothed?” he reasoned, that tone implying she might be a little simpleminded.

  She was simpleminded? This man was way off-the-charts weird, and the sooner Eva got herself out of here and left him to do his ‘thing’, the happier she would be.

  Her eyes narrowed. “What I think, is that it’s your problem not mine, Mr. Devlin. I only came here to—” She broke off as his cell phone buzzed in his pocket. “I think you had better take that.” With any luck it was the real girl sent by the ‘agency’, explaining she was running a little late but would be here soon. As far as Eva was concerned, the other woman was more than welcome to him!

  She walked over to the window to give him the privacy to take the call, frowning as she saw that the snow was falling harder than ever, the flakes fat and heavy as they swirled in the howling wind before settling on the thick layer of snow already covering the landscape.

  The world was white as far as she could see, which actually wasn’t that far anymore. Much as Eva peered through the window she could barely see the driveway she had driven down earlier, let alone distinguish it from the surrounding verge and hedgerows.

  If she didn’t leave here soon she wasn’t going to be able to, and there was no way she was getting snowed in here with a man who hired women ‘from an agency’ to go to bed with him.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  Eva turned slowly, brows rising as she saw the accusation in those hard blue eyes. Obviously his call had been from the girl from the ‘agency’. “My name is Eva Shaw.”

  His jaw tightened grimly. “Who sent you here?”

  “‘We come to you, we get…’ What are you doing?” she squeaked in protest as he reached out and took a painful grasp of her arm.

  “Who are you and what are you doing here?” he demanded again, those blue eyes glittering down at her with dangerous intensity.

  Eva didn’t at all care for being manhandled in this way. Even by a man who made her knees tremble just to look at him. Especially by a man who made her knees tremble just to look at him! “Well one thing I’m definitely not is your beck-and-call girl!”

  “My beck-and-what? What the hell is that supposed to mean?” He looked down the length of his nose at her.

  Her eyes flashed a warning. “It means, Mr. Devlin, that I’m not taking my clothes off. That I’m not going to stay here and help you do your ‘thing’,” she added scathingly. “That I work for the Dailey Courier Service. ‘We come to you, we get through’,” she managed to quote the company logo through to the end this time. “And that I came here to deliver a parcel.”

  “A parcel?” Instead of letting her go his finger tightened on her arm.

  Eva nodded. “And while I’m outside collecting said parcel from the back of my van, I suggest you go and put some more clothes on!” She didn’t wait for him to answer before wrenching her arm from his grasp and stomping down the hallway to the front door, throwing it open and stepping outside into the storm without closing it behind her.

  With any luck Finn Devlin would have frozen his balls off before she got back.

  Chapter 2

  No such luck, unfortunately. That bulging package at the front of his snug-fitting denims was still perfectly in place when Eva returned with the lightweight, if cumbersome, parcel. Although he had refastened the button on his denims and pulled on a tight-fitting, navy blue t-shirt that seemed to emphasize that magnificent chest rather than conceal it.

  Contrarily, Eva felt a little disappointed at the disappearance of all that naked flesh. Then gave a snort of self-disgust. The man paid women to have sex with him, for goodness sake!

  She placed the parcel on the floor of the hallway before closing the front door and presenting the electronic scanner to him. “If you could just sign in the box I’ll be on my way.”

  “You really are from a courier service...” Finn had finally noted the company logo on the front of the woman’s jacket.

  She gave him a puzzled glance. “I said I was.”

  “People say a lot of things,” he answered enigmatically. “Who’s the parcel from?” he prompted cautiously.

  She glanced down at the scanner. “It says Jack Miller on the invoice.”

  His agent. And Eva Shaw was delivering the parcel he and Jack had just been having an argument about on the phone.

  A parcel that now sat like a coiled snake on the hallway carpet.

  A parcel Finn had absolutely no interest in opening.

  Eva gave an impatient shake of her head. “Could you just sign in the box, please?”

  “No.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest as he looked down at her with one eyebrow raised.

  Eva bit back her irritation. This may not seem like a very important job to someone who lived in a dream house like this, but she worked for the courier service during the holidays as a way of helping to pay her way through university. A complaint of rudeness, from one of the Dailey Courier Service’s customers, wasn’t going to go down too well. Even if the owner of the company was her uncle.

  “That’s the way it works, Mr. Devlin,” she explained patiently.

  “You sign the box, I leave the parcel. No signature as proof of delivery, then I can’t leave the parcel. Simple.”

  Finn held back a smile as Eva Shaw almost ground her teeth together in an effort to be polite to him.

  Not that he cou
ld exactly blame her when he thought back to their conversation since he had first opened the door in answer to her ring on the doorbell. A clear case of mistaken identity on his part. Although in his defense, it was eleven o’clock, the same time he had been expecting the real girl from the agency.

  Speaking of which... “Why didn’t you tell me who you were when you arrived?”

  “Well let me see. Possibly because you were too busy telling me to get my clothes off?” Eva Shaw arched dark, pointed brows.

  Finn bit harder than ever into his top lip to keep back that grin, knowing she was seriously in danger of losing the battle of maintaining her politeness towards him.

  Was it any wonder he had made a mistake, when this woman had those sultry green eyes and those full and pouting lips? As for her hair—Jesus, Joseph and Mary!—how magnificent would that look draped over a man’s naked body?

  His naked body...

  Finn gave a shrug. “The idea still has merit.”

  “Not to me it doesn’t.” She eyed him scathingly. “Now could you please sign in the box, Mr. Devlin, so that I can be on my way?”

  Finn knew Eva Shaw wasn’t being altogether honest, with herself or with him. He may have been distracted earlier, and a lot angry, by that phone call from his agent, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t noticed Eva’s interest in his bared chest and unfastened denims. In fact, he regretted covering up now...

  It had been a while, months, since he’d last had sex.

  Was that any wonder, considering the woman he’d last had sex with?

  Finn’s jaw tightened as he gave another glance at the parcel Eva had delivered. “I’m more than happy to sign in the box, Eva.” He did so. “But I’m afraid you aren’t going anywhere.”

  She looked alarmed. “You can’t keep me here against my will!”