Wild Ride: An M/M Shifter Mpreg Romance Bundle Read online

  He hurried the last few feet forward and dropped down into a crouch, breaking into his kit as well now with hands that trembled nervously.

  “Hi, Ryker?” Eric said calmly. “My name is Eric. How are you doing?”

  The big man looked up a little at the sound of his name. “Hey,” he rasped, in a distinctly unfriendly voice.

  Bo shivered at the sound of his voice. The alpha’s head snapped around, his nostrils flaring as his eyes widened. “You...” he hissed, the tension in his voice rising.

  Bo glanced down, feeling suddenly like a shy schoolboy. He shuddered as Ryker’s voice seemed to rake claws down his spine, but somehow the sensation wasn’t entirely unpleasant.

  “Are you hurt anywhere?” Bo asked, his voice quavering slightly. Eric glanced across at him with a slight frown but didn’t comment on it.

  “Ugh, my head...” The big man started to lift one hand, but Eric grabbed onto it and lowered it back down.

  “Try not to move very much until we know what’s going on. What else?”

  Ryker’s eyes narrowed, and Bo sensed some of his alpha aggression starting to return as the adrenaline in his system permeated the rest of his body. He could practically feel it, pounding through the motorcyclist’s veins.

  “I’m fine,” he grunted.

  Eric rolled his eyes and shared a grimace with Bo, who knew that the human didn’t need to know this guy was a shapeshifter in order to appreciate this kind of stubbornness.

  “Well, we need to examine you anyway,” Eric said firmly. “And then you’re getting an ambulance ride to the hospital. Even if we have to restrain you to do it.”

  Ryker’s eyes seemingly flashed with anger, although Bo knew better than that. The tightening of the big man’s shoulders spoke of fear more than anything else. There was nothing in the world that a wolf dreaded more than restraints.

  “Hey, kid,” Ryker said gruffly, glancing at Bo. “You know what to do, right?”

  Bo blinked for a moment, taken aback as he readied a neck brace and handed it over to the paramedic, who placed it around the alpha wolf’s neck. That was the most important thing to do in the case of a vehicle crash. Even though it seemed as though Ryker could move around perfectly fine at the moment, injuries to the spine didn’t always show up right away. Best to immobilize the moving parts of him, just in case.

  “Right?” the alpha stressed, clenching his teeth as Eric took stock of his breathing and heart rate before starting to pull his jacket off to examine for any wounds.

  Bo nodded, because he did know what the alpha meant. Ryker was telling him to bring him to a shifter doctor, or to make sure that the doctor at the hospital wouldn’t ask too many questions if some of the results were a bit unusual for a human.

  “Good,” Ryker breathed, seeming to relax slightly.

  The leather jacket they pulled away from his shoulders was in terrible shape, torn practically into shreds by the wreck. Or was that the result of the crash at all?

  Bo barely contained a gasp as he saw Ryker’s body. His shirt was covered in more gashes and tears, and the wounds beneath were stark and jagged in a way that implied anything but injuries received as a result of rolling across the road at high speeds. Those would be more of the scraped kind, or abrasions, or breaks or sprains. These were terrible bite marks, dull claw wounds.

  Eric looked skeptical of the nature of the wounds as well, raising his eyebrows as he produced a pair of shears from his kit and cut away the man’s shirt. However, he had no way of knowing if these marks were those of other wolves.

  Did he cross a pack? Get beaten up by his own? But why?

  But, he reminded himself, it wasn’t any of his concern what happened to the alpha before or after this. All that mattered was right now.

  Eric straightened up and brushed his bloody gloves against the road. “Well, none of these look very life-threatening, but we still need to get you to the hospital for an x-ray. So, just stay still. Hannah!” he called over his shoulder.

  Almost immediately, Hannah rushed over with a stretcher board. Bo still almost smiled when he saw it. It resembled a very broad surfboard in both shape and length.

  “Don’t move, okay, Ryker?” Bo said, fighting to keep the tremble out of his voice. It felt incredibly strange to say the alpha’s name, the word odd and bulky on his dry tongue. “Just relax and let us move you around, okay?”

  “As long as it’s you,” the alpha growled, in a tone that was a great deal less flirtatious than the words spoken.

  Hannah set down the board. Eric looked towards Bo and they nodded together, both of them moving to grab onto the man’s body.

  The moment Bo touched him, he felt a shock travel up through his entire arm, lancing across the side of his chest and scorching him right in the heart. An audible gasp left his lips and he very nearly dropped the man, only instinct keeping him from screwing up.

  “Steady!” Eric said, his voice calm and almost friendly. His eyes were nearly murderous with anger, however.

  “Steady it is,” Bo replied, and now he couldn’t keep the tremble out of his voice at all. His hands shook as they gently, steadily dragged Ryker down into a prone position and then up onto the board.

  Hannah moved in between the men, deftly doing up the various straps that would hold Ryker in place. The alpha had his eyes shut tightly, breathing heavily and apparently not quite as fine as he pretended to be. Blood drizzled from his wounds, soaking into the material of his torn shirt and seeping across his skin.

  A police officer broke rank and came over to help them at Eric’s bidding, and all four of them grabbed at the handles on the side of the board. It was awkward to do, as Ryker’s muscular frame hung over the edges, but Eric counted down and they lifted him as one easily enough.

  Weak in the knees, and hardly able to remember what he was doing, Bo could feel the heaviness of the alpha but knew that he probably wasn’t helping out very much. Something weird was happening inside him and he didn’t understand it at all; his heart palpitated in his chest every time he looked at the man on the stretcher.

  There was an actual stretcher in the middle of the ambulance, so they slid the board onto it and secured it at the sides. Then, Eric shut the rear doors, Hannah leapt into the passenger side seat, and they were blazing off down the road again to return to the hospital.

  “I don’t know why you’re doing this,” the man named Ryker grunted from where he was staring up at the ceiling. Slowly, his eyes started to slip shut.

  “Hey!” Bo said. “Don’t do that! I need you awake and aware for me!”

  “Even someone like you can boss me around now?” Ryker groaned, opening his eyes again but continuing to just stare blankly.

  Eric glanced at Bo, clearly wondering the meaning behind the words, but Bo just shrugged and pretended like he didn’t know.

  “Well, as soon as we get you into the hospital and go through all of this with you, you can leave and never have to see me again.”

  The alpha grunted out a laugh that was rimmed with pain. “I’m not so sure that’s in the cards.”

  Does that mean he felt what I felt, too? Bo thought. Is this....

  But there was no more time to ponder; Eric tossed him a wad of gauze, and they went to work plugging the wounds to slow the patient’s bleeding until an actual doctor could get to him.

  “So,” Eric said conversationally, “where do you work?”

  “I don’t,” he grunted.

  “What about any pets?”

  Bo just barely held back a snort. Shapeshifters didn’t keep pets. It’s not like there was any rule against it, they just...didn’t. Maybe having an animal inside you was enough companionship, or something.

  “What about your bike?” the omega finally spoke up, figuring that would be something the man was a little more interested in. The point was to keep him talking and aware.

  “You mean that twisted hunk of metal that’s probably going to be towed to the junkyard?” Ryker gave another of
those grunting laughs, but this one seemed even more painful than the last. “I had her for less than a year. Bought her brand new. Name was Jessamine.”

  “You named it?”

  “Her,” the alpha stressed angrily. “Any vehicle is always a lady. You have to take care of her and give her everything she needs. So, yes, I named her. And she was a Black Eagle 500X3. Not like you would know what that means, scrawny.”

  Bo didn’t look up from where he was gently taping gauze against a particularly nasty bite mark on the alpha’s leg. “I guess that means it’s a good motorcycle?”

  “Not just good. The best. And I just fucking wrecked it.”

  If it had been any business of theirs, this would be the opportunity to ask the questions that were burning inside him. Eric didn’t comment, however.

  And neither did Bo, even though he felt for some reason like he was literally burning alive with curiosity. He’d had plenty of time to get a better look at Ryker since that first initial impression of him out there slumped against the fire hydrant, and he couldn’t help but to admit to himself that he liked what he saw. The glimpses of his abs beneath the torn and bloodied shirt was like seeing a picture of a mountain range: the lines were stark, jagged, and beautiful in their utter simplicity. Every inch of his body was broad and packed with bulging muscles. Now that his hair was drying, it was a luscious and curly mop of dirty blonde, flopping over dark eyebrows just above even darker eyes. His cheekbones were angular, and his chin was a thing of legends, covered in just the perfect amount of stubble to be pleasantly rough instead of prickly.

  I can’t believe that I’m imagining kissing him, Bo thought to himself with a soft little shudder. He leaned back slightly from the alpha as Eric took over trying to engage him in an actual conversation. Most of the time, he hardly noticed if others were attractive or not. Sure, it sucked when he went into heat and didn’t have a mate to relieve the pressure, but he hadn’t exactly gone around in daily life eyeing up pretty ladies or handsome men. As a shapeshifter, and specifically an omega, he just hadn’t ever felt an urge like this before. It was almost as untamed as this biker, with his crazy hair, crazy ride, and powerful body.

  Everything about him was just so tempting. Was he not supposed to imagine pressing his lips to Ryker’s? How would he taste? How would it feel?

  He imagined it would feel very much like that lightning bolt that shot through his body when he first touched Ryker. Like the embers rising in his loins now just at the thought...

  Then, suddenly, almost too soon, they arrived back at the hospital. Eric opened up the rear doors and together, they slid the stretcher down the ramp and began to push it inside the ER.

  Bo winced sympathetically before leaving the stretcher to the other members of his team, racing away to go alert the proper doctor. It was one of the scariest things in the whole entire world, being helplessly pushed along featureless corridors with only the dull ceiling lights counting the distance. So impersonal, so cold...

  He grabbed a nurse as she passed. “Where’s Dr. Goldman?”

  She didn’t question his urgency and just pointed him in the right direction. The doctor was, of course, in his office and he looked up at the sound of Bo barging in.

  “Please, come in,” he said drily.

  Bo frowned a little at that but didn’t let it throw him. “You’re needed in the ER. We’ve got a motorcycle crash patient being set up right now.”

  “And? What makes him so special that I have to... Ah. One of them?”

  Bo nodded. The doctor himself was not a shapeshifter but he was one of the few humans who were aware of their existence.

  Sighing, Dr. Goldman stood up. “Very well, then. I’ll be there in a moment or two.”

  “Thanks!” Bo chirped, and he began to work his way back through the twisting hallways and heavy metal doors to get to the room where Ryker was. A little smile played around the corners of his lips for some reason he couldn’t quite understand. He was nearly there, sensing the alpha just on the other side of the nearest door, when a shout brought him reeling back around.

  Hannah stood there down at the other end of the hallway, head tilted curiously so that her blonde hair fell down across one shoulder. “Bo! We just got another call! We need to go out now!”

  Damn, he swore silently, before suddenly realizing what he had been doing. He had no business coming back to Ryker after putting him in the care of the ER nurses, so why exactly had he felt compelled to return like this?

  “Okay,” he called out reluctantly and started to head towards her.

  Suddenly, her eyes gave a little flash that he was able to pick up on even from this distance. “Actually, there are still some straps in the room that we need to bring with us. Can you get them for us and then hurry up?”

  He smarted a little at being bossed around by someone he had seniority over, but he was glad to have the chance to do what he had been wanting to do all along.

  He practically lunged through the doorway and found it blessedly empty but for Ryker, who looked far smaller than he should have when swallowed up in the enormity of the too-soft hospital bed.

  “Hi,” he said quietly.

  Ryker didn’t even move his head, as well he shouldn’t have with that brace still on. Instead, only his dark eyes slid around to glare apathetically at Bo. “Hi.”

  His heart ached softly. It had to be terrible, to be so strong but now to be reduced to a state so much the opposite of what the alpha must be used to.

  “Um...I hope everything gets better for you,” was all he could think to say. He moved off past the fluffy white bed and picked up the straps Hannah had spoken of, lying uselessly against the wall.

  “Sure,” Ryker growled. “I’m sure it’s all going to be so great now that I...” His voice trailed away. “Get out of here.”

  Bo was dying to ask, but he had already wasted too much time here.

  Feeling like his soul was being ripped apart, he turned on his heel and ran out of the ER just as a nurse was walking in to tend to the huge man.

  He had to trust that the others would treat Ryker with every bit of skill they had, just as he would.

  Still, he wondered why it felt so hard to walk away.

  Chapter 2

  How on earth had it come to this? From the top of the world, leader of the largest pack in all of Seattle and the surrounding areas, down all the way to the bottom where even an omega had more strength than he did?

  Ryker hated himself for that, for not seeing the warning signs that had probably led up to this moment in his life. No, that had led up to the events of only two hours ago when the members of his own pack called a council meeting without him. That had been the culmination of it all but certainly there had been moments in the past weeks and months where he’d questioned the actions of those around him. Whispers instead of howls, a strange detachment between members instead of the communal peace there had always been...

  He had been such a fool, to chalk it all up to just the changing of the season, or the onset of mating season. Such a fool.

  But had things only just started going wrong, or had they been astray since the very moment he was born? He knew his parents had not imagined that their son would be an alpha. Two betas usually gave birth to an omega, but by the time he reached three years old it was quite apparent that he was very dominant. He surpassed even them by the time he was ten years old.

  Had it all started to go wrong then, when he rebelled against them and joined a gang at eleven? Or had there still been time to back away from it all?

  Maybe there had been time to reverse the damage of his choices right up until he challenged the current leader of the gang at sixteen, but the moment he won, perhaps all his chances at leading a normal life had been thrown out the window by his own hand.

  Whether or not this was the case, Ryker Hill would never know the answer, but he certainly hadn’t been expecting his reign to end like this.

  He should have been dead. Vanquished at
the fangs of his challenger, instead of outcast with only the wolf-wound equivalents of paper cuts on his body. It was all so incredibly wrong...

  And that little omega who was with the paramedics... Ryker still shuddered to imagine the boy’s touch on his skin, hurting him in a strange and tentative sort of way. That sensation...it seemed almost as if he should have recognized that feeling somewhere deep in his soul, but there was too much else going on for it to be apparent.

  Just then, the door to the room he was in opened up wide and a nurse strode inside. “Hi there, Ryker,” she said cheerfully. “My name is Mindy and I’m here to check your blood pressure and all that fun stuff. Just the usual things that get done every time you go to the doctor.”

  “Blood pressure might be a bit high,” he growled.

  Mindy nodded sagely as she readied the cuff and then gently began to wrap it around his upper arm, being as careful as possible not to jostle him too much. “Because of stress, you mean.”

  “No, because of the pretty lady feeling up my muscles.”

  She giggled dutifully and batted her eyes at him, but he felt for some reason that she hadn’t been nearly as taken in by what he said as he thought she would be. And now that he thought about it, he realized that he didn’t mean the words at all. He could hardly remember what she looked like when he turned his head away. What did that mean?

  The pressure on his arm increased in that unbearable way it always did, and Mindy nodded again. “You’re right. It’s very high. But you don’t feel faint or anything, hon?”

  “I feel about as good as I can,” he grumbled.

  “Hmm. Well, I’ll tell the doctor about it and we’ll see what he says. Until then, I’m going to look at your cuts, okay?”

  He sighed and submitted to her will, as she peeked under each individual patch of gauze and recorded which ones would need stitches.

  “That crash of yours really must have done you in! What did you land on, hon?”

  “My face,” he replied.

  She laughed and he watched the swell of her chest bounce beneath her scrubs, but it did nothing for him. In fact, it almost made him feel queasy to be looking at her in such a manner so he quickly stopped.