Three men and one lucky woman

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Two Wolves, a Man, and Their Woman (MFM) Werewolf Castle book 5

All three Golubev brothers—two werewolves, Dominik and Stefan, and one human, Uwe—want the same human woman, Kady Balan, who works at Werewolf Castle with their sister Anastasia. They decide to unite their efforts to claim her. With all three of them on the job, they can’t possibly fail to attract her to them. But none of their attempts to get to know her better succeed.

First they take her to a waterfall, but she’s wearing a swimsuit under her clothes so they don’t get to see her body. Then they meet strangers on the mountain who are planning trouble for their Alpha, so their date is cut short as they rush Kady out of danger and go to tell the Alpha what is happening. With various Alphas fighting to be the Supreme Alpha of Europe, will they ever find time and safety to romance Kady properly?

STORY EXCERPT

Food. That was why she was working at the castle this summer. She’d recently graduated from the local college with qualifications as a chef. She’d worked part-time all through school in a fast food restaurant and there was a job waiting for her there again, any time she cared to return. But she’d wanted this summer doing what she thought of as “real” cooking. At the castle she’d made pies and cakes, baked bread, and experimented with a range of semimedieval meals and all the attendant spices. Kady’d spent hours and hours researching medieval recipes and practicing how to make a medieval dish taste good to a twenty-first century palate.

She loved the work and was going to miss it like hell when the tourist season ended and she wasn’t needed anymore. She was going to miss Uwe Golubev, too. Kady walked over to a tree and sat on the grass, resting her back against its trunk.

Uwe. Such a yummy man. And human like her, not a werewolf like his father and two older brothers. Kady’s friend and coworker, Anastasia Golubev, was the baby of her family and a trained chef. She’d been working at the castle for three years even though she was human, too. A few months ago there’d been trouble with some people spying on workers in the castle, and the Alpha of the Werewolf Castle pack had called in Anastasia’s three brothers, all big fierce men, to keep a watch on the troublemakers. Uwe was an excellent baker, even though he had no training, so he’d started working in the kitchens and he was every bit as delicious as his pies and tarts.

Actually, all three brothers were mighty nice to look at. All big and dark and wild, like so many of the mountain werewolves, but smart and funny and good company as well. Although the oldest brother, Dominik, could be scary at times.

Kady grinned. The Werewolf Castle wolves suffered from a shortage of females, so they had a policy that two male wolves mated a human female. Anastasia herself had recently agreed to marry two of the wolves, Evan Huber, the head chef in the Castle Kitchen, and Ion Varga, an IT geek in the castle.

Kady wouldn’t have minded marrying a couple of handsome wolves herself. Especially Dominik and Stefan Golubev, but she liked the youngest brother, Uwe, even more. And he was human. Not that he’d ever made a move on her. He hadn’t asked her on a date or kissed her or anything. But she knew he was interested in her. Maybe she should make a move on him instead. Maybe she’d back him into the walk-in refrigerator and kiss him when he couldn’t get away from her or something. It’d be fun to see if he kissed her back or panicked. Except, she’d hate to be fired from this job. She loved it too much to jeopardize it. Dammit!

Kady caught a flash of movement out of the corner of her eye. She turned her head around to see behind her tree so fast she almost gave herself whiplash. Then she smiled. It was a wolf, a big black one, standing maybe a hundred feet away from her, watching her.

“Hi. It’s okay. I work at the castle,” she told him.

Well she supposed it was a him. She didn’t think one of their few females would be out here alone.

She rested back against the tree trunk again, closing her eyes, only to find the huge wolf’s front paws straddling her legs, his face almost in hers.

Her eyes snapped open at his hot breath on her face. Her heart was beating so fast she thought she might have a stroke, and she suddenly remembered there were actual wolves as well as werewolf shape-shifters, in these mountains. She opened her mouth to scream, as she stared into his gray eyes.

Gray eyes.

“Fuck it, Dominik Golubev! Back off, you big lump. You just about gave me a heart attack,” she yelled, ignoring the fact that strokes and heart attacks were different things, and people her age, twenty-two, didn’t usually have either of them.

“How did you know it was me and not Stefan?” Dominik had only taken the smallest of paces back from her, and he was stark naked. So naked, his long thick cock was just about at her chin level and very tempting. She forced her gaze higher, to rest on his face.

“Stefan isn’t as much of an asshole as you are. He wouldn’t deliberately try to scare me for no reason.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.” Dominik clicked his fingers and a second wolf appeared. This one was just as big and just as black, but it stood a few feet away from her, proving her point in her mind, at least.

“Go and put some pants on, Dominik. Or get back into your fur,” she said.

“We left our clothes by the gate. Who gave you the key to the gate? Humans aren’t supposed to come here, not even Werewolf Castle pack humans.”

“I climbed over the fence. It’s my day off and I’ve wanted to come up this mountain ever since I started work at the castle.”

Dominik stretched his hand down to hers, gripped, and hauled her to her feet.

“Well, you’ve seen the mountain and now it’s time to go. This area is private and you’re not a wolf.”

Kady eyed both man and wolf thoughtfully, then decided her chances of out arguing them were nonexistent. She shouldered her backpack and followed them down the mountain.

http://www.bookstrand.com/two-wolves-a-man-and-their-woman

Two Wolves and a Cook OUT NOW!

Where can an IT geek take two chefs on a date? Ion Varga is a werewolf and a Dom. Evan Huber is also a wolf, but Anastasia Golubev is human. Apart from that, they start work insanely early each day and work a seven-day week. By the time Ion solves that riddle, trouble has broken out in the Castle Kitchens.

It’s the height of the tourist season at Werewolf Castle, Anastasia has three big, bossy, older brothers, the new banquets are creating an enormous amount of work, and Evan thinks Lev is spying on them all. Ion worries Lev wants Anastasia for himself. Anastasia just wants them to take her down into the dungeons for some nice relaxing BDSM scenes. Lucky for her, Ion knows exactly how to please her and teach her and Evan some new games. But can his IT skills help solve their problems? Or will Lev’s people succeed?

http://www.bookstrand.com/two-wolves-and-a-cook

STORY EXCERPT

Ion Varga was a geek. He almost never wore medieval costume. He stayed in a nice quiet office, tucked away behind various security doors in the east wing, and did geeky stuff with mathematical models, statistical analysis, and computer programs the average tourist didn’t even know existed. There was a lot more to running a successful tourist attraction than sweeping the courtyard and having a few pretty girls dotted around to redirect lost tourists. He got to do the fun stuff without having to face the crowds and be nice to overweight, overtired paying customers.

Unfortunately, he was one of the few wolves who knew how to joust with a medieval sword and make it look exciting and dramatic, without actually hurting anyone. When his fellow geek, Grigori, had told him about the plans for the banquets, he’d thought it sounded like a great way for tourists to spend more money and have an added adventure without making an inordinate amount of extra work for the castle wolves. When Grigori had mentioned having some entertainment during the banquet, he’d agreed happily. When he found out that extra entertainment included him having a sword fight with someone else, he’d even thought it might be fun. Until he’d figured out just how much practice it took to make the moves look fluid and unexpected.

The practices had been long, and draining, and then he’d had to rearrange some of what he’d planned to do, as the banquet rooms were fairly narrow. However, they’d had their final rehearsals in the rooms themselves and he was fairly sure the customers would enjoy the show. Damask played a lute and Tatiana a wooden pipe similar to an early flute and they both sang an old medieval-style ballad about the wolves of Werewolf Castle. Then he explained a little about the swords he and Grigori would use.

Finally they had their fight, and apart from Grigori almost falling over at one stage, it went as planned. Actually the almost-fall just made it look even more realistic but he wouldn’t suggest they add it into their choreography in case one of them really did slip in the future. They bowed and left the room, walking the few steps to the identical room next door and doing at all again, minus the slip. After that, he took the second sword from Grigori and returned to his nice quiet office.

But seeing Damask there with Jairus and Grigori just reminded him of how badly he wanted to get to know Anastasia better. She’d been working here in the castle for years now, and he’d scarcely progressed beyond “hi” with her. Oh, he was a geek so he knew all about her human mother and werewolf father, her three older brothers—two wolves, one human—her home in the mountains, and the wild nature of her father and brothers. He knew she’d done very well at the specialist cooking school she’d attended, and he also knew she was single. All of that he’d gotten from the records in the castle computer files. He had access to all sorts of things other wolves knew nothing about.

What he didn’t have access to was her mind and her heart. Was she interested in forming a relationship with a couple of wolves? Was she ready for some dungeon play? Being from a wolf family she’d know all about BDSM but that didn’t mean she wanted to be involved in it and wanted that lifestyle herself. Maybe she was more like her human mother.

Then there was the matter of the second man to be included in the relationship. Watching her, Ion thought she was attracted to Evan. That was natural. She worked with him all day long and he was a talented man, an expert in the field she’d chosen. But did Evan like her? Ion had no idea at all.

The obvious way to find out was to invite her out on a date. But her first question, quite reasonably, would be, who is the other man? And if Evan wasn’t interested in joining them he was in big trouble. He’d be in even bigger trouble if she specifically wanted Evan and he wasn’t prepared to join them. Ion cringed at the kinds of disaster that could be.

Besides where could he take a couple of cooks out for dinner? The nearby town had a range of eateries, but whereas a bowl of Hungarian goulash or a burger would suit him just fine, they were not likely to be what Anastasia and Evan were looking for. There was a much bigger town an hour away which likely would offer better dining choices but he knew they started work very early in the morning. Cooking all the food for so many people was a huge job. Plus they made a lot of the treats sold by the Village Traders, as well. All of which meant it couldn’t be a late night out or they’d be tired the next morning. So an hour road trip each way would be a no.

Dammit. This was going to be more difficult than he’d thought. How was he supposed to get to know Anastasia? Was he going to have to wait until winter when Werewolf Castle only opened weekends and holidays?

http://www.bookstrand.com/two-wolves-and-a-cook

Two Wolves and a Dancer

Tatiana Ivanov needs help to plan the medieval dances for the castle’s banquets. Piotr Tomic, manager of the candy store and as delicious as his candies, and Alexandre Novak, head of customer service, are werewolf shape-shifters, perfect dance partners for her.

Piotr, a Dom, believes that at last the right woman for him to share has appeared. Alex wholeheartedly agrees. They take Tatiana up the mountain, under the stars at night, and begin to romance her, but right then the Alpha summons them. At first they’re concerned that the Alpha doesn’t want them to be together, but instead he sends them to Vienna to keep watch on St. Stephen’s Cathedral for messages for him about the warring factions over who should be the new Supreme Alpha of Europe. This is something completely unexpected to all of them. As well as learning about each other, they now have a very important job to do.

http://www.bookstrand.com/two-wolves-and-a-dancer

STORY EXCERPT

Tatiana Ivanov stared hard at the pictures on her computer screen then nodded, stepped out from behind her desk, extended her right arm as if she was holding someone’s hand, then walked forward three paces and bowed. She backed away three steps, then turned to her right and began walking in a circle.

“No, dammit, that won’t work.”

She stomped back to the computer and glared at the screen again, then pointed a long blue fingernail at a tiny figure. “There. He’s skipping. Maybe skipping will work.”

Back she went and did the three paces forward, bow, return. This time she skipped around in a circle. “Now if the partners go under each other’s arms it’ll be perfect. I need a partner to practice with though.”

It was getting late, but Tatiana didn’t think everyone would be in bed yet. She walked the length of the hallway into one of the living areas. She was in the east wing of Werewolf Castle, an area locked behind several layers of security where only the werewolves and their trusted friends had access. Tatiana herself was actually human, but her two cousins were both wolves, and her family and that of her aunt had always been close, so she’d been brought up knowing all about the truth of Werewolf Castle. Now she worked here in the summer, helping out with the tourists, and was busy planning some more entertainment for them. Genuine medieval dances. If only she could accurately puzzle out the movements depicted in these old tapestries.

Piotr Tomic was sprawled on a beanbag in the living room, his legs stretched out in front of him, watching tennis on the big screen television. The stores that lined the castle walls in the inner courtyard were known as the Village Traders, and Piotr managed the candy store. In Tatiana’s opinion he was every bit as delicious as the candy he sold. He was tall and lean, his hair and eyes so dark a brown as to almost appear black. The idea of dancing with him, even if it was only to plan a presentation for the tourists, suited her fine.

“Hey, Piotr. I need a victim to partner me while I design a dance for the medieval banquet.”

“Does this mean I get to hug you for no reason?” he asked her.

His eyes were sparkling black pools but she rather thought he was teasing. That was a pity. She’d be more than happy to press her body against his.

“Sadly, no. In those days holding hands was as sexy as it got.”

He grabbed the remote and switched the television off, then rose gracefully to his feet, bowed, and said gallantly, “My lady, I’m totally at your service.”

“If only.”

She led him back to the office where she’d been working and showed him the medieval tapestry of people dancing which she’d been looking at. She was impressed when he dropped into the chair she’d been using and muttered as he moved the mouse over the figures.

“You’re going to have to tell me what to do. It just looks like walking, bowing, skipping, and going under other people’s arms to me.”

“That’s what I think, too.”

For the next five minutes she danced him through her take on the movements in the tapestry, then she said, “Wait until I find some music and we’ll see if our timing is accurate.”

Tatiana went back to the computer and brought up a medieval music site she’d found and clicked on the first track. It was just a flute playing but she thought it should work. Once again they went through the stately movements, but this time it was Piotr who shook his head. “There needs to be more people. When you go under our joined hands it would be much better if another couple or two other couples did that as well. Yes. Six people would be best.”

Tatiana went and stopped the music. “That tapestry shows six people so that makes sense. Who else is still available right now? I really want to get this planned.”

Piotr pulled out his phone. “Alex? Can you come down to the office? Tatiana needs some people to help her with a dance she’s doing. Yes, you can dance. It’s just walking really. Thanks. See you in a minute.”

http://www.bookstrand.com/two-wolves-and-a-dancer