Carnal Alpha (Alpha's Obsession 1)

Chapter One

Cameron

“If it doesn’t rain soon, we might have to feed these to the cows.”

Zoe glares at me as she wraps a possessive arm around her tomatoes. “These are high quality, organic tomatoes, painstakingly grown with love and sweat. If you feed them to cows, I’ll feed you to your brother’s crazy bear.”

I glance at the forest on the edge of our ranch where Adrian’s deranged bear is probably terrorizing the local wildlife. I can’t worry about him and his savage grizzly now. We have bigger bears to fry. Our entire 1200 acre ranch has dried up from the drought and the grass is getting too burnt for the cows to feed on.

We have about five hundred of them and they’re getting hungrier every day.

Jane walks over, carrying a basket full of the largest zucchinis I’ve ever seen. “Who are we feeding to Adrian’s wild bear?”

Zoe’s eyes light up when she looks at her. Those two have been together for over twenty-five years and still have hearts in their doey eyes.

“Cameron is eying our vegetable stand,” Zoe says as she takes the zucchinis and sets them on the table next to the radishes.

“Oh, is he?” Jane asks as she picks up a tomato and starts tossing it to herself while she glares at me.

These two work for us on the ranch. They’re in charge of growing all the fruits and vegetables and selling them to the locals. They’re very loyal to us Bowen brothers, but they’re even more loyal to their produce.

“You can keep them for now,” I say as I slowly back away from the two women. “Let’s just hope it rains soon.”

It’s been weeks without a drop this summer and everything is starting to turn to dust. The grass is brown and crunchy, and with not enough to eat, the animals are starting to get irritable. We’ve been supplementing their diet with bought feed, but we’re running low on that too and there are shortages throughout the state of Montana where we live.

My eyes narrow on Logan as he comes riding over the yellow hill in the distance. I hope he has good news.

Logan is my brother, even though we don’t share the same blood running through our veins. We were best friends as kids and when his dad got into a tractor accident when Logan was only fourteen years old, my parents took him in and he’s been a brother to us three Bowen boys ever since.

Dust explodes under the hooves of his horse as he gallops across the wide-open pasture. Logan is shirtless as he grips the reins and bounces on his huge black stallion named Zeus, his cowboy hat clinging to his brow. The guy never takes it off.

I glance over my shoulder and see both Jane and Zoe watching him as he cuts through the dry dusty field.

“What are you two looking at?” I ask them with a grin. “I thought you were only interested in women.”

“He’s a beautiful man,” Jane says as she watches Logan approach. “I enjoy looking at beautiful flowers too. But that doesn’t mean I want to have sex with them.”

“Fair enough,” I say with a laugh.

I start jogging across the field to meet him. The sweltering summer sun is out in full force today with no cloud in sight.

Logan pulls up the reins and comes to a stop in front of me. I stroke his horse’s head and my hand comes away slick with sweat.

“Anything?” I ask, clinging onto the last tiny bit of hope inside of me.

Logan’s cowboy hat drops as he shakes his head. “Everywhere is dry.”

“Even the west side by the lake?”

His big shoulders slump. “Even by the lake. There’s nowhere for them to graze.”

“Shit,” I mutter as I look around, wondering what the hell to do. “All right. I’ll have to go find some feed for these cows.”

“Want me to come with?” Logan asks.

“Nah, stay here. I might need to load up a few bags on the passenger seat of the truck.”

My inner grizzly bear starts growling and pacing angrily as I head back to the house to get ready to leave.

Stop, I tell him. I don’t need this shit now.

He rumbles back with annoyance as he circles around inside of me. It’s the most irritating feeling to have an agitated grizzly bear inside of you. It’s like every cell in your body is twitchy and you can’t shake it off.

After a snarl from my bear, I stop and squeeze my fists.

I’m not dealing with this now, I hiss at him. I got five hundred hungry cows. Understand me?

He doesn’t give a shit about hungry cows. I think he would slaughter every single one of them if it meant getting closer to his mate. That’s the only thing on his mind. It’s always on his mind. And it’s starting to drive me crazy.