Claiming Beauty

CLAIMING BEAUTY ONCE UPON A SHIFTER BOOK 1 SKYE ALDER CONTENTS Want a free book? Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Want a free book? Did you know? About the Author Also by Skye Alder Copyright © 2022 by Skye Alder www.skyealder.com [email protected] All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. All characters and storylines are the property of the author and your support and respect are appreciated. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author. Created with Vellum WANT A FREE BOOK? Check out Possessed By The Alpha today! You can grab it Here. Check out www.skyealder.com for more freebies! * Who chooses to fall in love with a beast? That's the question that Thatcher has been asking himself for years. It's why he doesn't date, has never tried to find his fated mate, and rarely leaves his home. He knows what he is, and he can't bear to see the looks he gets whenever he goes out. He's content with his life of solitude. Until she shows up. Clara Young. She's the beauty to his beast, his fated mate, but Thatcher knows that this isn't a fairytale. She's stuck here because of the winter storm, but eventually, she'll leave him, just like everyone else. Unless he can change her mind and claim her before the storm passes. Come meet the shifters of the North Star pack as they find their fated mates. These four Alphas are hot and wealthy, just like the fairy tale characters they’re based on! These guys just have a little more... bite. ONE Clara Snow whips around my face, making my cheeks numb and obscuring my view of anything more than a few feet in front of my face. Not for the first time, I wonder if maybe I should have taken my brother, Rule, or best friend, Sunny, up on their offer to accompany me on my journey. My wolf snorts in disgust at spending a week alone with just my brother and Sunny, and I have to agree. They just mated a few months ago, and I know they’re still in that honeymoon phase. Besides, the whole point of this little camping trip is to try to find myself and figure out what I want to do with my life next. Snow and wilderness be damned, I am determined to put the last few years behind me and start over. I just retired from my life as a plus-sized model, and I’m looking forward to a free schedule with zero social obligations. Maybe I took my dream a little too far when I decided to hike up a mountain in a blizzard, but my heart was in the right place. I want to settle down and hopefully find my fated mate. Seeing my brother and best friend so happy together has only reaffirmed my dream to find my own mate and get my own happily ever after. Sunny and Rule said that I could stay with them for as long as I wanted, but it’s a little awkward being around them now that they’re together, especially during the mating moon. I love them both, but that’s too close for comfort. With the next mating moon coming in a few days, I knew I needed to get out of town. I couldn’t stand to listen to the two of them going at it again this month. Besides, I’m hoping that with the mating heat, I might be able to find my mate, too. My wolf curls up in my chest, partially because of the cold and partially out of shame. We’ve had a harder time than most shifters when it comes to locating our mate. Other shifters are able to sniff out their one true love, but I’m the only shifter I know who has trouble smelling. I have ever since I was born. The doctors told my parents it was anosmia, though it isn’t a total loss of smell. Just most of it. With my sense of smell dimmed, I have to be extra observant if I want to find my fated mate. The cold burns the tip of my nose, and I struggle forward a few more steps in the knee-high snow. As a shifter, my body temperature is higher than that of humans, but it doesn’t make much difference when it’s below zero outside. My feet and legs sting with every step, the bitter cold seeping into my bones and wrapping around my spine. I don’t know if I’ll ever be warm again. I’m up in Washington state, near the North Star pack’s land. I had planned for snow, just not this much of it, and now I’m struggling to find someplace warm and dry that I can stay in until this freak snowstorm passes. I’m sure one of the pack members will happily let me crash with them. I just need to find their houses first. As if the snow and wind weren’t enough, being in a new place certainly has my senses confused. Unfortunate for a shifter who relies on sight, sound, and smell to navigate the world. My wolf paces inside me, reminding me she could come out and bound through the snow ten times faster than I can, but I dismiss her suggestion. She whines, and I remind her that I don’t know the area well enough, and we’re well into hunting season. My wolf sighs and collapses in a dramatic heap inside my chest. I make