Page 5

Grey

The feel of her is more than right. The feel of her body with my senses full of her true scent, the sensations stirring in my blood… Everything is right, except her fear, and the fear feels so wrong that not being able to take it from her makes it like an itch I can’t reach.

I get why the guys were concerned. Especially Joel, Linc, and Jase. They don’t get it. Yet.

It doesn’t matter what she’s done; the urge to do what fate intends me to do is stronger. Ty would get it. Mase would understand. I wonder, briefly, if Rye is doing what he needs to do right now, too, despite what his mate has done.

But I don’t linger on that thought for long, because that’s a complex situation. I mostly focus on what I do know – that nobody gets between an alpha and his mate. The council does take care of the whole pack so that’s why they almost tried, assuming my judgement was clouded. But if they’d have stopped me from leaving with her, it would’ve meant they don’t trust me. I’m glad I didn’t have to point that out.

Yeah, she shot Tyson. Yes, she’s poisoned some of the pack members. And I’ll get to the bottom of that. Bottom line: this is who I’m fated to be with, and it’ll get figured out.

My grandfather told me as a kid that matings aren’t always logical at first glance, but eventually they make sense. When I questioned my parents’ mating being short-lived, Granddad told me he believed Dad was meant to be with Carrie, but that his union with my mother served a purpose – the creation of me for this council, for this pack, for the Blackwood family. Part of Dad’s job as a council alpha was to provide for his pack and he did that with a further legacy of providing me for his pack. I’m for this pack; Carrie is for Dad. The way Granddad put it made sense to me as a kid, and I haven’t spent much time questioning it since then.

There’s a reason or reasons that the woman who’s been trying to harm our pack is here, is mine, and I’ll get to the bottom of it after I claim her.

The fact that she burst into tears and cried all the way back to our village was one clue this wasn’t her own agenda. I’d lay down a bet she was coerced by someone to do those ugly things. This isn’t someone acting like an enemy. This timid, pretty she-shifter doesn’t come across as an instigator at all. In fact, when I saw her at the diner the day Riley caught the scent of Erica Young, I suspected she was untouched by how shy she was, how she dropped her gaze every time I looked at her. By the pink hitting her cheeks and by the lack of male scent attached to her.

I definitely noticed her. Even flirted with her. She’s exactly my type. Feminine. Shy. Submissive.

Although it’s now clear she was masking her scent, I’m smelling her true scent now. Whether or not she’s actually a virgin is a mystery for the moment. But from now on, she’ll only be touched by me. Because she belongs with me. She’s about to belong to me.

Our eyes meet and hers are wide. She promptly looks away, glancing everywhere but at me, taking in the foyer, eyes bouncing from the double doors of the coat closet to the powder room, then down the hallway leading to the rec room, which extends to the laundry, storage and the utility room as well as the garage entrance. Straight ahead is a short staircase to take us up to the level with the living and dining rooms as well as the kitchen. I take us up.

“Welcome home, Blossom,” I say and run my nose across her throat, which draws a shiver from her.

Though she shivers, her fear scent also spikes higher as her eyes pan across the space.

“This is the space I put together waiting for you. I hope you like it.”

She stares blankly at my mouth for a beat, but then her eyes devour the space as I move through it.

“After you settle in, you can make any changes you want. Nothing sentimental here, all bought new so anything you don’t like, we’ll get rid of.”

“It’s beautiful just like this,” she whispers, and I find myself pleased because she seems like she means it.

Bailey and I brainstormed after I bought the place and once I told her about the color scheme I had in mind, she helped me pick out the furniture, the art, even the little things like dishes and linens to match.

Ahead of us is an overstuffed green velvet couch and matching loveseat. The room has polished off-white (Bailey calls them bone-colored) end tables and coffee tables, another shade of off-white (cream to Bailey) walls. A few pieces of nature-inspired art decorate the walls.

There’s a large, white brick fireplace dominating the living room. The living room and dining area are tied together with twin thick, (what my sister called) jewel-toned rugs. The dining area is taken up by an off-white (Bailey calls it ivory and swears it’s vastly different from the cream-colored walls and the bone- colored tables) glossy dining set for eight with a matching sidebar. They’re close in appearance to my coffee and end tables. I never use this table, instead eating at the kitchen island. But I look forward to using it now.

“Not professional decorators, but think we did okay,” I said. “My sister helped. You’ll like her.”

“Green is my second-favorite color,” she says softly.

“What’s your first?” I ask, mouth splitting into a smile.

She said that like a little kid would, with a bit of wide-eyed wonder.

“Red,” she replies, staring at my mouth.

“Got good news, then,” I say, and we move to the next staircase, which leads to the top floor where the bedrooms are.

I wanted red in the master and outfitted the black and white master bathroom with red towels and bathmats. “I’ll show you the kitchen later.”

Mase began to set up his place for a family after we caught Ty’s scent for the first time, knowing that the missing piece of our council wasn’t actually dead.

Feeling like everything would fall into place soon, he dreamt up the plans for his house, drew up those plans and we worked with him to build just what he wanted. After showing pictures to a prospective client, things snowballed and Mase’s house was featured in a design magazine, which did good things for Savage Construction and all our bank balances.

Me and Joel followed not long afterwards by buying our own places, and I find myself glad about it, because I’ve brought her to a home I readied for her instead of taking her to a crash pad like the house I lived in with the guys up until a few years ago.

Riley moved out a while back and bought his folks’ place when they wanted to downsize, so he’s all set, too.

Linc and Jase still live there, though I’m sure now that they’re seeing me identify my mate, they’ll think about carving out their own spaces pronto. If the schedule so far is anything to go by, it won’t likely be long for them either. That big, old house looks like it was decorated by a couple frat boys who fired their cleaning lady years ago. It’s no place to take your mate. But it is on the river near Roxy’s Bar. It’s a big place that could fit a large family, so maybe one of them will hold onto it.

I bought this house from Joel’s ex’s folks when they decided to retire to the mountains a few hours south of here, joining their daughter’s pack to be near her and their four granddaughters.

Rye, Mase, Jase, and Linc helped me with the renovations here, though Joel didn’t come over much at first.

He told me he was fine with me buying it, but it was obvious the place held old ghosts for him from his time with his ex, who was claimed by an alpha while we had to hold Joel back, knowing he couldn’t do a thing about it.

Once I changed just about everything about this house, I had a party to celebrate, and he came. He told me the place looked good. I told him I hoped once he identifies his own mate, it’ll erase whatever old feelings still linger. It’s been over a decade since she mated and left town and Joel still won’t talk about it. We’re all looking forward to him moving on with his fated mate, knowing it’ll help him finally put his ex behind him.

Her parents leaving the village helped; I know he never found it easy to talk to them afterwards and he was always withdrawn for weeks after she visited them here. Joel doesn’t show it to many, but he feels things in a big way.

I’m happy with how this place turned out. I dug out the basement and added the garage and rec and utility spaces, put balconies and sliding doors on the upper two stories, and knocked down a couple walls. I also put in a new chef’s kitchen, not that I’m much of a cook. Wishful thinking that my future mate would be.

The place has a big yard and more than anything, I liked the location. It’s beside a big park with a playground; the place I played baseball in as a kid. On the other end of that park is a path that leads to the street my childhood home is on, where Dad, Mom, and my sister live, so it’s not much more than shouting distance and nice and close for babysitting needs once there are pups.

I’ve always pictured my future to include a large family. Always loved the idea of an unbreakable bond with someone, my parents’ bond severing notwithstanding. There’s got to be a pretty damn good reason for a severing and it’s a process designed so it can’t be done without certainty. To this day, I don’t know why their bond was severed, but as it happened before I was out of diapers and she left never to return, I have no memories of her and felt like nothing was missing from my life.

I know she was a member of the local coven, knew people in the village before she mated with my father. I also know no one in the pack has seen her since they split.

A few years after she left, Carrie stepped into the mother role for me, and I have very few early memories of times before she took that role, so I’ve got nothing but love and respect for the human woman I call Mom.

Carrie tearfully told me she couldn’t give me the many brothers and sisters she’d hoped to give while I held my little sister in her fluffy pink blanket for the first time. Pregnancy and childbirth were rough on her so when Bailey was still tiny, she went to town for surgery at the human hospital to ensure she wouldn’t become pregnant again.

Whether my biological mother had other children or not, I don’t know, but I grew up playing, roughhousing, hunting, and laughing with the five brothers fate gave me with my council co-alphas not to mention other kids in the pack. Bailey came along and we’re close. And now that I’ve got Ty, now that we’ve all got Ty, finding my mate is one of the two missing pieces taken care of.

This female is key to completing my circle. Great family. Awesome friends. A community I would die for, and I’ll get to make kids, watch them grow, and do it with my soulmate by my side. The only missing piece would be connecting with the witch blood in me, and I’ve been feeling called to do that as well, especially since finding out Riley’s mate is my first cousin. Now that Erica Young is here, I suspect it’s time for me to get acquainted with witchcraft.

This place has space for a big brood. An extension if we need more rooms. I’m thirty-two. She’s probably not far off twenty-five or twenty-six, so plenty of years available to make that big family.

We get to the bedroom, and I watch her eyes widen, landing on my unmade bed. Not only is her heart racing, her body shaking, but also the scent of her fear is stronger at the sight of my king bed covered with the tousled red comforter and black sheets.

“Didn’t make the bed. Didn’t know I’d be bringing you home,” I admit.

Speaking of which, the kitchen is a bit of a write-off, too. And there are probably jeans on the bathroom floor, toothpaste in the sink.

I watch her take in the space, the white bedroom furniture, the cream-colored walls other than the wall behind the headboard that’s a color called red gumball . I don’t give a shit about one shade from the next, but remember my sister insisting gumball was the nicest of the dozen paint chips that all looked just red to me.

I set her down on the foot of my bed and twist the lamp on for some soft light before I turn the big light off, then squat in front of her, taking her face into both hands.

“What’s your name?” I ask.

She stiffens even further.

I lean closer and stare deep into her eyes.

“I know you’re my mate and I want you to tell me your name. It’s my right to know.”

“Or what?” she asks.

And this is a true question, not a dare. She’s trying to determine if I’m threatening her.

I stroke her face with my thumbs while continuing to cradle her jaw. “Tell me your name now, babe, so I’ll know what to whisper into your skin while I make you mine.”

“Stacy,” she whispers immediately.

I feel a touch of relief, but it’s short-lived; she’s not okay and I need to fix that.

“First … you don’t need to be afraid, Stacy, okay?”

She swallows.

“You’re supposed to be mine. Don’t you feel it?” I ask.

She stares at me like I’m speaking in a language she doesn’t understand.

“So, you don’t feel it. But I promise you will. I’m gonna take good care of you tonight as I make you mine. You’ve got nothing to be afraid of.”

She continues staring.

“Gonna be blunt with this question, Blossom. Are you untouched?”

Still staring.

I rephrase, “Virgin?”

She shakes her head just slightly.

And before I’m able to guard it, I know I’m showing disappointment. She sees it; she looks embarrassed.

“Once you’re mine, that won’t matter to me, because you’re never gonna be touched by anybody but me going forward. I know you’re terrified right now so I thought it was because you haven’t–” I grind my teeth and haul in a big breath and let it out slowly in an attempt to shove off the possessive anger I feel right now at the idea of someone else touching her. “Never mind that. Let’s talk for a minute.”

She doesn’t speak.

“Okay?” I prompt.

She looks baffled as she nods just slightly, those huge brandy eyes full of fear and confusion.

“Right. So, the rutting urge is closin’ in on me, just being honest, but the nurture urge is stronger, luckily, so we’re gonna talk this out before we proceed. And Stacy… I promise I’ll make it good for you.”

She frowns.

“You’re afraid of me,” I state. “You shouldn’t be. Okay?”

“I… I shot your pack member,” she whispers.

“And why’d you do that?” I ask.

She blinks a few times.

“He’s gonna be fine,” I advise.

The relief is evident. She didn’t want to do it.

“And I hurt some of the other alphas,” she adds.

“And you think you’re in trouble.”

“Aren’t I?” she asks.

“We’re not in the habit of harming women. We want to know why you tried to take out Ty, of course. We make it a priority to protect our people, yeah. We have a right to be able to eat at a restaurant without being poisoned.”

Her expression drops even further.

“I’m thinkin’ you didn’t wanna do any of that. I’m guessin’ you were doing someone else’s bidding. Am I right?”

She flinches.

“All right, we’ll get to that later. You in a relationship with the guy who put you up to all this?”

She shakes her head.

“No?”

She shakes her head again, but there’s something strange in her expression.

“No relationship?” I prompt.

“Not exactly…”

“Well, you’re in one now. One that’ll last the rest of our lives.”

My eyes travel the length of her body as she exhales slowly. Her fingers tremble as she tries to adjust the t-shirt I gave her, either because she’s hiding her legs or because she’s cold.

I catch Linc’s scent just before my doorbell rings three short rings. She jolts so hard her body bounces off the bed, but I catch her before she falls to the rug.

She stiffens in my embrace as I guide her back to sitting on the end of the bed, explaining, “That’s just Lincoln.” I tap my nose. “Linc’s probably just dropped off your bag. Everyone knows to stay away when an alpha takes his mate home to claim her. We shouldn’t be interrupted again.”

My phone dings with a text message. “Or we shouldn’t be,” I amend distractedly as I fetch my phone from my pocket. “Chances are, the only other interruption will be tomorrow sometime, when my family drops off food, but they’ll just ring the bell and leave it.”

“Food?” she asks.

My eyes scan the text message Linc just sent. He wants my attention otherwise he wouldn’t have texted and rang the bell.

“Pack tradition. When an alpha claims his mate, they don’t typically surface for a week or so, so their family cooks a bunch of meals and drops them off. Where were you staying in The Hollow?” I ask. “Linc’s offering to pick up the rest of your gear. Says there’s a set of keys clipped to your backpack. One of them a key to your place?”

“Uh…”

“You got more gear? You’ve been here a bit?”

Linc’s text said he’s got the gun and a dead phone, too.

“I… a bit.”

“Where’d you stay?”

She shakes her head. “I can’t tell you.”

I lean in. “We might not be able to catch your scent trail since you masked it, but we’ll figure it out the regular way. Not a big town and you work at the diner, so it won’t be difficult. Either you rented a place or stayed at the motel. Sooner you start telling me everything, the faster we can put it all behind us.”

She takes this as a threat and shrinks back. “I… if you let me go, I’ll talk to h-him and ask him to leave you guys be. I’ll try my best to convince him.”

I cock my head to the side. “Who?”

“But if he wants to meet, be careful. He lies.” She frowns, and begins speaking faster. “Please don’t say I told you that. I don’t know why I just told you that.” She squeezes her eyes shut tight and then shakes her head. “I don’t know why I’m even suggesting this. Talking to him is pointless. He won’t listen to anybody; thinks he knows everything. He just gets people to do his bidding. Like me. I… I could’ve killed someone today. I actually tried to hurt someone.”

She starts shaking hard, staring at her trembling hands. “I could’ve. It would’ve changed me forever. Just pulling that trigger feels like it changed me, changed everything about who I am. That’s not me. Poisoning, shooting? N-not m-me.”

A sob bursts from her mouth, and I realize the adrenalin from everything that happened today is now ebbing. Now that she’s here, sitting down in a room on a soft bed with soft lighting, she’s crashing.

I gather her close, rearrange some covers over us and position her on her side, facing me.

She stares at her hands, which are pressed against my chest. Her eyes pan up to mine. The instant they do, an avalanche of emotion surges from her expression and I know if we were already mated, I’d feel it. It’s hard enough to watch, I can’t imagine how it’d feel if I felt all that I see from her. Tears trickle and though I’m sure she’s trying to hold back the flood of emotions, it’s wracking her body.

Her eyes dart away. I pull her closer to me.

“It’s okay, Blossom,” I say into her soft hair, taking in her scent as she fuses with me, my arms tight around her. “Don’t try to stop it. All those big feelings need to go somewhere. I can handle them. I’m here, I’m your mate, and it’s my job to take all your burdens. Go ahead, give ‘em to me.”

I kiss the top of her head, and she hesitates for a split second before she melts into me, clutching my back with her hands.

“Go ahead, babe,” I say. “You’re safe with me. I fuckin’ swear it.”

She begins to bawl her heart out.

Her submitting this way, letting go and giving this to me feels incredibly important.

Three or four minutes in, my phone chimes with another text, but the phone is no longer in my hand. It’s somewhere in this bed, so I ignore it. I’m holding my mate, stroking her hair, my lips to the soft skin of her forehead. My body heat has notched itself up and she’s melted into me.

“Someone made you do it,” I whisper.

She nods and buries her face in my throat.

“And you’ve never done anything like that before.”

She shakes her head.

“Ty’s fine. You didn’t hurt him. He recovered quickly and he’s a hundred per cent already.”

She nods, a huge, relieved breath gushing from her.

“The men you poisoned are fine. They recovered. It was a pain in the ass for our pack. We were concerned about it, but now we know. You’ll tell me why you did it, you’ll tell our healer what you gave them, and we’ll figure it all out. Nobody’s permanently hurt.”

She sniffles, still trembling.

“It’s okay, Stacy, I promise. We’ll sort it all out. Whoever made you do it can’t make you do anything else. They won’t force you to do what’s not you . You’re safe. I’ll see to that. I’ll see to all of it.”

She glances up and stares at me with wonder blended with pain before her expression shifts, changing to something different, something shrewd as she looks at me like she’s trying to figure me out.

“I’m not a liar,” I inform. “Not a game-player. What you see is what you get with me. You’ll soon trust in that. I’m not shitting you here.”

I cup the back of her head and bring her face into my throat again.

“I’m getting your skin all wet,” she says, voice muffled.

“Don’t care. But I’ll get us something to drink. We’ll talk some more. One sec, wait here.” I reluctantly let go of her and slip out of the room.

My wolf is practically howling inside me, wanting me to mount and mark her.

Mating her will forge a bond that’ll help her settle, feel safe, and I’ll finally be able to purr, which will put her at ease. This little female is timid. Traumatized. Someone made her do shit she didn’t want to do today. And at that diner.

I’ll find out who, find out why. I’ll show her she’s safe. And I’ll deal with whoever and whatever this is threatening the pack. One step at a time. She’s mine. I’m hers. One foot or paw in front of the other, all this is meant to be, and it’s all going to work out.

***