Page 4 of Forsaking His Mate (The Wolves of Black Mountain #1)

Chapter 4

Abel

I stumble into the hallway wall in my attempt to escape the kitchen. I can feel her calling to me, our mating bond trying to slam into place, but I push it ruthlessly aside. I won’t bond with her. I won’t bond with anyone.

With the door between us, I’m finally able to take a breath, but my heart is in my throat.

This is a nightmare.

My wolf is howling, trying to force the change that will allow him to greet her as my mate. I hold him back by sheer force of will, even though it feels as if my insides are being torn apart. I close my eyes, trying to focus on anything but the swimming in my head.

Who is she? And what is she doing in Hester’s kitchen?

This is my safe space, the only one I have, and this little wolf is encroached upon it.

Go back and claim her.

My wolf repeats this over and over inside the vaults of my mind. I ignore him. If he were thinking clearly, he’d know claiming her would be the worst thing we could do.

He doesn’t care that I don’t want a mate.

He doesn’t care about the danger we would subject her to by making her ours.

My wolf is driven by need. I’m struggling to deny it, too.

My body itches to go to her and tell her I made a mistake, but I can’t. I rush toward the front door instead, needing to get the fuck out of here.I’d thought she was Roux from behind. She has that same dark hair streaked with white, but her scent was different. It nearly drove me to the edge.

“I heard screaming.” Hester’s voice has me twisting around.

I’m so on edge I didn’t even sense or scent her presence. She’s coming down the stairs, tying her robe around her body as she moves. Her hair is in disarray, but her eyes are alert and sharp.

I lift my hand, pointing toward the kitchen, but the words stick in my throat. My body is trembling, every inch of my skin on fire.

“Who screamed?” she presses when I don’t offer anything.

“I… I need to leave.” I move toward the door again, but Hester is quick on her feet and stops in front of me, placing her hand over the door to stop me from opening it.

“Abel? What happened?”

I want to ignore her and keep running, but Hester has been good to me and I hold too much regard for her to disrespect her. “The girl in the kitchen…”

“The girl?”She glances in that direction and sniffs the air.“Tessa? What about her? ”

Before I can answer, the kitchen door opens, and Tessa is leaning against the frame, her eyes wide, tears streaming down her face.

Tessa.

A pretty name for a pretty wolf, and she is pretty. Her hair is piled on top of her head in a way that shouldn’t be attractive, but my cock is standing to attention. She has piercing green eyes that remind me of the emeralds, but they are wary and filled with pain.

She’s petite for a wolf, but I can scent she’s not entirely one of us. She’s like the other women Hester has here.

She’s tau.

Judging from the way she tried and failed to shift, a latent one.

Hester glances between us and I know she’s wondering what the hell is going on.

My head swims as I try to drag my gaze from Tessa’s tear-streaked face. Fuck, I want to go to my mate.

Claim her.

No. I shake my head. “Stay the fuck away from me,” I hiss, pointing in Tessa’s direction.

I don’t miss the ripple of agony and fuck, I want to take it back, but I’m too engrossed in my own emotions to do that.

“Abel!” Hester grabs my arm before I can get to the door. I don’t shrug her off, knowing my strength makes it likely I’ll hurt her, but I don’t let her stop me either.

“Let me go,” I growl.

She does and I storm out of the house. I can feel Tessa everywhere, and my wolf is screaming at me to go back. I ruthlessly push his voice aside and rush around the back of the house toward my cabin.

Roux is sitting on her porch, a mug clutched between her hands as I pass. Her dark hair is streaked with white, even though she isn’t old. Moon touched, we all joke. It reminds me of the little wolf in the kitchen, the one who mine wants to claim.

She stands as I speed past her, calling my name, but I ignore her, rushing up the steps to my porch and into my cabin.

I want to shift and run as my wolf, but I don’t dare give him control when Tessa is this close to me. Instead, I sag against the door and try to calm my racing heart. This is what I always feared would happen.

I ran away from everything I knew to find peace with what I am, to stop it from consuming me. Hester gives me that; she keeps me controlled and stops me from sliding into the darkness that has cursed all the males in my family.

What shitty luck is it that my mate would be here, the one place where I feel I can exist without endangering anyone?

I have to leave.

I grab a bag from under the bed, tossing it on the mattress, but I don’t move to fill it. I want to go, but I can’t; I’m too dangerous. Hester’s magic is all that keeps me from sliding into madness.

Fuck .

I would have to find another witch willing to deal with a wolf, and since full-blooded witches hate our kind, that is never going to happen.

I run a hand over my face, forcing myself to think of a solution. I never expected to find my mate here. I am thousands of miles from my old pack, and these wolves are hybrids, most of them more witch than wolf. I thought that would prevent them from mating, from experiencing the mating bond. I didn’t realize they could be drawn to their mates the same way as full-blooded shifters.

Fuck, fuck, fuck !

I try to calm my racing thoughts. This is a nightmare; one I don’t know how to wake up from.

My wolf doesn’t agree. He wants me to shift and go to our mate. His insistence is so compelling I start toward the door and have to stop myself.

I can’t.

A knock on the door has me twisting toward it, like it’s a live grenade. It’s not Tessa, which is the only thing that stops me from losing my shit. It’s Hester, but I don’t know what the fuck I’m meant to say to her.

“I know you’re in there, Abel Tanner.” Hester’s voice is muffled through the door, but it is firm and laced with annoyance.

I huff out a breath, knowing she’s not going to leave until I talk to her. I go to the door, pulling it open.

My cabin is small, just one room with a kitchen and a bed. The other cabins have more space, but I never wanted much, and this is just where I sleep. I usually eat at the main house—or I did. I won't be able to do that anymore.

Hester’s gaze slides around the room before stopping on the empty bag on the bed. “Going somewhere?”

“I don’t know,” I admit.

“What happened back there? Tessa’s a mess and you’re running.”

It doesn’t feel good to hear that. I don’t want to destroy the woman, but I’m not going to try to save her either.

“You need to keep her the fuck away from me.”

Hester takes my outburst without reproach. “Abel, talk to me.”

I lower my head, trying to breathe through the pain in my chest. My wolf is pissed at me and making it known very clearly. “She’s… mine.”

It hurts to admit that, and my heart squeezes a little tighter.

Hester frowns, then her eyes widen. “She’s your mate?”

“As soon as I scented her, my wolf went wild. Hers too. She tried to shift.”

She screamed. I remember that. Hearing it nearly pushed me over the edge and forced my wolf free. My claws had broken the skin, but I stopped the transformation. If I'd relinquished control to my wolf, I would have been helpless to stop the mating bond from snapping fully into place.

The silence is deafening as Hester tries to work through her thoughts. She knows me well enough to know what coming face-to-face with my mate would do to me.

“You rejected her?” she guesses.

“What was I supposed to do? I can’t have a mate, Hester.”

“Fate doesn’t care about what you want, Abel. She’s yours. The fact you’re both here together at the same time says this is meant to be.”

I growl, sounding more animal than man at this moment. “I don’t believe in fate.”

Hester shifts her shoulders. “It doesn’t matter if you believe in it or not. Fate brought you to me, just as it brought her. You’re both meant to be here together.”

“You know I can’t take her as my mate. Wasn’t your magic supposed to prevent this?”

I sound angry. I am. This shouldn’t be happening .

“There is no magic in existence that can stop you from wanting a mate that is fated.”

“What about my own desire to reject her?”

“Not even that! You’ll always be fighting against yourself.”

“Then I’ll fight.”

“She’ll fade away if you don’t claim her. You know what happens to rejected mates.”

I flinch at her words. I do. It is a tale we are told from a young age. Most fated mates can’t resist each other anyway, but there have been instances in the past where wolves have denied their mate.

I shake my head, as if to help clear it. I can’t think about my little wolf at this moment. “She’s one of you, right?”

“She’s tau, yes.”

“Her witch half will protect her from that.”

Hester glares at me and I can feel the waves of rage coming off her. “You don’t know that. We’ve never had a mated tau at the sanctuary. I have no idea what will happen. But I do know what happens to full-blooded wolves who don’t complete the mating bond. It isn’t pretty, Abel. She’s going to suffer in agony before withering away to a shell of who she is.”

That should be enough to make me go to her and save her. I know what it feels like to live under a cloud, waiting to lose your mind. I have dealt with that since I was a pup. Every generation of males in my family has had moon sickness.

She grabs my arm, forcing me to look at her. I hate seeing the disappointment in her eyes. “You have to go to her.”

“I shouldn’t have stayed in the sanctuary. These women are still part wolf. This was always a risk.” I curse myself for that, for putting myself in this position.

“So, what? You’re done? You’re just going to run, you coward?”

I snarl at her. She might as well have slapped me across the face. I feel her judgment weighing down my shoulders. “I never said I was done.”

“You go out there without anyone treating your moon sickness, and you know what will happen,” she says, her voice filled with anger. “You can’t just walk away.”

“I don’t want to walk away.”

“So, what are you going to do?” Hester’s question brings me out of my thoughts.

“I don’t know.” Avoid her. “I can’t leave without risking myself. I can’t stay without risking her. I’m out of options, Hester.”

Hester seizes my arm, her grip tight. “You’re controlled. As long as we redo the spell every ten days, you’ll stay that way. But this? There’s no magic that can stop it. She’s your true mate. You’re not going to be able to be around her without wanting her.”

She’s right. I can’t. I can sense Tessa, even from this distance. I know she’s still in the main house, which relaxes my wolf, but I can feel a hint of her emotional state too, her anger and grief warring with pain. I can stop all of it, and my feet want to move, but I force them to keep still.

Hester stares at me as I mentally fight myself. “I don’t know how you’re resisting,” Hester says.

Sheer force of will. It’s easier when I’m not around her, but I can still feel that pull, as if we are connected to each other by a string. “Because mating isn’t my destiny, Hester. I don’t deserve to be happy or content. ”

Hester’s face softens, as does her anger.

“I understand why you think that, but you’re wrong.”

“I won’t destroy her.” This is my hill to die on. I can’t get close to anyone, let alone a mate. “I won’t be my father.”

“This is not the same—”

“She stays out of my way and I’ll stay out of hers.”

Hester stares at me and I see the defeat in her eyes. “So that’s your plan? You’re just going to pretend she doesn’t exist?”

“Yes.”

“What you’re doing is cruel. At least talk to her and explain why you’re rejecting her.”

I should. I owe her that much, but admitting the truth about me isn’t something I want to do.

“It’s best we don’t speak at all.”

Hester scowls at me. “You can’t ignore her forever.”

I can’t, but I’m going to ignore her for as long as possible.

Her life depends on it.