Page 7 of Found (Mate Rejected #8)

7

AERIN

“ I ’m not hungry.” I push aside the plate of chicken, rice, and veggies that Shane sets on the bedside table.

He frowns. “You need to eat. The baby does too.”

It’s getting exhausting glaring at him. I’m also getting fed up with reminding him that this baby has nothing to do with him. Nevertheless, I glare some more. “Stop pretending to care.”

He still hasn’t told me who killed Bree, and the longer he doesn’t, the more sure I am that he did.

“Aerin…”

I try to get up off the edge of the bed, the operative word being ‘try’. Getting up requires more effort than it used to. In Winter Lake, Mack was always helping me up the second I moved to stand. I never had to ask. He was just there.

When Shane moves to do the same, I sit back. “Don’t touch me.”

He peers down at me for several seconds, then he drops into a crouch in front of me. “I’m not the enemy here, Aerin.”

“You kidnapped me right after you hurt one of my packmates. You are absolutely the enemy.”

And I still don’t even know if Chris and Zoe are okay. The last time I saw them, Zoe was on her side, unconscious, and Chris was on his back, blood pumping from his throat.

He could be dead.

Tears clog my throat and I blink them from my eyes as I put both hands on the bed and lever myself to my feet, skirting around him and walking to the other side of the room. It takes a second to gain control of my tears.

Shane stands. “How about a walk?”

I start to refuse when it hits me that I have a perfect reason to explore my new surroundings and potentially discover a way I can escape. It won’t be easy in my condition, but if I can get to a phone, I can at least tell Mack and the others where I am.

“I can’t walk for long,” I tell him, resting a hand on my belly. “I get tired easily.”

That’s true. But the more tired he thinks I am, the less likely he’ll expect me to run when I have the chance to.

He smiles. “You always liked walks, didn’t you?”

What I liked was being outside, away from his pack, who treated me like an outsider, and away from Shane who wanted nothing to do with me.

Gripping my arm, he leads the way out of the room before I can tell him I can walk without his help. But I think I’m going to have to learn to pick my fights, and this one doesn’t seem like it’s worth fighting over.

I try to look in the rooms we pass, but most doors are closed, and though there are sounds of people moving around inside, I don’t pick up anything useful. Whatever secrets are beyond those closed doors, I don’t hear even one of them.

There are a few people in the backyard when we find the back door. It’s the same construction workers I briefly saw as Franklin led me into the house.

All are shifters and they must be Raleighs. From their suspicious, silent stares as we pass, they must view me as much of an enemy as I view Shane.

“Are they rebuilding everything themselves?” I ask, briefly distracted from Shane’s hand on my arm as he leads us toward a bench just under a tree that backs onto the forest.

“They’ve been planning this for a while,” he says.

I twist around to watch the men continue their hammering and banging. “Why do they want Mack to lead? Surely, if they’ve done all this without him, why not continue on without him?”

“The Raleighs were great once before.” The familiar male voice makes me jump.

Franklin steps from behind a tree and I get the sense he wasn’t just hovering there. He was watching. Maybe even following us. “ Mack can make us great again.”

I glance at Shane. His expression is blank. I’m not sure if he knew Franklin was there all along or if he suggested this walk because he was told to bring me out here.

“But he has a new life now,” I tell Franklin. “I’m surprised you don’t want?—”

“ Connall ? Our old Alpha?” Franklin raises an eyebrow, and his voice drips with contempt as he continues, “He abandoned us to serve his own needs. We don’t need him.”

“Don’t you think Mack will do the same?” I say, playing devil’s advocate. Mack would never abandon his pack the way Connall abandoned the Raleighs. He wouldn’t abandon anyone. Once he gives his word, he means it.

“Mack has integrity.” Franklin strides over to me, not stopping until he’s standing far, far too close. He points his chin at the farmhouse that Shane and I left moments before. “He rebuilt, as you can see, learning on our own. Learning to become self-sufficient. We’ve seen what Mack has done in Winter Lake. He can do the same here. He will give us the home we’ve always wanted, and the leadership we deserve.”

While it’s disturbing to hear that he knows so much about us and the pack built in Winter Lake, it sounds almost like he’s living in the past. Or like he can’t let go of the past.

And it sounds like he has his mind set on this. That nothing I say will change his mind.

“What about you?” I look at the newer buildings they’re constructing. “You’ve done all of that, and you’re an alpha. Surely the men here must listen to you. Why don’t you lead?”

His smile is mirthless. “You are trying to discourage me.”

I shake my head. “I’m trying to understand why it has to be Mack who leads. It would have made more sense to me if you wanted his help before you built, but you’ve done all the hard work of rebuilding. Why not continue the way you have been?”

Shane’s hand tightens on my arm. I take it as a subtle warning to stop talking, but I ignore him to focus on Franklin, curious about his response.

“Do you know how long the Raleighs remained a powerful and respected pack?”

“My history isn’t great,” I admit ruefully.

He throws his head back, a deep, throaty laugh pouring out of him.

I watch him, unsettled by all the plans they must have spent years dreaming of, but doing my best to hide it. What happens when those plans don’t come to fruition? Who will Franklin and the rest of these men take it out on? Me? Shane? Or Mack, when he refuses to take the mantel that Franklin is so determined to hand him?

His eyes dip to my belly and I edge back half a step when he reaches a hand toward me.

Shane steps in front of me and Franklin’s lips twist in a mockery of a smile. “Mack will have a new life here with us.” He looks me right in the eye over Shane’s shoulder. “You will have a different life with Shane.”

He walks away, hands in his pocket, his pose casual.

I watch him stop to talk to a couple of the workers on his way back to the farmhouse. Shane leads me in the other direction, toward the small wooden bench we were walking to before Franklin surprised me.

I stop short of it, pulling on my arm so he knows to let me go.

“You realize what’s going to happen here, right?” I ask him. “We are expendable to them. They want Mack to lead. You—and me—are just a way for that to happen. They are not your friends or even your allies.”

“We have an understanding.” He looks at the bench. “We can rest here for a bit before we return to the house.”

I hesitate, not eager to sit down. The bench is low and standing is going to require effort. The Raleigh construction workers are still busy with their tasks, but they keep turning to look at us and their attention is not friendly.

Suddenly, being inside is vastly preferable to being outside.

It’s been a while since I’ve felt like an outsider like this. I felt it back in my dad’s pack, and more keenly with the Dacres when Shane took me there.

Now we’re both outsiders. I’m not sure what Shane thinks about it because he shows no sign he’s even the slightest bit aware of the looks aimed our way.

“It’s just a bench, Aerin,” Shane says, gesturing to the bench as he places a basket down on the table. “You need to rest and so do I.”

It doesn’t take much to tire me out, and Shane drove hours and hours from Winter Lake, probably getting little to no sleep to get us here as fast as he did.

I sit down.

Shane doesn’t speak as he sits on the other side of the bench.

I’m not sure why I think of it, but something about sitting outside near the trees with a wind rustling through the leaves reminds me of the picnic I once had with Mack. That time, we escaped our bickering dads for a lazy afternoon where we ate a picnic he’d prepared for us in the forest behind his house and made love in the stream.

That day was perfect.

This…

This is something else.

“I can make you happy,” Shane says, puncturing my memories.

I shake my head as I focus on the workers lifting a window into one side of the house. “You can’t.”

“We’re compatible, Aerin. Fated mates.”

I look at him. “Compatibility didn’t stop you from treating me like I was a worthless bit of trash that had blown in through an open door. You cheated on me with Bree. Over and over again, and you didn’t care what I saw or even heard.” He opens his mouth. “And you never did tell me what happened to Bree. Did your wolf kill her? Is that why you’ve decided you want me after all?”

He blinks, evidently surprised by my refusal to accept this new life he seems determined for us to have. “You didn’t use to be like this.”

“Like what?”

He shakes his head, but I know what he means.

“Tell me you didn’t expect me to just happily and meekly accept this?”

He doesn’t respond.

I move to stand.

“I didn’t kill her,” he says softly.

I stop. “Bree?”

Now he’s the one studying the workers who are hammering nails into the wooden frame to secure the window in place.

He nods. “We both worked hard to deal with the fallout from my dad’s death. You know what happened to him.”

I do.

It wasn’t a death. It was murder. Bree killed him, believing that Iain would convince Shane to change his mind about being with her instead of me.

“So someone found out that she killed him and killed her?” I ask, sitting back down.

I’d always wondered if they could find happiness together after what she did, because Shane loved his dad. He loved Bree too. He had to have loved Bree to turn his back on his fated mate for her.

How do you build a life with someone who killed the person you love?

“No one outright said it, but from the way I caught them looking at Bree, I think they worked out how he died.”

He refocuses on me and his eyes are bleak, haunted. “I found her body near some rocks. It looks like she just fell, but I knew it wasn’t an accident.”

Strange that she pushed me from the cliff in Winter Lake and someone killed her the same way. “Do you know who it was?”

He shakes his head. “I should have confronted them, but I just walked away. I couldn’t stay there anymore. Not after I lost everyone I loved. It wasn’t home anymore.”

I can’t help but feel a little sorry for him. My powers are not working now, but I feel his pain nonetheless. He’s hurting and probably always will.

Now, it sounds like whatever is going on in the Dacre Pack is the most dominant alphas wrestling for control. Just like what happened to the Raleighs, history is repeating itself.

There wouldn’t have been an heir apparent. Iain Dacre was in his fifties, not that old, and probably would have continued to be Alpha had he not chosen to step aside and pass the leadership to Shane.

Shane would have led the pack for decades, and everyone would have expected his son would be the next Alpha. I mean, there’s a reason Iain was always so insistent that me and Shane have a baby. That was his dream. Because none of that happened, Shane deciding to walk away would have left a gulf that needed filling.

“Who will be Alpha?” I ask.

He shrugs. “I don’t care. Rest. We’ll go back to the room soon.”

I feel sorry for him, but he’s trying to make this into our happy ever after and it isn’t. It can never be because I have that with Mack, and it’s a life I intend to go back to.

Shane’s happy ever after didn’t work out with Bree. I intend for mine with Mack to happen. I refuse to give up on us, even if, right now, I don’t know how I’ll escape.