Page 14 of Tamed Wolf (Rejected Mates of the Shelter #4)

Beckett, Now

We spend way too much damn time combing through records that day, and the only consolation has been that while our parents have been all too happy to play with Rowan while we look, Lark has been getting more and more comfortable with us touching her.

I know we’re all pushing our luck here, stepping up too close behind her as we reach for something, sitting too close on couches, blatantly pulling her legs over our laps, but at some point during the day, she stopped flinching or freezing when it happened.

And now as we drive her back to the shelter she insists she wants to sleep at, I can see her pinky linked with Brooks’ in the back seat over the bottom of Rowan’s car seat. That’s kind of huge, right?

It’s been a while since we were this excited about somebody, and the thing is, it transcends rationality. Wolves are very instinctual beings, and when we know, we fucking know .

I haven’t really heard about too many people having more than one fated mate, and maybe it’s not hitting us quite as hard as it did with our ex when we met her, but there’s something between us we need to keep pursuing.

“You hungry? Lunch was a long time ago, we could stop and grab something before we take you home, if you want.”

She looks over at Rowan, who’s been so good all day. “I’m sure he doesn’t want to go sit in a restaurant and be expected to behave. I can grab something in the kitchen when I get there.”

I look into the mirror briefly and meet Brooks’ eyes, and he shakes his head saying that’s not happening.

Brooks has always been the sweetest, cuddliest of us all, and he’s probably working very hard to restrain himself because I’m pretty damned sure he just wants to suffocate her right about now. Age gap or not, she’s someone that we feel needs our protection and that’s driving our instincts hard.

I exit and head towards one of our favorite places nearby, a little compound with an array of food trucks, somewhere chill where a baby that may get fussy won’t bother anyone.

The gravel hits the tires as we park and she just rolls her eyes at the blatant over handedness as I open her door for her, helping her down so I can walk in with my claim on her.

Brooks grabs Rowan and Blake is walking behind us all, always looking out for anyone that we might need to be careful of.

“Oh my gods. This is…why does every single menu look so good?”

She stands in the middle of the compound, just looking around. Garlic, bread, meat, all sorts of scents are floating in the air as different people eat at the picnic tables strewn about, and music is pumped through big speakers at each corner.

“So, what you’re saying is we need to get one of everything? Done.”

I start walking off, aiming to do just that, but she grabs my arm, stopping me. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not going to…I can pay you back. I just have to get my wallet from the guys.”

“Wait,” Blake says, perking up. “Please tell me you have access to the money they force you to make for them.”

“Can we not do this here? I told you taking me out was a bad idea.”

“No, that’s not what happened. Taking you nearly anywhere is a great idea if we get to go, too. And we’re not asking you to pay us back, because we took you here. I will buy one of everything if you don’t tell me what you want though. We’re far from being rich, but we do alright and we’re pretty comfortable. We can afford to feed you, we promise.”

“I know what you need, come here,” Brooks says as he grabs her hand and passes Rowan off to me.

I watch them go to a truck tucked in the corner, shaking my head. If she can’t pick, then I guess a massive supply of nachos should hit the spot.

Blake and I snag a table while we wait, trying to keep Rowan entertained with a baby food pouch. When we hear her laugh, Blake and I both instantly snap our heads to the sound, because it’s so fucking beautiful.

She’s got tears streaming down her face as she tries to balance a big armful of drinks and napkins, while Brooks balances two trays, both with massive piles of food on them. One chip-based nacho fully loaded down, the other with fries absolutely drowning in gravy, meat and cheese.

She’s laughing though because while he walks, Brooks is singing some ridiculous song he seems to be making up on the spot about how pretty Lark is and comparing her to all sorts of cheesy things, doing anything he can to take her mind off of us doing stuff for her, I think.

“No one was going to mention how embarrassing he is when you let me wander off with him?” she asks as she drops everything off on the table.

“Me? I’m the embarrassing one? I’m sorry, did you or did you not tell the guy at the first stall that tried to take our order that you were dying for a taste of his big, juicy meat?”

She giggles again and covers up her reddening face, and I’m just stuck watching her interact with my brother, because this is so different than what we’re used to feeling.

“Not everyone has a gutter mind,” she says somewhat quietly as she reaches for her soda.

“Pretty hard not to take anything dirty when it’s coming out of lips like yours,” he says easily as he reaches for a fry.

She frowns, looking down at herself, wearing borrowed clothes, hair simply down and unstyled. “I’m not wearing any makeup or anything, and I’m completely shapeless in these clothes.”

“It’s not the clothes or the makeup that make you beautiful,” I reassure her. I keep watching her out of the side of my eye as we all start reaching for food, and I think she’s recalculating things inside her head.

When we’re about halfway through our meal, she stops eating and reaches for a napkin, cleaning off her fingers and bridging them above the table before clearing her throat slightly. “When they first made me start dancing for them, I had to go through makeup classes and sit still for over an hour each shift while someone did my makeup for me. They’re…really good at gaslighting me into thinking everything they were making me do was to improve me. They were always so much nicer to me when I had a full, perfectly applied face of makeup on with the lashes and the contouring and the…drama. I guess they trained me to do it all the time, until I became uncomfortable without it. I don’t even remember the last time I went into public without a basic makeup look on.”

We weigh her words, but it’s Blake that finally addresses it. “I’m getting the feeling that those two fucks the goddess thrust upon you to wouldn’t know a quality woman if she bit them in the fuckin’ face. You were stunning at the club yesterday, but you’re no less stunning like this. In fact, I almost love this natural face better, because I know I’m only seeing your real skin, and I know that if I were to do this,” and he leans forward and brushes a kiss on one cheek, and then slowly does it to the other, “you’re feeling every part of me touching you. We just want you to get to a point where whether you do or you don’t wear makeup on any given occasion, you’re doing it for yourself, because you enjoy it, not because you think it improves your value.”

Before he can say another damn word, she leans forward and smashes her lips against his, but then just as abruptly pulls back and covers her face in horror. “Oh my gods, I’m so sorry, that was…totally uncalled for.” She tries to scoot back and cower, but Brooks is sitting there, so he swings a leg over the picnic bench and pulls her into him, holding his arms crossed over her front firmly to help her calm down and prevent her from running.

When her fight or flight seems squashed and she deflates a little bit, Blake scoots forward as he straddles the bench until his knees are encasing hers, and he grabs her face gently, broadcasting what he’s about to do.

Brooks loosens his hold so she has the option to dodge out if she’s not feeling it, but instead, she sinks into Brooks’ chest and takes every bit that Blake gives her.

It’s a chaste kiss under most descriptions, but it feels important because she’s choosing it.

When Blake pulls back, I can see even from across the table how dilated his eyes are, and then Rowan breaks all the tension by throwing his sippy cup across the table and splattering gravy over all of us.

Blake returns to his original seat, but Brooks keeps Lark where she is, even going so far as to offer her a bite of food.

I can’t fucking believe he’s being that damn bold…offering someone food when you’re considering a relationship is almost as big as a proposal. It conveys that they want to provide for you and care for you, and I can see that Lark knows exactly what it means as she looks at him over her shoulder.

It’s really just a fry, but in our world, taking it would be a sign that she wants to pursue something real with us.

They hold a silent conversation while I try to distract Rowan with a toy from his bag, and I hold my breath as she keeps eye contact and opens her mouth to accept the bite.

She chews carefully, swallows, and then closes her eyes and lets her hand rest on his knee as she gives herself an internal pep talk.

The entire ride back to the shelter with her in the front, I’m dying to just lean across the console and kiss her stupid, and it’s never been this nerve inducing for me to make a move before.

With Arabella, we were na?ve and just assumed everything was going to work out exactly how we had been raised to believe mates operate, and so we were excited to feel grown up and claim our mate and everything that goes with it.

I don’t want to fuck this up, if this truly is the second chance we didn’t know we desperately wanted, and I know Lark has a lot she’s still got to work through, but I know if I don’t make any sort of move on her before I let her go inside that I’ll be up all night kicking myself.

“Oh, we need your phone number,” Brooks says from the backseat as the sign for the shelter tells us to turn.

Even the drive in feels desolate and depressed.

“I’m not allowed to have a phone,” she mumbles. “They always know where to find me and make sure I know that there’s no one else that would want to contact me anyway.”

“But you have a job…surely you could just go get one, even a basic one, if you wanted one?” Blake asks, not really getting that it pisses her off.

She’s quick to retort. “A job isn’t the same as having money. Did you know that there are caps in place to prevent rejected wolves from accumulating too much money? Because we get shelter for free, which includes the food and the thrift shop that people donate clothing to, there are measures in place to prevent us from dreaming too big.

“For starters, we get half of what any other person would get as a minimum wage, and any tips I get are garnished heavily by my mates, and even Camden on occasion. They all say there’s nothing I need to spend it on, and that it would just go to waste if they let me keep it.

“Tips would be the one thing I could keep since it’s under the table, but trying to hide it from them has never ended well. So no, I can’t just go and buy a phone. Even if I somehow did have the funds for it, I’d have to take a bus to get to the store, and it would take an entire day to travel to the city where the shops are on the city bus. I don’t often have an entire day of leisure to give up for something so pointless. Thank you for the ride.”

She jumps out before the truck is even fully in park and since we brought her right to the entrance, she’s able to slip inside before I can put it in park and jump out.

I try knocking on the door, but it goes completely unanswered until a grumpy looking woman finally opens the door just a sliver.

“Sorry to bother you, ma’am, we were just trying to say goodnight to our friend, Lark.”

“If she wanted to hear such a thing, she wouldn’t have torn down the halls as quick as she just did. Remove yourself from the premises before we get security involved.”

I back up, resigned, feeling like shit that our day ended so badly.

I get back in the car and throw it in drive, feeling my chest tighten with each mile I put between us and her.

“Sorry I fucked that up,” Blake mumbles.

Rowan sounds like he’s on the edge of sleep, and since we just changed him, I’m hoping we can just carefully get him in his crib when we get home and make an easier night of it. Car rides always knock him out. “Not your fault. We need to learn her triggers and learn more about the fucked-up ways past alphas have tried to keep the rejected wolves in line so we can start to undo every damn thing for our pack,” I say calmly.

“I have half a mind to go straight to Camden’s and punch his fucking face in for contributing to her pain,” Brooks says, voice thick.

“I’m fucking texting him. I want to make sure he hears it from us that we’re pursuing something with his mom.”

“You sure that’s a good idea?” I ask Blake. “What if her mates retaliate?”

“Considering who we are and who they are in terms of pack hierarchy, I’m pretty sure we can take care of that problem,” Blake responds. “That agreement they filed is far from watertight. I know we already told her she no longer has to comply by it because there are so many red flags and violations on their part that it’s completely unenforceable, but if they touch her now that she’s under our protection, they’re going to have a whole fuck ton of mess to contend with. I want Camden and any other fucker he runs with to know that she’s off limits, and that if they harm her in any way, they’re going against us. I hope they fucking retaliate, because I’d love nothing more than to have an actual reason to punch their fucking lights out.”

“And that, dear Rowan,” I say under my breath, “is not how we handle bad feelings.”