Page 3 of The Enforcer’s Rejected Mate (Red River Rejected Mates #1)

At first, I thought I was wrong, that it wasn’t a mate dream at all.

Maybe I wanted to belong to someone so badly that I was reading too much into a regular dream.

As much as it stung to admit that to myself, I did and so I ignored the dream, but it came back.

Night after night, after night, the dream returned and played out the same way until I was forced to name it.

I held out for six months before I finally went to Maud with it.

“I can’t see his face,” I told Maud when I was thirteen.

A jumble of nerves and shame. Not having a wolf is one thing but now this?

My mate dreams were faceless. Always faceless.

Wrong. Defective and broken just like the rest of me.

What was so wrong with me that I couldn’t even do this right?

Why was life so easy for the other girls?

Maud grabbed my hand, her touch chased away the dark thoughts. “If you can’t see his face, then it’s not time. He’s not ready. That’s all, sweet girl.”

“What do I do until he is ready?”

“You wait, of course.”

I’ve been waiting years but all of that ends tonight. I can feel it. Anticipation rolls through me, or maybe it’s adrenaline from the way my limbs feel like they’re electric. A bird caws overhead and that breaks Keiran’s silence. He looks away from the sky and the bird, and back to me.

“You look pretty,” he says. A blush blooms across my cheeks at Keiran’s rare praise.

Maud never fails to tell me that I’m a good looking woman and I ought to take more pride in that.

Keiran never tells me I look good or pretty, or beautiful, or any of the other hundred things I daydream he’ll say to me.

I think Maud’s just being nice about how I look.

I’m tall, nothing compared to Keiran but tall enough at five foot ten.

I have dark brown eyes and high cheekbones, both I know I got from my mother from the one tattered photograph I have hidden under my mattress.

She gave me my dark hair too. Its waist length on account of Maud being the only one to help me cut it.

I’ve been tempted to do something else to it like I’ve seen on the women in town, the pretty pixie cuts and shoulder length layers that curl so nice, but after one haphazard jagged cut I gave myself as a teen in the name of achieving a different look I’ve never tried it again.

I don’t mind it, though, because my hair is pretty.

That’s something I know is perfect. Glossy and thick, it shines from the rosehip oil I make with Maud.

I’m tan from spending most days out of doors, and the hard work I do in the kitchens or the laundry room keeps me strong enough, though I could stand to gain a few pounds.

My rations from the kitchens aren’t the best, not when I eat last. My stomach growls and I wince, the whisper that I should go, I should not be here with Keiran when my place is at the table eating my fill with Maud.

I fidget under Keiran’s gaze. Heat rises, my skin feels like it’s stretched over a hive of buzzing bees. I only ever feel this way with Keiran. He’s not the man from my dream. Not my soulmate.

We both know it’s the truth.

I hate it.

My chest aches. I wish he was my mate. I wish Keiran would pick me.

Just once. My fingers twitch and I want to press my hand against it to soothe the pain but I don’t move.

If I move, I’ll come to my senses and bolt.

Even if I know it’s wrong, I don’t want to leave him.

Not yet. And that’s why I don’t move when Keiran starts towards me.

I stay right where I am because I feel pretty.

Keiran said it. I pretend Keiran is picking me.

Choosing me over the entire pack. What’s one more delusional daydream fantasy in the grand scheme of things?

“T-thank you,” I stammer out.

Keiran comes right into my space and lowers his head to my neck.

He runs his nose along my neck. My knees go weak just like they always do when he does this.

I lean into him when he moves closer. The warmth of his body against mine makes my head feel fuzzy, like it’s stuffed with linen scraps.

Even if I know it isn’t real, it’s hard not to feel like it is.

That my daydream isn’t just a dream. I wrap my arms around Keiran and hold him.

“Feel so fucking good,” he growls against my neck and grabs my hips.

He fists my skirt in one of his big hands and hikes my leg over his hip.

I know what it means when he touches me like this.

What he wants. I want it too, but…behind us I can hear the odd clink of dishes and clang of a pan.

The sounds remind me where I’m supposed to be.

I lean back to look up at him. “I-I don’t have a lot of time. Maud is waiting on me.”

A disgruntled growl rumbles low in Keiran’s chest. “That witch can wait.”

The way he spits out that witch leaves no room for wondering what Keiran thinks of Maud. I frown and push against his chest to look up at him.

“She’s an Elder,” I remind him, “ your Elder and she’s no witch. She’s a healer.” Reality soaks into the moment like spilled water. The earlier butterflies he gave me are gone. I don’t want to be close to him anymore. The heat in my body settles and cools under Keiran’s narrowed eyes.

“Elder or not, everyone knows she’s a crone.”

“And I’m training to take her place,” I remind him. “What does that make me?”

His handsome face twists into disgust. “A waste. You don’t belong here with the witch rotting away in the woods. You know it the same as I do.”

That surprises me.

Keiran never says things like this but he did call me pretty. Definitely a lucky day today.

“I don’t know anything of the sort and even if I did, what am I meant to do?

Work in the kitchens? Pull double laundry shifts and never see the sun?

You really think wasting my life inside like that is better?

” The laundry room is a low cinderblock building with a dingy tile floor, no windows and harsh fluorescent lights.

It’s the newest community building and the worst of them all for some reason.

The heat traps in the building in the summers until my lungs almost burn from breathing in the hot air.

“I’d rather die.”

Keiran’s brow pinches. “Those are dependable jobs. Respectable.”

“They’re not, but neither am I, isn’t that right?” It’s a question we both know the answer to. I’m not respectable. I’m the orphan the pack tolerates. “That’s why you come to see me where no one can see.”

Keiran drops my skirts and lets go of me so fast that I stumble forward and I have to catch myself on a tree to stay upright. “I came to you for peace. Not dramatics.” He turns to storm away from me and my body goes into panic mode.

This isn’t how my perfect day is supposed to go. He wouldn’t leave me like this on the day that I’m going to shift.

I push away from the tree and chase after Keiran.

“Wait, please. Please don’t go.” I’m begging.

I know it, but I’m not too proud to beg.

I never have been, not with Keiran. I can’t let him leave.

If he does, then my fate is sealed. I won’t shift.

It’s not logical, I know that. I know Keiran staying won’t decide if I shift or not tonight but right now it feels like it will.

Keiran stops but he doesn’t turn to face me.

The pretty feeling I wrapped myself in earlier feels delicate and fragile.

The slightest movement could tear it to tatters.

What does it say about me that I’m desperate to keep it whole?

My face burns hot and I try not to think about the way I’m stepping on my own pride when I reach out to touch Keiran’s arm.

“Stay with me. Please. ” Keiran turns to me with that last please. His handsome face looks like it’s carved from stone. A true poker face. “I’m sorry,” I tell him quickly. He softens when I apologize.

He always does.

It doesn’t matter if I’ve caused offense or not. Whatever goes wrong between us always lands squarely on me as surely as the full moon will rise tonight. I’m used to the taste of sorry on my tongue.

“I-I should have thought before I spoke. You’re right. Those jobs are respectable and-” Keiran silences my words with a kiss. He gathers me up in his arms and shoves my skirts back up my thighs. Relief floods through my body because I don’t have to keep lying and most of all– he still wants me.

I wrap my arms around his shoulders and bite back a moan when I feel his teeth nip my collarbone. He’s playing with fire, biting and teasing my skin near where a mating bond would take the best. I don’t say a word and let him play his game.

“Need you. I need you,” Keiran whispers to me.

I start to work on Keiran’s belt. “Then take me,” I whisper back while happiness sings through me. My earlier panic is forgotten now that I have my perfect day back on course. It will all be worth it. Every second of it will be when I shift.

Besides, I can put up with anything so long as Keiran still wants me.