Micah's Mate

by Abigail Raines

  At least I’m not crazy.

  At home that night I have a couple drinks, but not so many that I’ll lose my inhibitions and text Luna too much. She always answers me but she’s getting increasingly hurt. She apologized for calling me an “asshole.” But she won’t say a goddamn thing about what she meant about not having a pack. I figure I’ll give her some time. She let me in again once, maybe she’ll come around a second time.

  I’m hoping she’ll at least let me see her again. She may have to, or my wolf may give me fits. I know it’ll lose its little mind if I finally get a chance to catch her scent. I remember her telling me how good I smelled and that makes me smile despite all the shit that’s going on.

  I spend the evening watching nature documentaries and lifting my free weights. I’ve got too much nervous energy, even after the shift.

  Around midnight, I’m awake and nowhere near sleeping. I wonder if Luna is asleep and find myself reading over our texts for the millionth time.

  After another drink, I maybe lose my inhibitions a tiny bit.

  What does your wolf look like?

  I send the text to Luna before really thinking about it. And then feel vaguely mortified.

  I didn’t mean that to sound weirdly dirty, I add.

  I see the three little dots that mean she’s formulating an answer and wait with bated breath.

  Finally she says, I’m light brown. Like a honey brown. I have amber eyes.

  I actually gasp audibly at that because she sounds so pretty. I’m filled with an aching desire to see Luna’s wolf. My own wolf is howling for her.

  Do you have a picture?

  Why does this feel like you’re asking for nude pics?

  Technically I am.

  LOL.

  My heart swells because I made her laugh. I just wish I could hear it. I’ve already seen her cry too much. I chew on my lip, hoping she’ll take me seriously and send me a pic but I don’t want to bug her either. I feel like every conversation is loaded right now. Everything feels so fragile.

  A minute later I get a text and yell out loud like an idiot.

  It’s a photo of her wolf. I think it’s an older picture and I wonder who took it. Maybe her mother.

  She’s stunning. Her fur is silky and she was right to say honey. Her coat is a light, golden brown with tips of white. I wish I could see her in front of me. I want to sink my hand into that lustrous fur. I want to see how the light makes that pretty honey color glitter.

  You’re gorgeous, baby.

  She doesn’t respond for a while and I hope beyond hope that I didn’t make her cry.

  Finally she text back, Thank you.

  We don’t talk about what pack she comes from. We don’t talk about anything that’s important. But we don’t stop texting until sunrise.

  Chapter Eleven: Luna

  I’m a zombie at work but I feel a little better. It’s probably because the guy I’m falling for is such a sweetheart. I can’t imagine why he likes me so much with how I’ve been acting, but he keeps coming back for more. He had me laughing all night. We couldn’t bear to say goodnight and didn’t even realize how the hours were passing. Nothing really changed exactly. But I’m starting to wonder if maybe, just maybe…

  “Don’t be an idiot,” I say to myself that night as I poke at a TV dinner. When Michelle was around, I felt like it was easier to slip into my usual spunky self. She was such a lovely person to live with, and she’s such a good friend. But the truth is, I can fall into moods sometimes. I tend to be pessimistic when left totally to my own devices. I think it’s because I grew up in that Hardwidge pack. I was used to things being taken away from me. I was used to life being hard and bleak and bloody. For the last several years, I’ve gotten used to my human life. I almost felt like I wasn’t a shifter anymore. It was just something I had to deal with, like a disease. I’d take my tonic to cover my scent and when the wolf was starting to really lose its mind, I’d take it out for a run. On my own. Always on my own.

  So it’s hard to believe that I could let my wolf out and be happy at the same time. It’s hard to believe that something as good as being Micah’s mate could ever happen to me. When I think about it sometimes, I hear Dax’s voice in my head.

  What are you if you’re not Hardwidge trash? Nobody at all. A lone wolf.

  “Luna!” I hear Dax pounding at my door and fear courses threw me, sudden and sharp. I’m sure he can smell that even if he doesn’t smell the wolf. He might smell the wolf anyway. It’s probably stupid of me, but I stopped taking the tonic the night before. I figured Dax had already found me and Micah already knew. What was the point of hiding it anymore?

  “Luna!” His voice thunders through the door and I feel frozen. “Girl, open up! I know you’re in there! I’ll break the goddamn door down!”

  I’m pretty sure a neighbor told off Micah for pounding on my door the other night. I wonder where that neighbor went.

  I trudge to the door and let Dax in and, all of a sudden, he’s all smiles again.

  “Well, hello there!” He says, as if we’re pals. He eyes the lacy cami I’m wearing and pulls on the strap with the tip of his finger. “Ooh, sexy.”

  “Don’t touch me,” I snap, backing away.

  Dax makes a show of sniffing the air. “I see Mr. Tremblay made another appearance. Or rather, I smell it.” He comes up behind me and sniffs my neck and I grimace and twist away again. “I can smell you too. Mmmm. Your wolf’s as sweet as apple pie. Just like I remember it.”

  I try to look calm, if contemptuous, but I’m scrambling inside. I don’t know what I can possibly do to get him to back off if only for a short time until I can think of something.

  “You need to give me more time to think,” I blurt out. Not sure he’ll buy that, but it’s worth a shot.

  “Or, you’re thinking, are you?” Dax says sceptically. “Because I’ve had the impression you’ve got no intention of leaving with me.”

  “I just don’t see why this has to happen now.”

  “Because I say it does,” he whispers.

  I hate it when a guy like Dax whispers. You know his type is about to do something scary when he gets all quiet.

  “Look, Luna, I could give you the hard sell,” he says, throwing up his hands. “I could tell you that you and I would rule our pack together. Overthrow these half-assed half shifter bullshit packs and take over the whole clan, take over this clan even…”

  That makes me snap my head up. The Hardwidge pack is such an entity unto itself, it’s only loosely affiliated with the clan that oversees all of Oregon. They never had much power because my father was always acting like such a wildcard asshole. They were pretty much left to themselves and nobody wanted to take them down either because they’d gotten so big.

  It doesn’t surprise me that Dax wants to try to take over the Oregon clan but if he’s going to start shit with the Tremblays…

  “Why would you take over this clan?” I say darkly. “It’s not like it was a hundred years ago. Packs don’t go overthrowing each other anymore-”

  “We will,” Dax says fiercely. “We’ll bring back the righteous old ways. Everyone’s forgotten what it means to be a shifter. I’m going to remind them. One dead wolf at a time. Starting with your boyfriend.”

  When he threatens Micah this time, I feel a fury like I’ve never felt in my entire life.

  Not my mate.

  “If you lay a finger on Micah Tremblay, the only dead wolf is gonna be you.”

  We fix our eyes on each other and it happens all at once. Abruptly, we both shift right in the middle of the apartment and I fight like I’ve never fought before, even in the really rough fights I’d get into in Hardwidge, when rabbit was scarce and there was only one to share among three other wolves, or when some bitch wanted to prove herself up against the alpha’s daughter and made me fight for my life while my father just laughed.

  Dax goes for my neck and I get out from under him and clamp his foot in my teeth like a vise.
I let go when his claws find my hide. We tear up the couch and my forgotten stacks of Blu Rays go flying as we wrestle around the apartment, fighting for control. He keeps trying to pin me and I get out from under him again but I’m exhausted from barely sleeping the night before, and I’m also out of practice as a wolf.

  He manoeuvres me beneath him, my neck in his teeth, and forces me to submit. I go quiet and I want to rage. I want to destroy him. I want to see him gushing blood right there in my apartment and damn the consequences.

  Dax is refusing to shift back. I think he’s waiting for me to shift first and I finally give in. The weight of his wolf on top of my human form is suffocating. He finally shifts back too and rolls of me and now he’s laughing, the bastard.

  “Oh, girl! I’m glad you still got fire in you!” He hops to his feet and whips out a cigarette, sticking it behind his ear before whipping out another one. “That’s that alpha blood I was talkin’ about. Still gotta keep you in your place, of course.”

  On the floor I crouch and hug my knees. I feel like he’s broken me.

  He squats down next to me and claps a hand to my cheek, squeezing my chin and forcing my head up so I’ll look at him. “I’ll kill him, Luna. I swear I will. You think I won’t because he’s a Tremblay? Luna, I didn’t come here alone.” I look up at him, a thrill of terror running up my spine. “I got a whole little army of wolves with me ready to fight for their alpha and his mate. I’m not afraid of these spoiled, rich, little pups. I’ll grind that Xander Tremblay’s skull into dust.”

  I can’t breathe. I can’t think. And I can’t win either.

  “I’m coming back tomorrow. Don’t bother to go to work, you don’t need that human job now.” He tousles my hair like I’m a little kid. “If your bags aren’t packed when I come back, I won’t be so gentle next time.”

  I don’t watch him leave, but I jerk when he slams the door so hard the wall rattles.

  I am completely fucked.

  I start shaking and I can’t stop. I’m too scared even for tears. I considered that I would have to go off with Dax, but now that’s it’s really happening, it feels like a fate worse than death. Still, I have no choice. I’m not going to let him hurt Micah. I love him too much. And that’s not even counting the rest of his family or Michelle and little Trevor, who would definitely get caught in the crossfire. It’s all too awful to contemplate.

  I’m exhausted and I’m sore from the fight.

  I curl up in a ball on the floor and I don’t move for a long time.

  I fall asleep on the floor, and when I wake up it’s already eleven in the morning. I have no idea when Dax is coming back and I start moving, mindlessly packing clothes and anything important into bags because I have to be ready. I’ve never wanted to live in fear of anyone, but I’m also a survivor like mom taught me to be and I’ll do what I have to do. Hell, maybe someday I can escape from Dax and rebuild a new life somewhere. I’d just have to make sure Dax thinks I don’t care about Micah anymore to be sure he won’t be in danger. It might take a couple years. God, I’ll probably have kids by then.

  My phone is dead. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is the next thing, the next task; pack this bag, roll up these sweaters. I won’t be able to properly move out or resign or anything. I’ll just be abandoning my apartment. Oh well. I won’t be able to say goodbye to Michelle and it makes my heart hurt. If they file a missing persons report or something, I’ll already be gone and Dax’s pack is so off the grid, they’ll never find me.

  I start crying without even realizing it as I stuff any bag I can find with my things. It’s completely chaotic. My muscles still ache from the brutality of the fight and I’ve barely eaten anything in the last day. My wolf is pacing, growling, scrambling…

  The knock on the door is too gentle to be Dax, but I still jerk when I hear it, adrenaline making my hands shake.

  “Luna!” Michelle calls out. “It’s me. Please be home. Everyone is worried.”

  I didn’t call in to work. My phone is dead. Oops.

  I summon my best acting abilities and open the door just a crack so she won’t see all the packed bags right behind me.

  “Oh man, Michelle,” I say, smiling slightly. I try to make voice raspy. “I slept in and my phone died-”

  “Your supervisor called me,” Michelle says. “I’m your emergency contact and you didn’t call in-”

  “No, I know, I just woke up. Think I’m coming down with something. You should go, I don’t want to get Trevor sick.”

  Michelle is pushing at the door and she frowns at me. I must have given something away or maybe it’s the way I’m bracing against the door like it’s a matter of life and death, which...it kinda is.

  “You’re full of shit,” Michelle says.

  I get choked up and I can’t control whatever my face is doing because all Michelle had to do was look at me and she knew. And the idea that I might never see her again kills me.

  “Michelle,” I say thickly. I lose my grip on the door and she pushes her way in.

  “Oh sweetie, you’ve got to tell me what’s happening.”

  The thought of telling Michelle what’s going on seems absolutely impossible. It feels like the merging of two worlds. Michelle has always been like a pure, bright wonderful thing in my life. She was somebody, who didn’t know where I came from and could therefore never hold it against me. When she asked me about my childhood, I just told her it wasn’t great and that I didn’t like talking about it. She never pushed and I always appreciated that. I know I can’t just dismiss her now. But if she ever got hurt because of me...I can’t imagine living with it.

  Michelle looks at the chaos of half-packed bags and spins around to stare at me.

  “What’s going on?” She says flatly. “Where are you going?”

  “I’m...I’m just going on a trip. I know it’s kind of last minute. I just need to get out and I really need you to go right now. I’ll call you when I get there.”

  “What are you talking about? If you were going on a trip, you would have told work and they didn’t even know where you were-”

  “I said I slept in. That’s all.” I smile, fighting to appear normal and failing miserably. “I just need to…” I swallow and run my hands through my hair. “I need to get my head together. That’s it. Really.”

  “Sweetie, I know something’s going on with you and Micah,” Michelle says slowly. “That’s obvious. Micah won’t say what, but he’s been acting weird. Aaron knows something’s up. I have to think it’s about you.”

  “It’s not about Micah,” I say softly.

  “Then give me a clue here,” Michelle says. “You’ve always been there for me. Let me be there for you.”

  “I...I…I need you to go.”

  “Luna, please. Tell me!”

  “Michelle!”

  “I’m your best friend!”

  “I can’t!”

  “What is it!”

  “I’m a wolf shifter!” I say it and then shut my mouth. I curse myself but the words just jumped out.

  Michelle gapes at me and I suddenly feel so horribly guilty. All this time she’s been mated into a whole shifter family and here her best friend has been a shifter too all along. I know she’s going to want to know why I didn’t tell her. But explaining about Dax…I feel a deep sense of shame even though I know logically this isn’t all my fault.

  “Is that why you smell different?” Michelle says. Her eyes are big. She doesn’t look angry or even upset. “I’ve gotten to where I can pick up the scents now. I’ll never be able to shift, but there are some things I can do. I knew you smelled like a shifter, but I thought maybe it was because Micah had been here. Did you cover it up before? Oh my God, this is great!”

  I shake my head, utterly astonished. None of this makes sense to me at all. “You’re not mad?” I say, barely breathing. “You’re not mad I never told you? Even after you got together with Aaron?”

  She shrugs and steps forward to rest her hands on
my shoulders. She looks so pitying, which I kind of hate, but I know it comes from empathy. “I can understand why you didn’t tell me before. I know by now that shifters try to hide themselves from humans. I’m just grateful I still got to be your friend. I don’t know why you didn’t tell me later. But I know you must have had your reasons. I just hope you tell me what they are.”

  I glance at the my phone. Time keeps passing. Dax is going to come. I imagine he’ll come later, but who knows. I don’t want Michelle to be here when he does. I don’t know what to do and my head is buzzing. My hands are shaking. ”You know how I never talk about my childhood?”

  “Yes,” she says, nodding. “That makes sense now, I guess.”

  “I grew up with...a pack. It wasn’t like the Tremblays.” My voice is flat, robotic. If I let myself feel anything about what I’m talking about, I’ll really lose it. “They were cruel. Brutal. I barely survived. But my mom got me out. I’ve been hiding ever since but they’ve come for me. And if I don’t return with them, they’ll hurt Micah.” I break down and Michelle wraps me in her arms. “Michelle, I love him. He’s my mate. None of this is his fault and they’ll kill him; they’ll...I have to go back with them.”

  “Sweetie, it’s okay-”

  “It’s not! It’s not! I have to go! You have to go before he gets here-”

  “Okay, we’re going to the estate right now,” Michelle says in the same tone of voice she uses when she talks about taxes. “We’re leaving and we’re going to the Tremblays and they’re going to help you-”

  “No, no, no!” I get incoherent and hysterical and I’m not even sure I’m forming words when Michelle slaps me across the face. It stings just a little bit, but it wakes me up and I take a breath.

  “I am so sorry I had to do that. But you really need to shut up. The Tremblays are powerful and you’re as good as family. We’re going right now. Get your purse.”

  Chapter Twelve: Micah

  I am so fucking tired. I tried to catch up on sleep the day after staying up with Luna texting, but that’s when the exhaustion hit even harder. Oops.