He reached for his shampoo when a blinding pain filled his eyes. Growling and cursing, he pulled his head back from the water and blinked hard as his vision blurred. He dropped the shampoo bottle on his foot. “Son of a bitch!” He snarled. He turned off the water and opened the shower door, turning his face to the bathroom mirror. He couldn't see shit. The mirror was steamed up and his vision was still blurry.
Getting out of the shower, he went to the counter. Leaning into it, he looked at himself in the mirror. He wiped away the fog and did a double take. “No!” He gasped looking at his hazel eyes that now had clear blue sunbursts in his irises. His heart started to pound and pound hard. Mated. The word flashed like a big neon sign over his with a smaller one that said P.S. You're fucked.
Great. Just fucking great. This was just what he needed. What were the gods thinking? Hadn’t he been through enough shit? “I fucking knew it. What the hell was I thinking?” He wanted to smash his head into the mirror over and over again.
There was a knock on the door. “Old Man, stop making pancakes in the shower. You’re going to be late for work.” Daniel’s voice came from the other side of the door.
“Okay, I’ll be right out,” Jared said, his voice was a little high.
“Dad, you okay?” Daniel asked.
“Yes, I’m fine. Can I borrow one of your work shirts?” Jared asked, changing the subject.
“Sure. I’ll leave it on the bed for you,” Daniel said, sensing that his father was in panic mode, but he went to get him one. Coming back into his father’s room he saw Jared dressed, except for a shirt and he was wearing shades. “You do know those go on after you have a shirt on, Old Man?”
“I know,” Jared said.
Daniel dropped his shirt on the bed and was going to ask him more questions when there was a crash in the hallway. “Theo, you better not have knocked over the chair again.” He said leaving his father to check on his siblings.
Once he was alone, Jared finished dressing as his mind went apeshit with all the ways this would fuck him and his life. “Why the fuck can’t I just have some peace? Something easy.” He had to find Serra and talk all of this out. “When will I ever learn to leave blondes alone? All of them are trouble.” He didn’t like blondes honestly, but they seemed to love him. Jared dressed his feet and put his things in his pockets that he’d need for the night. His phone in hand, he ghosted himself to work and hoped his new, fresh hell wouldn’t be noticed by everyone else.
Humming to herself, Serra wrapped the colorful Christmas paper around the box and then hunted for the tape. She’d just had it, so it couldn’t have gone far. Wrinkling her brow, she lifted one leg and then the other, taking care not to let go of the paper wrapped around the gift. Where the hell had it gone? She eyed the pile of already wrapped presents and wondered if she’d accidentally put it inside one of those. Rubbing her itchy eyes, she growled and patted the floor behind her. Her lips curled up into a smile when she felt her fingers brush over the cheap plastic tape dispenser.
Leaning the heel of her hand and wrist against the seam of the paper, she worked to pull and rip the tape over the toothed cutting thing with her fingers, having to shake the first piece off when it flipped up and stuck to the back of her hand. Gods, there had to be an easier way to do this. She’d been tempted by the gift wrapping booth at the mall until she’d seen the line that circled the food court and then continued down the hall toward the music store she’d visited with Jared yesterday. Life was too short for lines like that, so here she sat fighting with scotch tape for hours. Maybe she should rethink that stance on standing in line.
She had more success with her second go at the roll of tape. Bouncing a little to celebrate the small victory, Serra folded the ends of the paper into tidy points and secured them with strips of the tape. Holding up the present, she admired her work and slapped on one of the pre-written tags, so she could remember who it belonged to before adding it to the pile. Flexing her fingers, she rubbed at her eyes again with her thumb and forefinger, blinking to clear her vision. She leaned her back against the sofa, smirking at the arm that bent at a strange and broken angle.
After ten years of self-enforced celibacy, it only seemed fitting that something would get broken. She dropped her head back against the cushions and closed her eyes, seeing Jared. His hazel eyes that glowed with humor when he teased her, the dimples that softened the hard planes of his face when he smiled, the square stubbled jaw under lips that demanded to be licked. Serra groaned and bit her lip. And gods, that tattooed hard body. Her stomach fluttered, and her temperature began to rise, just thinking about him.
She’d hoped that she’d be able to shake the panther from her mind after last night, but now he was even more firmly entrenched. That concerned her. She wasn’t a cub anymore, and her illusions of Prince Charming and happily ever after had been killed long ago, even before the night that had ruined her life. She didn’t want to feel the warm and fuzzies for anyone, especially not a panther that could barely tolerate her on most days. Sighing, she scrubbed her face with her hands and lifted her face to watch the sun begin to dip below the horizon.
She wasn’t sorry that they’d had sex. How could she be? It had been amazing and in a weird way, had helped her reclaim a part of her that she'd thought dead. In truth, she’d avoided it for so long because she was afraid that it would be like reliving that night all over again and unlocking some buried memory that would break her beyond repair. So she had systematically pushed away any male that showed even a passing interest in her and found things to despise in each one. It had worked, she hadn’t even felt a spark of attraction until she met Jared. What made him different, she had no clue. Just that he was, and that he made her body hum like a sports car on the Audubon whenever she was near him.
Growling at her lack of control, she scooped up her phone and scrolled to the number he’d given her this morning as she watched the sky darken. This was a bad idea on so many levels, but something inside her screamed that she needed to see him again, or, in this case, hear the deep rumble of his voice. Goosebumps covered her arms and made her shake her head. What the hell was he doing to her? Why him. Why now?
The questions bounced inside her skull with no answers. She ignored the other thoughts that they woke. Thoughts of staying in one place and rebuilding her life. She couldn’t. She blinked back tears as hopeless loneliness settled over her. It didn’t matter how much she wanted it. She was too much of a train wreck to saddle anyone with.
She dropped her hand to her lap. Her eyes still focused on his number and her thumb hovering over the call button. She shouldn’t call. Pain suddenly radiated through her eyes, like a handful of sand had been blown into them. Her fingers splayed reflexively, dropping her phone before both hands flew to her face and rubbed her eyes. Pushing herself off the floor, Serra stumbled down the hall blinking rapidly and trying to see where she was going through the burning. Her hands groped for the faucet as she leaned against the vanity and splashed water onto her face. It seemed to help, and slowly the pain and itching faded.
“What the hell?” she muttered as she wiped her face on a towel and leaned closer in the mirror to see what was going on with her baby blues. Serra gasped. She couldn’t breathe. Her heart skidded to a halt and refused to beat, filling her head with the sound of locked brakes before a car crashed. Her jaw gaped and her eyes closed. Her mind fell back through time, pulling her back to the bed she’d laid on for months. In form and never moving, with her eyes locked on her reflection in the mirror, waiting to see the color change in her iris that would tell her that as broken as she was, now she was utterly ruined.
Her eyes opened for a double take and blinked at the sunburst of hazel color that circled her pupil and mocked her. Both Tigers had had hazel eyes, but could the lag be this long? Jared’s eyes were hazel too. She dropped her head forward limply on her neck and shuddered, feeling like she was going to be sick. Either she was mated to one of the three that had attacked her or to th
e panther that she pissed off.
“Fuck my life,” she whispered and rubbed her hand over her mouth as her eyes stubbornly stared at her reflection. She had a week to find out. Her chest ached at the possibilities. Either she was going to be marked as a rejected mate and shunned by everyone, including her family, or she was about to totally fuck a perfectly good panther’s life who was just as likely to reject her. Gods, Mom was right. She was toxic to anyone unfortunate enough to know her. She needed to know but was terrified of both answers.
Serra had no idea what to do. Pushing the blonde hair back from her face, she pulled until her scalp stung. This was too much. “No,” She said to herself as she made her way back to the kitchen. “I am not dealing with this shit tonight.” She kicked her phone as she passed, sending it skittering under the sofa and went straight to the pantry to pull down the bottle of tequila she’d bought when she’d moved in.
Turning, she pulled down a glass and forgot about it as she tilted the bottle back and swallowed until the burn faded.
She couldn’t just call him and ask, ‘Hey do your eyes look a little different today?’ Growling and shaking her head, she stepped outside to pace around the perimeter of the pool. Maybe if she got drunk enough she would fall in, drown and save them both the trouble. She dropped onto one of the chairs, braced her elbow against her knee and let her face fall into her palm. Just fuck.
She wanted to talk to her father, but it would bring up too many questions that she didn’t want to or couldn’t answer. Growling as she raked a hand through her hair, she cursed herself for throwing away her smokes the other night, because she could sure as shit use one right now.
Jared kept his head down as he went in through the staff door. Shades pushed up on his nose tightly, he saw that the place was packed. He wasn’t sure if he was happy about that or pissed off. His emotions were going wild on him. As he clocked in and went to start his shift, he felt someone watching him. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. Ignoring it, he made a lap around the bar hoping to find Serra. No luck.
He growled and moved behind the bar. Taking out his phone, his finger lingered over the screen. His mind was pulling him in different directions. Part of him was angry this had happened. The last time it was a lie. It was just some fucking spell, and it had almost cost him his brother. Fucking bitch, his mind yelled. She had played him like a fiddle. And when she left, taking his children, his heart broke. Only they weren’t his kids at all.
“Fucking stupid lying slore of a blue waffle cunt!” He snarled out and slammed his fist on the bar so hard the glasses close to him jumped, along with the human female standing next to him. She didn’t bother to ask him what was wrong. She just bolted away like a gazelle.
Brock lifted his head when he heard Jared go off. “Wow calm down, Man. The bar rags did nothing to you.”
Jared stared at the tall, muscular male. “Sorry,” Jared said in a low snarled voice. Rage was pumping through him. How could someone do that? He had loved Emma, and the bitch had ripped his heart out, put it in a blender, and then hit purée.
Brock looked at him and noticed the shades, but said nothing. The Panther was already pissed off, and he’d learned in the past, not to fuck with him.
Serra calmed down a little more with each drink she took from the bottle and was almost mellow by the time she turned it up and got nothing but a drop on her tongue. Closing one eye to focus better, she eyed the thick glass. This would not do. Setting it down with a hollow thunk on the tile, Serra sighed and tried to stand. The first attempt was a no-go, but the second was smoother, if a little wobbly. Pushing the hair back from her face and smoothing it as best she could, she pointed her feet toward the house and willed them to take her there.
A growl rolled up the back of her throat as she pawed through the pantry and didn’t find a replacement bottle. She held out her hand to ghost in another bottle and thought better of it. The last thing she needed was to close herself away from everyone and drink alone. She needed a distraction, something to take her mind off the cluster fuck she’d made of her life. Closing the cupboard door harder than she meant to, she grinned. If she was lucky, her smokes might still be behind that bar where she’d tossed them. Serra ghosted to the back alley to check.
Jared turned his attention to a group of males getting loud and growled. Moving out from behind the bar, he took hold of two of the males. “Not tonight, assholes.” As they started to threaten his life, he threw them through the closest door. They hit the back alley door and fell into the street. Jared followed them out and watched as they got to their feet and stood ready to fight. “Please, you’re outnumbered.” He said as both men looked at each other like he was bat shit crazy.
“Dude, there’s two of us and one of you.”
Jared smiled. “That’s what I said. You’re outnumbered.” He needed to get rid of the rage pumping through him. Bashing their heads together would help a little. And then he felt her appear. “Fuck me!” He snarled. He couldn’t see her, but he felt Serra there.
Serra copped a squat and scoured the ground with her eyes, praying to any god that might be listening that she would spot the black and blue camel crush pack that would soothe the anxiety that was threatening to have her breathing into a paper bag with her head between her knees. She jumped when she heard the door thrown open, crashing against the brick facade of the bar.
She knew that pissed off voice. Banging her head softly against the dumpster, not caring if she got anything on her, she groaned. Of course, he was here. Just fuck. The tequila made her stupid, but feeling Jared so close by and the fury that rolled off him sure as shit sobered her up and made her feel a little sick, but mostly less drunk. Forgetting about the cigarettes, she leaned to the side to see around an abandoned trash can.
Jared wasn’t wrong, the other two were outnumbered, because she would be damned if anyone sucker punched her maybe mate. A fair fight she wouldn’t embarrass Jared by interfering in, but one low blow and her claws were coming out.
The males shook their heads and went in for the attack. Jared blocked the first one as he tried to swing on him. The other male decided to play dirty, pulling a knife from his back pocket.
“Prison rules,” Jared growled dodging the knife swing from the other. He felt the blade slide across his right hip. Snarling in pain, he wanted to shift and claw their throats out. “You mother fucker!” He yelled moving back quickly.
The males laughed and regrouped trying to back Jared into one of the big dumpsters.
Serra’s brow arched and a growl rolled up the back of her throat as the scent of blood filled her nose. His blood. “Oh fuck no,” Serra grumbled under her breath as she pushed to her feet, letting the other two see her as they tried to back Jared toward her. Her eyes moved over him, looking for the wound and locating the growing blood stain on the hip of his jeans.
Her eyes swept over the two men coolly as she stepped out of the way of Jared dodging another swing of the knife. The smell of cheap booze poured off the men, making her smile. Ghosting beside the one with the knife, she sunk her claws into the arm holding the blade and wrenched it up behind his back, her other hand tangling in his hair and yanking his head back. Her boot to the back of his knees dropped the SOB to a prayer pose. “I have to talk to him about a few things, so how about you two kids go play and let the grownups talk?” She smiled sweetly at the other male and cocked her head to the side. “Rhetorical question, so that you know.” Serra nodded toward the mouth of the alley with her head and gave the arm of the one she was holding another twist.
She seemed to come out of nowhere. Before Jared could tell her not to get involved, she was kicking ass and taking names. He growled and tackled the other male knocking him to the ground. Once there, he started to choke him out. Jared’s large hands felt the guy’s windpipe start to give. Growling low, he watched the light in the human’s eyes start to fade. He was killing him, and he didn’t give a shit. No one touched him, and he couldn’t let them hurt h
er.
Her head tilted to the side as she watched Jared strangle the human. She should care that the stupid piece of shit was dying, but she didn’t. That Jared and herself would have to pay for it, that registered on her radar, but just barely. “You can’t kill him. No matter how much he needs it.” Her tone was calm and bored like she was discussing how paint dried.
Jared snarled and ignored her.
“Don’t make me do something else that will piss you off,” she warned.
“I’m not scared to go back to prison.” He said still choking the human out. The man struggled under Jared. Jared let go, got off him and stood up. He found the knife on the ground and picked it up. He moved to the other male, the one she had a hold on and rammed the knife into his groin. Twisting the blade, he smiled coldly. “Do not come back again. Ever.” His voice was calm and cold.
Pulling the knife free he dropped it and stepped back, watching the male’s face. He was so shocked that no sound came from his working mouth.
Sighing, she dropped the male when the knife clattered on the broken asphalt and wiped her hands against the thighs of her jeans, trying to get its stink off her. Grimacing, she shook her head and went back to the search for her lost smokes. “Feel better?” She asked over her shoulder to the Panther who was still seething before glancing back at Mr. Shocked and Pissing Blood. “That was your cue to leave if you want to keep breathing.” She smiled tightly and cursed about stupid humans under her breath. Damion’s pig farm would be a good place to dispose of them. Maybe they should reconsider this letting them go thing.
The humans escaped down the alley leaving a trail of blood. Jared didn’t care. He closed his eyes behind his shades, trying to calm himself. Once his heart slowed down a bit, the sting of the wound on his hip set in.
The Mating (Black on Black, #1) Page 10