by P. Jameson
But in all the years, all the conversations, all the one-on-one time… he’d never told his best goddamn friend about his son.
They didn’t know him. They thought he was peace-loving and zen. He was the mellowest among them, but it was because for so long he hadn’t cared about shit. Not until things started changing. Not until the pact changed and the light descended on Ouachita.
Not until Destiny chose him to be their guide. Not until Sunshine blasted her light into his heart revealing all his cobwebs.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. But it wasn’t for any of them. It was for the one person who would never be able to offer forgiveness. It was for Jordy.
He eyed the others. Everyone was there but Sunshine. He didn’t know where she’d gone, but he had to get this out. It was poisoning him.
“I was a father. I had a cub. I had a mate. I had it all, but I lost it.” The words tumbled out of him like a volcano erupting. “I had a female. A leopard. She wasn’t happy, but I tried. So. Damn. Hard. I didn’t cat around. I was good to her.” He ignored the tears that came. It burned him to break like this in front of the strongest people he’d ever known, but this was real. This was it. This was him. Shit and all. “Didn’t matter, she ran. She had our baby and ran. Left us. Traded our life, traded our tiny helpless son, for a new life where she could numb out on drugs. Waste away.”
His words settled into silence. They painted the air with a new story, and he could see his clanmates grappling to make sense of it.
“But her animal,” Magic murmured, frowning. Except he, of all people, knew exactly what happened when a shifter’s animal gave up.
Mason shook his head, hands fisting and opening before hooking over his hips. He was wound too tight. Needed to run.
Stay. Get it all out.
“Her leopard was weak. Wouldn’t fight for her. And… our son… he inherited her weak animal.” His voice broke admitting that. His Jordy was strong, fought long and hard, but his leopard hadn’t. “She left Jordy with me, and I cared for him. We were making it okay without her. But then…”
Mason started pacing. This was the hard part. This was the part that made him want to escape. The part he’d spent years escaping.
No. No more running. No more hiding.
“He got sick. A cancer took his little body and it was just too much for his cat. He couldn’t… he couldn’t beat it. Fuck,” he breathed pacing the room faster.
The new baby whimpered, and he stopped, taking a deep breath. He could do this. And without scaring the little one.
Shaking his head, he looked at his clan. “He couldn’t beat it.”
His people stood silent, each face holding a different expression as the reality of his past set in. As they saw him how he truly was. Not the playboy, not the schmoozy sex on a stick masseuse that drew the ladies to the spa. Not hometown famous. Not the one-night-stander afraid of commitment. Not the joking, foul-talking, beer chugging, rangy mountain cougar. But as a man, who’d been broken by a shitty past, whose shadows were blown apart by watching his clan find happiness. A man who wanted happiness of his own because the way he’d been living was choking him out little by little, a fist around his throat.
Silence filled the space while his breaths heaved, and he waited for their judgement.
“Did you go after her?” Layna asked quietly.
He stared at her where she stood beside Ryan. She’d hidden out at Lake Haven, avoiding her mate like the plague. All their females had. They wouldn’t like hearing the truth.
But no more hiding.
“Yes,” he said. “I tried. Not so I could force her to stay, but for our young. He needed his mother.” His voice cracked and he cleared his throat.
“You couldn’t find her?” Owyn asked.
Mason closed his eyes, taking a deep breath before answering on the exhale. “She broke our bond so I couldn’t.”
“She…” Layna’s voice trailed off. “How?”
“I don’t know. I couldn’t scent her, couldn’t feel her. Couldn’t fucking find her.”
“A weak bond,” Thames rumbled, but Nastia shook her head, quickly swiping tears from her cheeks.
“No. Something else. Remember what the Elder said.” All gazes swung in her direction, and she muttered, “Oh, what? He’s going to find out sooner or later.”
Mason scowled. “Find out what?” Had Destiny been talking to them? About him? Why couldn’t she have just told him whatever she needed to say straight to his… his… head.
“Destiny said Mason has made a mistake,” Nastia murmured, her brow creased in thought. “But he wasn’t ready to admit it. When he’s ready, he’ll need the clan to have his back like a… a… what was it?” She squinted hard at Mirena.
“Like a chiropractor,” Mirena offered.
“Yes. Like a chiropractor. Because the clan is powerful enough to fix his mistake. That’s what she said.”
Mason shook his head, bewildered. Sure, he’d made mistakes. Too many to weed through and figure out which one she was referring to. That’s why he was spilling his guts while they should be celebrating. A little psychic help would be good right about now, but Destiny had gone silent.
“What are you thinking, witch?” Magic asked, hand on his chin, eyes flitting from Nastia to his mate and son and back.
“I think…” She took her time, looking at the others. Like she was considering something, working it out in her head. Slowly, she nodded. “These bonds aren’t easily broken. A true mating bond… it doesn’t just go away. Look at us.” She swept her arm out, including everyone nearby. “This is what mating bonds look like. And breaking it would never be so easy. It would take death.”
But Deana had been unhappy. She’d wanted out. The Ouachita mates didn’t want away from their males.
Doc added, “Even a female cat who’d bonded, no matter how hard she wanted away, would struggle.” She glanced at Owyn. “I know because I grew sick after I’d bonded to Owyn and we weren’t together.”
Nastia nodded. “If your… female… was able to evade you, and cut off the connection, I suspect it wasn’t out of sheer will. Especially since you say her cat was weak.”
Mason shook his head. “But we were never normal anyways. Our bond was different. She never gave it her all. Never trusted me. And we had no healing abilities. I couldn’t fix her heart, couldn’t fix her body…” He trailed off as a thought hit him.
Not like he could fix Sunshine’s.
Destiny’s words from earlier came back to him. Your first mating was a mistake.
A mistake. He’d argued with her because mating Deana had given him Jordy. But maybe she was being literal.
“I think you bonded and marked the wrong female.” Nastia confirmed exactly what he was trying to wrap his head around.
First mating was a mistake.
Which meant…
Mason swallowed hard. Felt his eyes go wide as he stared at his brothers and sisters.
It meant Sunshine was his intended. Sunshine was the female meant for him. His perfect match. She was his, and not just because he wanted her to be. She was the one his cat had been waiting for all this time. Since he was a boy, listening to his mama tell him how to do right by his mate.
His cougar tried to tell him. The animal was right, and he’d been denying it all along.
The cat purred inside, finally satisfied that he and Mason were on the same page.
Sunshine is mine.
As if he’d conjured her, he watched through the window as the top of her blond head passed by it, and then her worried face was in the doorway.
“D-D-D-occc, come! Bethany’s birthing has begun! Tried to help, but I don’t know how. Please, come, she needs you now.”
Then she ran from the room back to Bethany’s, taking his heart with her.
Chapter Twelve
Mason stood in the waiting area of the spa, watching carefully through the window at the happenings in Bethany’s room. Doc and Owyn didn’t need him in
there. Adira was doing a fine job helping, and besides, he knew she’d grown closer to Beth over the months she’d been here. She spent countless hours playing games with Rhys and keeping him company so Renner and Beth could have some alone time before the new baby arrived.
She belonged in there, and Josie’s birth had put him through the ringer. He’d sit this one out.
Ryan appeared beside him, saying nothing. Staring through the same window that only showed half of what was going on in the delivery room. Bethany wasn’t visible, but he was no doubt nervous for his sister.
Together they watched as Owyn and Doc flit around the room. Adira and Renner stood on either side of the bed, cheering Bethany on.
Minutes later, Magic took up post on Mason’s other side. “How’s it going?”
Mason gave him a shrug. “Good, it looks like.”
“Good.”
“Didn’t mean to fuck up your special day,” Mason muttered. “Sorry I lost my shit.”
Magic took a few seconds to answer. “Naw. It’s good. You’ve been too solid for too long anyway. I was starting to wonder if you were normal.”
More silence as the three of them waited to hear a new cry.
“Could’ve told us,” Ryan mumbled. “We could’ve helped. We do that, in case you haven’t noticed. We help each other.”
“I did notice that.” Mason had been helping them all behind the scenes for over a year. He knew. “Haven’t said his name out loud since…” Ryan’s head turned to look at him, but Mason kept his gaze trained on Adira where she stood next to Bethany’s bed. “Not since the day I lost him. I wasn’t ready. Not until seeing that new young.”
“Jordan Rhys,” Magic murmured.
“Huh?”
“We named him Jordan Rhys.”
Mason ripped his gaze away from the room to stare at him. Jordan.
“We assumed Jordy was short for Jordan,” he said.
“It was.” Mason’s heart thundered.
Magic naming his first born young after Mason’s was better than saying I love ya bro. It was saying… I respect you and the shit you went through. I’m not mad at you. I honor you.
“And Rhys, after the first young ever born of the Ouachita clan,” Magic added. “JR for short.”
“Damn fine name,” Ryan murmured, nodding. “Damn fine.”
Bethany’s long guttural scream followed by a silence brought their attention back to the delivery. Mason could see Doc quickly working on something that fell below the frosted part of the window. The whole room seemed to grow thick with tension as the seconds ticked by slower than cold tar.
“Come on, come on,” he whispered. He could feel Ryan strung tight beside him, waiting for that first cry from his new niece or nephew. Magic shuffled from foot to foot, itching to pace the way he did so often.
And then they heard it, an angry squeal that was like music to their ears. Loud and obnoxious. Furious at the bright cold world. Evidence of healthy lungs.
The cheers erupted around him and again, Mason felt like he’d won the jackpot. Like this was the beginning of a new day. Like all his mistakes were put to bed and he could start over new. Do it right this time. With Sunshine. With his clan… his family.
“It’s a girl!” Renner called, his face lighting up. “A little baby girl.”
“Yesss.” Ryan pumped his fist in the air, and turned to find Gash. “That’s a hundred green ones you owe me, big buddy. Pay up.”
Magic scowled while Gash dug for his wallet. “You bet on what the baby would be?”
Ryan grinned big. “Sure did.”
“You bet on mine?”
Ryan’s smile faded. “No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
“Well, it’s just—”
“Wasn’t my young’s status worth anything to you?” Magic’s frown went full-face.
“It was just that—”
“Didn’t any of you want to make a buck on whether mine was a dude or a lady? Huh? Anyone?”
Several of the clan struggled to contain their laughter.
Ryan tried again. “Listen, it was—”
“Bastards,” Magic muttered, stalking back to Josie’s room while the rest of them snickered and hooted.
Mason turned back to watch the scene through the window. Doc and Owyn were finishing up with Bethany, while Renner held the baby against his mate’s chest. But it was Sunshine that captured Mason’s entire attention. It was the way she looked on, warring emotions on her face. Excitement for the new life she helped bring into the world. Happiness. But swirled with something so sad, the weight settled around his heart again.
Their bond was stronger now, and he could feel her emotions like they were his own. She looked up, her eyes locking with his, and it was clear as day. Hope, struggling to fly and crashing hard. And worse, she was resigned to let it lie there.
His Sunshine was giving up.
His gaze bore into her through the window and she didn’t look away. But this felt different than when Deana gave up. That female had given up for selfish reasons. Because she didn’t want the life she’d created with Mason. With Sunshine it was something else. Something he couldn’t quite…
There. Right there.
With Sunshine it was because she was afraid of what she would become. Afraid of hurting the ones she loved. Oh, his female cared hard. Real hard.
Mason narrowed his gaze at her, watching as a single tear rolled down her cheek.
But his resolve was strengthened. He knew they were for each other. He knew, and he’d show her. Everything was going to be alright.
Don’t cry, mate. I know just what to do.
And this time, that statement was truth.
***
Adira busied herself around the spa, helping Doc and Owyn clean up both rooms. She helped Josie into a more comfortable room in the Lodge. They’d move her and the new baby back to her and Magic’s cabin tomorrow.
And then she repeated the whole thing with Bethany.
By the time the mothers, the anxious fathers, and their sweet new young were settled, it was nearly dawn and everyone had left to get a few z’s. Everyone except for Layna. She was stationed at the front desk, yawning while she cradled a steaming cup of coffee.
“Cong-g-g-gratulations, auntie,” Adira told her as she passed through. But the cougar motioned her over with a growing smile.
“Thanks, witch,” she said, setting her coffee aside. “It’s been so long since I held a baby, I think I’ll be bugging Beth and Josie for more newborn snuggles after I get all the guests checked out. Only one couple is registered for tonight so I’m upgrading them to the cabin east of the lake and offering free room service. The clan will have the place to ourselves tonight. Party time.” She winked.
Adira nodded, attempting a smile. Good. This was good.
Father Isaac would be here by then, and as soon as the stars were visible, they could start the spell to cancel her out. Normal humans had names for what was going to happen to her. Death. Dying. Passing on. But she didn’t like to think of it like that. She wasn’t dying. She was returning to where she came from. To the mystics that birthed her. And when she did, all her magic would go with her. Light or dark. Whatever she held, it would be given to the stars and black sky.
And her people would be safe. Mason would be safe.
That thought settled her nerves.
“So…” Layna said, sipping more of her drink. “Your man is still in the spa. Think he fell asleep waiting for you.”
Adira nodded to avoid needing a rhyme.
“Sorry I interrupted your baby making earlier.”
Adira shook her head, heat flooding her cheeks. “We w-w-weren’t… uh…”
“It’s okay,” Layna said quickly. “I’m just glad he was able to connect with you like he did. Otherwise, I don’t think he ever could have been honest with us about his past. You’ve really helped him, Sunshine.”
His past. The reminder of what she’d heard twisted her stoma
ch. He’d had a young, and a mate. The details had come to her partially through his thoughts she could eavesdrop on, and partially through the open doorway when she’d walked back into the spa.
Mason had a family. And he’d lost them. Tragically, though the details were blank to her because of Renner waving her down to help with Beth. Whatever else Mason had worked through with the clan, had been lost to all the excitement going down in Beth’s room.
But she didn’t need to know. He’d suffered, and now it made sense why he rejected the idea of her as a mate, of giving her a young to anchor her. So much blank space had filled in with just the little she’d heard.
Her cat wasn’t truly hers, and wouldn’t be ever.
It made her decision easier. Even if just a little. She’d just gotten it wrong with him, thinking he was hers. But now, the pain of that not being reality would get washed away with Father Isaac’s spell.
Cancelling her out was going to fix a whole lot.
Layna’s gaze narrowed on her, and Adira knew it was time to move along before the cat’s intuition caught something she didn’t want it to.
“I’d better go… you know… check him…” Rhyme. Rhyme. Rhyme.
“Before you wreck him?” Layna offered, and Adira let out a breath of relief.
She nodded her goodbye and continued down the hall. Pushing through the door, she kept as quiet as possible. She didn’t want to wake Mason. In fact, she planned on using what power she could muster to perform a light sleeping spell.
She stopped just inside the door to watch him. He was so peaceful like that, with all his walls down. He lounged on the loveseat, one long leg draped over the arm. Hands folded over his chest, face angled toward the door like he’d been waiting for her.
Adira’s heart fluttered wildly in her chest, seeing him soft and at ease. She wished she could cross the room and crawl on top of him. Melt against him like she had in her bed. How could he feel so much like hers when he wasn’t?