by Zoe Chant
Slowly, slowly, Lynn came back to herself. Her breath evened out, her heartrate slowed, and she relaxed back into the soft earth, feeling the weight of Ken on top of her. His face was pressed against her neck, and she reached up to card her fingers through his sweat-damp hair.
And slowly, a new knowledge filled her.
She was more certain than she’d ever been of anything before. This new truth had appeared, like an immutable law of the universe, like gravity or temperature. There was no denying it, because it was all around her.
This man was her mate.
As she blinked up at the sky, the realization coursing through her veins like a heartbeat, Ken lifted his head and looked down at her.
They stared at each other for a long, long moment. There was no need to ask if Ken felt it too. Just by looking at him, Lynn could tell that he did.
“Lynn,” he murmured. “I knew there was something special about you from the moment that I saw you. I never realized it would be this.”
Slowly, Lynn pushed herself into a sitting position. Ken retreated enough to let her, but stayed close, slipping an arm around her shoulders, twining the fingers of his other hand with hers.
Mates. “I never thought I’d have a mate,” Lynn said blankly.
It was true. She’d always pictured herself alone. She hadn’t dreamed about perfect, destined romance like some of the other shifter girls she’d known, growing up. Heck, she hadn’t even dreamed about normal romance.
Her dreams had always been about the forest. Sometimes, about her family—about her lost parents, her difficult sister, her grandmother. What it would be like to have a large family, a dependable family. A family that was there all the time, and not just when they wanted to be, or for only a short time before they left or passed away.
She’d never dreamed about boys. Nor, as an adult, about men.
A mate was family, though. Right? She tilted her head to look at Ken, considering. Could he be her family?
But it wasn’t any use asking, was it? There was no getting away. He was her family.
The thought sat oddly in her chest. On the one hand, it felt perfectly right, perfectly wonderful. But on the other hand—
“I never thought I’d have a mate, either,” Ken said softly. “When I was a kid, I daydreamed about it, but only ever in this…lost, abstract way. And when I grew up, I thought that it seemed like too much for me. That I couldn’t make that kind of commitment, maintain that close of a relationship.”
Lynn managed a little chuckle. “That doesn’t bode well.”
His arm tightened around her. “In my twenties, it wouldn’t have. Even in my thirties. I didn’t think I could be that for another person. But I learned, in the Corps, how to commit, and how to be close. I just came out of it thinking that it was too much. That I couldn’t ever do it again—not for an institution, not for a person.”
“And now?” she whispered, caught in a swell of apprehension. That he’d say he couldn’t? Or that he’d say he could?
“Now I know I can,” he said back. “I just never wanted to before. Before now.”
Lynn wriggled out from under his arm, started casting around for her clothes. Underwear, bra. Pants. Shirt. “But how can we do it?” she asked, searching desperately for practicalities. She needed something concrete. She couldn’t swim around in this sea of emotions for much longer, before drowning. She wanted dry land. “You have this job—you won’t be here for much longer—and I could never leave Glacier—”
“I would never ask you to,” Ken said immediately. “I promise. I’ll never ask you to leave your home.”
That was some kind of commitment, from a man who’d as much as admitted that he’d never really had a home, himself.
“But maybe I can stay here,” he was continuing. “I don’t think I mentioned to you how much of a coup it was for me to get this job. It was my connection to Cal that even got us the permits to work in Glacier, and my bosses were incredibly grateful. They were talking about how many years of work we could do up here. Our data on these northern forests is incredibly sparse. I’m pretty sure I could get them to agree to post me semi-permanently here in and around Glacier—especially if I say I’m getting married to someone who lives here, the company’s pretty good about respecting relationships like that—”
Married. God. Lynn pulled her boots on and breathed. She wasn’t just going to stand up and run away from all this talk of commitment. She could stay here and have a rational conversation about it.
Couldn’t she?
She felt like some sort of bizarre male stereotype. Wasn’t this how men were supposed to be? Comfortable having fantastic sex with someone, but the second the word marriage was on the table, they were off like a shot.
Whereas right now, Ken was calmly discussing the idea of getting married, of bending his whole career around this newly-discovered relationship. And meanwhile, Lynn was the one practically hyperventilating about it.
“Ken,” she said, interrupting a stream of reassurances about how his job would be perfectly okay with him running off to live in Nowheresville, Montana for the rest of his life with a woman he’d known for less than a week. “Ken.”
He stopped. “What?”
“I need to take a little while to think about this,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting to change the rest of my life today. I never expected this. I need to take a step back. Be alone. Think about what this is going to mean for the future.” She remembered suddenly, “I have to meet a client in half an hour anyway.” She was lucky she hadn’t had back-to-back appointments starting at six AM today.
His face did a—a thing. Lynn instantly felt like the worst person in the world, because it was clear that he hadn’t been ready to hear that. Even more than just his expression, she knew he was hurt, deep in her bones.
How long had it been since she’d had the power to hurt another person so easily, like this? Had she ever?
But before she could say anything, try to explain, or take it back, his face smoothed out completely, composing itself into the friendly, easygoing expression she’d seen before. “Sure,” he said. “I understand. No problem.”
It was awful to see. Lynn knew she’d hurt him. She’d watched it happen. And then he took that hurt and buried it under a smile, as though it didn’t matter, and no one needed to see it.
“Never mind,” she said. “I’ll stay here for a while. I can—I can call my next client and cancel—”
“Whoa, whoa,” he said instantly. “I said it isn’t a problem.”
It was Lynn’s turn to be gentle, to be understanding, she realized. As kind as he’d been to her about revealing her body, she had to be just as kind to him about revealing his emotions.
“Ken,” she said quietly. “You lied.”
His eyes widened. “Wow,” he said after a long moment of silence. “That’s going to be tough to get used to.”
“Not lying?” Lynn wasn’t sure how she felt about that.
“No, not that. I’m not a compulsive liar or anything, I promise.” He flashed her a reassuring smile, which faded into a thoughtful look. “I’m just…used to being able to keep stuff hidden, I guess. Give myself time to process it.”
“I’m not as good at that,” Lynn said. Too much time spent alone, probably; she hardly ever had to deal with strong emotions in front of people. Everyone in town was used to her being gruff, blunt-spoken, not hiding her opinions of things.
“So you have to take some time to yourself.” Ken was following the thought to its logical conclusion. “All right. Okay. That makes sense.” He was talking to himself, now, working through it.
“You get that I don’t want to get away from you,” Lynn tried. “I just need—this is a big change. I need to think about what it means.”
“Yes,” he said slowly. “Yes. I understand.” He looked up and smiled, and this time it was tentative, but real. “All right. When can I see you again?”
“Tonight?” Lynn said. “Dinner?�
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Ken took her hand, squeezed it. “Dinner sounds amazing.”
“Great,” Lynn said on a relieved sigh. “We can go to Oliver’s, I guess; it’s the best place in town.” Although that meant the gossip would begin spreading immediately. Nina had worked as a waitress as Oliver’s before taking the guide job with Lynn, and Lynn was sure her former coworkers would be texting her about her new boss being there with a—Lynn cast an eye over Ken’s still-naked body—very attractive man. Probably before they were even seated.
But if they were mates, well, it wasn’t like they were going to be having some kind of secret fling. Right?
God.
Lynn squeezed Ken’s hand back, then freed her fingers. “I have to go meet my client.” After having sex out on the forest floor. She was going to be scrutinizing herself very carefully in her truck’s mirror before heading back, that was for sure.
He leaned in and kissed her softly. “Go. I’ll see you tonight.”
The kiss temporarily evaporated any issues Lynn might’ve had a second ago. She kissed him back, marveling once again at how right it felt. She’d never even realized it was possible to feel like this.
Only the knowledge of her client waiting for her made her pull back. “Tonight,” she affirmed, and turned towards her truck. Thinking about speed, she shifted, the better to run back quickly.
The mate-bond hit her all over again once she was in her lynx form. Mate! her lynx was thinking ecstatically. He’s our mate. The lion is our mate!
Lynn hadn’t quite realized how fantastic Ken smelled in her human form. She wanted to run back and nuzzle up to him, then maybe curl up next to him and stay there forever.
Client, she reminded both herself and her inner lynx, although her shifter side definitely didn’t care much.
Mate, her lynx thought wistfully, as Lynn forced them to trot off into the woods instead of staying curled up with Ken.
If she hadn’t had a real professional obligation, she would’ve turned right back. Well, it was good to know that her shifter side didn’t share any of the complicated feelings Lynn’s human side had about the mate-bond.
Mate, she thought again, this time with all the wonderment that had been overwhelmed by her doubts. My mate.
***
Ken watched Lynn vanish into the forest, holding himself still with an effort.
His lion was roaring inside him. We can’t let our mate leave! We just found her. She needs to stay with us!
That’s not how this works, Ken told his lion firmly. Our mate is her own person with her own wants. She can make her own decisions. We can’t run after her and carry her off against her will. She wouldn’t like that.
His lion receded a bit, grumbling, Well, if you say it like that.
I do.
The problem was, Ken understood his lion’s need. But he also understood that it wasn’t a need born entirely of love and desire.
Although he felt both of those for Lynn, and they both rose up in him, cutting like a knife, when she left.
But really, that kind of dumb possessive behavior was born out of fear. He was afraid that if he let Lynn out of his sight, she wouldn’t come back. And if he couldn’t trust his mate to come back to him, if he thought she’d run away from his love, well, then he couldn’t trust in anything. And he’d probably want to take a good hard look at his own self, if he ever did drive a woman away like that.
So he let Lynn go, trusting her to come back.
And, truth be told, he understood why she needed to be alone for a bit.
Because, mates. Now that the initial euphoria was receding enough to allow for other thoughts, Ken’s brain was becoming one big question mark.
Mates. At his age. It was insane.
And it wasn’t just his age. He’d spent his entire life demonstrating that he wasn’t the sort of man to be a good mate to anyone. Drifting from woman to woman, having fling after fling, nothing serious. Sometimes just good sex, and sometimes not even that—he was always happy to go out on a date or two, show a woman a good time, make her laugh, kiss her at the end of the night and leave it at that if she didn’t want any more.
That sort of life was totally incompatible with even the idea of mates. Committing his whole self to one person, putting her needs above his own, bending his life to fit around hers—
Well, the only thing in his life that had ever had that privilege was the Marine Corps.
And even that had started more as a way to get away from his family than anything else. Over time, he’d learned the rewards of devoting himself to something bigger than just him. He’d learned what it was like to forge bonds with people. People like Cal, and the rest of his old unit. Seeing his old buddies Nate, Carlos, and Ty at Cal’s wedding had reignited that connection. Reminded him that he wasn’t as much of a loner as he sometimes thought.
But there was a big difference between the kind of bond you forged with a wartime buddy and the kind you had with the woman who was your mate.
Could he do this? Was he even capable of it? Those seemed like the big questions he should be asking.
The problem was, he was so sure he knew the answer. Yes, his entire body screamed. Yes, his lion said with absolute confidence. Yes. After all, there was nothing else Ken had to distract his attention. Only his job, and he’d taken the job so he could be outside and active. If they wouldn’t post him to Glacier permanently, he could quit and do something else. Anything else, really, if he was living up here.
Maybe Lynn would take him on at her guide business. It sounded like she had more clients than she could handle.
The idea of Lynn as his boss made him smile. He was sure she was as no-nonsense in the office as she’d been with him at first. She probably had everything organized to a T, and made sure every client went away satisfied.
And Ken would be happy to work for her. Or to work somewhere else, and come home to her every night. To go running with her in the mountains, to sleep curled up together in the wilderness. To sleep in her bed, wherever that was. He wondered where she lived—a house or an apartment? Probably a house, in a small town like this. He couldn’t wait to see it.
That Yes was still pulsing inside his chest, a sure and certain drum.
He was going to trust it. And if it turned out to be optimistic, well, no matter how many jokes he made, Ken had always been a hard worker and a fast learner. He’d never done anything like this before, never been in any kind of serious relationship, but he could do it now.
For his mate.
***
Lynn went through her early client meetings in a daze. It was lucky she’d guided hundreds of people down the trails she was using, or she would’ve been completely incoherent with them. But the well-practiced speeches on topography, history, and plant and animal life fell off her tongue with almost no input from her brain.
Her brain, meanwhile, was screaming Mate, you left your mate back there! Go back and find him!
But underneath that, there was this impossible-to-ignore well of uncertainty and doubt. Not of Ken in particular. Lynn had no reason to doubt him, nothing that made her think he wouldn’t be a good mate.
But she’d been completely alone for so long. And her family had all left her, through disappearance or death.
Partway through the day, she realized that it wasn’t just uncertainty she was dealing with. It wasn’t thoughts that she needed to process, it wasn’t just the newness of the whole idea of having a mate.
That was real. That was there, but it wasn’t anywhere near strong enough to stand up to the pulse of joy she felt whenever she thought of Ken.
No. This was plain old fear.
More than fear, even—almost panic. There was a deep, old knowledge inside her: that anyone she loved would leave before long. Her parents hadn’t stuck around long enough for her to know them. Her sister had left long ago, and right afterwards, when Lynn had needed her most, her grandmother had succumbed to a heart attack.
She couldn’t blame
her mother or grandmother, of course; they hadn’t chosen to die, and if there’d been another option, they would’ve taken it. Her father and her sister…well, she could blame them, but she’d found it better to put her energies elsewhere.
But she couldn’t forget.
Even if she didn’t think about it much anymore, even if she was able to live her life without feeling lonely, most of the time…
The second she’d realized that Ken was her mate, that here was someone who would stay with her forever, who would never leave—
The fear had roared up inside her. It had made her desperate to get away, because some ancient, wordless part of her brain was sure that if she stayed, Ken would leave.
Well, she wasn’t going to let that scared little part of her win.
No way.
***
Ken showed up at Oliver’s, the local diner, promptly at six.
He’d washed up and groomed as best he could out in a freezing mountain lake, and put on his least-wrinkled clothes—and then scoffed at himself. Did he think Lynn would care if he wore the plaid flannel button-down that was seventy percent wrinkles, as opposed to the plaid flannel button-down that was ninety percent wrinkles?
She wouldn’t, he knew. But the fact remained that he cared. He wanted to put in the effort for his mate.
Even if she was feeling ambivalent about him.
Ken was trying not to be tense about this. But it was surprisingly difficult.
Normally he was an easygoing guy. He went with the flow. If things didn’t go his way, well, there were always plenty of other ways they could go. He’d pick a different one and be happy with that. After all, any other way of living just meant you’d be constantly disappointed, frustrated all the time.
So when Lynn had wanted some space, had wanted to wait all day and then meet for dinner in public, at a diner, Ken had started to argue and then stopped himself. It was fine, right? Sure, he would’ve preferred to be with Lynn as much as possible today. But he understood that she had to think. And he would’ve preferred to meet somewhere private—back out in the woods, maybe. Or at her home. He had no idea where she lived, he realized, and he wanted to see that.