One True Mate 7_Shifter's Paradox

by Lisa Ladew

She cut him off, her eyebrows drawn, more of her hair springing out of its braid. “I know your hard dick did not mean you would think of me as your mate. I’m asking this question independently of that biological response.” Her scent flared, but he couldn’t tell what it was saying.

  He shook his head, thinking back over what she’d said, she’d said it so fast. Shit, he’d insulted her. And now he was insulting himself. He wasn’t slow. But apparently he wasn’t as fast as Eventine.

  She wasn’t mad at his biological response. Her scent filled the cold room with a warmth and scent that made his stomach swoop and clamp down. Her sweet but hard scent was wild, like all full-blooded wolven, and broad and vast and deep and complex like all the shiften, and at the same time, she had her own special Eventine twist of a wildfire full of secrets and stories. Twist. The lonely bonfire on a cold Northern Pacific beach in the spring. Twist, the sweet Kansas memory of marshmallows toasted on a stick, charred black, just like she liked them. Twist, a California forest fire with darker scents that hid and ran from Harlan. Twist. The flat, wet, hot of a humid Florida beach bonfire, lit in protest in the nighttime hours before a hurricane.

  Harlan reeled with the information, with the stories inside her scent, and just that quickly, they were gone. But she was aroused, he’d determined that for certain. His hard dick against her hip hadn’t bothered her one fucking bit.

  Oh Rhen, he was in so much trouble.

  “Eventine, ah-”

  She cut him off. “You know who I am.”

  He was confused. “Yeah, Eventine Risson.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “So you know how old I’m supposed to be.” A statement.

  He nodded cautiously, completely unaware where this was going but sensing landmines everywhere. The training room they were in was still empty. Far away he heard the sounds of wolven lifting weights, grunting and swearing.

  She swore and stalked away from him, then came back stood right in front of him, strong arms crossed over perfectly small breasts. “You’re my mate,” she said, staring in his eyes.

  Harlan couldn’t quite believe what he had just heard. Eventine Risson had recognized him as her mate? But she was 16. And he hadn’t recognized her back. What a fucking mess. And still his blood spiked. He wasn’t ready to mate, but then that’s all he had ever wanted at the same time.

  He rubbed the back of his neck and wished for shoes and socks. “Ah, Eventine, have you ever heard of a- well, ah mate crush?”

  She only stared for a moment, and then she clamped down on her scent and her being so violently that he took a step back. It took him a moment to realize she was angry. But not showing it.

  Eventine’s eyes narrowed, and he moved to protect his throat, but she didn’t attack him. Instead, she pulled her shirt over her head, dislodging more lovely curls. Shit. Under the shirt she had on a sports bra, her curves twisting his mind, bending his will.

  She turned around, still tightly controlling her anger. Harlan wasn’t sure what she expected of him at first, but then he did. She thought her renqua was visible and he could see what he could not. Did she have a mate mark? Did she have his mate mark? His fingers trembled and he hadn’t lifted them yet. He curled them into a fist.

  He could tell her. Evie, I can’t see it, move your hair. But then he wouldn’t get to touch her. He raised his hand and brushed those soft curls aside. She cried out lightly, the sound echoing in the still empty room at the end of the quiet hallway thank Rhen and her skin goosepimpled violently, the tiny bumps raising under his fingers on her shoulder and he was touching her hair. So soft and thick. So much of it. He brushed it to the side and she sighed, melting under his feathered touched. The room disappeared. His senses narrowed. Evie’s heartbeat. Evie’s breathing. Evie’s evie’s evies evies all evie everything he could take in from her and then he moved her hair far enough but his hand was still covering her renqua. He could only see dark arcs peeking out.

  Evie melted under his hand, her shoulder and neck muscles visibly relaxing. The moment stretched long, lifting Harlan’s ribcage, making him set his feet, filling him with an absurd desire to stand taller, look bigger, rip off his shirt and flex a few muscles, growl meaner, snarl with purpose, cover this little female with his body, let her touch everything she wanted, look her fill. He could protect her. He could keep her safe while she ran the world in that way that women did. Look Evie, turn and look. He pulled himself tall and a bit of a growl did escape from his throat. He clamped down in it and ripped his hand away so he could see, could know if she had a mate mark or not, because he did not want to dream about what her circled phoenix plus his knot could make. Anything. A knotted phoenix. A fiery, circled, sentient-looking knot. Something more that transcended both.

  Harlan held his breath and did not let himself feel the disappointment inside him when he saw yes, she had a mate mark, but it was still pale.

  A mate mark was a kind of indiscriminate, light, wavy scar that formed over a female wolven’s renqua when she’d recognized her mate. It didn’t take shape until she’d accepted her mate, and when she did, the scar shifted into the renqua of the male she’d accepted, and then when he claimed her, his bite mark deepened and darkened and melded with the mate mark into a scar that overlaid and blended with her renqua, a sign of their union more official than any token.

  Eventine Risson had a mate mark, yes. Not his. Not anyone’s. According to fate, she had recognized her mate, but not accepted him. He stared. “It’s pale,” he said, his voice flat and dull to his own ears, and she startled like she hadn’t expected that. She twisted, trying to see her own renqua, then went to the mirror on the wall, staring at it, her expression confused. Which made no sense.

  She ran her hand over the mark, staring at her own eyes in the mirror like she was having a conversation with herself.

  “Was it not pale this morning?” he asked.

  “I only saw you an hour ago,” she said flatly.

  Shit. She might not even have checked it, just assumed it would be there. Harlan had been thinking he would be smart to stay away from Eventine Risson, but if she really did recognize him as her mate that would be cruel to her.

  She interrupted his thoughts with a question. “How old do you think I am?” she said, her voice restrained as if she were scared to make any big moves around him. She was still staring in the mirror.

  “You’re 16,” he said, not about to elaborate that it wasn’t that simple, or so he’d heard.

  Evie stiffened ever so slightly. Harlan saw it anyway, in the tensing of the curve at her neck.

  “You repeat those words like they are a fact,” she said.

  Harlan shook his head again, raising his eyebrows. Again. That made no sense to him.

  Eventine dropped her hand, came back to him and searched his face. For the first time he saw uncertainty stamped in her features. For all her tough and bluff and speed and competence, she was still wolven.

  She spoke, still staring at him, and the moment turned soft and tender. From outside the door, somewhere deep in the gym a woman laughed. “Look at me, Harlan. Do you believe I am 16?” He shook his head, ready to speak too soon, and she held up a hand. “No. Look at me, really look at me.” She shot a glance past him at the door and the one small window that revealed the empty hallway beyond. “No one will come in here,” she said, sinking lightly to the mat and crossing her legs, tucking her feet neatly under her, then looking away from him. She breathed deeply and he relaxed. He couldn’t help it. She had that effect on him.

  He studied her profile, knowing that her skin, face, and body were telling him very little about her age. Sure, she was under 30, almost certainly, but other than that? He had no idea. Her face and her curves said 18, at least. Her petite nature said maybe younger. But her spirit? Whoa. Was that what he was supposed to be guessing? But no, that made no sense. So he looked at her. Really looked at her like she’d asked. So pretty, the amber eyes, bright and hard and decisive. You could see the surety behind them. Her lip
s tightened and she pressed them together, then relaxed them, still looking away from him.

  “Eventine, I’m not sure why-”

  Her eyes narrowed and she looked at him sharply and he felt another swooping in his belly. Something to do with a shift in her emotions?

  “Eventine, shit, forget I said that, about the mate crush. I just ah-” He rubbed the back of his neck again, trying to sort through what was going on inside him. He really only knew one thing. “I don’t recognize you as my mate.”

  Nowl’s growl bubbled up from deep inside him: I should be honored to receive such a fine wolf as Butterfly as my mate.

  But you don’t recognize her?

  A beat while he considered. I don’t.

  Eventine took a step forward. Harlan received a sense of her wolf inside, Butterfly. Petite, red, fierce, but gentled for the moment. Butterfly stretched her neck forward energetically, nose leading, and there was Nowl, reaching out, touching noses.

  Nowl? Do you now?

  No.

  And still Nowl did not pull back.

  Evie moved in close to him, making the hazy picture of Butterfly and Nowl fade and Evie jump into stark relief. She was only a foot away. She raised her hand, seeming about to touch him on the arm.

  She cocked her head, let her arm drop. Then stepped back. Nodded once, sharply. “You’re good. I’ll get your weapon.”

  And just like that, he was dismissed.

  22 - Past - Beastie Boy Gets Mean

  Jaggar took the curve at the speed of sound and Harlan held his breath until they cleared it. “You want to ease up a bit, Beast?”

  Jaggar shot him a look at the nickname.

  Harlan laughed. “Come on, no one calls you that?”

  Jaggar sneered but didn’t snarl. “Of course not.”

  Harlan made a face and looked the other way. Trying not to smile. Jaggar was a good kid. Touchy but he had his reasons. They’d had an interesting couple of days, Jaggar being assigned to help him orient to the department while a replacement was found for Sergeant Wheeling, who had gone out on maternity leave. Harlan liked Jaggar. Jaggar wanted to like him back, he really did, and they both knew the two of them could be great friends, but for some reason, the kid kept going sandpaper on him.

  Harlan hadn’t done much yet. Certainly no demon ass-whipping. He’d only gotten his uniform and weapon, qualified with his weapon, driven around the area a few times, studied the protocols, sniffed around Eventine Risson’s story a bit, just a couple questions here and there, and been issued a vehicle. He still didn’t know what his job would consist of each day, and was disappointed in the lack of demon blood-letting so far. In fact, the KSRT didn’t seem to do much at all besides bitch and bullshit until the shit hit the fan. The group needed a leader, one who wasn’t knee deep in baby poop at the moment or worrying over a comatose boy’s mental health.

  Oh, and he hadn’t seen Evie since she’d confessed she recognized him as her mate, he’d practically called her an immature baby in response, and she’d dismissed him and disappeared.

  He’d resolved to stay away from her, steer clear from her, knowing it was cruel if she really did recognize him as her mate, but it hadn’t mattered anyway. She’d disappeared. Which had given him a little breathing room. Made him wonder if perhaps her mark had come in, and it had not been his after all.

  Harlan stared out the window, at the forest whipping past, trying to think of something else besides Evie. It was all oaks and sycamores and elms blurring by, mostly blues and greens, but the first fire colors of fall were starting to show here and there. He dug around in his mind for an olive branch to extend to Jaggar. Wait. That was a human expression that made no sense to wolven. He was going to quit using it. What would the beast want? Not an olive branch. Something meaty. A meat popsicle. No that was stupid, there were no meat popsicles. Oh no? What about a drumstick, a big old fat turkey drumstick could be a meat popsicle if you stuck it in the freezer. Ha, not so stupid after all. Or maybe twice as stupid, he didn’t know. Luckily, no one would ever hear it, because he had an excellent filter. 93% of his thoughts never made it out his mouth.

  Harlan grinned, extending a meaty mental drumstick to the Beastie Boy. They could be working together for years, once Jaggar entered the KSRT. Who knew how important they would be to each other in the future, how bonds built now could affect what happened later.

  “Ok, Jaggar, I won’t call you Beast, either. Sorry! Anything else you’re pissed at me about?”

  Jaggar had an answer all ready for him. “I told you she was off limits,” he snarled.

  Harlan snorted softly, lowering his voice. “You told me?” Meat popsicle snatched back. Bite off a big imaginary hunk in front of him, swallow without chewing, and throw the rest in the dirt. We doing this? Cuz we can do this.

  Jaggar’s hands tightened on the wheel. “Yeah. Me and her, we got a thing.”

  Harlan grappled for control of himself, even though he knew it wasn’t true. Thought it wasn’t true. “Really?”

  “No, not really, you fucking dickhead, but we could, if you and your stupid abs would go back to Harlan, Harlan. You’re too fucking old for her, anyway.”

  Harlan kept himself well-reined in. No sane wolf wanted to fuck with the Beast that had never been allowed to shift, because the Citlali were petrified of what it might do. Harlan might have been accused of being a crazy wolf a time or two, but he’d never been called a stupid wolf. He liked his guts in his gut and he was gonna keep them there.

  He looked away and nodded his head. “Hardcore, kid.”

  The country road stretched on between farm after farm. They crested a gentle hill, slid down the other side, and up another, before Jaggar started to thaw. He spoke, and Harlan could feel the monumental effort it took. “Look, I know she’s not my mate. I know she thinks she’s yours, so that means you’re hers, and you’re just too fucking stupid to see it. She’s smart enough for both of you, so she’ll figure out how to get your dumb ass to notice it eventually, but until then, excuse me if I don’t throw you a fucking party. Evie’s my friend, and now she’s gonna be your mate, and-” He stopped talking abruptly.

  Harlan knew what the rest of that sentence was. And I won’t see her anymore. Shit, kid, sorry. But he wasn’t gonna promise it wouldn’t happen. Sometimes, that’s how it was. And fuck if it didn’t warm him from the inside out to think Jaggar might be right. Maybe he was too stupid to see that Evie was his mate. Maybe he should go with it. See what happened.

  He cleared his throat. No idea what he was going to say, but something would come out. Hopefully it wasn’t too stupid. “Look, I know you’ve known her for a long time.”

  Jaggar interrupted him. “Yeah, since I was five, and she was FIVE.”

  They crested another hill. Jaggar interrupted him, jerking his chin ahead of them. Harlan looked. The green plains and fields were flat, some harvested already, some still waving with crop. Jaggar had taught him every crop on their 2 hour drive from Chicago to Serenity. The empty or newly-planted fields had held spring oats or winter wheat, or maybe hay, while corn dominated what was left. Illinoisans (the S is silent he reminded himself. Illinoiiiiyans is how they said it) liked their crops. Back in Kentucky they’d been more into forests and streams and fucking off than this endless farming.

  One house appeared at the bottom of the next gentle hill, the only house in sight, and Harlan was seized by the knowledge that they were headed there. That was Burton Risson’s house, and Eventine Risson’s house. That massive, three story farmhouse with the sparkling white paint job and the carved front door grand enough to be a focal point for the house, even from this far away. The land the house sat on took up acres and acres, as far as Harlan could see, a few hobby crop plots here and there, plus one big, strange hole in the front yard of Burton’s house, but mostly, it was corn in every direction.

  They pulled in without another word, Jaggar parking the truck next to a well pump in the yard and jumping out. Harlan followed. Jagg
ar approached a back door into the house, not that carved monstrosity that Harlan had seen from the road. This was a normal door.

  Inside. Mud room, cool and clean and dark. Then farther inside. Through a doorway. Another doorway. Eventine’s scent barely lingered here, like she took great pains not to touch anything as she entered. Harlan wasn’t sure if she was there or not, but he guessed not. Burton Risson’s alpha wolf scent filled the room and overpowered everything. Into a kitchen. The place was cool. Lots of hardwood, wide hallways, built-in shelves, lighting and high windows. It didn’t look like a farmhouse from the inside.

  There, on the table. Something that did scent like Eventine. Jaggar had disappeared into another room. Harlan wondered briefly where Eventine’s room was, then went to the table and picked up the small notebook that scented like forbidden fire. He opened it, turning to a page at random. It was filled with notations that looked rather like math, but in two different sets of handwriting.

  Nxe4

  D3

  Harlan puzzled over the notations, scenting deeply, two secrets playing through his head.

  A hand reached into his awareness and plucked the notebook out of his hand. Jaggar.

  Jaggar shoved the notebook into his pocket. “That’s mine.”

  Harlan didn’t want to rise to the bait. Did anyway. “Then why’s it in Eventine’s house, scenting like she just had her hands all over it?”

  Fuck. Too late, Harlan remembered he was a 23 year old male, and Jaggar was a 16 year old beast who was probably smarter than Harlan would ever be.

  Jaggar sneered, then pulled the notebook out of his bag and pressed it to his nose. They were equally tall, both just over six foot, but Harlan had sixty or seventy pounds more muscle packed onto his frame than Jaggar did. But then Jaggar had the Beast and didn’t need shit else to scare bigger wolves than Harlan. Jaggar sniffed gently then grinned, showing his teeth. “It does scent like Evie, doesn’t it? That must be because it’s actually our notebook. See, me and Evie, we share this.” Jaggar held it up in front of Harlan’s face, fanning the air with it so Harlan would get another scent of Evie.