by Amelia Jade
“Seems like a terrible start to their vacation,” was all he could say.
“Really? You don’t say!” Braden replied, probing his rear end gingerly. Agony pounded long nails into his head with a hammer as he touched his tailbone itself. Yep, definitely broken. That was going to be annoying for a few hours until it healed. Thank goodness that’s all it would take though. He couldn’t imagine having to deal with it for weeks on end like a human would.
“You okay?” Gray asked at last.
“Nothing a few hours and a steak won’t fix,” he muttered. “But Gray, something tells me that these guys weren’t here on vacation.”
There was a muffled snort. “Whatever gave you that idea?” his boss asked, looking around at the destroyed room once more.
Ignoring the sarcasm, he told him all about what had happened. As he did Gray’s face grew even more closed. To a stranger he might look stone-faced, but Braden knew him well enough by then to recognize the signs of anger building.
“Get some rest. I’ll take this to Andrew.”
Braden followed him from the room, wondering if he was even going to be up for a steak as the adrenaline faded and the pain started to truly sink in.
Who are you kidding? It’s steak!
Chapter Two
Elle
They emerged from the woods at last, the park opening up before them.
“I can’t believe we made this work!” Ruth exclaimed happily, clapping her gloved hands together repeatedly in excitement.
Elle smiled and nodded. She too was ecstatic. It had taken a lot of planning to get this many of the girls together, but she was glad that they had. Now that they were clear of the woods the eight of them descended upon the park in a swarm. Their objective was rather unusual for the time of day, and that only made her smile even more. It was a Monday morning, the perfect time for their planned activity.
“Hooray, for no babies for a day!” Rachel, another of the friends, cried as she threw both hands up in the air.
All the others cheered right alongside her, including Elle. Like the others, she missed her baby. Gwenevere was staying with another of the mothers for the day, but she’d be home to her daughter tonight. But being able to relax without a child for the day was so far turning out to be a bigger blessing than she’d ever realized. It gave Elle a chance to focus on herself, to remember who she was, and though it had only been a couple of hours so far, she felt like a brand-new person, refreshed and reinvigorated, full of life once more.
And the day was just getting started!
It was cold out, and in what she was learning was typical early February fashion for the small mountain town of Cloud Lake, it was snowing again. The sun was shining through the clouds enough to help offset the grayness in the air, and it made the flakes seem lighter, and less offensive than they might normally be.
“Well come on Elle, let’s go!” Angela, part of her little trio of best friends said. The three of them, Rachel, Elle, and Angela all hurried to catch up with the others, boots crunching the snow underfoot, compacting the fresh addition into the thick layer that had already been ground down by dozens of others. They all reached their destination at the same time and found seats on the provided benches.
“I haven’t done this since I was a young girl!” one of the others said, her voice bubbling with anticipation.
“It’s been a long time,” Elle concurred as she removed the objects from where she’d been carrying them around her neck. “Maybe not that long for me, but still at least half a dozen years, if not more.”
The others all chimed in their agreement as they removed their snowboots and replaced them with skates. Elle finished lacing hers up, removing the black rubber skateguards that covered the blades when not in use, and started moving along the thick rubber mats that the town had laid down until she got to the edge of the ice.
“Well, here goes nothing,” she said, flashing the others a nervous grin. Being the first in line to do something had rarely fazed her, and she wasn’t going to let it happen now. With a deep breath, and a prayer to her brain in the hopes that it would remind her how to skate, she stepped on to the ice.
And promptly fell flat on her rear. This was accompanied by uproarious laughter from the other women, all of whom had been fearful of doing the same thing, and were glad that someone else had done it for them.
“Well, come on then,” she said, getting to her feet and managing to stay up this time. “I bet you most of you fall flat on your butts too.”
Elle wasn’t mad, though she had a feeling her rear was going to be a little sore the next morning. This was exactly the type of fun she’d expected to have when she’d first proposed the idea to the others. With all that had been going on in Cloud Lake lately, she felt that they needed a day to go and just relax, without stress and fear of…well, anything. Things had calmed down lately ever since Angela’s mate had revealed a spy sent to infiltrate the shifters of Cloud Lake.
She considered that as her skates bit into the outdoor ice rink that was made every winter at the park. Although she herself was still living the perfectly acceptable life of a single mother, something that bothered her not in the least—though it was definitely quite taxing—most of her friends had found love in the form of one of the shifters of the Embassy Guard. The whole concept was still sort of weird to her.
Gaining some confidence with her skates she pushed off, moving with the dozen or so other skaters as they made large, lazy circles around the rink, her mind still on the shifters. Most of the world’s population of shifters lived as far apart from humans as they could, in remote areas that discouraged human visitors. But Cadia, the territory on the other side of the Quicksilver mountain range to the east of Cloud Lake, had actually started to go the opposite. So much so, that they had actually opened up an embassy in Cloud Lake.
It was odd, in many ways, but the ambassador himself was—from all reports—a good man, and the ceremonial protection unit that had also come with him had contained two shifters who had fallen for her best friends. Both Rachel and Angela were head over heels for the men they called their mates.
She hit a rough patch of ice and wobbled, but her balance was returning to her now and she recovered smoothly, allowing herself to slow down for a moment. When she was in her early teens Elle had taken figure skating lessons for two years, and the more she continued to glide across the ice, the more it all came back.
I’d forgotten how much fun it is! I need to do this more often. Making a promise that she’d come out at least twice more before the snow melted, Elle maneuvered herself back over to her group of friends. Most of them were middling to poor skaters, though Carly, like herself, had some experience. The rest of them had bunched up into a pack, helping everyone stay on their feet as they laughed and shrieked their way across the ice, getting into absolutely everyone’s way.
She joined that pack now, letting herself be used as a stabilizer to help the group as a whole.
“Everyone having fun?” she asked, more rhetorically than anything.
“I’m terrible at this!” seemed to be the consensus reply, followed by shrieks of laughter as one of them went down.
“Oh come on!” she cried. “It’s not that hard. Watch!”
She pushed off, spinning around and skating backward after ensuring she had a clear path. “See?”
“Showoff!”
“Rude!”
“Never gonna happen with me!”
“It’s not hard. Anyone can do it,” she said again, right as her foot caught that same patch of ice she’d had troubles with before. “Ack!” was all she managed to say as she went down in a fall that lacked anything remotely resembling grace.
She hit the ice rather hard and slid quickly toward the boards. Elle tried to flip herself over to find some way to stop herself, but the ice was slippery. There was no stopping it, she was going to hit the boards. Hard. A collective gasp went up from her friends, and Elle braced herself for the worst.
“My apologies for the sudden touching of your person,” a voice rumbled from somewhere above her.
Elle blinked, abruptly realizing that she wasn’t staring at a blank landscape of snow, but a white shirt stretched tight over the chest of a person. Swallowing nervously, she craned her neck back to look at her rescuer.
He was tall. Really, really tall. Oh, and there were muscles. The shirt was a plain white T-shirt she knew now, pulled firmly over his athletic build. It bunched tightly over his biceps, emphasizing their thickness. He had a tattoo on his right arm, but her eyes were too busy trying to take in his sheer gargantuan size that she never really noted what it was of.
“Um, it’s no problem,” she said, astonished that her voice didn’t crack or falter.
Did she mention that he was handsome? Like, stunningly so? A strong jaw, uncovered by any stubble—just the way she liked it—formed the basis for a face that provoked all sorts of thoughts inside her that she desperately wished she didn’t think. Prominent cheekbones and a powerful nose complimented his slightly canted eyes. She looked at them now, noticing the brown circles tinged liberally with amber. They were dark and mysterious, and yet they twinkled mischievously in the daylight, diffused as it was from the gray clouds.
“Are you unharmed?”
“Uh, yeah, yeah I’m fine,” she assured him. “No problems here, see?” she twirled to demonstrate, lifting her arms to prove it.
She twirled. With her arms in the air. Her jacket lifted up, and suddenly Elle realized that her rear, likely covered in snow, was in full view of him. She slammed her arms down and continued her spin, stopping once she faced him, her face burning hotly in embarrassment.
“Yes, I see,” he reassured her.
Elle could have died. What had she been thinking?!
“So,” her mouth said of its own accord. “Do you come here often?”
Chapter Three
Braden
The human woman looked rather unhappy. Yet she’d also asked him a question. He was caught in a quandary. Did he do his best to keep the conversation short and just excuse himself from the area? She clearly didn’t seem to want to talk to him, which was a shame, because she was stunningly beautiful. He growled at himself, angry at how he’d opened the conversation.
“Your person”? Really? Who the hell says that anymore these days? Get yourself together and stop sounding like an archaic twit. Also, answer her question. It’s polite.
“Actually no,” he replied. “This is the first time I’ve ever come to this part of the town.”
“The town,” she said, repeating his words. “You’re a shifter then?”
He smiled as gently as he could, not wanting to upset her with the answer. She already seemed unimpressed by his touching of her, even if he had saved her from harm. “Yes. Whatever gave it away?”
To his surprise she smiled, some of the unhappiness lifting. “Most of the residents call it Cloud Lake. Or just ‘town.’”
His eyebrows narrowed as he regarded her lovely oval face and almond-shaped eyes of a beautiful forest-green. They were captivating, and he had to actively work not to get lost in their depths. It was a bigger challenge than he would have expected.
“You’re not from here either,” he said. It wasn’t a guess.
“No, I’m not,” she agreed. “I guess that’s something we have in common.”
It was his turn to smile, and he delighted in the way her cheeks, already red from the chill wind, turned a slightly brighter shade as she looked at him. Her long dirty-blonde hair, pulled back in a ponytail under her thick, warming headband swayed slightly as a breeze stirred it.
“So what brings you to this part of Cloud Lake?” she asked with a puff of breath, the air condensing in a cloud of gray in front of her.
“Believe it or not, a simple walk,” he admitted. “I was over there when I saw you go down,” he said, turning and pointing to one of the paths that meandered through the large park. His trail through the snow where he had left the path to come to her aid was rather visible.
“That’s…a long way to come,” she admitted a little uneasily.
“We’re pretty fast,” he said, tossing her a wink to try and relax her. “I can cover that ground much quicker than any human.”
“Apparently,” she concurred.
“What about you?” he asked, trying to keep the conversation going. Deep inside of him something was happening, something that he wasn’t quite sure how to handle, or to even classify. His bear was stirring, becoming aware of the situation, and more importantly, the woman in front of him. It was only a matter of time now before—
It noticed her. A thunderous roar exploded inside his head, lancing pain into his temples as his animal fought his control. It wanted him to lean forward, lift her up and cover her mouth with his. Little things like propriety, custom, the law, and even clothes were of little matter to it. All it could think of was one particular thing:
Mate.
Braden had always had a firm control over his beast, and he exerted that now, reining it in tightly. I don’t even know her name, he argued fiercely. You will obey me, he snarled as it struggled to force his hands forward. Braden was made of sterner stuff than that, however. His fingers didn’t even twitch. In front of him the woman answered his question, seemingly oblivious to the battle going on inside of him.
“Actually no, not normally. I don’t venture out of the south part of town either.”
There was a way she said that, as if she expected him to know what she meant.
“You are one of the Women of the Institute?” he asked, purposefully putting capitalization on the name.
“If that’s how you prefer to refer to us,” she said, making it clear she wasn’t in favor of the moniker. “Though I suppose it’s the most accurate way. Heaven knows we’ve tried to come up with something else, and haven’t succeeded. So sure, why not. Yes, I am a Woman of the Institute.” She used her fingers to put quotes around the words as she spoke. “You know what we are, obviously?”
“Yes,” he said simply. There was no need to explain it.
Over a year and a half earlier, nearly three hundred women had come to Cloud Lake under the sponsorship of his homeland of Cadia. They were all, in a way, victims of a hideous human corporation colloquially known as “The Institute” that had tried to use a science-fueled program to commit a mass genocide of the human race. As part of their master plan, they intended to use willing human women to help breed positive shifter characteristics into the human DNA population, while culling any full shifters from the herd. It was a despicable plan, though none of the women who had volunteered had been told the truth at the time.
So Cadia, once it had destroyed the Institute, had taken the well-being of these women into its own hands. They hadn’t wanted to bring them into the shifter territory itself, so they instead used the nearest human town. Thus the relationship between Cloud Lake and the humans had begun. Many of the women had left by this point, while others still had met locals and moved in with them, and an even smaller handful had ended up as the mates to some of the shifters who worked at the embassy. In fact, a quick glance at the gaggle of women now staring at the pair revealed the mates of two of those said shifters. He inclined his head toward both Rachel and Angela, whom he knew rather well.
Almost at the same time a loud giggle came from the group on the far side of the rink. He winced. “I’m sorry if I’ve made you the subject of gossip.” The tone of the giggle had been fairly evident.
“Oh please,” she said with an exaggerated eyeroll. “They’ll gossip about anything. T
hey’re starved for drama lately. I’ll be the most popular girl around for the next twenty-four hours, unless something else happens.”
Braden couldn’t stop himself from grinning. “Glad I could help then.” On a whim, he stuck out his hand. “Braden Fields.”
There was no hesitation as she took his grip, her small hand engulfed inside his grip. “Elle Mirrine,” she replied, pronouncing it “Mer-een.”
“A pleasure to meet you, Elle. If you have any trouble with the gossip, I have a few things I can share about Rachel or Angela.”
“You know them?” she asked, twisting to look back at the others.
He looked down as he felt a tug, and realized with a start that they still hadn’t let go after shaking hands. Confused, he looked up, watching as Elle came to the same conclusion. Almost in unison they opened their hands, looking anywhere but at each other. Braden thanked his lucky stars he had something to continue talking about.
“Um, yeah. Did I not mention I was a Guard at the Cadian embassy? I work alongside Hector and Noah.”
Elle shook her head, obviously as relieved as he was that they could avoid discussing what had just happened. “No, I don’t think we’d gotten that far. But that’s good to know. If I have any difficulties, you’ll be the one I come to for dirt.”
“Whoa now,” he said, holding up his hands. “I’m not a professional blackmailer. This is all new to me.”
She laughed. It was a lovely singsong noise, light and airy. It made his heart stir, and forced him to clamp down on his bear once more, holding the other half of him steady.
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Braden could tell the end of the conversation was nearing. She was there with friends, after all, and she couldn’t just up and leave them to spend the rest of her day with him. Not politely, at least. If he wanted to talk to her some more, he was going to have to screw up his courage and ask her to see him again.
Right. Easy. Not a problem. Can-do. Absolutely. Piece of cake. Easy as A-B-C.
“I should probably be getting back to my friends,” she said.