I was exhausted, drenched, and out of tears. I felt… drained.
Xander was my mate.
The words kept running through my mind.
Mate.
Mate.
Mate.
I stood, hugging my soaked arms to myself as shivers wracked through my body. My teeth chattered as I bent and picked up my long-forgotten sword, sheathing it in the scabbard that hung at my hip before grabbing my wet hair and twisting it into a semblance of a bun on the top of my head. Picking up my cloak, I threw it over my shoulders. It was soaked, but at that point in time, I didn’t really care.
I had to go back, and yet, nothing was better. Tomorrow, we were going to leave. Head south, with this weight between us. This very heavy, very complicated weight. Nothing about our relationship was uncomplicated.
That would have been too easy. There was no easy solution to the problem that lay between us.
After all, what kind of simple solution was there to having a mate who clearly thought being attached to you was the worst kind of torture? I had thought our arrangement had been painful before. Pretending to be his wife was bad enough.
But now that he had spoken those words out loud, it was impossible to ignore them.
We weremates,and he hated me.
At that moment, I wasn’t too fond of him myself.
* * *
I was picking my way through the woods, taking my time returning to The Pines, when a softmeowcame from behind me. My breath caught in my throat as I slowly turned around. Standing less than ten feet away from me, leaving tiny paw prints in the wet mud, was another cat.
“Hello there,” I whispered as I crouched, extending my hand. “Aren’t you darling?”
The black cat approached me, purring softly as it rubbed its head against my hand, begging for a scratch. I complied, enjoying the softness of the animal’s fur. A few moments later, the cat lifted its head.
Wait.
What?
I narrowed my eyes. This cat had a half-moon under its chin, just like… I pulled my hand back as though I had been burned.
“How did you get all the way out here?” I asked the cat. This wasn’t just any cat. This wasthecat. I was sure of it. The one that had visited my tower every day growing up.
The animal stared at me, blinking its large green eyes, before a deep male voice said from somewhere in the trees, “Why, he came with me, of course.”
I jolted upright.
My heart stopped beating in my chest.
Scrambling backward, I watched with wide eyes as the cat jumped to attention and slinked towards the voice. It prowled away, standing on the edge of the forest when its body began to blur. It darted behind a bush, and moments later, a white flash of light filled my vision.
When the light receded, the cat was gone. In its place was a stout male. He was as bare as the day he was born, the greenery from the leaves barely covering his nakedness. He grinned lecherously at me as he bowed before he turned, scurrying off into the forest.
A shifter.
“Don’t tell me you don’t recognize my voice,” the hidden person said. The timber of their voice sent skitters down my spine, and I forced myself not to throw up right then and there. He continued, “It would be a shame for me to have traveled all this way and find out my fiancée didn’t know me.”
“No,” I whimpered as a cold sweat covered the back of my neck. “It can’t be.”
Even as the words left my mouth, I knew. He had found me. Goosebumps covered my flesh, and my blood ran cold.