Page 45 of His Runaway Mate
“We’re American Trash,” Sam says, bristling. “And you’re no better.”
“Dressed like a pack of whiteboard markers,” I comment.
That makes the guys, and Laura, all laugh. Even a couple of the other pack crack smiles because it’s funny.
Not all of them are laughing though. The tall guy with the long hair and an incredible allegiance to his goofy clothing over our goofy clothing takes a swing at Simon.
In seconds, a full-blown fight has broken out. We’re still in human form, but there’s a fray afoot. Everyone’s getting hit. I’m trying not to use my broken hand, but I’m getting pushed under a scrum of furious young wolves each eager to prove themselves in combat.
“Excuse me,” a calm voice floats to us all through the arbor of trees. “If I may…”
A hand slides into the fray, grips me by the collar, and pulls me free. I expect to see Rex Regent on the other end of that hand, but it isn’t him.
“Miss Love. The alpha requests the pleasure of his mate,” Fescue says mildly.
The fight stops as soon as it started. The way the Minnesota wolves’ faces pales when Fescue frees me and declares me the alpha’s mate is so priceless it’s almost worth all the hassle I have been through.
“It is generally regarded as a matter of protocol that it is best that an alpha’s mate does not skirmish with the guests,” he says as he leads me away. My guys are with me, of course.
“It wasn’t her fault!” Laura pipes up. “They started with us first.”
“And they will be handled,” Fescue says. “If the rest of you would like to go and get ready for whatever it is you’re planning on doing next, I need the alpha’s mate for a dress fitting.”
I go with him because why not, he did just kind of save my ass. I was getting crushed under that pile-on, and I was worried my tracksuit was going to get ripped. It seems, so far, like no real damage was done though.
“Lunch, perhaps first. I know how fighting stimulates the appetite. I am sure the alpha will be pleased to see you. I know he’s taken a break from negotiations.”
As we enter the dining room, a space set aside for the alpha, and alpha adjacent people, I see that Rex is being chatted with by several people. He is looking hot as hell in his expensive, bespoke business suit.
“Can I truly not prevail on you to get changed? You look…” Fescue pauses for impact. “Scuffed.”
I pause for a moment, but I know damn well that I could roll into lunch with Rex wearing a decrepit potato sack and he’d still be hard for me.
I realize, in a flash, that I feel wanted in a way that has never happened before. There’s no insecurity in me, wondering if he’s really into me, wondering if he really wants me. He has made it abundantly clear and he is showing no signs of changing his mind. I am being referred to as his mate publicly in passing.
This is big. Really big.
I start to feel a bit sick.
“I have to go to the bathroom,” I tell Fescue, who is pleased because he thinks this means I am going to freshen up.
Safely in the bathroom, I lock the door and look at myself in the mirror.
“You can do this,” I tell myself. “You can’t do this.”
I splash some water on my face with my good hand and close my eyes.
It’s dusty.
Not the bathroom, but the place where my memories take me. It’s the side of a road, next to a gas station where nobody has been left alive. My father is getting back into his clothes, wiping off the streaks of blood that stayed on his body through the shift.
I am fourteen years old now. I am too old to sleep through these murders. It is too hard for me to block my ears and not hear the cries. He kills quickly, most of the time, but when there’s this many people, it’s never quickly enough.
He tosses a bag of meat into the back of the car. “Get in, Nicola,” he says.
I shake my head. I don’t want to be in that vehicle with him. I don’t want to ride smelling the blood and the flesh, and knowing that those people weren’t the first and won’t be the last.
He looks at me. “What’s the matter? You want to get yourself a candy bar? Go on. Run in then. Make it quick. I think one of them had a cell phone.”
