"You think I’m not trying?You think I want this?”I snarl.
“Why is this even happening?”she moans.“Maybe…maybe someone from the Shadowpine pack cursed us both, somehow?This doesn’t make sense, we can’t be fated mates.Because we knew each other when we were little, and we never felt this.”
“Yeah, that’s because the fated mate thing never hits until after puberty.Until after we’re ready to…” I choke on the word.“Mate.”
“Nooo,” she groans, with possibly a little more disgust than is strictly called for.
“We need to…to avoid each other.You can’t come back to our property…” Just saying that makes my wolf howl with rage inside me.My claws shoot out.My fangs stab through my gums.It takes all of my strength to re-cage my wolf.
“Not come back?We have a deal with our pack!”she cries out, face flushing with anger.“And my pack needs this money!It figures you’d try to stab us in the back.Again.”
She’s blaming me for her pack’s desperate situation.Yes, I was the one who turned her father in.I did what had to be done.
And she doesn’t know the half of what really happened on that day.
“We’ll pay you anyway!”Anything to avoid this nightmare.
But she’s already shaking her head, dark locks flying.Those silky strands…tangled in my fingers, pulling her hair, pulling her to me…pinning her down, claiming her, knee between her thighs, spreading her legs…
“And how would we explain that?”she scoffs.“Seriously.Why would we say that I’m not allowed here after you hired me, but you’re going to pay us anyway?Are you going to tell everyone that you’re my fated jerk-face stupid mate?”
Maybe?
“Hell no,” I growl.
“Fine.Fine.We hate each other, but fate thinks we’re mates.I have the solution.Here’s what we do,” she says.She takes a deep breath.
Before she can finish her sentence, her eyes flash gray and gold and she lets out a low rumbling growl.
Between one breath and the next her wolf takes over, the shift rolling through her fast and fluid, clothes shredding, and then there are four paws on the shed floor instead of two boots.Her wolf is a glorious, lustrous gray and white, absolutely stunning.My wolf howls in joy, in approval.
Run with me, nip me, play with me…
She heads to the back door at a dead run, bursts through it into the April air, and disappears into the tree line.
I stand there by the shredded pile of her clothes and struggle to contain my own wolf, who’s hurling himself violently against the cage of my flesh.
Chapter Three
Henrietta
Andrew and I stroll silently through the cornfields together.
Silas is with Carlton, in Carlton’s office, going over records of the last few years' crop yields — at Andrew's suggestion.We need a plausible excuse to get Silas out of the way for a bit.
The morning is soft and green, the kind of April day that makes you forget Arkansas summers exist.The corn is ankle-high, glowing with health, and the air smells like turned earth.I focus on that.On the hum in my feet where the roots push down through dark soil.I am here for the crops.That is the only reason I am here.
I am definitely not aware of the six-foot-something wall of snarly muscle walking two feet to my left.
"You were going to say something before you wolfed out yesterday," Andrew says gruffly."So.What's your brilliant idea?"
"Okay.We obviously can't stand each other, right?"
He nods vigorously."Clearly."
He doesn't have to agree quite so fervently.Jerk.
I take a deep breath."So if we spend enough time together, I think the fates will realize that this is a terrible mistake.And we’ll also annoy each other so much that the bond will break.What we need to do is hang out together as much as possible until the bond is broken.”
