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"You…" I stare at him. "I don't know what your game is, but I'm not interested. You're mistaking me for somebody else."
"Am I?" Adam just smiles. "Take off your blouse, and if there is no star-shaped birthmark on your lower back, I'll admit I'm wrong."
My jaw tightens. "Excuse me? That's it. I'm done here!"
I turn around only for him to grab me by the waist and whirl me around until my front is pressed to his.
"What're you––"
He pulls up my blouse, ignoring my struggles, and looks down. A chuckle leaves his mouth, "Pretty birthmark you got there."
I push him away, furious. Fixing my blouse, I scowl at him, "What the hell do you want? If you're trying to blab on me to your father, he won't believe you."
"Now, why would I do that?"
He leans forward, and I can feel my traitorous heart begin pounding all over again. "Getting my fated mate in trouble hardly sounds like the ideal thing to do."
His eyes are locked on mine, and I see amusement dancing in his eyes. Does he think this situation is funny? I’m quivering with fear over what Jonathon will do to me, and he's having a laugh at my expense?
I try to muster up some confidence. "I don't care what you have to say. We're not fated mates. I would––I would know if we were!"
"Would you though?" His amusement is gone, replaced by a frown on his face. "You should have realized it the moment you took in my scent outside the bar. Father must have really kept you sheltered for you not to even understand your own basic instincts."
My hands are trembling now.
He's not joking.
He really thinks we're fated mates.
I was never taught what other children of my kind were. I was locked in the attic or isolated when other children my age were taught how to hunt, how to shift, and how to get in touch with their animals. I stumbled on most of those things well into my teen years. My first shift had been painful, triggered by an extremely vicious beating. I had been further punished for allowing my animal out.
I stare at Adam.
I don't know if he's lying or not. My instinct and experience with this cruel world tell me he's lying, that he just wants to hurt me like everybody else. But my wolf's strange reaction to him has me questioning myself. What if he's not? What does that mean for me? The next alpha of this pack, the one Jonathon has enlisted my help in removing, is my fated mate?
"You look like you're having doubts." Adam takes a step back. "You're exuding pheromones, Cynthia. Pheromones that are aimed at me but also act as a warning to other wolf shifters that you're taken. I'm surprised my father or Norman haven't said anything to you. Are you by any chance taking a pheromone blocker?"
I go still. "What?"
"A pheromone blocker," he repeats patiently. "It helps dilute your scent so it's harder to pick up on your pheromones."
I open my mouth only to snap it shut as I remember the pill Tony has been giving me every morning without fail. He must have known, I realize to my shock. He must have scented the pheromones. I recall the panicked look on his face when helooked at me. He had then used a different route and made a brief stop somewhere. Whenever I was sick as a child, I was never taken to a healer. It was Tony who gave me some medication to make me feel better. That was why I hadn't questioned him.
Perhaps I should have asked him. Perhaps I should have been more vigilant about what he was giving me.
"You look like you're going to keel over any minute." Adam puts his hand on my lower back, guiding me to the chair. However, I jerk back.
"Don't touch me!"
Panic and fear are brewing within me.
What's going to happen to me? Jonathon will kill me. Or worse, he'll force me to mate with Adam, and then he'll hurt me to get to him. I don't win in any scenario.
"You need to calm down, Cynthia," Adam says, slowly. "I'm not trying to hurt you here."
"And I'm expected to believe that?" I give him an angry look.
"Yes," he says simply. "I'm your fated mate. Our bond comes before every other loyalty we have, even to the pack."
