Greyriver Shifters

by Kristina Weaver

  No love, no bond. No bond, no young. No young, no future, I think, cutting a glance at Logan, who is looking away and grinding his jaw. Yeah, he blames me, I think, my own jaw clamping down as my heart squeezes.

  Banner comes over, crowing as well, and we spend the next few minutes slowly letting the others take over and coo at the young, Logan having moved to the bed where he’s spellbound and grinning as people laugh and share in the joy.

  It’s when they’re all too busy to notice that he takes my hand and pulls me out of the room, out of the clinic, away from the anguish that is pouring through me.

  *******************************************************

  “He’s a fucking asshole,” Banner slurs, making me giggle and grab the third bottle we’ve shared out of his hand, the sweet burn coating my throat and nerves in the numbness that I need.

  “Ban, don’t sweat it,” I slur back, sighing as I lean back against the railing of his porch and look up at the stars.

  It’s cold as a dead demon’s balls out here, the snow having flurried for hours while we drink and snuggle on his swing, just being. We’ve hardly spoken since Banner brought me here and silently raided his home for enough liquor to get us more than buzzed.

  I appreciate that because I was too raw to articulate a damn thing and on the verge of tears for a while before I pulled myself together. I want young! Of course, I want young, but I can’t have them because my mate is an idiot who keeps thinking I’m the problem.

  Granted, I am no walk in the park, but at least my cold heart beats with love! He’s just vacant where I’m concerned.

  “I should have killed him,” he mumbles, ignoring the bottle in my hand to open another, this one freeing us both up to drink more, faster.

  “Me too. Shoulda just done it the night he came home and tried to pretend he cared! You know,” I slur, blinking slowly. “I heard him,” I confess guiltily, making Banner pause and look at me sharply. “Didn’t mean to. Wasn’t on purpose.”

  I stop, swallowing another gulp and swallow again when the buzz hits stronger, making my stomach flip before it settles.

  “Han—”

  “Oh chill. I been prac’sing. Found a way to men’ly block it, so I don’ hear ev’thing,” I mumble, snuggling down when Banner throws a blanket over me and leans closer.

  “He’ll go nuts if he knows.”

  I snort, roll my eyes, and keep drinking to stave off the pain I felt when I heard his thoughts. I didn’t know whether to be flattered or hurt that he wanted to try that badly. Only, it shouldn’t really be that hard should it? Hearing my mate tell himself that he had to accept everything he didn’t like about me wasn’t fun. Knowing that he has a right to feel that way…

  Painful.

  “Trush me, don’ evah wanna do tha’ ‘gain. Hurt,” I confess, my eyes going wet. “Been tryin’a be betterer. Kiner. Cook. Wash laun’ry wishout turnin’ ev’thing pink. So shtupid,” I mumble, looking away when Banner sighs and shakes his head.

  “You shouldn’t change, Han. Logan either loves you—”

  “Or he doesn’t,” I say slowly, wanting the words to come out clear. “Doesn’t. Wantsh f’male like Meek or Barbie. Not me. Can’t do an’thing. No bond. No young.” I sigh, my left eye releasing a tear despite the effort I make not to cry.

  “Oh baby, come here. Shh, it’s not you. It’s him.”

  I sniffle, my head lolling, and snuggle closer when I hear the familiar howl of a wolf echo through the night, the angry sound making me shiver. Logan. He’s pissed and likely headed right my way.

  “S’me,” I slur, breathing in his scent, a smell that makes me feel safe and calm. “Don’ wanna feel n’more.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Hannah

  Christmas! I love Christmas, always have, and despite the happy family vibe everyone has going, the fragile truce Banner and Logan have going, or the almost desperate way Logan has been trying to bond with me lately, I am in heaven! Acquisitive, greedy heaven!

  I love gifts and wrapping and that smell that comes with the season. I love the pine needle scent surrounding us. I love the smell of turkey and mashed potatoes—my favorite—and I love that I’m wearing a custom-made reindeer sweater that is hideous but so comfortable over my black tights.

  Ros made this for me, a stocking filler that in no way competes with the designer stuff my mom used to throw my way. It doesn’t compete because the thought behind it is so great. I don’t think Mom’s leather purses or electronics even make it into the stadium.

  I love today, and for the first time in two weeks since Mika had her baby, I feel happy. I’ve been okay since Logan found me with Banner, snarled his fury, and carted me home where we had the roughest, best, most explosive sex I have ever had in my life.

  It was elemental, savage, perfect in its possessiveness, and I woke the next morning, slightly hungover but feeling, steady. Accepting. No longer filled with hope.

  With that shit gone, thank you God, I could look at everything with objective eyes, and you know what, so fucking what if my life sucks by everyone else’s standards. I got what I needed.

  I’m alive. I’m free. I have money because Logan has money, so I get to live the way I want! Yeah, the way I want. It’s…almost true. So what if the freaking maid, Shelly, sneers at me. She cleans the house and I get to lord it over her to punish her for being a judgmental bitch.

  So what if Logan pretends happiness and goes overboard with his affection? At least I have affection. So what if part of me aches? Given enough time, I’ll strangle the emotion to death and be back to the old me. The me who doesn’t sweat the small things.

  As Christmas blooms around me and I watch people talk and laugh, see Mika cuddle her young and try to keep Prissy from taking him, the only regret I have for the day is that Barbie is still gone.

  I haven’t reconnected with her since that night months ago, no matter how I tried. It’s not my problem though. I tell myself that every day, and I’m finally starting to believe it and shed the sense of failure that comes over me whenever Logan asks.

  Bastard.

  “Hey baby, you want something?” he asks, wrapping his arms around me from behind to smooch my neck and breathe me in.

  Sighing, I enjoy the touch, just for now, and shake my head with a laugh.

  “Your mom’s been stuffing me since we all got here. Even Prissy is ready to pop.” I giggle, watching her stroke her belly with a grimace.

  “Weeeell, we could go upstairs, rest a little before the big show starts,” he murmurs, nuzzling my nape and making me shiver.

  “We had sex before we left the house.” I moan, twisting my neck to give him access to more of me, hoping that he takes the hint and strokes over my mark where I need him.

  He doesn’t though, and it makes me sniff silently because he hasn’t put his teeth in me since the night Bran was born. I don’t ask. I don’t let it bother me but for the weak moments when it occurs to me that this…it’s going nowhere.

  Logan tries to make me happy but keeps himself apart, separated from me in a way that I don’t think even registers. It’s when he’s pulling back with regret that I stiffen, right before the door bursts open to let in a scent that makes me groan and wish for death.

  “Jules! Oh my God!” Prissy screams, the commotion that follows drowning out her cries as people all around us surround her in seconds.

  Logan himself, although I don’t think he even realizes it, pulls away from me hard and fast, as if he’s not comfortable with her seeing this.

  As if—

  I cut the thought off, squaring my shoulders and wait my turn, stepping forward only when Julia laughs and tells people to back off before they smother her.

  Her first sight of me gets a response I expect, a sneer, before she huffs and narrows her eyes. Eyah, smell it, I think, smirking when her eyes go round and flit to Logan.

  “You didn’t!”

  “Jules—” he says, his discomfort making his eyes flit
to mine before he looks away guiltily.

  “You did! Logan, what the hell?” she barks, giving me a look that makes me feel like a dead rat clogging the drain pipes.

  I want him to do something, say something, just this once that isn’t filled with excuses, as if he needs to explain me, as if I’m some sort of dirty add-on that he needs to justify every fucking second of his life.

  Which he does! They all do. I’m not a part of them. Not truly. No matter how hard they want me to believe it, because the truth is that they all still look at me and remember who they think I am.

  I’m…outside, looking in.

  Story of my life, I think, smirking when her face goes hard and red.

  “Jules, she’s my Fated,” he starts, spreading his hands in a gesture of helplessness.

  “But she’s so…” she trails off, her voice going hard when she spots me again, her eyes filing with every single kernel of dislike I would expect.

  “She’s my Fated,” he says again, that word making my wolf stretch up into a snarl that ends with a whimper.

  Look, I get that this is hard for him. I do. Him and Julia are friends, always have been, and it’s been many a time that I’ve walked into a place in town, seen them together, and had to ignore their whispered little comments and sniggers.

  I get it. This isn’t easy, but you know….

  Fuck them all!

  Banner comes up beside me, my protector, my knight, as always but this time I don’t let him defend me because I don’t want or need it. I want to be…me. Just me. And if these people don’t like it, well then, I shouldn’t be here.

  Stepping away from Banner after squeezing his arm, I turn to face them all, ignoring the guilty looks of people who know they’re doing me wrong even as I breathe deeply and force a smile.

  “I’m his mate,” I clarify, shaking my head when Logan flinches, realizing his mistake, the subconscious way he rejected me, hurt me.

  “You are—”

  “His mate,” I emphasize, smiling ruefully when his eyes flash to me, the sight of his comprehension causing anguish to course through me.

  Seeing that, seeing the way it all clicks into place for him, should make me feel hopeful, better, and yet it doesn’t because I shouldn’t have to remind him! I should know, without even thinking about it that he sees me that way instead of as the Fated he chose to mate because he didn’t feel like he had a choice.

  I’m the female he wants, the one his wolf wants while a part of him shies away from accepting that…he could love me. He could. He laughs at me, at my snarkiness, so I know he likes it and finds it amusing. He likes that I’m not shy or afraid to voice my views. He…wants me.

  Sometimes. When he admits it.

  “Hannah—”

  “Or I was,” I elaborate, laughing mirthlessly when I see people all around me flinch. “I guess I should take the hint though, huh?” I chuckle, my eyes going wet because it’s about time I just stop pretending altogether.

  Not for them alone, but for me. I’ve been running from myself my whole life, trying to be who I need to be because who I am is too weak to stand the hurt and disappointments I’ve had all my life.

  The real me loved Bear like a friend, a lover, the hope inside me making me feel so weak I believed that he would want me, eventually.

  The real me I had to shove away because I knew deep down it wasn’t true.

  The real me has always known I’d be hurt if I let myself believe—for even a second—that what these people have been offering me is real. The truth is, it isn’t.

  They want to love me, I get that, and yet they don’t because they don’t know me.

  “Hannah—”

  “You hate me, Julia?” I ask, interrupting Logan when he ties to speak, his hand reaching for mine.

  I step away, raising my chin, and stare the younger female down until she sighs and shakes her head.

  “I do. You’re just so—”

  “Mean? Unkind? Nasty? Vain? Superior? Frivolous?” I ask, smiling when her eyes go hard, and she nods.

  “You’re all those things, and you’re not good enough to lick the floor my brother or Logan walk on!” she yells, her blue eyes going dark when I laugh and flick a glance over the spoiled little princess. “You’re so…ugly inside. All I see when I look at you is someone who doesn’t care about anyone else. You’ve had everything you could need all your life and yet you—”

  “You know nothing about me,” I tell her, breathing through my agony when she sneers again.

  “You—”

  “Julia that is enough!” Prissy hisses, her eyes going hard while Nick’s jaw hardens and Banner growls.

  I appreciate the effort, the way they try to look at me, offering me…something. But I can’t take it. All of this, it’s not mine, and it’s time I faced that. None of these people will love me, truly love me as I am because the truth is they don’t know one part of me. Partly because I don’t show it all that often, but mostly, and this is my truth, my salvation, they don’t want to. That hurts, sending a shaft of pain through every part of me, but I steel myself and swallow at the lump in my throat.

  “No! It isn’t. I’ve spent my life watching this female treat everyone around her like garbage. I’ve had to watch Bear get caught up in her web and see her suck the life right out of him. He almost killed his Fated because she’s so selfish she couldn’t let him be happy without her grasping ass. I’ve watched her reel males in and reject a male who is too good for her anyway! And what for?” she screams, her malice hitting me like a physical blow. “What for? You could have been so much better.”

  I nod, acknowledging her anger, even accepting some of it because it’s my due…and…yet…it is not, I think, as I take in the way Bear flinches, his face going sad when I shake my head silently, stopping his words.

  “I could have been. Maybe. Perhaps. All that shit that your parents teach you when they love you and show you how to dream of a happy life. I could have been friends with Banner all my life instead of losing the only person who loved me. I could have tagged along with Bear and Logan in my teens and gotten to know Logan instead of constantly latching onto your bother,” I admit, holding my hand up when Bear opens his mouth to protest my self-scathing tone.

  “I could have done so many things in my life that would have made me happy and not left me alone all the time, constantly wondering what would have happened had I just been brave enough to try.”

  “You could have! You chose—”

  “Yeah, I did. I chose. I chose to leave Banner alone because his mom and brother chased me away and told me never to come back. I chose to do exactly what my parents expected because the truth is, it hurt less. I chose to be with Bear because my father demanded it of me even when I knew that I loved him too much to use him. I chose to accept that everyone hated me and that I gave them more than one reason to do so. More than anything, I chose to be exactly what people wanted me to be because it hurt less than to try and constantly have my teeth kicked,” I whisper, my tears falling when I hear Ros gasp and see the pain in her eyes.

  “All my life I made choices. I told myself that one day, somehow, the next choice I made wouldn’t be to make a pact with my best friend to be mean…when I had to be while expecting him to still love me. Because I didn’t want to go home and have my father kick my teeth in and throw me into the basement where he’d starve me for three days. I made that choice and I lost because, yeah, people see what they want to. All of you, every single one besides Ban and Bear took one look at me and always judged, always waited for the elite to come out,” I say softly, stepping back when Banner comes closer.

  “No, I need…do you know why I was with Bear? Because it didn’t matter to him who everyone thought I was. He saw me, and he was willing to use me to feel better, just like I used him.”

  “Hannah—”

  “And that was okay with me because it was better than being alone! If my father thought I was doing what he wanted, and Bear got what he
wanted out of it, then at least I got to be somewhere safe and warm and I didn’t constantly have to pretend all the time. It’s so fucking exhausting!”

  “Oh please!” Jules sneers, looking me up and down. “Poor little rich girl wants me to believe her daddy beat her—”

  “I don’t care what you believe, Julia. It means nothing to me. It just is what it is. I have spent my whole life wanting nothing more than to be free of my prison and just…learn to be me. Not Hannah the spoiled little idiot with no intelligence, who my parents expected me to be. Not Hannah the low-maintenance girlfriend. Not the girl you all hated. Not the girl who only cared about herself. I just wanted to be me. To find someone. To love someone. Someone who’d love me,” I whisper sadly, smiling against tears when Logan gasps and he comes closer.

  “Don’t! You want to know why I don’t try to be that prefect little mate you expected?! You want to know why I refuse to even try to be what you think you want? Because it’s not true, is it? I didn’t mate you years ago, even when you tried to make your claim, because I knew, even then, you wanted me to refuse you. You didn’t want me,” I scoff when he shakes his head in denial.

  “I made the claim—”

  “You did what your anger demanded, all the while telling yourself that it would be alright because you knew the little bitch I was and you were secure in your freedom because I was too high and mighty to accept a mixed breed.” I laugh, cutting him off.

  His wince and the guilt that blazes in his eyes is confirmation of what I have always known, and I laugh ruefully, my hurt and anger combining to form a hard lump inside my chest.

  “I didn’t—”

  “I don’t care! You think I care that you all have always seen exactly what you wanted to see?” I ask, pushing away that one part of me that denies my words. “I learned a long time ago to be exactly who everyone needed me to be. My father didn’t get to hurt me so much anymore because I gave him the spoiled doll he wanted. My mom just didn’t care, so I stopped giving a shit that he’d slap her around. You, all of you, were just waiting with baited breath to see what you thought an elite would do, and you know what, it made you happy, made you all take a deep breath because you wouldn’t have to feel guilty if I proved you wrong. You?” I say, my mouth twisting when I meet Mika’s pale face and wide eyes. “I tried to talk to you that day in the bakery. I tried to tell you that I know what it feels like to have a Fated who doesn’t want you. I couldn’t do anything to change Bear’s mind, even if I wanted to—which admittedly I didn’t—but I tried to keep him from hurting you more.”