by Milana Jacks
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Caught Beast Mate
Beast Mates, #4
Milana Jacks
Copyright © 2017 by Milana Jacks
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Afterword
His Beast Mate, #4.5
About the Author
Also
Chapter One
Sienna
A steaming pot of God knows what simmered on the stove. My stomach growled in protest at my new vegetarian diet, but I wouldn’t eat the meat that Hasel, the beast matriarch, had prepared if it were the last food on Earth. I shook off my backpack and dropped it on the floor. This early in the morning, everyone went about their business, which made it a perfect time for me to go about mine.
From the bottom cupboard near the stove, I got three wooden sticks and put them in my bag on top of the red cloth Momma Jo, the human matriarch, had given me. Every morning, Hasel made fresh bread, so I threw yesterday’s bread in the pig bucket, broke off a piece from the new one, and tucked it in the pack’s side pocket. My water bottle needed topping up. If something were to happen to me out there in the desert, having water made the difference between life and death. I filled the bottle from the drinking water bucket.
After half of us humans had gotten sick with vomiting and diarrhea, hunters, beasts that settled in the community, dug for cleaner water and put purifiers in it. Beasts seemed less worried about clean water than we were. Perhaps they had better immunity. I didn’t know, but I was on my own, and these past months had taught me how to survive. Packed and ready, I headed out.
“Hey, Sienna,” the menace of my life said and propped his hand on his hip. An eight-year-old boy of four foot ten, with blond hair and blue eyes, Cole wouldn’t leave me alone. At first, I thought it was cute that he considered me “his woman,” but after a month, it got annoying. “Hey, Cole.” I headed for the opposite exit.
“Wait. Where’re you going?”
“Nowhere. Everywhere.” I speed-walked through the hallways, reached the last room, passed Mr. Silent—a guard beast who could be mute for all I knew—took a right and swung open the back exit. Early morning sun bathed my face, and I looked up with a sigh. Spring was coming. I loved springtime. Not too cold, not too hot, and where I’d grown up, on Big Bear, we even got wildflowers.
No wildflowers out here in Nowhere, New Mexico, but the sun still reminded me of springtime.
“Can I come with you?” Cole asked.
Gah! I couldn’t even enjoy my moment. “No.”
“Why not?”
“Don’t you have something to do? Like bug Zarik over there?” I pointed at the beast who was throwing spears at the makeshift targets over the community walls. He did it every day, same time, same way, and after he threw his five spears, he’d go out to fetch them. I presumed he practiced for when his imaginary enemies tried to seize the place. These hunters never rested, always on alert as if we didn’t live in the middle of nowhere and as if humans would actually dare attack a beasts’ nest.
“Zarik only lets me get the spears, not throw them. I’m bored.”
“You’ll be bored with me too.” I found my rusty black bicycle where I’d left it leaning against the wall, checked the horn, then waited. The evil highlight of my days. Zarik stretched his powerful body, his right arm at a precise angle. He sprinted and…I honked.
Beeeeeep!
Zarik stumbled.
Threw the spear.
It hit the wall and broke in half. He cursed, spun around, and pointed a finger at me. “Female, I will bend you over my knee for this.”
I winked at him. Despite the remark, Zarik was a gentle, lonely male who only ever asked me to help him bathe. His mellow demeanor suited me. I didn’t like being around bossy beasts like Mayhem. Or any beasts at all. Unfortunately, avoiding beasts was impossible. I hadn’t stayed in this community by choice. I was stuck here.
Cole tugged my sleeve. I climbed on my bicycle, ready to go. “I don’t have another ride,” I said. “You can’t come with me.”
“I’ll run next to you.”
“It’s too far.”
“I am strong.” He bent his arm at the elbow and showed me his scrawny little muscles.
“You are very strong, but I still can’t take you with me.” I pedaled away.
Daddy used to tell me not to trust anyone. That bad times bred even worse people. That nobody would stand for me but me. And him. Daddy always stood in my corner. The problem? Daddy wasn’t here. I was on my own, and I wanted him with me, because if anyone knew a way to get back home, it would be my father.
My ancestors had survived the Great Nuclear War because my great-great-grandpa Bob had been one of the people who believed in UFOs. The entire population of Big Bear had called him crazy when he walked around with a backpack filled with emergency supplies. But then the nuclear storage places started exploding, and Grandpa Bob became the most popular man in Big Bear. As the nukes engaged around the United States, wiping out everything in their radius, and as we fought other nations who threatened us, people begged Grandpa Bob to open up his shelter.
Inside the sealed underground bunker that he’d been building all his life, he watched them plead for mercy. He didn’t let them in. Not enough supplies, only enough food for him and his family. When Daddy told me this story, he said we should always help out others, but never at our expense. We had to learn to say no if it threatened our survival.
The alien beasts threatened my survival.
Daddy had told me about the beasts too. He painted them on the canvas of my mind as hairy werewolves who stood on two legs, with blood dripping from their canines and down their chins. At seventeen—the first time I’d seen a beast—I knew he spoke the truth. That
beast male who attacked us was a monster found only in horror tales, and although the beasts looked humanoid, I’d seen the monster behind the humanoid form. As much as possible, I avoided them. Here, at my temporary home in Community Forty-four, my gut told me I should make myself invisible, stay out of trouble until Daddy came for me.
Behind me, footsteps sounded. I looked back to see Cole running after me. Great. I sighed and leaned my bike on the gate. He’d run himself into exhaustion, and I’d feel bad about it, so I left my bike, and we walked out into the desert. Besides Cole, avoiding others at the community had proved easy. I spent my days ghosting through the halls, doing whatever chores Hasel assigned to me. The pair of beast hunters who lived here didn’t bother me, only Zarik sometimes asked I help him bathe. As long as I kept my mouth shut, Hasel didn’t bug me either. I did what she asked, and she let me live here. I existed. Nothing more. Though once in a while, Hasel would get into those weird moods where she would play a mother to me. She’d get all mushy, pitying me, and ask about my life before I came here. I deflected until I grew tired of deflecting and told her I came from some dead girl’s womb. A truth. Mom couldn’t deliver naturally, so they cut me out of her. She bled to death.
Dad had raised me on his own and far away from anyone. Apart from my dad and me, nobody had climbed that high up the mountains for about a decade, not until the beasts started planting the forest. In my teenage years, Daddy tightened his leash on my outings, thinking it would keep me safe from the beasts.
It kept me safe, until one day, it didn’t.
One beast attacked my dad, took me on his bike, and changed my life. The beast was dead now, but if he were alive, I would have killed him myself. I also knew Daddy would never sell me to anyone. He’d refused the beasts’ Pairing Program registration and the community life, and forbade me from venturing outside our perimeter. We hadn’t had much, sometimes we were hungry, but we had each other, and I had the reassurance Daddy would never sell me.
Now I walked alone.
Chapter Two
Torrent
If I never felt sand stick to my open wounds again, it would be too soon. Also, if I never felt the sun burning my skin again, never felt the desert wind crack my dry lips or chill my bones, it would also be too soon. I dragged my broken leg through the sand and ate the dirt on my lips as I crawled. I could barely see ahead of me. Too hungry, too thirsty, I’d survived for days on pigeon crap and one snake I’d managed to catch with my teeth about five days ago. My stomach rumbled like an old Harley engine. I would give my left nut for a human right now.
Or even a fucking cucumber.
I hated vegetables, but damn if even salad didn’t sound great right now.
I lifted my head, wiped the sand out of my eyes, trying to assess my surroundings. As if they’d changed from nothing but sand to something else. Maybe a tent pitched in the middle of nowhere. A coyote, even. Nothing. A whole bunch of nothing. That was the thing about this fucking planet. It was a whole bunch of nothing, and in the past few months, after Men of Earth had captured me, I cursed my sister for making me leave Tineya with Goner, Alpha Beast’s brother. On extremely bad days, when my captors had beaten me, when I starved, I even regretted leaving my parents. My family wouldn’t follow Alpha Beast Jamie, too comfortable inside the high towers of our home planet. Why had I followed Jamie again? Ah yes. I’d witnessed the horrors Jamie’s father, our Alpha Nie, had wreaked on other beasts only because they hadn’t believed he was descended from the Beast Mother, our deity.
Fuck Nie. I managed a snarl and pushed forward. At twenty-five, practically a baby by beast standards, I’d come to Earth. Here, Jamie trained me, and I moved up the ranks, got closer to the brothers. They were a tight bunch, stuck together like glue, and they’d let me inside their circle. When Jamie happily mated, I envied him because I’d royally fucked up my mating.
Overall, I’d made many mistakes. Should’ve stayed on Tineya, turned a blind eye to the injustice, and became a spiritual guide, a priest in human terms, like my father and his father before me. What the fuck was I doing here? This planet was a dump. Even the natives thought it was a dump. Why else would they activate weapons of mass destruction and commit global suicide?
I dug my elbows into the sand and crawled forward. My leg scraped the dirt, and I knew the wounds couldn’t heal by now. Even if I made it out of this desert, I was pretty sure they’d cut this leg off. Yeah, a crippled beast would charm Sienna’s tits off.
I shook my head. The fuck I cared? My mate was out there somewhere, dead or being raped. What would my Alpha do in this situation? Jamie would push harder, try to survive if only for her. He would try to rescue her. But first he would move the planet out of its orbit to find her. Me? Torrent, son of the High Priest of Tineya? I couldn’t even find my mate in the shelter in the middle of Beast City—where I lived, no less—let alone on this entire continent. They could’ve taken her to Anywhere, USA, while I crawled across the deserts of Nowhere, USA. Damn me.
Fuck this shit. I was done.
Yeah, I needed my rest. Hadn’t slept in a while, kept moving, kept crawling, hoping I’d get somewhere.
I never got anywhere. Luck didn’t have my back, and that one time luck did have my back, I got shot, had the scars to prove it. My mate’s father shot me. If he’d killed me, it would’ve been great all around, for me and for her. But no, I lived. I lived and lived and lived again. I rested my cheek on the dirt, the sun behind me, burning my back.
At least now I sported an awesome tan.
In the distance, she appeared before me. Golden hair, clear-sea eyes, and she smelled like lavender. I licked my sore lips. A tinge of copper in my mouth. I sucked the blood, thought about honey, and she came to me. What if I were to die while immersed in a delusion where my mate came to me?
Hell yes.
Any day.
It was summer on Big Bear Lake. High altitude. Clean water. Better chance for forest survival. So our science team had said, and we dropped them off up there for ground sampling or whatever else they did. A leader from the small community below Big Bear invited me over, probably hoping I would pair with one of the women from his stock. Even though we accepted dollars as our currency, revived the economy to hold the human’s green money, I always had a pot of gold coins stashed under the seat of my bike.
Most of us beasts looked out for pairs. We called them pairs, not mates, because we liked to keep the secrets of our species between us. Humans were a cunning species who would use that knowledge against us.
After a visit with the leader where I ate like a king, I toured the community of about a hundred humans but didn’t find my mate. I rode back up to the lake. With the weight of a hearty breakfast in my belly, I relaxed on my bike by the shore and admired the rare beauty that had survived the negligent inhabitants of Earth.
There should be a settlement up here, I thought. Right by the water. Cabins surrounded by trees. I’d get a small boat, buy fish for the lake…yeah, very nice life.
Something small and far away caught my eye. Alert, I sat up. A human walked toward the lake. Closer and closer yet. Ah, a female. I shook my head. The human males had zero sense of protection. They let their young females run around without any supervision. This one was miles away from her community.
The wind in my favor, I lifted my face. It blew her scent straight into my nose. I inhaled a lungful. This female smelled good. Lavender. My dick grew to its full size. Dayum, I needed to dip that fucker into pussy. It wouldn’t be this one, though. She looked like a virgin. I didn’t do virgins. Nope. Virgins latched onto a male, and unless she was his mate, a beast male couldn’t promise her a future.
The girl stood at the end of the lake, didn’t even look around her. I snorted. Even with her inferior vision, if she actually bothered to take in her surroundings, she would have seen me. I shook my head in disapproval, then stuck two fingers into my mouth so I could whistle.
She slid off her backpack, pulled her dress over her
head, spun around, and released her golden-blonde hair. It swayed right above her ass.
Time stopped when she bent over to get soap.
My breath arrested when she turned back and smiled.
Fingers in my mouth, I froze; then my hand slowly fell to my side, leaving my mouth gaping. Maybe I drooled. Any beast would drool.
No, not any beast, because no other beast would ever see her naked.
She was mine!
I leapt off the bike, then remembered Vice’s instructions the day he’d lined a bunch of us up in the compound. Loud and clear, my dear, sane friend had said, “If you happen to come across your mate outside of the community, whatever you do, do not scare her. If you are lucky, she will run. If you are not lucky, she will try to kill you. Yes, there are armed females walking on this planet. Beware an armed female. They shoot to kill. What to do? Follow the female to her home, call it in, and we will approach her in her house, where she feels less threatened. Do not kidnap the female. Never kidnap a female.”
Vice hadn’t said anything about a naked human female at the lake.
Still, I should probably follow the instructions. He knew better. I’d spent years in South America’s jungles, working to revive their forests. A female was a rare sight, and tribal females were married off as soon as they could bleed. Married females couldn’t be paired. My experience with human females was limited.
Now, I also knew human females of this one’s age were chaste. She looked about eighteen. Chaste meant modest and delicate, so I didn’t run after her demanding she give me her body right then and there. No. I wouldn’t do that, not only because of Vice’s advice, but also because I had class. Came from a highborn family. My father hadn’t even chased my mother down. He’d courted her, then bedded her. Even though I didn’t like my father, I would not stain my family’s name by acting like an idiot.
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