by Reina Torres
Xavier nodded and looked at the plate eagerly. He’d never understand why, but he had an affinity for the stuff that came out of Harry’s kitchen. It was all good, but he’d spent most of his life chowing down on meat so rare it barely kissed a grill, but one look at Harry’s mooncakes or those sesame seed covered dough balls he called jin dui and his stomach couldn’t get enough.
He waited for Georgia to go first, but she waved him on. He picked up one of the cakes and with a hand on each side, he broke the cake in half. The filling had a faint purplish color, and at the center of it on one side was the perfectly rounded yolk of an egg.
Smiling for the first time in days, he lifted the cake toward his mouth, intending to bite off half the yolk.
“So, tell me what has you so twisted up inside.”
Xavier heard Georgia tsk at her mate, but Harry waved her off, begging for trouble.
“Aiya, woman. Let me ask him. You can see he’s upset!”
Georgia crossed her forearms, and the fingernails on one hand tap, tap, tapped on the tabletop. “I can also see that he’s hungry.”
Xavier knew it was up to him to save Harry from his mate. “I know you both have heard about True.”
Now, Georgia relaxed beside him, her focus on him instead of her husband who apparently thought he was immortal enough to test his wife. “Miss Sinclair. From the city.”
He dropped his chin down in something that looked like a nod. “I want her.”
Georgia’s eyes opened wide, and her lips formed a curious little ‘o’ of surprise. “I don’t see the problem. Is there some reason why she doesn’t want you in return?”
Images.
Scents.
Physical… yearnings flooded into his head.
Into his body.
And he leaned an arm on the table to hunch himself over. It wasn’t polite to sit at someone’s table hard as a rock.
For our mate.
His panther gave him the silent treatment when he didn’t repeat the words to the Huangs, but even Xavier knew that gift wasn’t going to last long.
“I made my uncle a promise.”
The older couple shared a look, but it was Georgia that spoke. “What promise?”
Xavier set the two halves of the mooncake down on a small, separate plate that Harry had set before him and turned to devote his full attention to the two. He needed to see the reaction in their eyes. Their emotions, because his own were so hard to understand.
He had wanted to go to Aaron, but he knew what the man’s answer would be. Celeste and Aaron were so damn happy, and Celeste hadn’t made any attempt to hide how much she wanted everyone to be just as happy, so of course, they would give advice based on their own views.
“My uncle made me promise not to fall in love.”
He saw a momentary flicker on Georgia’s face, but as good as his eyes were, he hadn’t seen her exact expression. He should have known that she was that fast. She didn’t get to be as old as she was without learning how to control herself.
“Did he use those exact words?”
He would have nodded, but his panther nudged him, and the memory came flooding back in his mind.
His uncle sitting on the cliff above their home, collapsed on his knees, his hands loose and listless at his sides. Even the hair that had fallen across his face seemed to cause him pain and drain him of energy.
“Don’t let this happen to you.” At first, the words had no inflection, barely a whisper. “Don’t let them take it away.”
“Take what?”
That’s when his uncle had looked up and his hair had fallen away from his face. The skin that Xavier had seen was ashen, almost lifeless, but his eyes were alive with pain.
“You give them your soul,” he’d panted the words and the speed of his breaths seemed to give him more energy, some adrenaline pumping through his veins. “Your mate-”
His head fell back, and a sound came out of his throat that Xavier had never really been able to describe. It was not a scream.
Not a roar.
As the sound echoed in his head again, Xavier lifted his hands and closed them over his ears, willing the otherworldly sound to disappear.
He felt hands on his hands and felt more than heard the soothing sound of Georgia’s voice crooning to him.
And the nightmare went on inside of his head.
His uncle, kneeling at the edge of the cliff, his voice finally tearing free of his throat, sending the sound far, far away.
And that’s when Xavier realized what it was that he heard. His uncle’s soul torn from his earthly body.
When his head lifted, and his eyes fixed on Xavier again, his uncle’s mouth lifted at the corners in some kind of macabre smile.
“They’ll take it when they leave. They’ll take your soul.”
He couldn’t listen to anymore. He couldn’t.
He pulled his hands away from his ears and immediately turned his gaze to Georgia to make sure he hadn’t scared or hurt her.
As much as he growled and grumbled, he was first and foremost the man that his parents and his uncle raised. He never wanted his pain to hurt others. He just needed to protect what was left of his heart.
Georgia reached out and set her hand on his, her smile a gentle, comforting one.
“What’s wrong, Xavier? What’s in your head?”
How could he tell her that the pain he felt from the loss of his family was still raw inside of him.
“My family,” he let out a long breath and wet his lips before he explained, “he tried to explain that we’re not… we’re not going to… to get to be happy. My mother and father died while I was no more than a child. My uncle told me.”
Harry held his breath for a moment and then let it go. “Your uncle Landon. He was hurt.”
“He was in pain,” Georgia looked between her mate and Xavier. “After he lost…”
Xavier hadn’t really seen Georgia look that troubled before. She was usually unflappable, but not at that moment.
“His mate,” Xavier added in. “She killed herself instead of bonding with him. Instead of letting him mark her. He told me that we’re all cursed. None of us were meant to be happy.”
“You can’t take that as the truth.” He heard the conviction in Harry’s voice. “By the end,” Harry just couldn’t seem to say, ‘by the time he killed himself,’ “he was struggling.”
Xavier felt as if the hollow spaces he had inside were filling up with anguish and despair. “Yeah, I remember.”
“But you need to remember something too.” Georgia’s hold on his hand was gentle but rock steady. “You need to remember that when your parents passed on, you had your uncle. When he… when he passed, you had us. You had Aaron. Then Locke became your friend.”
He scoffed. “I can count my friends on one hand.”
Georgia huffed in that way that made it look like the feeling just ruffled her feathers. “You have more than that,” her tone was steady and yes, comforting, “you have True now.”
“I’ve been fighting.”
“With True?” Harry sat back to stare at him. “Why would you fight with her?”
Xavier hung his head for a moment. “Not really fighting with her, but fighting to stay away from her.”
Harry and Georgia looked at each other, and Xavier saw the unspoken communication between them. It made him feel like a total outsider, but that was just the doubt inside of him.
“You can’t do that, Xavier.” Georgia wiggled his hand as if she knew she had to pull him out of his thoughts. “You have to listen to what you feel, in here.” She touched her free hand over her heart. “And your panther? What does he have to say?”
“Too damn much.”
I heard that.
Harry laughed. A short flash of sound. “You’ve been arguing with him too.”
“Not so much argue as ignore.”
You growl at me too much to say you ignore me.
“Do you think,” Georgia spoke slowly, a
nd he could see her going over and over the thoughts in her head, “that your panther would tell you something that wasn’t real?”
The truth was a cold slap in the face.
His panther was only too pleased to lay down on his side and glare at him through his thoughts.
“No.”
His panther laid down his head and swished his tail.
“What has he been telling you since you met True?”
As if he needed the reminder, his panther was only too happy to place some rather pointed images in his head.
Images he wasn’t going to tell the Huang’s about.
“That she’s mine.”
Ours.
“Ours,” he corrected.
Another swish in the darkness and maybe a sly smile that showed white fangs through their link.
“Is there a reason why you’re fighting this so hard when you know what your panther thinks, unless you don’t feel the connection to her?”
Xavier looked at Harry. “I’ve been so busy fighting it that I don’t think I even know what I feel for her.”
“Then you need to stop fighting it and see.” Georgia gave the back of his hand a soft tap. “You’ve been putting up so many walls, I think you need to make sure you’re giving this thing between you a chance.”
It was tempting.
Too damn tempting to think he was in any position to make a decision either way.
Harry spoke up one more time, leaning both of his forearms against the table and speaking quietly as if the room was filled with people and he was imparting a secret. “You worry that you’ll lose her, just like you lost your parents, but Xavier, if you don’t try to make the connection with her…”
Georgia and Harry reached out a hand to each other at the same moment and clasped hands in a movement so natural he felt the tide of their love course over him in his seat.
“Then you’ll be missing out on so much more, Xavier. Just remember that.”
Xavier had a feeling that he wasn’t going to be able to think about anything else for the rest of the day.
Eight
True kicked off her shoes and pulled her blouse over her head as soon as she shut the door, leaving her in her slacks and camisole top. It was just enough to feel the air on her arms and shoulders. It helped her feel grounded to have the air on her skin and feel alive, if not completely free.
The dreams were starting to invade her day, making her nod off at odd times. She’d just nodded off in her car after returning home from dropping Wren off at her place.
The inebriated woman had giggled and hugged her the whole way from the passenger seat to her bedroom. True knew that she should try to get some sleep before cooking something for supper.
Aaron and Celeste had invited her to their home to eat, but she couldn’t abuse their hospitality. She was a big girl, and she could feed herself.
She just wasn’t trusting herself not to fall asleep at the cutting board, or while something was in the stove. It would just be easier to fall into bed and see if she could grab a little bit of restful sleep before the dreams came back.
Then again, she turned to look at the open bathroom door. There was that big tub in the bathroom. That might be a welcome change to flopping down on the pillow-soft mattress. And if she surrounded herself with warm water, maybe it would help her get some real rest.
Crossing to her linen closet, she pulled out a big fluffy towel that looked like it could easily cover a shifter in full transformation and headed for the bathroom.
Her phone rang, and she dug it out of her shoulder bag. KATHERINE was the name displayed on the screen. With a giggle bubbling up inside of her, True accepted the call and fell back on the bed with a big smile. “Talk about perfect timing!”
“Well, if I knew I was going to get that kind of reception I would call every day.” Katherine’s warm laughter was like a warm mint tea, easing the muscles in her shoulder, and the tightness around her heart.
“I wish that was possible. Even on a good day back in Sylvan we barely had time to sit down and talk unless we both moved our schedules around and took a girl’s weekend.” True looked over at her dresser and saw a picture of them on their last trip, traveling all the way to Mackinac Island. “I can’t wait until we can do something like that again.”
“Well, first things first,” Katherine replied back. “I need to come and visit you in Mystic. Are the shifters as hot as we hoped they would be?”
For a moment, True wondered how truthful she should be, but then she realized that Katherine knew her well enough that she could probably sniff out a lie, even over the phone. “More.”
Ignoring her best friend’s squeal of jealousy, True couldn’t help the grumble that fell from her lips.
“Of course, I’ve really only spent time with the three that work at the resort. Aaron is married to Celeste.”
“Mated,” Katherine interjected the thought. “He’s mated to her, right?”
True thought about it and nodded before remembering that her friend couldn’t see her through the phone. “Both really. Besides his mark, Celeste and Aaron had a regular wedding. It was good because she said her kids were home on break from college, so it was a real family moment. And then…” She could have stopped there, but apparently, she was too tired to get her mouth to listen to her brain. Apparently, somewhere between the two parts of her body, somebody dropped the call. “There are these two guys who are doing all of the refinishing work inside the building. It’s no hardship to see the two of them around the place, even if only one of them has a civil word to say to me.”
“Oh? What’s wrong with the other one?”
Oh, goodness, what wasn’t wrong with him? Darkly gorgeous. Hot as hell, if he didn’t glare and grumble every time he saw her, she might actually be attracted to him.
Well, more attracted to him.
If that was possible.
“Life sucks.”
“Excuse me?” Katherine’s laughter was a short burst followed by a few odd chuckles. “What’s going on over there?”
“Working.”
“Oh?” Her friend’s tone said that she wasn’t going to let it go. “What’s going on. It’s not like you to dodge a straightforward question.”
Sighing, True rolled onto her back and folded one leg over the other. No matter how grumpy and growly Xavier was, she just couldn’t seem to let him go either. “One of the two guys working on the bar, Xavier, he’s kind of an ass.”
There was a long moment of pause on Katherine’s end, and just when True was about to say something, anything, to fill the void, she heard her friend again.
“Right.”
“No, he is. He’s bad tempered and territorial. I’m not looking to be best friends or anything-”
“You better not, that’s my job.”
“But I think it’s worth trying to get along considering I’ll be here for a while and it makes sense to have a good working relationship with the people you spend most of your time with, and it’s like he won’t even try. It’s so damn frustrating. This is going to be the biggest moment in my career, and I feel like I hesitate every time I go anywhere near the bar because I don’t want to cause trouble. Not that it’s a huge deal since he seems to be avoiding me like the plague. I mean, do I smell that bad? I just don’t-”
“So exactly how hot is this guy?”
True’s mouth froze in place, and her thoughts hit a wall like a freight train.
And dropped right out of her head.
“I’m sorry, what?”
Katherine’s voice was full of sass. “You’re talking a mile a minute, and even though you sound like you want to wring his neck, your voice is deeper, warmer. Either you’re a little buzzed on alcohol or him.
“So, I ask you again… How hot is this guy?”
True squeezed her eyes shut, but instead of going dark and blank, to give her a chance to gather her thoughts, all she could see was Xavier and those dark green eyes staring out of the dark
ness.
Every inch of her skin was alive, tingling.
“He’s scorching hot.”
“Girl,” Katherine sighed, and True could hear something rustling, as if she was curling up with a pillow on her couch, “tell me everything.”
True rolled her eyes. “I think I have. He hates me. And while my mind wants me to drown him in the horse trough, all the rest of me wants nothing more than to have my hands all over him.”
She could hear her friend’s indrawn breath.
“And before you say anything, Kitten. Yes, not just my hands, that wouldn’t be enough. Not by a long shot. But that would entail me getting close enough to do that and he’s made it his mission to stay away from me. He didn’t even come to the tasting today.”
It hurt more than it should, but she liked making people happy, and knowing that Xavier had a serious respect for alcohol, enough that he had his own expertly crafted still, she hoped sharing her work with him would be enough to bridge the gap.
Instead, he just didn’t show up.
She pulled herself out of her thoughts to catch the tail-end of Katherine’s comment.
“… you ask anyone what put that stick up his ass?”
True covered her mouth for a moment after she snorted. “No, I love Celeste and Aaron, but they’re my bosses. It just seems like career suicide to ask them why the big bad panther seems to hate me.”
“Hmm,” Katherine’s tone was thoughtful, “yeah, kind of middle school, huh?”
“See?” True was thrilled that she wasn’t completely crazy. “Exactly.”
“What about his friend?”
“Locke? I could probably ask him, but I get the feeling that Locke makes it his personal goal to push Xavier’s buttons on a daily basis. If I went to Locke, he’d probably tell Xavier. Who knows? It would probably be a huge violation of his privacy, and he’d really hate my guts.”
“Wow.” Katherine’s voice went silent for a long moment. “Instead of Mystic, they should have called the town Rock and a Hard Place.”
True couldn’t help but laugh. “So true, so… ugh.”
The two shared a good laugh, and True felt the heavy pressure on her chest lift just a little bit.
