by R. E. Butler
Comet’s Fated Mate
Arctic Shifters Book Eight
By R. E. Butler
Copyright 2018 R. E. Butler
Comet’s Fated Mate (Arctic Shifters Book Eight)
By R. E. Butler
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.
Cover by CT Cover Creations
This ebook is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination and not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locations is coincidental.
Disclaimer: The material in this book is for mature audiences only and contains graphic sexual content and is intended for those older than the age of 18 only.
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Editing by Hot Tree Editing
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Thanks to Shelley & Joyce for beta reading.
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To anyone who ever wondered if Santa is real… I give you SC, NPC, and the Quads with lots of love, a dash of magic, and one of Mrs. C’s special hugs.
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Comet’s Fated Mate (Arctic Shifters Book Eight)
By R. E. Butler
Quad shifter Vaughn didn’t know what it would be like to meet his fated mate, but he never expected a workaholic bar owner to be so immune to his charms. His beasts are going crazy now that he’s finally found Holly, but she’s not interested in anything he has to offer. He’ll have to figure out a way to get her to see him as more than a bartender and employee.
Holly isn’t interested in anything but keeping her bar from financial ruin. She knows her sister, Ivy, isn’t happy, but she can’t seem to dig herself out of the mess left behind when a contractor skipped town with all her savings. When Vaughn, the sexiest guy she’s ever met, wiggles his way into her life, she finds it hard to keep her distance. She doesn’t have time for romance, but his kissable lips are making it difficult to think of anything else.
Vaughn wants to share his shifting nature with her and make her his mate, but he has no idea how to scale the walls she’s erected around her heart. Vaughn needs a Christmas miracle to make Holly see the light. Too bad all the magic is up in North Pole City.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Coming Next from R. E. Butler
Contact the Author
More Works by R. E. Butler
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Chapter 1
Holly sat at her desk in the bar’s only office and stared at the monitor. Her sister, Ivy, had told her to set up a business plan for the first quarter of the new year. Holly was a little embarrassed that her younger sister had to tell her to do something as basic as making a business plan, but that’s what it had come to.
The bar had originally been their uncle’s. He’d offered it to Holly for pennies on the dollar so he could retire, and she’d jumped at the chance, renaming it Holly’s. She’d gone to business school and had always wanted to open a place of her own. The bar with the attached two-bedroom apartment upstairs had seemed like a dream come true, but now it was more a nightmare than anything.
In an attempt to bring in more customers, she’d hired a contractor to remodel an empty back space into an inviting patio. She’d envisioned an upscale summer menu and specialty cocktails. When the contractor absconded with her savings, she was left with an empty space, an empty bank account, and a headache the size of Oklahoma that refused to leave. She didn’t like to admit how over-the-top devastated she’d been with the contractor’s behavior, but it had hobbled her and she hadn’t known how to deal with it. Paychecks had been late, and some employees quit, which left her scrambling to handle everything as best as she could.
Everything had suffered in the following months. Customers stopped coming in, which meant money wasn’t flowing like it should. And she’d been forced to rely heavily on Ivy, who was gracious enough to not point out how terribly Holly had failed in her quest to make the bar into something better.
On Christmas Eve, something amazing had happened. A woman who Holly was certain she’d never seen before yet looked so familiar came into the bar and stopped a fight before it even started. Then she ordered a ginger ale and tipped Holly several hundred dollars before offering to send two men who were looking for jobs in Holly’s direction. The day after Christmas, the two men came by: Jack, who agreed to be the bouncer, and Vaughn, who wanted to tend bar.
She liked Jack.
She was secretly crazy about Vaughn.
There was something about him that was dangerous to her sanity and her future plans. She wanted him more than she’d ever wanted anyone, but she was doing her best to keep him at arm’s length. The last thing she needed was to get romantically involved with the sexy guy who had a thousand-watt smile and muscles for days.
She knew if she just kissed him once that she’d be toast, so she was adopting a strict no-touch approach to the man.
Sighing, she sat back and rubbed the space between her eyes just as there was a knock at the door. “It’s open.”
The door swung open, and Vaughn stepped into the office and shut the door. He sat across from her and said, “The bar’s closed up.”
She glanced at the clock on the monitor and realized it was later than she thought. “I’ll handle the cleaning. You can take off.”
“The cleaning’s done.”
Her brows rose. “You did it?”
He nodded. “Me, Jack, and Ivy.”
“Wow, thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank me. It needed to be done, so I did it.”
“Well, I’m going to say thanks anyway. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“I wanted to talk to you.” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.
She was aware she was staring at him, but he was too damn sexy for his own good. His hazel eyes appraised her, and it took all of her willpower not to focus on his lips.
“About what?”
“I heard you’re working on a plan for the next few months. I wanted to help.”
She arched a brow. “Brought many bars back from the brink of bankruptcy?”
He shook his head. “No, but I do know business, and you clearly need some help.”
She bristled at his words but couldn’t argue at how right he was.
“The patio’s killing me. It’s unusable right now, and I don’t have the funds to fix it. I need to bring in customers to bring in money so I can fix the patio, but the patio was supposed to bring in customers.”
“I’m pretty handy with a hammer.”
Her brow arched. “You want to remodel the patio?”
“I can at least make it usable. You might want to move on, though.”
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I’ll work on the patio, if that’s what you think will really help you, but you’re living in the past. You got scammed and it sucks, but wallowing in how much you lost isn’t going to make things better here.”
She opened her mouth to tell him to get out of her office, but she didn’t. He was right, even if he was being bl
unt.
“Do you have any siblings?” she asked.
“I have a younger sister named Violet.”
“Are you close?”
“Yes. She still lives at home with my parents.”
“Ivy’s put her life on hold for me. I never meant for the bar to suck the life out of both of us, or to push her dreams aside for my own.”
“Then don’t let it.”
“I think that’s easier said than done.”
He shrugged. “Maybe. What’s your plan for the new year?”
She looked at the monitor. “A weekly quiz night. We won’t get revenue from the game, but it’ll come in with snacks and drinks. If I make it Friday nights, then I can just have Ivy play on Saturdays only and not during the week. That’ll help her get back some of the time she’s been giving so willingly to me.”
“Cool. What else?”
“Darts competition one night a week. My uncle used to host them, but I took the darts down to paint and never put them back up. They’re in storage.”
“That’s a good idea.”
“And a themed dance night, like 70s or 80s, disco or country. Mix it up.”
He smiled, a little half curve at the corner of his mouth, and it made her stomach flip.
“That sounds really good, Holly.”
She breathed out a sigh of relief. She hadn’t realized how much she’d cared that he liked her ideas, or why it even really mattered that he did.
“I have another suggestion.”
“Oh?” she asked.
“Rethink the patio.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re focusing on that a lot.”
“You have an idea in your head. I’m just suggesting that you could do something else with the space.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Think about rethinking it, or think about thinking about it?”
“Yes.” She smiled when he laughed.
“I’d like to walk you home.”
“That’s not necessary. I live upstairs.”
“I know how close you are, but I still want to walk you there.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Why?”
“Let’s just say I’m being chivalrous, but mostly I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep tonight if I’m not positive you made it safely to your place.”
It had been a long, long time since someone cared whether she was home safe or not, aside from Ivy. Vaughn was as sweet as he was sexy, and that was a potent combination.
Saving her work, she turned off the computer monitor and grabbed her coat. “I’m ready now.”
“I thought I might have to argue with you.” He stood and opened the door, and she followed him out after turning off the light.
“I can let you be chivalrous.”
She locked the bar and he walked her to the back, where she rested her hand on the railing and put one foot on the bottom step before turning to face him.
“Thank you,” she said.
“For what?”
“Everything.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Good night, Vaughn.”
“Good night, Holly. Sweet dreams.”
She walked up the steps and unlocked the apartment. Before she shut the door, she looked at the bottom of the steps and he was still there. True to his word, he watched her until she was in the apartment, and then he waved and walked away into the darkness.
She turned the deadbolt and leaned against the door. It was tempting to call out to him and ask him to come back and join her, but she knew she couldn’t. She’d just hired him; it would be a mistake to get involved, even if he was amazing and sweet, and mouthwateringly sexy.
Business first.
Romance later.
Chapter 2
Vaughn glanced at the clock as the video call program connected. He had an hour until the bar opened. Although he and Jack were hired for weekends only, he wanted to help Holly out as much as possible. It had everything to do with the fact that the beautiful human was his likli fanna – his fated mate.
Vaughn was a quad, a rare type of shifter who could change into four animals. His favorite of the four – polar bear, arctic fox, snowy owl, and reindeer – was the arctic fox because it was a fast runner. But without the reindeer, he wouldn’t be a quad and wouldn’t be part of Santa’s sleigh team. He lived in NPC, otherwise known as North Pole City, with other quads, shifters, and elves. His father was a shifter but not a quad, and his mother and sister were elves. Only males were shifters.
Santa and Mrs. Claus, known as SC and Mrs. C to their people, were the leaders of NPC. Mrs. C had a special sort of magic known as mate-magic; which she used to bring together two people who would be perfectly matched as mates. His parents were mate-matched, but quads, unlike the other shifters and elves, had the ability to find a special sort of mate called a fated mate, the one female on the planet perfect for each quad. There were eight quads on the sleigh team, and he and Jack were the last two unmated.
Christmas Day morning, when the team returned from delivering gifts, Mrs. C brought him and Jack together and explained that she believed they would find their fated mates in Holly’s bar. She wasn’t sure if the two sisters were the mates or if they would simply meet their mates in the bar at some point, but it had been a no-brainer for him and Vaughn. They’d packed up immediately and said goodbye to their families, moving into a two-bedroom apartment in the same town as the bar that had previously been rented by Declan’s human mate.
Mrs. C had arranged for Jack and Vaughn to apply for jobs at the bar. They’d shown up the day after Christmas, and the moment he walked into the bar, he’d known immediately that Holly was his fated mate. It took every ounce of his willpower not to throw her over his shoulder and take her somewhere private to mate and mark her. But she was human, and shifters, and the whole truth of SC and the North Pole, were unknown to her world. He couldn’t simply tell Holly he was a shifter – he had to make sure she was ready to be his mate. Risking the welfare of his people wasn’t anything he wanted to do. The question was how to get the prickly female to open up to the possibility of getting into a romantic relationship with him.
The video connected, and he smiled at his parents.
“How’s it going down there?” his father, Abe, asked.
“Not too bad.”
“Did you find your fated mate yet?” Penny, his mother, smiled hopefully.
“Yeah, as a matter of fact, I did. Her name is Holly Donovan, and she owns the bar where I’m working as a bartender.”
His younger sister, Violet, leaned into view. “You found her? That’s wonderful news!”
“Thanks. She’s pretty standoffish, doesn’t seem to want to get to know me any more than as an employee.”
“You’re a wonderful male,” Penny said. “She’ll come around. The trick is not to push too hard or you might push her away.”
“You have a year at any rate,” Abe added.
Vaughn nodded. NPC was magically protected and closed every day of the year but one, the twenty-four hours from dawn on Christmas Eve to dawn on Christmas Day. He hoped Holly would want to move with him to NPC next Christmas so he could keep his job as the Comet position on the sleigh team.
She loved the bar, though. That much was clear.
And if, once they were mated, she wanted to stay here and not move to NPC, he’d stay for her.
He desperately wanted to tell her that there was a tavern in NPC that needed someone to run it. That he’d happily help her, and even build her a damn patio there, too. But, of course, he couldn’t, at least not right now.
“I know,” Vaughn said. “I promise I won’t come on too strong.”
“You’re wonderful,” Penny said. “She’s a lucky female.”
“Speaking of lucky females, your sister has some news,” Abe said.
“What’s up?” Vaughn asked.
“I’m going to ask Mrs. C to mate-match me.”
His brows rose. She’d just turned
eighteen, but she looked so happy that he knew if he said anything about her age, she’d get mad, so he smiled instead. “Whoever he is, he’ll be lucky to have you in his life.”
“Mom and Grandma both were mate-matched at eighteen,” Violet reminded him.
“I didn’t say anything,” Vaughn said.
“You were thinking it, though.”
He laughed. “Yeah, but I just want you to be happy, and if it’s the right time for you, then Mrs. C will have the perfect male for you. Just be sure to let him know you have a protective older brother who expects you to be treated like a queen.”
“I wish you could be here for our mating ceremony, but I don’t want to wait until next Christmas. No offense.”
“I understand. I can be there remotely with the video app, though.”
“That would be cool!”
He glanced at the clock and said, “I’m going to head into work. Good luck with your mate-matching.”
“Good luck with your fated mate,” Violet said.
He said goodbye to his family and turned off the app.
“Did I hear that right?” Jack asked from the doorway. “Your sister’s getting mate-matched already?”
“Yeah, she just turned eighteen.”
“Well, if it’s not the right time for her, Mrs. C won’t match her with anyone. That happened to my cousin. Mrs. C told him to come back in a few months. He was pretty devastated, but when he went back, she matched him right up.”
“Did she ever say why he had to wait?”
“No, just that the magic only worked when it was the right timing.”
“That makes me feel better. At least if she does find a match for Violet, it’ll be perfect.”
Jack’s phone buzzed, and he looked at the screen. “Ivy said that Holly’s going to come up with a special drink for New Year’s Eve for a big party.”
