Snow Red

by Ellis Leigh

  “I am. Pretty sure you confirmed that when you broke my bed.”

  His wicked smirk returned, his eyes practically twinkling as he said, “But was the night worth the damage?”

  To my bed, my thighs, my pussy, my back end. I was an aching mess with nowhere to sleep, and I had never been happier.

  “Absolutely.”

  He dropped lower to place a soft, sweet kiss on my lips before rising back up. “Can I take you to lunch?”

  He was my mate, had broken me and my bed, but such a sweet question still made me flush. “Of course.”

  “Is the diner okay or—”

  “There’s this new French bistro out by the woods. Lots of vegetarian choices for you and fish for me.”

  “Sounds perfect.” He grabbed my hand and led me out of the library, both of us grinning like maniacs along the way. Being mated soothed something inside me, made the happiness easier to grasp. Made the bad stuff seem so far away. It wasn’t, of course. LaPorte, Indiana, wasn’t all that far. But somehow, Mateo made all those memories and fears disappear. My big, strong mate would never let anything happen to me. Not even if the “anything” was coming from my own mother.

  Thoughts I did not need to have in that moment.

  “This place is nice,” I said as we were seated on a deck overlooking the woods and, farther out, the mountain. “I’m so glad you were willing to try it.”

  “Thanks for finding it. The only places I’ve been passing, other than the hotel restaurant, are the diner and that barbecue place out by the highway.”

  “I’ve heard that’s good,” I said, distracted by the menu. When Mateo didn’t answer, I glanced up to find him staring at me with a concerned look. It took me a second to realize what might be wrong. “Oh, right…barbecue. Meat. Specifically, cow meat. So, no. We won’t be going there.”

  He reached across the table and grabbed my hand, giving it a squeeze. “Thank you.”

  And so went our lunch, both of us happy and chatty. We ate slowly, truly taking advantage of the time together. Neither of us went too deep on our questions, which kept the conversation fun and light. At least, until we were preparing to leave, and I asked him something that made the smile fall right off his handsome face.

  “What case brought you to the Cove, anyway? You said a missing persons one, right?”

  The words had seemed innocuous enough, the questions ones anyone would have asked. But Mateo went still and silent, face tightening with what looked like anger. The energy around him even shifted into something dark and downright scary.

  “Just a case. Come on, princess. Let me get you back to work.”

  And apparently, that was it. Case closed. His reason for being here was definitely not open for discussion. That fact sent a little ball of worry spinning through my gut. What could the case possibly be that he wouldn’t want to talk about? Maybe he couldn’t talk about it, like it was some sort of official thing and he was bound not to bring it up. Or maybe it was bad. Really bad. Maybe he—

  “Hey,” he said as he slid into the driver’s seat of his car, having already helped me into mine. “Why do you look so anxious?”

  I took a deep breath, centering myself in the moment. I was being ridiculous. If Mateo didn’t want to tell me about the case he’d been working that brought him to me, there was a reason. A totally logical, likely pretty innocent, reason. One that had nothing to do with me. This was a boundary he’d made clear, and I should respect it.

  Physical boundaries, not so much.

  I crawled across the console and planted myself in my mate’s lap, cuddling close and purring under my breath. His heat, his touch, calmed me immediately. I had never felt as safe as when I was in his thick arms.

  “You okay, princess?” he asked, sounding far more nervous than I wanted him to be.

  I rubbed my head against his collarbone, scenting him. “Yeah, I just needed a snuggle to calm myself.”

  He grunted then reached down, sending the seat flying backward. We stopped with a jolt, the steering wheel no longer digging into my hips.

  “Better?”

  I wiggled over him and stretched, taking full advantage of every inch of space as he stared at me. “Absolutely.”

  His hands found their way to my waist, his touch strong and solid as he squeezed me. As he moved me over his hard cock a few times. “Naughty girl.”

  My grin came unbidden. “Maybe. How can I not be? You’re just so…big.”

  He groaned and dropped his head back, rocking up into me a time or two before holding still. Holding me still, too. “I bet you’re a tiny thing.”

  It took me a moment to realize he meant my cat form. That was the only part of me he hadn’t seen yet. Without a word, I went ahead and shifted. Popping out of my fallen clothes the second I made it to fuzzy and four-pawed. He picked me up in one hand, lifting me toward his face. I head-butted his chin, purring the entire time. And then I meowed. Loudly.

  Mateo laughed. “You are a sassy one, aren’t you? You’re beautiful, too.”

  I head-butted him again and reached to place my front paws on his collarbone, kneading his flesh. Purring so loudly that I felt my entire body trembling with the sound.

  “Okay, princess. I get it. You’re a happy kitty. Now, settle down in my lap and let me drive you to where you can shift without showing off that pretty human body to anyone else.” He started the car, keeping his hand on my furry body as I curled up in his lap. “Gotta protect you from everything. Can’t have you just naked in my car. At least not with other people around.”

  Naked in his car and without an audience seemed okay, though. Noted.

  Mateo drove us to the motel he had been staying in, cradling me and carrying my clothes into what had to be his room. The space seemed dark and totally out-of-date when we walked in, but it was clean. My mate wasn’t a messy man, which was a good thing. He set me and my clothes in the bathroom then closed the door, giving me a privacy to shift and dress that I had neither asked for nor needed. Yet, I appreciated the respect. Shifting could be an odd time for our bodies. One never knew how the bones and skin were going to move when changing forms.

  I shifted human then tossed on my clothes, catching a glimpse of myself in his mirror. My face was flushed, my smile wide, and my eyes bright. I looked honestly happy. Unbearably so. That was all because of my new mate and the way he treated me so well. The way he cared for me. He was a perfect mate—attentive and aware of my needs but not overbearing.

  “You are one lucky girl,” I whispered to my mirror self, my grin widening.

  Needing to be with my mate once more, I rushed out of the bedroom. Mateo sat on the edge of the bed, looking downright pensive, which just wouldn’t do. I raced at him, jumping into his lap, and knocked him back. We both laughed as I sprawled on top of him, the sound quickly morphing into groans of pleasure as I kissed him good and deep. As I laid my body on top of his and wrapped my arms around his neck. This feeling, this heat, was what I’d needed. What I had craved. I had never felt happier or safer than in that moment.

  And then Mateo had to open his mouth. “I believe you need to go back to work.”

  I huffed. “Spoilsport.”

  He rolled me under him, eyebrow raised. Settling his hips between my spread legs as if he belonged there. Which he absolutely did.

  “I’d be happy to spend the afternoon balls deep in my mate, maybe break another bed. But your bosses may want you to finish your shift.”

  I sighed and rolled my eyes, purposefully exaggerating the irritated tone in my voice as I said, “Fine. If you’d rather me work than have sex with you.”

  He growled my name, diving in to kiss and bite my neck. Both of us chuckling as he rolled us back over again. Bliss. My mate and I together was pure bliss. Nothing had ever felt better. Nothing would ever take him away from me. Nothing could ruin this.

  “Come on,” he said, rising to his feet and pulling me with him. “The sooner you get back, the sooner you can stop working
, and then we can get naked together.”

  “Promise?”

  “Absolutely-fucking-lutely.” He grabbed my hand and tugged me toward the door. I was still smiling, still sort of laughing under my breath when I saw it. When I spotted the picture that yanked the blissful feeling right out from under me. That sent a shard of icy glass slicing through my gut.

  “Mateo?”

  He turned, looking confused. At least until I pointed at the picture on top of a stack of papers on his desk. Papers with my real name on them. Papers signed with a scrawl I would recognize anywhere.

  “Why do you have a picture of me as a teenager in your room?”

  8

  Mateo

  Pacing in a small motel room was the epitome of ridiculous for a man my size. I walked from one end to the other in a total of two strides, maybe three if I kept my steps small. A quick turn and then I was across the room in two to three more. Ridiculous. And yet, I paced. It was the only thing I could think to do, seeing as how my sweet mate looked to be shaking mad.

  I glanced at the end of the bed where she sat stiff as a board, where she glowered at the floor I’d just passed over, and I took a deep breath. This was going to be hard.

  “A woman named Lucy Meyers hired me to find you.”

  Those red lips turned down even farther, that beautiful face filled with an emotion I hadn’t thought she was capable of. And she said nothing. Not a word. I had to fill the silence.

  “She reached out to me two months ago, claiming you were a runaway and she just wanted to know that you were safe somewhere. I took the job, not having any idea who you were other than the lost child she had made you out to be.” I stopped pacing, wary and unsure if I should even bother with the next words, but throwing caution to the wind. “Your mother misses you.”

  Arabella sat silent, moving only enough to place her hands on the edge of the mattress next to her hips. As if she needed extra support to stay seated. Maybe extra leverage to pop up and attack me. I had absolutely no idea what was going on in that pretty head of hers. At least not until she finally opened her mouth and the most deadpan, emotionless voice came out of her.

  “My name in Kinship Cove is Arabella Snow, but my real name is Arabella Gunness. Her name is not Meyers.”

  My brain took a moment to chug to life, but once it did, the pieces fell together. Gunness and LaPorte, Indiana.

  “Are you related to the serial killer Belle Gunness?”

  She took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah. Or at least my mother claimed we were. As if I was supposed to be proud to be the great-granddaughter of a woman who had killed her children, her husbands, and her suitors.”

  I had to dig through my case memories a little harder than usual to remember all I knew about Belle Gunness, and when I did, I frowned. “I thought she killed all of her kids.”

  “And died in a fire, right? Except the body in the fire was the wrong height. She didn’t die and even went on to have two more children. She killed one but kept the last alive. That’s our line. I hated growing up with that name, but my mother loved it. Thought she was some sort of local celebrity because of it.”

  “That’s…sickening.”

  “No, what’s sickening is how my mother took after Belle. How she’d joke about killing me with the neighbors, then put poisons in my food to see how I’d react.” Her blue eyes met mine, fiery and truly filled with fury. “I ran away because I was terrified she’d actually kill me one day, on purpose or accidentally.”

  Every instinct inside me raged right along with her. My mate—my fated partner—could have died before I’d even met her because her mother had some perverted obsession with a possible connection to a serial killer. That was a new one for me, as was the rage boiling up from the depths of my soul.

  “She tried to kill you?”

  Arabella turned my way, that blank slate of a face finally breaking. Sadness and anger meshing to pull together a picture of a child who’d dealt with trauma, all grown up into adulthood and still being hurt by the actions of her parent.

  “A lot. She tried to kill me a lot. Then laughed about it.” She sighed and shook her head, breaking eye contact. “So, you can see why your working for her pulled the rug out from under me.”

  Oh, I could see it, all right. I was absolutely horrified that I’d allowed such a woman into my life, let alone possibly back into Arabella’s. Had I known anything about how horrible Arabella’s mother was, I never would have taken the job. But then I wouldn’t have met Arabella. My bull didn’t like that thought any more than he liked the idea of her being around someone actively trying to do her harm. Neither of us knew what to do, though. How to fix this. My bull wanted me to release him, to let him take over so he could chase the woman down. My man side liked the idea, except it left our mate alone and unguarded. That wasn’t happening.

  “I’m…” Words were harder than I’d ever thought possible, but I dug deep. Pushed past all the anger and fury that didn’t need to be pointed at my sweet princess. “I’m sorry I brought all of this up for you. I’m sorry I wasn’t as honest as I should have been right from the start. I didn’t realize how hurt this whole thing would make you or the backstory. I honestly just thought I was doing another job to help a grieving mother.”

  Arabella didn’t look up at me, though. She didn’t answer either. She sat, eyes staring at the floor, for a long, tense moment. And then she sighed.

  “I need to get back to work.”

  With that, she rose to her feet and headed for the door, and my heart sank straight into my gut.

  “Arabe—”

  “No.” She reached the door, already opening it before I could stop her. “I’m done with this for now. I need to go to work.”

  I crumpled but followed her out, too afraid of being rebuffed to reach for her hand. Watching her for any sign of my usually happy and sweet mate. Not that I deserved that. This was my fault. Had I told her why I was in Kinship Cove, she could have told me her story on her terms instead of mine. She could have had time to prepare herself. Instead, she had found out in a way that made me look like a liar. I had hurt her with my lack of explanation. I would never forgive myself for that.

  The drive to the library was spent in absolute silence—no talking, no radio, no nothing. It was as if we were strangers in the vehicle, uncomfortable sharing space and just waiting out the minutes until we could get away from each other. Still, the drive wasn’t nearly long enough. I needed more time with her, needed to figure out how to fix what my silence had broken. I needed to make sure she knew that I would always protect her and would never intentionally lie to her. She needed…

  “Just drop me off at the door. You don’t need to walk me in or anything.”

  …me to leave her the hell alone, apparently.

  “Arabella, I would like to pick you up after work if you don’t mind. So we can talk more.”

  She shrugged but didn’t look at me. “I don’t know if I want that right now, but I’ll text you.”

  With that, she rushed out of the car and up the stairs, disappearing into the old, brick building without a single backward glance. My heart shattered right there in my car, my inner bull groaning a mournful sound in my head. My mate had left us without a care, but it was our own fault.

  Fuck me, I needed to find a solution for this issue.

  As I turned to pull away from the library, I noticed two things almost simultaneously. The first was a woman with dark hair and abnormally red lips standing across the street. Watching the doors. The expression on her face sent ice shooting through my gut, but I had less than a second to take her in before she turned and walked away. Disappearing into the parking lot. The second thing was a man who was most definitely some sort of law enforcement staring off in the direction where the woman had been. He looked familiar—I was pretty sure he’d been hanging around with the main librarian, Arabella’s boss, Brittani. He had that cop stare, that stance that said he was ready for anything. That air about him.
Definitely the law and totally noticing the same woman I had. The one who had disappeared.

  Fuck, I needed to do a little more digging into Arabella’s past, even if she didn’t like it. Specifically, stuff regarding her mother. I also needed to track that guy down and have a conversation. I had a gut feeling we could help each other out.

  “Hang on, princess. I’ll fix this.” I pulled away from the library but pulled right into the lot, reaching into my bag to find my mobile hot spot as I cruised slowly past the cars. Searching for the woman. The cop-looking guy met my gaze, and I gave him a nod, heading closer to him. I needed to have a chat with him, and then I could start my digging. Right from that lot. No fucking way was I leaving Arabella unprotected.

  9

  Arabella

  Twenty-four hours. That was how long I stayed in my little pity-party bubble. A full day without reaching out to my mate, without seeing him other than from afar—because, of course, the man refused to just…disappear—and without a single ounce of happiness in my world. I knew I was overreacting. Mateo had been doing his job when he’d talked to my mother. He’d had no idea about her history or our past. I knew from experience that my mom could charm the scales off a snake, so why my anger seemed centered around Mateo took a long time for me to work through. When it had finally hit me, waking me from a dead sleep, I had nearly cried with relief.

  I was mad at Mateo because I had seen him as flawless, but this mistake on his part—this secret kept from me—had turned him into a creature on the level of the rest of us. Flawed, one who made errors in judgments, human. The man wasn’t a prince even if he did like calling me princess. He was simply a man who had found his fated partner in me. He would make mistakes, as would I. There was really nothing wrong in his actions.

  I just had to figure out how to tell him that and apologize for needing time to work through my emotions.