by Kidd, Lola
Rachel smiled. “I bet. How’s work?”
Dom relaxed. She was being nice. “I’m off before five. Can’t complain.”
“Lucky you.” Rachel started rolling silverware for the night crew.
“How’ve you been?” Dom asked.
She shrugged. “Okay. I’m still working the morning shift. I have my evenings free to do as I please. Can’t complain.”
Dom smiled. “What are you doing with your evenings these days?”
Rachel stopped rolling the silverware in her hand and looked at Dom with one eyebrow arched. “Keeping busy. From what I’ve heard, you’ve also been keeping yourself busy in the evenings.”
He realized his mistake and paled. “I didn’t mean anything by that. Just trying to get to know you a little.”
“I think we know each other well enough.” Rachel continued to roll the silverware at an even pace. “I was just starting to get used to you, Dom. No need to make it awkward.”
“I didn’t mean anything by the question,” Dom protested.
“Good. I would hate for my good friend’s ex-boyfriend to be propositioning me at my job. That would be very messy.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” Dom said through clenched teeth. So much for her being nice.
“Like I said, good. Gwen is trying to find happiness and I don’t want you coming in here and messing things up.”
Dom put his head in his hands. “I think we both want Gwen to be happy. I wouldn’t do anything to strain your friendship with her.”
“That Lovely and Kind agent has been helping people all over town. Maybe you should look into it for yourself.”
That perked Dom’s ears up. The gears in his head turned quickly. “Lovely and Kind. Is that how Gwen’s finding her little slice of happiness?”
“It sure is.”
Dom’s sandwich came up. “Can I get that to go?”
Rachel stopped doing side work to put his food in a box. Dom paid and thanked the cook and Rachel for the sandwich and fries. He needed to get home. He knew how he was going to get Gwen back. There was a surefire way to show here that he was her mate.
***
“Cheer up, Gwen.” Kellan Lunar gave her an exaggerated smile. “Give me one of your million-dollar smiles.”
Gwen tried to arrange her face the right way.
Kellan put the camera down. “Maybe we’ll try this another day.”
He was trying to update the employee profiles on the company website and social media sites. He’d heard it was a good way to drive traffic to a website and engage customers on social media. Now that a local baker had been featured on a national television show, the town was getting a slow trickle of tourists. The Lunar Hotel was the only game in town, so they were doing more steady business than usual.
Gwen liked having her picture taken but she wasn’t feeling it today. “Sorry, Kellan. We can try again tomorrow.”
“Something wrong? You seem a little off.”
Gwen nodded. “How did you know Molly was your mate?”
Kellan’s face took on the cloudy look of a man newly in love. “I just did.”
“But how? Was it some kind of light bulb moment or something?”
He considered the question. “I guess it was more of a feeling. If I had been paying better attention, I would have noticed right away. But I was being stubborn. So for me, yes, it was a light bulb moment. Maybe more of a kick in the ass moment to go and claim my mate.”
Gwen nodded. “Has anyone ever been wrong before?”
Kellan frowned. “I’ve been confused before. You know about my past. I thought another girl was the one. At least my human side did. My wolf was never on board with that relationship. Something didn’t feel right.”
“What do you mean?”
He struggled for words. “I loved her and she loved me. The relationship was good but not great. It always felt like it wasn’t quite right. Like there was something more out there for me to find.”
“So, even if your human side loves someone, your animal will clue you in.”
“Exactly. You have to listen to your instincts. I think even humans have that sixth sense kind of intuition. When you’re doing what the universe intended for you, it’ll feel right.”
Gwen nodded.
“Why do you ask?”
“No reason,” Gwen said quickly. “I was thinking about my LK match. I haven’t found anyone yet, but I’m wondering how I’ll know when I meet them.”
“Don’t worry, you’ll know.”
“You don’t have to wait around here with me all night,” Gwen said. “Go on and get home to your wife.”
Kellan checked his watch. “You sure?”
Gwen nodded. “We only have ten rooms tonight and Virginia’s here too.”
She didn’t have to tell Kellan twice. He was halfway out the door before she’d finished speaking. “Thanks, Gwen!”
It wasn’t a big deal at all. There was no need for two of them to stay until midnight. She was going to be there until three a.m. anyway. Gwen didn’t need Kellan for protection either. She was a full-grown female tiger. She could get nasty if she needed to. Virginia was around somewhere too. The young wolf was a cousin of Kellan’s and a member of the Lunar Pack. Between the two of them, Gwen was confident they could handle any problem.
It was a slow night anyway. Normally, Gwen liked having company on these nights. She and Kellan could talk and keep each other from getting bored. She wasn’t in the mood for happy talking this night. She had too much on her mind. She had sworn she’d stop thinking about Dom, but she couldn’t.
Kellan had said she would know when she met her mate. Gwen thought about everything her mother had told her about meeting her father. He’d been a human. Gwen’s mother had said she’d practically dragged the poor man back to her apartment and almost killed him with her loving. Her mother was a real character. Good thing her easygoing father had let Mom do whatever she wanted. He never questioned the pretty shifter woman who had dragged him home.
That was what Gwen was looking for with a mate. The knock-you-over, head-over-heels kind of love. That wasn’t how she felt about Dom, exactly. But she didn’t know. She wasn’t sure if it was her human getting in the way of her intuition. Maybe she and Dom had too much history to have a really romantic love story. She’d liked Dom when she first saw him, but that seemed more like lust at first sight. He was so hot it was hard to see how anyone could not want the handsome tiger.
She was getting herself off track, right back to wanting to sleep with Dom again. Gwen grabbed her phone and looked at her apps. Her eyes widened when she realized why she was having such a hard time. She was going into heat! Good thing she had that handy little phone app to tell her when it was happening. She was the worst at keeping track of her cycles.
No wonder she wanted Dom so bad and she was so emotional. She breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn’t losing her mind, and there was no need to question her choice of using LK Brides. Dom wasn’t her mate. He was just the best genetic material around town. Her tiger wanted to get knocked up by the best guy it could sniff out. That was Dom alright. When they were dating, Gwen would imagine how their cute little cubs would look. Not anymore. She had to nip this in the bud. She was going to stay as far away from Dom as she could the next two weeks. She would feel a lot better once she was her regular self again.
Her phone jumped in her hand, frightening her. She dropped it and had to scramble to pick it up before the call went to voicemail. “Hello?”
“We got a match!”
“What?” Gwen couldn’t believe her ears.
“We have a match,” Olivia repeated. “I told you it would happen.”
Gwen sat down hard. “Is it someone good?”
“He’s great.” Olivia’s excitement was audible. Gwen could see the blonde agent dancing around her office when the news came in. She always worked so hard for her clients. “He just joined the agency tonight and he only matched with your profile. It’s
a 99.8% match.”
“Whoa. That’s good.” Gwen was smiling so hard her cheeks were starting to hurt. “Tell me about him.”
“I’m going to send over his profile right now and if you’re interested, I’ll connect you two. Want to hear the strange part?”
“Go on.”
“You know the man! He’s a tiger from Sunset Falls too!”
“Fuck!” Gwen dropped her phone for the second time that night.
Five
Dom looked at the email and smiled. This was going to throw her for a loop. He’d known he and Gwen were mates, but he hadn’t thought they were this compatible. They were a 99.8% match. Liv had sent him an excited email less than fifteen minutes after he’d filled out the application and created a profile.
She’d remembered him from his speech at Frank and Amy’s wedding. She hadn’t known he was interested in the service but was excited to work with him. While she hadn’t told him who his match was, Dom had told her that he was raring to get going on the process. He didn’t think Gwen would agree to contact with him, but there was no way she’d take this lying down. He poured himself a glass of scotch and waited.
Headlights shone across his driveway at 3:07 a.m. He let her bang on the door a while before answering.
“Dammit, Dominic Cates!” She kicked the front door and roared. “I know you’re in there, you good-for-nothing shifter.”
He went to the door but didn’t open it. “I’m not going to let you in here when you’re acting like that. What’s your problem, Gwen?”
“You know damn well what my problem is!”
He feigned innocence. “You broke my heart yesterday and now you’re here yelling on my doorstep at an ungodly hour. I don’t have any idea what this is about.”
“This would be about you ruining my chance at finding a mate. I know about Lovely and Kind Brides, Dom. Olivia called me herself.”
“Huh?” Dom laughed as Gwen started kicking at the door again. “I’m in the dark here, Gwen. I did apply for an LK Bride. Rachel told me the service might help me find a mate. After the ugliness with you last night, I thought now was the perfect time to sign up.”
“You son of a bitch.” Gwen pounded on the door with her fists. “You knew I was trying to find a match and you cheated me out of him. I don’t know how you did it, Dom, but you better ’fess up.”
“Did what? You can’t cheat a computer system, Gwen.”
“I know you did. Don’t you try to play innocent with me. You heard I was trying to find a match and you went in and played the system so you’d get me. This is low, Dom. Even for you.”
“Are you saying you’re my match?” Dom tried to sound surprised. As he figured, Gwen didn’t like that.
“Stop messing around, Dom. You need to fix this. Call Liv and tell her you cheated.”
“Now, how do you think I did that? If they say you’re my match, you’re my match, Gwen.”
“I am not your match. We are not mates.” There was a long string of curses mixed with growls and roars. He could hear her scratching into his front door. That door was going to have to be replaced this weekend.
“Have they been wrong before?”
“They’re wrong this time,” Gwen snarled.
“They aren’t. I don’t know why you’re having such a hard time accepting this. We’re mates, Gwen. I’m telling you. LK Brides is telling you. And if you’d listen to her, your tiger is telling you too. You can’t run from fate.”
“If you were my fate, we would have gotten together years ago. But we didn’t. We broke up. We are never, ever getting back together, Dom.”
“I’m going to marry you, Gwen Johnson. Even if I have to drag you kicking and screaming down the aisle. I’m going to marry you and we’re going to have a whole mess of cubs.”
“In your dreams, Dom!”
“I’m just letting you know what’s going to happen. You may not like it right now, but I’m not going to stop fighting for us. I’m your future, Gwen. Get used to it.”
She screamed and kicked his door one last time before leaving his porch. Dom opened the door and watched her peel out of his driveway. She left a cloud of black smoke and screeching tires in her wake.
He’d known she was going to get mad, but not this mad. Nothing to be done about that, he decided. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. He expected to get an email from a very confused Olivia in the morning. Didn’t matter. He was in the clear here. He’d only applied to LK Brides because Rachel had told him about it. Now, the waitress was going to feel mighty guilty about telling him to do that.
Dom was hoping Rachel would also feel sorry for him. He would wait a day or two before going back to Two Wolves. If he knew anything about Gwen, news of his “cheating” was going to be all over town by the time people were pouring their morning coffee.
***
Gwen went to her house and kicked more stuff. She screamed, she tore at her hair, but it didn’t do any good. She couldn’t believe it. Dom was lucky he hadn’t opened his door. She was angry enough to rip him to shreds. Or at least bite him a little. The asshole had cheated the system. Gwen didn’t know what his game was, but she didn’t think it was the least bit cute.
He thought he was being romantic or something. He wasn’t. She was serious about finding a mate. He had never shown any interest in being a husband and father until now. It was like he had woken up the morning before and decided it was time to find a wife. Maybe he’d found a gray hair and was feeling his mortality? Gwen didn’t know. None of it made any sense.
Olivia had told her there was no way to cheat. Unless Dom knew how Gwen had answered the questionnaire, there was no way for him to match her answers. He could try, of course, but it was very unlikely to succeed. Olivia thought Dom was a nice guy. He’d given such a moving toast at the wedding, she’d told Gwen. How could he be a bad guy? Gwen wondered how sweet on him Liv would be when she found out he was screwing a girl barely out of high school.
She was too mad to sleep, so she waited for the sun to come up. Mark Lunar at Two Wolves was flipping the sign to “Open” when she parked her car in the diner’s parking lot. Gwen was their first customer of the morning.
“Morning, Gwen.” Mark yawned widely. “Can I get you a cup of coffee and a menu?”
“Rachel can help me.” Gwen spotted the waitress in back and sat at the counter.
“Getting off late?” Rachel asked from the back as she tied her apron.
“I got off a few hours ago. I was too mad to sleep.”
Rachel came out and poured Gwen a hot cup of coffee and set a pitcher of creamer in front of her. “What’s wrong?”
“Man troubles.”
Rachel nodded sympathetically. “Dating is tough.”
“Actually, this isn’t about dating. It’s my LK match.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. From the sound of it, you had a hand in this one.”
“What?” Rachel looked alarmed. “I’ve never even signed up with the agency. I’ve only met that Olivia woman twice.”
“This isn’t an Olivia thing. It’s a Dom thing.”
Understanding dawned on Rachel’s face and her eyebrows shot up. “He didn’t!”
Gwen nodded. “I don’t know how he did, but yes, Dom cheated. He and I got matched up.”
“That bastard! I’m so sorry, Gwen. I only told him to sign up with the agency because he seemed so sad. I thought it would help him get some direction in his life. I thought all shifters needed to find a mate.”
“Not all of us. Some people don’t have mates and some prefer to be alone.”
“Like Kai.”
“Exactly. Some of us don’t want to find someone.”
Rachel crossed her arms. “You think Dom’s one of those people? He seems to be putting a lot of effort into wooing you here.”
“That’s not the point. If we were mates, I would know. He’s trying to force the issue.”
“Maybe you don’t want to accept that he’s your m
ate.” Mark sat down next to Gwen at the counter. His eyes were bloodshot. His twin brother Matt usually took the morning shift, if Gwen remembered right. She’d much prefer having Matt to commiserate with. Mark was no better than Dom.
“That’s not it,” Gwen said dismissively.
“Are you sure?” Mark asked. “LK has made great matches all over the world. Some even in our own town. How could Dom trick them?”
“I don’t know. He just did,” Gwen insisted.
Mark shrugged. “I’m with Rachel. If a man is willing to work that hard to get you, you should hear him out. I know I wouldn’t go to all this trouble for a girl I didn’t care about.”
Gwen rolled her eyes. “Saying you’re into someone isn’t the same as actually being a good boyfriend or husband.”
“You’re just making excuses. If you were really trying to find love, you would give Dom a chance. He’s not like he used to be.”
“Thanks for the advice,” Gwen said through gritted teeth. “But I was the one in a relationship with him once. I know what he’s like.”
Mark stood up. “Just give the guy a shot. You never know what could happen.”
He went to pour a cup of coffee for one of the senior citizens in his pack. Gwen didn’t have anything against Mark, but he didn’t know Dom like she did. She’d heard that Mark and his brother Matt had both signed up with LK Brides too. Obviously, Mark was hoping for a happy ending for Dom. If a cad like Dom could find love, it meant anyone could.
“Like I’m going to take his advice.” She rolled her eyes again.
“Mark’s a good boy,” Rachel said defensively. “Everyone isn’t like Dom. Maybe Dom isn’t even like Dom anymore.”
“Oh, no. Et tu, Brute?” Gwen let her head fall back dramatically. “I swear everyone is against me today.”
“I’m not saying he’s a good guy,” Rachel said thoughtfully. “I’m just saying he might be better than he used to be. Are you the same person you were seven years ago?”
“I am,” Gwen said defiantly. “Mostly.”
Rachel raised an eyebrow. “My point exactly. I don’t know if Dom is worth a second chance. But I do think you deserve every chance at happiness. If that means going out on one date with Dom, that’s what you need to do.”
