by M. J. O'Shea
“Why would I want to be ‘shackled’ for life to a human?”
The way he threw the word I’d used back at me, and the way he made “human” sound like some kind of subspecies―I just wanted to scream.
“You know what? Screw you. I’m out of here.”
I stood and turned to jog away when I felt a strong hand on my arm, holding me in place. I wriggled against it for a few seconds before I admitted it was useless. He was so much stronger than me. Turning back around, I regarded him with what I hoped was a withering stare.
“Let go of me.” I ground the words out slowly.
“You can’t leave.”
“Watch me. I’ll take the pain over being near you.”
I could’ve sworn he flinched. Good. Doesn’t feel very nice, does it? “Don’t be ridiculous. We need to go upstairs. My mother wants to get to know her new son.” The words and his body were telling me to stay, but his voice sounded like he couldn’t stand the thought of it. My insides felt hollow, filled only with aching, burning hurt.
“No. I’m done. I don’t want anything to do with the lycans, with you, with anyone who thinks I’m not worth being with. Let go of me. Like I said, I’ll take the pain.” I started to walk away, trying to tug my hand from his grip and ignoring the burning in my gut.
“Miles, it’ll kill you.”
Those four softly spoken words stopped me in my tracks.
“What?” It was hard to push even that hoarse half-whisper out.
“My mom sent me after you. She said not to let you get too far―that the pain would eventually kill us. Both of us.”
His mom sent him? He didn’t even come after me on his own, and I’d actually die if I was away from him for too long. God, it just kept getting better and better, didn’t it? PC’s grip gentled, turned into a touch. I took the first opportunity to pull my hand out of his.
“So we’re really stuck.”
“We’re really stuck.”
My heart yowled, but I faced him silently. It was a long time before I felt like I was ready to speak. When I did, it came out slowly, my voice dry and matter-of-fact. “Fine. But it’s not going to be like it was. Don’t touch me, and unless it’s something necessary, I don’t want you talking to me either.”
PC rolled his eyes. I wanted to punch him.
“We’re going to have such a pleasant life together,” he muttered. He led me to the door.
“And while I’m at it, don’t you dare blame me for this again. I’m not the one who’s Mr. Supernatural Dog Boy. The dumb human couldn’t possibly be responsible for this mess.”
PC glared at me and slammed the door to his building against the wall. “After you, dear.”
“Screw you.”
PC’S MOTHER was waiting patiently when we returned. I was furious but still felt a little bashful, since I’d been the one to run off like a stupid kid.
“I’m sorry,” I murmured before sitting on the couch. PC sat on the couch as well, but as far away as he could be without squeezing himself into the corner. Fine with me. Stay away. Too bad my skin didn’t like it very much. I felt it pulsing, wanting to get closer to him. I dug my heels into the floor, like that would help.
“It’s okay, dear.” PC’s mother spoke quietly, regarding us with interest. “You were upset. My son was being insensitive.”
He glared at her. “So what happens now?”
“Well, ready for it or not, you two are mated. For life. I’ve said that the bond between you cannot be undone. And it can’t, not by anyone.”
Way to break it gently, Mom. I half-waited for PC to freak out again, but he sat there stoically, taking his punishment with a grim frown. I decided it couldn’t get any worse if I spilled the rest of it.
“Um―”
“Sabina,” she prodded gently.
“Sabina.” I repeated. “PC and I already figured out that it… um… the bond has probably been there our whole lives anyway.”
He glared at me too, like me saying the truth out loud was going to make it truer than it already was. His mother, on the other hand, looked intensely interested. I realized this must be a huge deal for the lycans, especially with the odd circumstances of us coming from so far apart and, well, both being male. I somehow doubted that happened very often.
“How do you know? The only other imprinted couples I’ve ever come across had lived in the same villages their whole lives, so they already knew each other and were aware of the imprinting since they were both old enough to feel it.”
PC sighed. “Remember those dreams I’ve always had, Mom? The ones where I was looking for a rowan tree?”
She nodded.
“Show her, Miles.”
My cheeks turned red. Fine. I lifted my shirt to reveal the tree.
“It’s a rowan tree. Rowan is his middle name. I was having those dreams before Miles ever got the tattoo.”
Her eyes widened noticeably. “Then you’ve been…. You’ve been waiting for Miles since you were little boys.”
I cringed.
PC jumped up, expression verging on panic. “I can’t have this conversation right now―maybe not ever. Mom, you met Miles, you can go tell the council that the stupid bond is real. I have to figure out how I’m going to live my life with a human chained to my neck.”
“And what about me? This isn’t exactly my idea of a party!” I was getting tired of his martyr act.
“Whatever. We all know how you feel about the bond.”
“Felt. Past tense. As in not anymore.” If I were a lycan like him, I would have growled. I wanted to.
Sabina smiled. “I believe you two have some things to work out.” Why was she smiling? It annoyed me even more. “And unless you want Amanda and Leila getting involved, I’d suggest you do it somewhere else.”
“Let’s go to your dorm then, Miles. She’s right. We don’t want the girls getting involved any more than they already are.”
“Fine.” I couldn’t wait to be stuck alone with him in my tiny little room where there wasn’t even a door to escape behind unless I wanted to sit in my closet of a bathroom. “Bring a book or something. I have homework to do.”
With that, I nodded to his mother and then stomped out to the hallway to wait for him.
MY ROOM was warmed from the autumn sun that streamed, bright and cheerful, through the windows. Unfortunately, that same sun showed the healthy layer of dust that covered my teetering piles of books, the lampshades, and the stack of coffee cups that were perched precariously near my bed. I was too distracted to care all that much. I dropped my keys and turned toward my card table desk to grab the writing work I needed to catch up on.
I would have made it, too, if I wasn’t slammed against the wall and nearly smothered by an insistent pair of lips. PC’s tongue delved into my mouth, rubbing angrily up against mine. I shoved at his chest, catching him off guard and causing him to lean back a few inches.
“What the hell? I said don’t touch me!” It was too late, though. His taste was on my lips and tongue, and even though my hand was only on his shirt, I felt the warmth of his skin pulsing through, calling to me. “Damn.”
I grabbed his shirt and hauled him close, smashing my mouth back on his. I don’t want this. Yeah, right. Tell that to my pounding, aching body. It shouted gloriously, reveling in the closeness I’d been denying it. PC must have felt the same. His hands shoved into the back pockets of my jeans and squeezed, pulling me as close as he could, undulating his body against mine while his mouth plundered and pillaged, seizing spoils that were reluctantly his for the taking.
We broke apart seconds before I would have passed out from lack of oxygen. The much-needed air rushing to my brain restored just the tiniest bit of sanity. I stumbled a little, my hands pushing him away. I couldn’t touch him anymore. If I did, there wouldn’t be any stopping. It was hard to remember that I hated him at the moment, until I looked at his face and remembered the sneering way he’d assured me he wanted nothing to do with us. I pushe
d harder, finally getting him to move enough that I could scoot around him.
“What was that for?”
“I smelled you. I couldn’t help it.” The admission was grudgingly given.
“Well, start helping it. I’m getting my writing stuff out and you’re going to leave me alone. I’ve already missed too much class because of you.”
“Fine.” He went digging in the bag of books he’d left there the day before. I’d forgotten all about them.
I settled on my bed, spread my work out, and opened my laptop on the bedspread between my legs. PC lay down horizontally at the foot of the bed with his book. I wanted to protest, but I had to admit it was a lot easier to breathe with him lying close to me.
I started by working on the assignments listed on the syllabus for the previous week. I’d missed both classes because I had been so sick. After the insanity of the past few days, it took me awhile to get myself back in school mode, but I managed. Flunking out was not an option unless I wanted my mother to kill me.
An hour or so later, I was halfway through the three scenery descriptions we were supposed to write when I felt it—a light touch on the top of my bare foot, fingers drifting across my skin and underneath the ankle of my jeans. My head snapped up, ready to glare, but he wasn’t even looking at me. His face was buried in the book he was reading and his fingers were absentmindedly seeking the warmth they craved. The touch was pure instinct, his body wanting to be close to mine. It felt wonderful. My blood sang from the rightness.
I nearly sighed and scooted closer to his caressing hand before I remembered how he’d compared me to a weight around his neck dragging him down. Screw him. I jerked my legs back, crossing them and resting my elbows on my knees.
“It hurts,” PC said quietly.
I knew it did. My body had been aching dully, with the exception of the few glorious minutes when we were kissing, since our fight on the street. Seemed like our bond was telling us that it disapproved of us not getting along.
“Guess you should have thought of that.” I was willing to be stubborn. I didn’t think this was the kind of pain that was lethal, and I refused to fall back into the way things had been. Not when I’d seen how he really felt about me.
PC put his book down and wriggled his way up until he was lying right next to me. He reached out and slipped his hand under my shirt.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I know none of this your fault. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”
“You don’t really mean that. You just don’t want your body to hurt anymore.”
“Do you want yours to?”
I sighed and reached behind me to pull his hand out from under my shirt. I didn’t want to, but I managed it.
“No touching, PC.”
“But I do mean it. I was an asshole to you and I am sorry. I don’t really blame you for all of this. You were just sitting there, available. It hurt when you ran away and I was panicking and it was easy to get mad at you—take it out on you.” He chuckled sourly. “Who else am I supposed to blame if not the poor unsuspecting human guy who had nothing to do with this world before he met me?”
“You were panicking?” I raised my eyebrow.
“Okay, I’m still panicking, but it’s easier to breathe when I’m touching you. That much I know.”
I gave him a wary stare. I wasn’t sure if I wanted any part of this reconciliation. He obviously had a quick temper, but I’d never had an easy time forgiving people once they had burned me. The things he’d said had burned like a steaming hot poker—still did every time I thought about it.
“Miles, please just—” His phone buzzed in his pocket. He reached for it while absentmindedly slipping his hand back under my shirt to the skin of my lower back.
Jesus. My body gave in, leaning back into his hand with a satisfied grunt.
“Hey, Mom.” PC listened for a second, then put his hand over the bottom of his phone. “My mom wants to know if we fixed everything. She’s got stuff she still needs to discuss with us.”
No. Not fixed. “Again? But we haven’t even been here two hours. I’ve got homework to do.” I gestured at my computer.
“This shouldn’t take too long.” He rubbed his fingers gently on my lower back. “You’ll still have time to do your work.”
The dizzying change in his mood threw me for a loop. To go from glaring accusations to apologies and reassurances within the space of barely two hours? I wasn’t sure if I could keep up. I huffed but nodded. Better get it over with. There was no escaping from what I was sure was more fantastic news.
“She says she wants to meet here, since Leila and Amanda are probably going to get up soon.”
I was horror-struck. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I hissed. “Your mother is not coming to the dorms. Tell her to meet us at the bookstore or something.”
PC gave his mother directions to Village Books and told her we would be there in about fifteen minutes, which gave me just enough time to shuffle my papers away and get shoes on, grumbling to myself the whole time at the helplessness of the situation. I felt like a ball being tossed about in some cosmic game. The worst part was I didn’t even know who the players were.
“I’VE BEEN thinking more about your bond. Did you have any other reasons to believe it had been in place since you were children?” That intensely interested look was still on Sabina’s face.
I tried not to groan out loud. Our inescapable bond was the last thing I wanted to discuss in depth. I was already having a hard enough time squirming away from PC’s relentless touch—I hated loving it as much as I did. Better to get the inquisition over with, though. We weren’t going to be able to avoid it forever.
“I’ve always known that I was meant to be in New York. It’s nothing I can explain, but I knew it was true. I’m from California originally. I’ve only been here for a few months but I’ve wanted to come for years. Even when I was a little kid, I felt like I would belong here more than I did at home.”
She smiled suddenly. “You’re from San Diego, aren’t you?”
PC looked at her sharply. “How did you know that?”
“When you were a little boy, you used to constantly try to get your father and me to take you there. You wanted to see the ocean and the zoo. You even had a poster of the pandas. We were never sure where the infatuation came from, but it seemed harmless enough.”
“Really? I don’t remember that at all.”
“It makes sense.” They both turned to look at me. “The pandas were always my favorite. My mother took me there all the time when I was little.”
“And when I started shifting and was mad at the world for all those months, Miles said he had an awful time then too.”
“Yeah, I used to get so mad at my mother. Always at her and for no reason.”
“Which was probably because I was mad at my mother for being the reason I kept turning into a wolf. It’s her family that I get it from. My dad was human until she turned him.”
“You didn’t want to be a wolf? I’d have given anything not to be ordinary.”
“No, not at first. I wanted to be normal, and I sure as hell didn’t want to look like this forever. It would have been better if I looked older when I turned, I guess.”
PC’s mother smiled at him, and part of me wanted to reach over and ruffle his glossy curls. But I didn’t. I just looked at him silently until he cleared his throat.
“Listen, Mom, I know all of this is fascinating to you, but we’ve got more immediate things to deal with. How are we supposed to live like this? I mean, I felt like I was dying when Miles was right outside the building. It even hurt when we were in the same room and not touching. He has to go to class, and I have to go hunting. What are we going to do?”
I was pretty sure I already knew the answer to that, so I spoke for her. “I think it depends on what our intentions are when we walk away from each other. If the bond isn’t being threatened, like if you just go to the other room and my body knows you’re
coming back, it’s uncomfortable for you to go, but it’s okay. Tolerable. If I think you’re running away, or if I run away, and the intention isn’t temporary, that’s when our bodies freak out and the pain starts. It probably hurt earlier because we were angry. If we were simply not touching, our bodies could handle it.”
Sabina nodded. “I believe the more intimate you two are, physically and emotionally, the more comfortable your bodies will become with small separations. You’ll also probably get better at communicating with each other over distances too. Especially once Miles gets turned.”
“Turned?”
Oh. Wait a freaking second. Were they saying if I was PC’s mate or whatever, then I’d probably have to become a—
Oh my God.
“Mom, this probably isn’t the best time to be laying more on Miles. We didn’t have the best day and―”
“Do I get a choice?” I said it so quietly that it was probably hard for them to hear me.
PC glared at his mom. “Yes, of course you do.”
“Actually, it’s pretty common in lycan-human matches, even nonimprinted ones, for the human to become lycan. Your father did.”
“Yeah, but Miles didn’t choose this, Mom. Dad did. I don’t want to take away what little he has left of his independence.”
I was still reeling from the shock of Sabina’s casual statement, not to mention a suddenly supportive PC. I was still on edge, waiting for him to freak out and yell at me again.
“PC, do you want to watch Miles grow old and die decades, even centuries, before you do?”
PC opened his mouth and shut it silently. I was silent too, unable to wrap my head around the idea of living for that long. I wasn’t sure what I thought about turning into a wolf either… other than I kind of liked it. I’d spent my life being small and quiet. The idea of roaming the streets of New York huge and powerful was undeniably alluring.
