by J. D. Light
Some had been caught that day, but there had just been too many things that had to be taken care of for it just to have been the ones they'd already discovered.
I didn't know a great deal about why River had moved away from the streak in the first place. I knew that he and the old alpha had started disagreeing on a regular basis, and he didn't agree with a lot of what the man had been doing.
I also knew that the old alpha had been pushing for changing the streak by bringing in chosen and having chosen children. And both Axel and River had been against the idea. Their reactions had been a bit different.
River had moved to Florida where he only kept in touch with Axel, while Axel had gone to Nebraska to see if the chosen who'd been rescued from another group doing the same thing would be interested in meeting streak members in hopes of finding a love connection.
As far as I knew, that hadn't worked out, but it didn't really matter, because the alpha had apparently already started making plans on how to get chosen in a different way. An awful way.
"Uh, never mind." Did he just blush? He dropped his hand back to the console, leaning onto his elbow slightly and glancing at me for a moment, before looking back at the road. "So, what are you nervous about?"
"I don't know," I said halfway honestly. "I guess I'd just gotten a little too complacent. I thought things were okay. I just wonder how long I'm going to have to be looking over my shoulder."
He nodded, giving me a sympathetic smile. "We'll do anything we can to keep you safe. Thankfully, for every chosen, there are like… I don't actually know the shifter to chosen ratio, but I know that there are a ton of shifters out there who are going to do everything they can to keep you and other chosen safe."
"And there are some out there who will do everything they can to make money off of us, and some that would lock us in a basement or something just to keep us pregnant all the time," I grumbled bitterly.
"I know. Sadly, the only way to be truly safe is if you got mated."
"What?"
Every gorgeous inch of him had every bit of my attention, as I turned slightly in my seat to try to understand what he was saying.
"Yeah." He glanced at me blinking, and looking every bit as surprised to find that I didn't know, as I felt at hearing the words.
He licked his lips, once again drawing my attention to them, and I desperately tried not to think about… anything to do with those damn lips.
"Once you're mated, you can only get pregnant by your mate, since you'll only be able to have an orgasm with them, and that's what activates the… organ."
Some of this I already knew. Part of what made mates special was that once you found the person who was perfect for you in every way, there was nobody else in the whole world who would ever compare. So, being attracted to, getting turned on by and definitely having an orgasm with any other person the world wasn't possible, but did not extend to people who chose their mates for convenience? Or even out of love when they weren't your soulmate?
"So, once you've mated, even if the meeting is forced on you, you can't then be turned on by anyone else?" My stomach turned just thinking about all the implications. "But how are these men planning on keeping a bunch of us knocked up? And what if you were already mated and then found your soulmate?"
"Breeders are a bit different," he growled, clearly angered by the very idea. "Usually, the claiming bite is what puts chosen into a type of heat." I checked my head back in shock, making him chuckle. "It's not like what you read about in books," he assured me, patting the air for just moment in the classic calm down motion. "It just means that their body is readying itself to make babies."
The amusement fell from his face, and he licked his teeth, looking angry again. "Unfortunately, we found out through questioning the people involved in the first chosen auction, that they've come up with a drug that simulates the claiming bite, and therefore, throws the chosen into heat. Amazingly, it was apparently actually developed over two hundred and fifty years ago when the last group of chosen were coming-of-age."
He cleared his throat, looking uncomfortable. "As for the other thing, I've never actually heard of it happening. My hope has always been that if you have a soulmate out there, your soul knows it and is in constant search of its other half. It would never let you fall in love with someone else, because without your other half, you're never whole."
That made sense and was sweetly beautiful. His hope had become my hope.
I chuckled, shaking my head and looking out my window. "This is so weird to talk about. I still can't believe I can have a baby."
"Do you want kids?" he asked quietly, almost too low for me to hear.
I blinked, not surprised to find that the question was too hard for me to answer. Most things these days, seemed to be too complicated for my brain. "I don't know. I've thought about it occasionally. It would be pretty neat to have a little me running around, especially since I thought that would be impossible without a surrogate."
Though, I knew it wasn't possible, just thinking about having babies made it to where I couldn't help but picture what little Rivers would look like.
Would they have dark hair, and prowl when they walked? Would they have crooked, ornery smiles you couldn't help but return?
And what would our children look like?
"Why is that?" he asked, pulling me out of a daze where I was imagining perfect little boys and girls that had a beautiful mixture of our features.
"Huh?" I asked eloquently, trying to remember what I'd just said.
"Why would you need to surrogate?"
My eyes widened, fairly confident I knew how this was going to go over, but there was that little piece of me that was worried what I was about to say was going to cause problems. It wasn't like it would be the first time.
"Because I'm gay," I said quickly but softly, deciding to rip the Band-Aid off just as he pulled to stop at the end of the driveway, in front of an adorable, gray-blue, cottage style house.
If I looked at the trees, I could clearly see other houses that were similar in structure, but with the way the vegetation surrounded the house, it almost felt secluded. For some reason, that made the thought of staying there with River a bit more intimate.
I had been expecting something a little closer to like a summer camp type-thing. This felt a little more like honeymooning in the mountains.
"You're gay?" he asked on a whisper, drawing my attention back to him.
My stomach dropped at the look on his face. It was very clear something about my confession had upset him. I didn't know what it was, and I honestly wasn't sure I wanted to.
"You didn't know?"
He shook his head, his eyes looking almost sad. "I didn't," he said, his voice sounding dead.
"Is it a problem?" I asked, zero contention in my tone.
I didn't want there to be a problem, but I also knew I didn't have the strength to fight with him about it if it was a problem. Anybody else in the whole world, and I'd gladly throw-down on the subject, but if this man had a problem with me being gay, I knew the anger wouldn't be able to override the devastation.
He gave a harsh huff of a laugh, grabbing the door handle. "No, Loge. I just thought… I figured… it doesn't matter."
He climbed out of the car, opening the back door and leaning across the seat to grab my bag. He didn't look at me as he slung the strap over his shoulder and made his way toward the house, and I couldn't help but feel like I'd missed something—something extremely important.
***
"That's probably why I hate it so much," Edmond said, eyes narrowed in thought as he nodded his head.
I tried to see what it was he was looking at, but even putting my head as close to his as I dared without just absolutely sticking my cheek to his, I saw nothing on the wall that he was looking at, except a design in the texture that looked almost like a cat standing on one hind leg while kicking the other in the air. Somehow, I didn't think that was what he was talking about.
&nbs
p; I looked around the room, wondering if anyone else might know what the sweet man was talking about, but the two other people there didn't even seem to be paying attention to us.
"Hate what so much?" I asked finally, trying not to smile.
It had been like that for the last hour that River had been in the meeting room with Axel and Recker, and a few others I'd only met briefly. They'd said we were more than welcome to join, but Edmond had said, "Wagoner is going to pay for what he’s done," while glaring, and his mate had nodded like that made sense as an answer, and walked into the meeting room without him.
I'd peeked inside the room and shook my head, because I knew he'd tell me everything I needed to know anyway, and the prospect of sitting in a tiny conference room with a bunch of largish shifters seemed a little too claustrophobic to me.
"Broccoli," Edmond answered… at least, I assumed he answered, but I had to admit, I had no idea what that meant.
"Did I space out?" I asked tilting my head and rolling my eyes up toward the ceiling in thought. "Was someone talking about broccoli?"
Edmond blushed, looking adorable and sighed, rolling his eyes. "No, sorry." He waved his hand toward the door. "Turner said one of the streak members was worried about her mate pushing their son too hard, and that she wanted to lead him without pushing him, because when she was a kid, if her parents tried to push her too hard, she would do the opposite of what they wanted, and she saw a lot of herself in her son, so she was afraid with her husband pushing him all the time, he was going to do the opposite."
I licked my lips, giving a long, slow nod that clearly indicated I was still confused. "And that's why you hate broccoli?"
"Mm hmm." He was folding little squares of paper while following some kind of instruction manual, with his tongue sticking out to help him concentrate. "Because my mom forced me to eat it so much when I was younger."
I managed not to laugh, and when I looked over at the two guards standing by the door, they looked like they were fighting amusement too.
Edmond seemed to have the opposite of a rambling problem. There was a lot that happened in his brain between the words he spoke. He called it cutting out, but that phrase made Axel growl, so I'd for sure never used it. But he said he was like a cell phone with bad reception. You only got bits and pieces and you had to figure out what the hell was going on from that.
It was actually pretty adorable, but I had to admit, I hadn't figured it all out quite yet.
"Do you ever sit in on the meetings?" I asked, glancing at the door and wondering what was taking so long.
Not that I had anything pressing to get to. It was Saturday.
"My butt just falls asleep so easily." He rolled his eyes, clearly disgusted with himself for that fact.
"Because…" I racked my brain for a reason him going to meetings would wrap around to his butt falling asleep. "You sit for too long, and when you sit for that long, your butt falls asleep, so you don't go anymore."
I was pretty proud of myself when he nodded, giving me a smile.
"Yep. Unless it's to do with streak economy, I'd rather not sit through it. Axel will fill me in later, and constantly hearing about all the crazy people out there, and why they seem to find it necessary to think of chosen as nothing more than a magic womb, makes me depressed. I swear I've heard it all."
I saw movement out of the corner of my eye, and watched as the guards nodded to a big guy with brown hair and a huge smile as he walked into the room. I knew I'd seen him before, and I reasoned I'd probably seen him at the grocery store since most of the streak members shopped there, but I couldn't seem to come up with a name for the guy.
"Hey, Edmond," he said, leaning down to give the man a small hug from behind the couch.
"Hey, Kendrick." Edmond grabbed the man's arm where he put it around the front of his shoulders, giving it a little squeeze, and Kendrick stood, making his way over toward me, hand already extending for a shake. "Have you met River's…" Edmond's eyes widened slightly and he coughed. "This is Logan. Logan, this is Turner's mate, Kendrick."
I narrowed my eyes for a moment on Edmond, trying to figure out what it was he'd been about to say, but I just didn't have enough information, so I shrugged and took Kendrick's hand, giving it a firm shake.
"Oh, yeah," the brunet said, his smile big and almost puppy-like as he flopped on the couch next to Edmond. "Hi. River's told us a lot about you?"
I blinked, not really sure what to think of that. "He has?"
Had it been good things or bad things?
Kendrick jolted before turning to glare at Edmond. I got the impression Edmond had just elbowed him, and again, I wondered what was going on that I didn't know about. I was really starting to feel a little self-conscious about it all.
"Where have you been?" Edmond asked, clearly changing the subject. "They're discussing chosen stuff. Aren't you supposed to be in there?"
Kendrick shrugged, hiding a yawn with the back of his hand, before letting his body flop against the back of the couch. "Turner will update me. I had another case I was working on for Asher, and then he had me book him and Warren a cruise. Warren has spent his whole life being so suspicious, it's actually almost impossible to hide anything from him. I'm going to basically have to keep all the tickets and information with me until it's time to put them on the damn boat."
The door opened and men started spilling out. Rowe, one of the biggest guys I'd ever seen in my life walked out, holding something tiny… and possibly alive, in his hand.
"Was that a skunk?" I whispered, not wanting to draw the shy man's attention.
Edmond nodded, but his focus was on the project in front of him. He bit down on his lip as he folded the paper, like, eight more times, and it still looked nothing like a damn frog.
"He won't even kill spiders," he grunted, when the thing finally folded just the way he wanted, apparently.
I blinked at the man, trying to follow that particular train of thought, leaning around him slightly to look at Kendrick, hoping he might have some insight I didn't.
He smirked, clearly aware of exactly what I was thinking. Yeah, that was a skunk, he mouthed, and I raised my eyebrows, nodding slowly, even as my face crinkled up in confusion.
The blond, who'd been introduced to me earlier as Turner, smiled as soon as he saw Kendrick, and Kendrick smiled back standing quickly and rounding the back of the couch. Turner walked directly into the man's arms. They talked amongst themselves for a few moments, smiling and chuckling like the best of friends. I could actually see the love they had for each other.
I blinked, turning away because I felt like the moment was private, and I was invading. Unfortunately, I nearly face-planted the side of Axel as the alpha bent over the back of the couch to kiss his distracted mate on the cheek.
Edmond laughed, clearly tickled by the man's beard, but happily moving into him as Axel pressed his nose to his mate's neck.
I couldn't deny it. I really loved watching mates interact with one another. These men had all probably seen their significant others just hours before, but they greeted each other like it had been months.
Apparently, it was just one of those things. The more connected mates became, the harder it was for them to be without one another, because it actually felt like they were half a person.
Before witnessing it myself, I never would've thought it would be something that I'd enjoy, but with every new mated couple I saw, something inside me craved that kind of closeness.
I glanced over at River as he spoke with Recker. I knew the other man from back when I'd been held in that bunker. He'd been undercover, pretending to be on the side of the other men who were looking to make a bunch of money from all the chosen they'd either bought through online ads, or had picked up right off the streets.
I'd known Recker was better than the rest from the beginning, since he didn't treat any of us like we were cattle. If it had been up to that Burns guy, we'd have all been eating like dogs out of a tray while our hands were cu
ffed behind our backs, but Recker had always been very helpful and nice.
His job had been to find where the missing chosen were being held and make sure that there was plenty of usable evidence to keep the people responsible from getting away with it.
River looked over at Kendrick and Turner when Kendrick said something that made Turner toss his head back and laugh. The way Kendrick watched his mate was almost like he was awestruck.
I glanced back over at River, worried I knew exactly what that sad look on his face was all about. Something about the way River always acted when the subject of mates came up, had always made me suspicious. I had a horrible feeling that River knew exactly who his mate was, and that there was something holding him back.
Lacey was by no means the only person who came into the grocery store and flirted with River. It seemed like the man had admirers everywhere. Men, Women… Hell, even some of the teenagers from the streak would come and flirt with River.
The man was gorgeous and funny, and just ornery enough to pull you into his teasing in a way that made you feel giddy.
I'd done my best to pretend like we were just buddies, and to me we really were friends, but there was a bigger part of me that wanted more. There were so many complicated emotions around whether or not River had found his mate.
If he had found his mate, that meant there really was no chance for him and me. It also meant there was something holding him back from being with his mate. But I'd seen the way he'd looked at not only Turner and Kendrick, but also at other mated couples around the streak. If he hadn't found his mate, he was definitely looking for one, and that brought on a whole new level of sadness for both him and me.
I couldn't stop thinking about River and his mate situation, and as we are walking out the door, I glanced back over my shoulder at the two mated couples, taking in how they both seemed to be completely wrapped up in one another, almost to the point of not realizing anyone else was in the room.
I wanted that for myself, and I wanted that for River.
Because of shifter hearing and general streak nosiness, I waited until we were quite a way down the path to our cottage before I addressed the worry that was floating around my head. Not many people seemed to know about River's problem, and I sure didn't want to be the one who brought it to their attention.
