001 | We're not mates - or are we?

Rhiannon’s POV

It was time.

Stephen and I had been waiting for this moment for years. Five years, to be exact. We were pack-school sweethearts, convinced that we were destined to be together. There wasn’t anyone else. There couldn’t be.

The seconds inched by on the clock. 

Dad leant forward in his seat, sat opposite us at the kitchen table, staring at it just as intently as we were. Beside him my twin sister, Hyacinth, leant back in her chair. She went too far, stumbled, and rocked forward hard enough to knock the jar of flowers on the table over. She leapt up and grabbed a tea towel, wiping up the spillage hastily before refilling the jar with water, flushing bright red all the while.

I rolled my eyes at her. “Are you turning eighteen or four this year, Cin?” I teased.

She stuck her tongue out at me as she re-took her seat, eyeing it warily and sitting very, very still this time. “At least I’m not turning into an ass,” she shot back, once she was sure she wasn’t about to wobble off her chair again.

Despite our shared genetics, Cin looked nothing like me. Well, okay, she was lucky enough to share my small, straight nose and full lips, but that was where our similarities ended. She was all pale and waif-like, with delicately arched blonde eyebrows and a splash of freckles across her nose, as if a painter had flicked their brush over it. My gaze hovered on the small scar slicing down the left side of her lips, my heart knotting over the old injury.

“It’s almost your birthdays,” said Dad, cutting in smoothly before we could start bickering. He repeated this little speech every year; usually, though, these words were spoken as he bid us goodnight the night before. We’d never stayed up to see in our birthdays before. “Eighteen,” he continued, on a heavy sigh. “Where has the time gone?”

Cin and I shared a grin; she rolled her pale blue eyes fondly. Stephen nudged me with his elbow and murmured, “One minute.”

My whole body tensed. Beneath the table, his hand found my thigh and squeezed. I relaxed into his touch, letting it soothe me as it always did.

Stephen was the love of my life. He was kind, sweet, considerate – and, even better, he was handsome as hell. His lean body was well-muscled, his brown skin gleamed in the lamplight, and his warm brown eyes met mine with adoration shining in them. We both wore jumpers his Ma had knitted for us – mine a new addition to our ever-growing collections, an early birthday present given to me before she and his dad had left for the snowy woods to hunt.

“Thirty seconds,” breathed Cin, eyeing Stephen and I with trepidation and some emotion I couldn’t read marring her rounded face. She tucked a lock of white-blonde hair behind her pierced ear, revealing a moonstone stud glinting in her lobe. 

Nervous, I brushed my fingertips over the matching moonstones in my own earlobes. Where Cin only had one set, though, I had hoops and studs lining the entire curve of both ears – as well as a silver nose ring. We’d done them ourselves, years ago, with a needle from Dad’s sewing kit and jewellery Stephen had nicked for us from his Nana’s boutique.

Well – he’d told us he’d nicked it, at the time. Later, we’d found out from his Nana that he’d bought the whole lot, paying for it by helping her out at her market stall. I’d called him an idiot, but in a nice way, the sort of way that suggested I thought he was sweet regardless of his stupidity.

I felt more than saw Stephen scrubbing a hand over his short, textured hair. I put my hand over his, my anticipation swelling to a crescendo. 

“Ten,” Cin whispered, “nine, eight…”

A sharp look from me shut her up.

Just as the clock struck midnight.

I expected to feel fireworks. I expected to feel love rushing through my veins, the kind spoken about by the pack elders in awe and fascination. I expected to feel something, anything – 

But I felt exactly the same as I always did.

No – wait. There was a tug in my chest. A tiny pull, which fizzled out as quickly as it had arisen. It was barely there, a translucent veil over my heart and nothing more. I didn’t have first-hand experience of how the mate bond felt, but I knew that wasn’t it.

Disappointment flooded my veins. Stephen, my boyfriend of five years, the man I loved, the man who’d waited two whole years for me to turn eighteen after he had, was not my mate.

My wolf, Tiger, cried out in my mind. She’d been quiet all evening, driven to silence by the anxiety of waiting for her mate to emerge, and at last she spoke. ‘It’s not him,’ she whispered brokenly, before disappearing back into the recesses of my mind once more.

‘Tiger? Tiger, talk to me. Are you sure it isn’t Stephen?’

She didn’t reply.

My face fell. I turned to look at him, tears brimming in my eyes that I swiped away angrily. A muscle flickered in my jaw. I schooled my expression, readying myself to offer him comfort. He’d need it even more than I did. 

I cupped his face – and felt the familiar way his cheeks rounded when he grinned. Frowning, I looked up at him.

“Rhi,” he breathed, his eyes wide, exalted, “we’re mates.”

Wait. What?

I blinked up at him, confused as hell. I looked over at Cin, needing to share a look with my twin, but she was staring at Stephen, her lips parted, her cheeks flushed. She’d be no help at all, then. Great.

“Stephen–” I started, but I was interrupted by my dad cheering. Cin was quick to join in, clapping her hands loudly and stomping her feet on the terracotta tiles as she whooped. 

He kissed me. His familiar lips felt wrong. I could taste the triumph spilling through him, his excitement apparent in the way his front teeth knocked against my own, in the way they hadn’t since we were over-enthusiastic teenagers making out for the first time. 

I could feel his heart thundering in his chest. He deepened the kiss, his tongue sweeping over the seam of my lips in askance. He’d never normally kiss me like this in front of my dad. What the hell was going on?

Hesitantly, I let him slide his tongue over my own. I shivered, surprised by how wrong something I usually loved could feel. My hands curled into fists in my lap and, as he shifted closer to me, I pulled away. His eyes darkened with hurt, so I pressed a chaste kiss to his mouth – a promise that there would be more, later, in private. A smile hooked one corner of his lips up.

While we’d been kissing, Dad had dimmed the lights. I squinted at Cin through the darkness, waiting for my eyes to adjust. Before they could, candlelight scorched my retinas.

“Happy birthday to you,” he warbled, his voice pitchy, “happy birthday to you…”

Stephen joined in, slinging an arm around my waist and squeezing. “Happy birthday dear Rhiannon and Hyacinth,” they sung quickly, trying to shove in too many syllables, “happy birthday to you!” 

The candles were the same ones we’d had for the last two years, half burnt down but still usable, flaring brightly as he placed the cake between us on the worn wooden table.

“Dad!” we cried as one, staring in gobsmacked awe at the cake. Since our pack’s resources had started to run low, luxuries like cake were non-existent. Both amazed and glad of the distraction from my apparent mate, I reached for his hand.

“How the fuck did you get that?” I asked.

“Language,” he tutted, but his pride over the cake drowned out his disappointment in my crude mouth. “I did a favour for that mopey Warrior Wolf, you know the one?”

We nodded, and all three of us said, “Kieran,” in unison. 

“Yeah, him. Well, I laundered a suit for him – one guess as to what he needs it for, the poor chap – and when we were chatting I mentioned that it was my daughters’ birthdays coming up. The next day he pulled me aside at training, said he had something for me after, and then he gave me this as a thank you.”

“But where did he get those ingredients?” asked Stephen. “I’ve not even had a loaf of bread in months,” he shuddered, “let alone enough wheat and sugar to make something like that.”

I rolled my eyes at him, relieved by the normalcy of this conversation. “Luna Amelia. Isn’t it obvious?”

“Poor, lovelorn numpty,” sighed Cin. Then she clapped her hands abruptly. “Anyway, chop chop. I want cake.”

Dad ignored her, beaming down at Stephen and I proudly instead. “Congratulations, you two,” he said, leaning over and squeezing my shoulder. “Mates at last, as we all always knew you would be. Right, Hyacinth?”

“Right,” she murmured, too distracted by the birthday cake to listen properly. Of course. “Come on, Rhi, make a wish,” she hurried me. “I want a slice. Or two. Or three.”

I laughed, but there was a hollow feeling sitting heavy in my chest. Were we mates? Was this tiny tug how it felt? Was I broken, or had everyone been exaggerating my whole life?

I forced a smile. “Save some for me,” I joked weakly.

“Not a chance. Now, c’mon, hurry up.”

Stephen seemed convinced that we were mates, so I shrugged off my unease and tried to think of a wish before Cin blew out the candles without me and started gobbling our cake down. The same one that came to me, unbidden, as it had every year, for as long as I could remember, flitted through my mind. 

No, not that one, I thought, trying desperately to think of something else. But it remained, obstinate as a cat demanding to be fed, and when Cin raised her eyebrows at me, I gave in to it and nodded.

I wish I knew who our mum was.

The candles wafted into smoke, twirling into nothing. Disappointment lodged in my belly, burrowing down deep into my bones. As my family fell into easy conversation, our warm kitchen filling with laughter and joy, I felt like an outsider looking in on it. 

Stephen’s arm stayed wrapped around my waist. It didn’t feel soothing anymore. It felt like an iron chain, holding me in place against my will.

“Happy birthday, my beautiful mate,” he murmured, kissing my cheek.

I tried to speak, but the truth of what we were – or, more accurately, weren’t – to each other lodged my voice in my throat. Stephen was clearly confused, delirious, or just downright stupid. 

Because we weren’t mates. No matter how much I wanted to be his, I knew that this feeling, looped around my heart, wasn’t the mate bond.

* * *

When we finally stumbled into bed, over-full and bloated from the impressive amount of cake we’d shovelled down, unused to food so rich after an entire year on strict rations, I’d made a decision.

I loved Stephen. It didn’t matter what the Moon Goddess had planned for us. I’d loved him for five years, and I had no intention of stopping now. I knew him, his quirks, his humour, his kisses, and I wanted to keep every bit of him in my life.

Our embrace turned heated, his hands running possessively up my slim waist and palming my breasts. I arched up into him, kissing him hard. I thought that if I kissed him hard enough, I’d get rid of the feeling of wrongness that was making my heart pinch.

I tore off my clothes, laving kisses down his neck and along his broad shoulders. He groaned, grinding his hips against mine. He was quick to unbutton his trousers and slide into me, both of us moaning as he filled my slick heat.

“Mark me,” I breathed raggedly, my chest heaving, as he started to thrust. 

If he did, we’d have every gift given to true mates. We’d be able to read each other’s emotions, mindlink in our human forms, and always be able to find one another. 

And he’d never need to know that we weren’t really mates. He’d never come down from this high, never realise what we were missing.

“I don’t need to,” he said, pulling back slightly, a tiny frown line appearing between his eyebrows.

I bucked up against him. “I know,” I lied. What I actually knew was that we weren’t true mates, because I’d tried to mindlink him earlier and he hadn’t heard a thing. I’d decided I didn’t care, though, and I wasn’t one to go back on my decisions. “But I want you to. I want your mark on me, Stephen.”

Tiger hissed, 'No, Rhi. Our true mate could be out there somewhere.'

I ignored her, just as she'd ignored me earlier.

He groaned, low and guttural, and dug his teeth into my neck.

* * *

The next morning, I knew why I hadn’t felt the mate bond pulling me to Stephen.

It was pulling me to somebody else.