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Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 73
JesamineI was just about to drift off to sleep when there’s a knock on the door. I’ve been in a foul mood ever since Lo and Perrin’s visit earlier and was just trying to clear my mind with a long-overdue nap.“Who is it?” I mumble.The visitor knocks again, unable to hear my groggy question.“Who is it?” I call louder.The door opens, and to my complete surprise, Jack hobbles in, supported with a crutch on one side. I heard rumors of his alleged injury the night of my own attack before the Sacred Call, but I hadn’t so much as seen or heard from him. Not that we’re friends or anything. Hell, Perrin barely was. And besides, Goddess knows I’ve had bigger things on my plate. But I knew from Jennivah that he was in here healing from a pretty messed up leg injury.“May I come in?”“Sure.” I sit up in the arm chair and adjust the blanket I have pulled over me. “Actually, can you kick up the thermostat?” I gesture underneath the blanket, pointing t== to the far wall. Jack hobbles over to th
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 74
KiraFor the second time in a few days, I find myself at the door of the archives, poised to apologize to Ben. Only this time, my heart isn’t in it.In fact, it barely feels like it’s in my chest.It’s not that I don’t believe he deserves the apology. I was a total bitch at dinner. I know that. But the other night, I felt the need to be honest and candid and explain everything. Tonight? I want to be here and be gone as soon as it’s over. No lingering, no nothing.I open the archive door. It’s not locked, as there’s still a half hour left until closing. “Hello?”Marge’s voice greets me. For the first time, I see her standing in the atrium, briefcase in one hand and her coat slung over her arm. She’s clearly on her way out for the evening. Curious, given that she didn’t enjoy Ben taking any responsibility the last I knew of it.“Ah. Kira.” Her voice is stilted and nervous, despite her stoic professionalism. I feel bad. I did this. I blew up and left and went to drink and that’s how I l
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 75
Deidre “Good evening, Luna.” “Good evening, Benjamin. I hope you had a good day.” He winces as if in pain, but then politely smiles. I pull up the sleeves of my baggy sweatshirt and take off my hat, smoothing my hair. The evening was warmer than I anticipated. He asks, “Do you really need the cloak and dagger?” I laugh. “It’s just easier this way. Peace is harder to come by these days it seems.” “I understand.” I’m not sure that he does, but don’t question him. The nice thing about our arrangement is that he hasn’t once sent me away or asked too many questions. I’d like to keep it that way. “Where will you be setting up this evening?” He asks this question every night I’ve come here, and every night I give him the same answer. “It’s been a few evenings since you’ve been here, so I wasn’t sure if you made progress on your project.” True. Ever since the arrival of the Chiyads, I’ve been extra careful and haven’t been by. “Unfortunately I haven’t made any progress on it since I
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 76
KiraThe next morning, I got up early and went for a long run. Perrin met me just after dawn and it felt good. Really good. Like I was hitting some type of rhythm again, shoes digging into the trails and dirt and mud flinging up my shins. “Are you getting faster?” Perrin puffed as we crested a hill.“You’re getting slower.”“Not hardly. Seth has been kicking my ass as much as he’s been kicking yours.”“Then why are you eating my dust?”I launched into overdrive at the top of the hill, nearly careening down it at break-neck speed. I could hear Perrin hot on my heels, the excitement of his voice in a near shout from the thrill of running almost uncontrollably. “Are you trying to kill us?”“Not this morning,” I grinned and shouted back over my shoulder. It was a beautiful morning. Full of promise. Full of potential. I was going to see my brother today, and spend the first meaningful time with him since he arrived. It didn’t matter that he was leaving shortly after that. I was going to s
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 77
KiraMy head hurts more than I care to admit. Whether from the anxiety or riddles Irene planted in my head, I don’t know. What I do know is that I have two hours of training with the Luna before I get to see my brother for lunch. And I physically can’t wait.There’s something about having a twin that’s comforting. Is it possible to have a mate of just the mind? And not in a gross, intimate way, but in a, you-know-each-other-because-you-basically-share-a-brain-and-don’t-even-need-a-mind-link, kind of way? He may have gotten under my skin the past few years, but he’s my brother and I miss him, so much more than I realize.“Hi Cynthia,” I say, scooting down the hall towards here. I flatten out my blazer, having just changed in the bathroom. It’s wrinkled, but at least I remembered it. I glance down, trying to smooth out the wrinkles. “I’ll wash these before I return them I swear.”Cynthia greets me with a wink. “Do you have the list for me?”I produce a crumpled menu order ticket from my
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 78
KiraThe glass holding my milkshake falls to the floor in an explosion of broken glass.“You’re what?”Ethan repeats himself. “I’m competing for Beta.”“Are you insane?”“Last time I checked, no.” He scratches his short beard. “But it has been awhile since I’ve had my head examined.”“Oh stop it!” I hiss, trying to keep my voice down. “But you just found out Gowan wasn’t coming back! How the hell did you tell Eli that you were going for it?” I give him another look, and it registers. “Wait. You expected him to turn Justin down, didn’t you?”He shrugged, glancing over his shoulder. We were in here alone now, Dina and the other kitchen staff on break between the lunch rush and dinner preparation. “I didn’t expect him to turn Justin down. Nor would I want that, thank you very much. He’s my mate and I never want to see him hurt.”“But you knew somehow, didn’t you? You wouldn’t have said something to Eli if you were certain. What gives?”He shrugs again. “I just had a feeling.”“And I jus
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 79
Perrin“Who else is coming?” Mark asks.Me, Lo, Janas, and my father were all squeezed into my father’s office. Not that it wasn’t a spacious room. But nobody besides my step-mother or Mark stood anywhere next to or behind the Alpha’s desk. And right now, Mark was occupying a space alongside the filing cabinet with his arms folded. That didn’t leave much room for the rest of us.“Kira,” I mention. “I think she was having lunch with Ethan.”“Here!” Kira calls, nearly sliding through the doorway and stumbling over her own momentum. She barely catches herself and lunges for Lo’s sleeve, who keeps her from falling. Kira straightens and shoves the rolled sleeves of her wrinkled blazer up her arms and offers a disheveled smile. “Anybody else?” Mark drawls, unimpressed.“Deidre,” my father replies, eyes still trained on his laptop. “She is?” She wasn’t who I asked Mark to invite here today. But I’m not entirely surprised, however. To be fair, Lo isn’t either, but it makes sense for her to
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 80
PerrinMy father sits down and immediately rubs his temples. “So help me Goddess Perrin if you impregnated a third she-wolf I’m going to cut off your–”“No!” But the denial is shouted by more than just me. Lo and Kira stand on either side of me, looking equally repulsed.“Kira.” I say simply, trying to recover. “It’s about Kira. And her secret.”“What?” My beta’s head snaps as she turns to look at me, clearly surprised. I can feel the suppressed confusion in the room. “Kira is going to be my Beta, and I think it’s time we allowed her to be who she truly is.”Deidre instantly interjects. “I’m working on her–”I raise a hand, and to my complete surprise, she stops talking. “I’m not talking about interfering with her training–or her wardrobe, for that matter.” It’s only right to speak plainly, and wish no shame. “I’m talking about who she is. She has no reason to hide the real her.”I refuse to look at Kira. I don’t want her to think of this as some personal favor. It’s the right thing
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Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 160
Deidre“How about this?”Mistra shakes her head, the pink dress I’m holding not doing it for her. Of course it wouldn’t. Mistra only wears dark and… darker. Except for the day she came back from vacation. From ‘visiting her son.’ Here. In Texas.“How about this?” This dress is darker, with a slit up to the thigh that should make any she-wolf her age think twice.“Too revealing,” she dismisses it. The hangers clank loudly on the rack as she disapproves of yet another rack of options.“Mistra?” The clacking plastic stills in response. “You wore pink when you came back from Texas. You think I didn’t notice?”A considering pause follows, then, “I was in a different mood, then.”“Oh?”“Yes. It was… the fresh air.”“So logic would dictate the color would suit you now as well, wouldn’t it?”Another pause. “I suppose.”I thrust my arms around the corner of the clothing rack, holding the original pink once again. She grabs it reluctantly and holds it up to her chin in front of a full-length mi
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 159
Perrin The sound of my camera phone clicks and I don’t bother checking it before sending it to Lo. Then I switch shirts, and send another. PERRIN: Blue or green? LO: Either. They each bring out one of your eyes. LO: Goddess you look good. Before I can type a response, a video call from Lo pops up on the screen. I can tell based on the angle of the camera that she’s propped me up against a glass on Dina’s counter in the kitchen. “Hey there, beautiful.” Beautiful doesn’t do her justice, even mid-meal. Her eyes are bright and full of laughter, as if she’d just been joking with Dina. She munches on a carrot stick, grinning. “You know it’s not fair for you to just send me pictures like that.” She lowers her voice. “When you know I really want the other kind of picture.” I laugh, angling the camera so she can see my bare chest. “Gross,” I hear a mutter somewhere off-camera. “I’m not going to be attacked while I’m having lunch, Jack. You can be excused for ten.” “Thank Goddess.” Ja
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 158
Deidre “Fontaine?” I flick through my mental list of scholars. Nothing registers. “Well, if he’s not a medical scientist or researcher, I probably wouldn’t have heard of him.” Mark grunts, throwing his phone down next to his lunch plate. “I’ve got nothing. The internet is supposed to be helpful. All I have are a bunch of university papers and a bunch of research I can’t make heads or tales of.” “Ah yes. My husband’s Beta, ever the academic,” I smile over the brim of my cup. “Quit it,” Jason growls, absorbed in his own phone screen. “Janas is keeping tabs on him, but other than going back to the infirmary, he hasn’t done much apart from call a taxi to take him to a restaurant.” Mark blinks. “A restaurant?” “Yes,” I quip. “The social environment in which people elect to eat and enjoy one another’s company–not that you’ve been to one in the last ten years.” “Seriously?” Jason snaps, head swiveling between Mark and I. “This is the last thing we need.” “A restaurant is not a securit
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 157
Kira The tour was incredibly boring. Ben was professional and polite, wandering at a pace that Lo could keep up with, without getting breathless and being able to contribute to the conversation. It annoyed me how courteous he was. Jack spent most of the tour looking around inconspicuously for all of the cameras, finding their hidden reflective lenses in the niches of wood and leather around the Archives. From what I could tell, he’d found twenty-six of thirty. A flashing, toothy smile catches on another camera. Fine. Twenty-seven. They were just making the far side of the stacks, near the stairway that led down to the pack Archives, when Sirius became incredibly more interested. “And what are these?” He asked pointedly, looking at the stairs and the ropes that separated them off from prying visitors. “Ah. The Royal Archives of the Aperture Pack,” Ben said admiringly. “Home of our pack lineage, royal birth and marriage documents, copies of temple ceremony proceedings, and histori
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 156
Kira I watched through the screen as Lo’s baby bump proceeded the rest of her into the frame, extending her hand to greet Ben’s. It was more formal than I’d ever seen either of them interact; but I recognized the show. It was all about appearances. Impressing this scholar. A moment later Sirius eased into the frame, his height nearly blocking out all of Lo except her belly, his own graceful hand extending to capture Ben’s as they exchanged greetings. “Good morning, Professor–?” Ben opened warmly. Smooth. And good. Since I still had no idea what this guy’s last name has to do a thorough background check. I looked at my legal pad, tapping my pen on the blank page. Mark was clear with his instructions, and so far I wasn’t doing very well. “Oh! Just Sirius, please. No need for formalities.” Lo stepped out from behind Sirius, her face beaming with that pregnant glow of hers, despite the gray-scale of the monitor. “Sirius, this is Benjamin, the scholar and historian I was telling you
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 155
Kira Janas walked me through my controls. Eight screens, two keyboards, something that looked like an old-school joystick, and enough cords and plugs to cover the majority of the Luna’s office. I wondered what she’d think of it now; it’s usually pristine surfaces now covered in a jungle of electrical equipment. “Got that?” Janas said for nearly the seventh time. “Yes,” I muttered, sitting down in the seat behind the Luna’s desk. It was the last place I ever thought I’d sit, and shifted uneasily as I put down my crutches. The ruse was still necessary in case anyone came in here with Cynthia while I was working. I had felt the glances as Janas wheeled me in this afternoon, crutches across my lap as we passed the busy lobby of the pack house. Many offered greetings and wishes for a speedy recovery, all genuine. It made my back stiffen at the deception. I made a mental note to talk to Perrin about just how different his legacy was going to be from his father’s… and despite my own sel
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 154
BenMy alarm goes off, and I don’t even want to reach for my phone.It’d be great to stop the two-day hangover that plagues me. But something else entirely when I’ll look at my screen and realize Kira hasn’t called me back. Or texted.Not like she would.I roll over, swatting blindly at my bedside table until my phone drops onto the floor, vibrating and jittering across the cheap carpet like some strange bug.I test my eyes, flickering them open against my ceiling.Well. At least my hangover is gone today. I exhale. I’d rather have the pain of that hangover instead of the anger I feel at myself. Not just anger.Shame. Annoyance.And the worst part? The self-pity.I’ve drowned in the feelings of the last few days, addicted to the self-sabotage of not eating, not consuming anything and not trusting myself. I’ve been sober for years. And doing this now? Giving into temptation? I want to blame my thesis. My stupid failed research. I want to just burn all of it to Hell and back. But gnawi
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 153
Perrin“Holy shit.”Mark softly whistles behind me, unnerved at the site of it as we drive in. The Chiyad training facilities is enormous. No. gigantic. Whichever one is bigger.“This is where Ethan’s been training,” I say unnecessarily, awed at the outside of it. I wondered if Ethan could escape being the favorite for the Beta championship by just having access to state-of-the-art facilities. Mark doesn’t answer, but drives to a series of parking spots on the side of the building. “I know Ethan’s been working hard,” I go on as we get out of the car. “And Justin had only mentioned they were working on getting their facility renovation underway. Is this the before or after? They couldn’t have done all of this in just a few months.”Mark’s neck cranes to look up the side of the building. “I don’t know.”We walk into the large side entrance, automatic doors whooshing in around us with crisp, air-conditioned coolness. I blink twice as a discreet whirring sounds, a scanning of our bodies
Chosen Mates, Stolen Fates Chapter 152
KiraI set the phone down on the bedside table, pulling my blankets over me at the chill that had nothing to do with the temperature of my room.What the hell?But I couldn’t help but smirk. My gut instinct about the visiting wolf hadn’t been totally off. Something hadn’t been right about Sirius. Not wrong, per se… but definitely not normal. Were all European wolves that way? And how Mark had discovered our pack had a visitor less than twelve hours after they’d left? I didn’t know. Some type of Beta secret perhaps. He’d tell me in time. I was beginning to realize just how much I had to learn.I frowned, knowing Royhill would likely come pick me up in the morning. I stared at the clock. It was way past my bedtime. Not that I cared. I scratched at the stupid fake brace on my leg.On the positive side, apparently hiding away in the Luna’s office was going to be exactly what I was up to, the joke made earlier to Jesamine in jest or not. And sooner than I had anticipated; Naineeve was her
