“It has been a very long time since I have had a companion to talk to.” The look on his face made it clear that he thought his answer was explanation enough.
“It’s obviously been an even longer time since you talked with a female.”
His dark eyebrows drew together. “Why do you say such a thing?”
“Because you seem to think that you will win this battle of wills.” Sally stepped around him and took a seat on one of the couches. “You want to chitchat, for a while, or shoot the breeze for a bit? Fine, then how about a little tit for tat?” Sally motioned to the chair opposite her, “Take a seat, Thad. Do you mind if I call you Thad? I figure if we’re going to be bosom buddies nicknames are in order.”
He eyed her warily as he moved toward the chair and slowly lowered his large frame into it. “So you will talk with me awhile before requesting the information you have come for?”
She gave him her biggest grin. “Oh, definitely. I will talk. Okay,” she began as she rubbed her hands together eagerly. “You’re a guy,” she paused, studied him for a minute and then continued. “Well, sort of. Let’s go with you’re a male.”
Thadrick gave a slow nod.
“Then maybe you could help me out. Costin, that’s my mate, he’s been a little distant lately. Of course no one else notices, but that’s because the distance only happens when we’re alone, as in alone, alone.” Sally winked at him. “You know what I mean?”
Thadrick shook his head from side to side.
She blew out a breath ruffling her hair. “Alright, let me go back to the basics. When two people love each other, they get married, and then they join their bodies as a way of showing love to each other. They do this while alone. Get me now?” Sally had to bite her lip to keep from laughing as she watched the djinn’s eyes widen. But still he nodded. “Great! Okay so he’s distant and I’m thinking maybe I’m doing something wrong. I mean things have been a little slow lately but that’s mainly because of my cycle. You do know what a female cycle is, right?”
His mouth opened and then closed, and then it opened again only to close again.
“Well, just so you will have a full understanding. Humans reproduce by having babies. It’s part of the whole alone thing I was just talking about. And the cycle is part of a woman’s reproductive… system, for lack of a better term. In this system, an egg is released each month. The egg can’t do much on its own. So it just waits around until it gets attacked by a man’s… let’s call them soldiers. They came marching in all uninvited like. But if that doesn’t happen during the month when the egg is waiting around to be invaded, then the women’s body gets rid of it. And let me tell you, this process is not fun. There’s all this cramping and bloating. No, seriously, it feels like one of those blow fish things has ballooned itself open inside of you. And to top it off, the pants that you could button two days ago, yeah, they don’t button anymore. It seriously sucks.” Sally checked his reaction, taking a breath as though she’d run out of air as a guise to look him over. His body was rigid and she swore she could see the wheels turning in his brain working out an escape plan. Fat chance, genie boy, Sally thought to herself. You wanted to talk. We are going to talk.
“Oh man, that reminds me of a time one of my best friends ― of course, you know who she is since you keep the history and what not. Anyways, Jen, that’s the best friend, was on her period, that’s another word for cycle just in case you weren’t aware. I have no idea why they call it a period. The only thing I can figure is that like the period means the end of a sentence the period for a chick means the end too. The end of rational thought as the hormones take over.” She waved her hands. “I’m getting off topic. Okay, so Jen was on her period and had run out of feminine products. I am not even going to begin to explain what those are. She made me and our other friend, Jacque, go with her to the store, because chicks don’t do anything alone. We’d probably all pee in the same toilet at the same time if there was one big enough. Anyhoo, we’re at the store looking for the correct aisle and Jen, being herself, starts yelling, ‘Code red, this is a code red. All available employees assist the teenage girl bleeding to death on the feminine products aisle. I repeat this is a code red people. This is not a drill!’ ” Sally did laugh then. She’d yelled out the words, just as Jen had, and Thadrick was staring at her as if she’d sprouted three heads.
Sally clapped her hands together and let out a sigh. “Oh geez, good times.”
“Good?” Thadrick asked sounding utterly horrified.
She chuckled. “Yes, most definitely good. I’ve got plenty more where that came from. Oh, oh,” she said hopping in her seat. “This is a really good one. It’s another Jen one, of course. She tends to be the one who manages to get herself into interesting situations. So, she’s married to her mate, Decebel. He’s like this big, stoic, no non-sense Alpha male. About a month after they got married, she had her period. Jacque and I were hanging out in my room, and she comes busting in hollering incoherently and flinging her arms around. Once we finally got her to calm down we were able to see what she was holding in her hand, waving it all over the place. It was a note from Decebel. Usually, she would have showed it to us just so she could rub it in our faces that she was having alone time. You remember what alone time is? She loved to rub it in. I know, weird. But then, everyone has a thing, and that just happens to be hers.
“This time, she showed us the note because she was panicking over what to do. I won’t go into details about what Dec wrote in the note, exactly, but let’s just say Dec was hunting and Jen was the prey. She isn’t one to be embarrassed easily. Usually she’s incapable of actually becoming embarrassed, but she’s different with him. She allows herself to be more vulnerable. Well, that was one of her moments when she suddenly had the need to be accepted in all her messy glory. Pun intended, sorry couldn’t resist.
“She starts sputtering out, ‘He expects action, which you guys totally know I would be all over that like mosquitos on a bare leg.’ We ask her what the big deal is and she says, ‘The big deal is I’m bleeding like a freshly stuck hog. I can’t even fake a headache because he’ll be able to smell it. I mean, how messed up is that? He can smell my period. That’s just all kinds of wrong. So instead of the good old headache excuse, I have to shut him down with, Sorry babe, but I’m pretty sure you only like your prey bloody when you’re in your wolf form.’ ”
Sally nodded at the traumatized djinn before her. “I know, she has a way with words. Just hope you never have the misfortune of being the object of her quick witted tongue. Chick can be brutal. Okay, let me think,” she said as she tapped her lips with her finger. “I know I’ve got more hilarious stories like that.”
“No,” Thadrick said, finally having jerked himself from his stunned silence. “That’s enough of that.”
“You’re right,” she nodded. “We need to get back to the original topic. So the distance between me and Costin. I totally don’t think it has anything to do with my period. Jen claims that men have periods too and I’m beginning to agree with her. Maybe he’s just on his period” ― she made quotations with her fingers ― “and his hormones have him acting out of character. Yeah, that must be what it is.” Sally whooshed out a breath. “Man, that was good. Thanks for fleshing that out with me. Alright, new topic!” She clapped her hands rapidly while grinning like an idiot. “What’s your stance on boxers versus briefs and the whole relation to sterility thing?”
Dalton held up a hand to indicate that he was finished. He bent forward, bracing his hands on his knees. He was out of breath, but it had taken all of the males sparring with him to finally wear him out. Had he been fighting only one wolf, he might have killed him, not necessarily on purpose, because his control was nil. Peri had announced that Volcan was going to let Jewel go in two days’ time and then she’d left him in Farie. To say he was pissed would have been like saying the sun was a little warm.
The rage had instantly consumed him, dumping adrenaline into his bloodstream.
The only thing that kept him from tearing off through the forest in search of the veil had been the presence of the Alphas, including his own.
Finally, evening out his breathing, he had the sudden urge to shed his human skin. He needed his wolf to help him deal with the emotions flooding him. Dalton tore the clothes from his body and phased instantly to his wolf. For a moment, he didn’t know where he was going to go, but then he pictured the room where Jewel had laid for several months, still as death, lost in her own mind. But still she’d been there with him. He took off at a run. He didn’t slow down as he rounded the side of the house and bolted for the window he’d used to visit her. He leapt, and his head slammed into the glass, shattering it. His body followed and the glass crunched beneath his paws as he landed. Dalton didn’t stop to think about whether or not his feet were being cut. He made a beeline for the bed that had been hers. It had been stripped of the sheets, but she’d laid there for so long that her scent lingered on the mattress. He jumped up onto the bed, giving it a good sniff before laying down. After several minutes, Dalton gave in to the urge to roll around, covering himself in her scent that was left behind. His feelings were confusing to him. He needed her with a desperation that rivaled the way a male felt for his mate, and yet still the pull of the mate bond wasn’t there.
Doesn’t matter. She’s ours, his wolf snarled. He’d become increasingly agitated. His wolf needed action. He wanted to hunt, but Dalton didn’t have the slightest idea where to begin.
Two days’ time, he reminded the wolf.
Two days too long.
Dalton agreed. It didn’t change the fact that she simply was beyond his reach. Without the bond, he had no way to find her. He pictured her face in his mind and he shook like an addict needing a fix. After everything he’d been through in his long life, who would have thought that a human female, who loved books and useless information, would be the thing that brought him to his knees? He turned his head up toward the ceiling and howled — long, deep, and mournful. The sound filled the room and traveled out the broken window. It started in his lungs and traveled up his throat and out of his mouth, but the source was his cold, broken heart. The other wolves joined in his chorus. He was so focused on his own grief that he didn’t hear the door open or close. As his howl died, he became aware of his Alpha standing against the wall across from him. He held a pair of sweatpants in his hand but didn’t offer them to the wolf.
Dillon watched him quietly. Dalton met his gaze briefly before looking away. He didn’t lower his eyes; it wasn’t in him to be submissive at that point. There was only one who could bring him to his knees and it was no longer his Alpha.
“Peri will get her back,” Dillon told him.
Dalton growled.
“I know,” Dillon held up a hand. “I know you want to be the one to rescue her. No, I take that back. I know you should be the one to rescue her. But at this point, does it really matter? Isn’t it more important that she be returned to you, no matter how that has to happen?”
Dalton phased. He caught the sweats that Dillon tossed at him and jerked them on. “Of course, I just want her back no matter how that has to happen. But that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t kill me that I wasn’t the one who could save her!” He roared when Dillon started to interrupt. “It kills me because she is mine. I am the one who is supposed to keep her safe and I failed. Not only did I fail to keep her safe but I then failed to get her back. What kind of mate does that make me? How can she ever feel safe with me?”
“I won’t argue with you,” Dillon said calmly. “If I were in your place, I would feel the exact same way, as would any male in your shoes. So it would be pointless for me to tell you that she doesn’t expect you to be perfect. She doesn’t expect for you to be all powerful.”
“I should have kept her safe.”
Dillon made a dismissive gesture with his hand. “That’s not the point, at least not anymore. You need to start preparing yourself for her return. She may not be the same person that she was.”
Dalton shot his Alpha a glare. “She will still be Jewel.”
“Yes, but there is no telling what Volcan has done to her.” Dillon pushed away from the wall when Dalton took a step toward him. “Dammit, Dalton, I know you don’t like to hear it. I know it’s horrific and disgusting and enraging, thinking of all the possibilities, but you have got to be prepared. You say you don’t feel a pull toward her anymore, at least not the way mates do, so that begs the question, how will she feel about you? I am not trying to be cruel. As your Alpha, it is my job to protect you. I just want you to be prepared for the fact that she might not run to you with open arms. That doesn’t mean it’s because she’s mad at you or blames you. It could just be because she doesn’t feel like she knows you. Humans spend a much longer time courting one another than we do. When the mate bond was present, she felt instantly drawn to you, like she already knew you. But she may not feel that way anymore. You need to be prepared to be patient with her.”
“I’m not an emotionless, cold bastard, Dillon,” Dalton snarled. “I won’t expect anything from her. I just want her safe. I want her out of the hands of that sadistic prick. I want her here with me and if it takes a day or a thousand days, I want the chance for her to fall in love with me, bond or no bond.”
Dillon stared at him for several silent, tense moments before nodding his head and then silently leaving the room. Dalton stared at the closed door for several minutes. His Alpha’s words played over and over in his mind, She may not be the same person that she was. He wanted her to be whole and intact. She’d already been through so much and it hadn’t broken her. Regardless of how strong she was, everyone had a breaking point. He hadn’t known his own until he’d met Jewel. She was his breaking point.
“Hang on, Little Dove,” he murmured under his breath. He gave the empty bed one last look and then walked over to the broken window. Dalton jumped out and landed softly onto the ground. He didn’t know where he was going. He just knew that sitting around waiting wasn’t an option. If he had to run for the next two days to hang on to his last shred of sanity, then that is what he would do, be it in wolf form or human. Dillon had been right, he didn’t want to hear about the things that could have happened or could still be happening to her. He didn’t want to think that Volcan might have broken her. Dalton could only hope that she would be able to forgive him for failing her.
“I will make it up to you,” he vowed as he took off into the forest. If his existence was only to help her heal and live a happy, safe life, then that is what he would do. Even if she didn’t want him as her mate, he would still do everything in his power to ensure her happiness.
Anna’s eyelids felt heavy as she opened them and blinked several times to clear away the sleep. She pushed herself upright from the plush chair into which she had folded herself and looked slowly around the room. The sight of the fairytale-like room reminded her that she was no longer with her new healer friends. She looked around for the small pixie woman. Adira, she remembered, had been her name. But there was no sign of her. The fire still burned in the small hearth, but the songs of the birds had quieted. A painful clenching in her chest and the subtle feeling that she wasn’t alone had Anna clenching her teeth as she remembered the reason she’d ended up with Adira in the first place.
She’d needed to think, to really process the changes that were happening so rapidly in her life. It was one thing to watch one of her new friends find their mate or to see ones like Sally and Costin fitting so well together. But it was an entirely different thing now that it was happening to her. Feeling a presence in her mind had been alarming, especially, when she’d felt her own soul responding to it. There was a part of her that wanted to turn around and run straight to him. She didn’t understand that part. It was almost as if a stranger resided inside of her, and for the first time, Anna was meeting her.
The stranger was trying to tell her that she belonged with the wolf that pursued her, that by his side was where she was mean
t to be. But the rational side, the side she had relied upon for so long — the human side — was telling her she didn’t know the man from Joe Blow on the street and therefore would not be running heedlessly into his arms.
She rubbed the sleep from her eyes and stood up to stretch out her tight limbs. Though she’d slept, it hadn’t been peaceful, which was evidenced by how tight her muscles were. As she rotated her head around on her shoulders, she saw the tree branches part and Adira walked in.
“How did you sleep?” the pixie asked with a friendly smile.
“Not great,” Anna admitted.
The woman nodded as though she understood. “It’s hard to sleep well when so many changes are taking place.” She paused and then seemed to remember she was holding something. She held out her hand. “Here, I picked these for you.”
Anna stepped forward and took a small basket of berries from the woman. Her first reaction was delight. Anna loved plants of any kind, both flower and fruit bearing. But then she considered what she knew of fables and, stupid though it may seem, she couldn’t help but wonder. She looked down at the berries and then back at Adira. “There isn’t some weird rule about not taking food from pixies because then you will want to dance forever and forget all your family or anything is there?”
Adira laughed. “The things you humans come up with is quite amusing.” She shook her head. “No, not that I’m aware of.”
Anna nodded. “Good, because I’m starving.” She dug into the berries as she watched Adira move about the room, straightening this and that. She seemed quite content in her home even though she appeared to be the only one who lived there. “Do you get lonely?” Anna blurted out before she could think better of it.