After a shower and sitting and staring at a blank piece of paper, trying in vain to put his emotions into words, Fane decided to take a break. As he was lying on the bed all he could think about was a certain fiery red head and that tonight she would be all his. He had really been hoping that Jacque would be willing to incorporate the human wedding vows into the bonding ceremony, but she wasn’t ready for that. He had explained that their bonding was permanent, unlike a human marriage, but the idea of being married at 17 seemed to make her nervous, so he would wait. Fane was quickly learning that waiting really sucked.
“Wolf-man, we are heading your way, hope you’re ready for this.” Fane heard Jacque’s voice in his mind. He grinned at her playfulness, which was one of the things his wolf really liked about her: she played, something that even wolves in the wild did as a part of the mating dance.
“I have been ready for you since I laid I eyes on you. Be safe, I will see you shortly,” he told her as he imagined himself caressing her soft face. He sent her that feeling as well and felt her shiver in response. That made him smile even bigger.
Looking at the time on his phone, 12:15, Fane got up, deciding it was time to get dressed just as he heard a knock at the front door.
“It’s open,” he said loudly.
Fane’s mother Alina came through the doorway. “I brought you the vows you are to say during the ceremony, and I was wanting to ask you if you had gotten Jacque an offering yet.”
“I actually got her two things. The first is an autographed book she told me she loved as a child but no longer owned a copy of. I hope that it shows her that I listen when she speaks and the things that she feels are important to her are important to me as well. The second I think I should show you.” Fane walked out of the living room and went back to the bedroom, returning with a small black box.
“Fane, is that what I think it is?” Alina asked.
“I know that she isn’t ready to go through the human ritual of marriage. I have tried to explain to her that bonding is more permanent than marriage, but still she wants to wait. Through the bonding ceremony she will have my mark, my scent, and that will tell all Canis Lupus that she is mated, but human males will not recognize this. They will, however, recognize an engagement ring,” Fane explained.
Alina was shaking her head when she said, “Barbarians, all of you. Possessive, bossy, over-reacting wolves.” Fane knew she was teasing because she was beaming from ear to ear. “Well, let me look at it.”
Fane opened the black box to show his mother the ring he had chosen to put on the finger of the one woman who would complete his soul. The ring was a wide platinum band and engraved all the way around the band in Romanian were the words 'finalizarea, absolut, chiar, intreg' (complete, absolute, unmovable, whole), and in the center was a very rare red diamond in a marquee cut.
“Fane, it’s beautiful. I recognize the band as the one that I gave you to hold onto until you met your mate, but where did you get the stone?” his mother asked him.
“The day I spoke with Da and he told me Sorin was coming, I called Sorin and asked him to look in the vaults in the pack mansion for a red stone for the band. I figured with the vast size of the vault and the centuries of things accumulated he could surely find one. I knew the bonding ceremony would be taking place sooner than we originally planned and I wanted the ring to be ready. The day that Sorin took Lilly to her book store he made a stop at a jeweler while Lilly was working and had the stone set. I wanted red for two reasons. One, she is my micul incendiu (little fire), with so much personality packed into such a small package, and two, it will be a reminder of this day when we both shed blood to bind our souls to each other.”
Fane suddenly fell onto the couch, face held in his hands. “Mama, how is it possible to love someone so intensely, so much that at times it feels like it’s going to make your heart explode because you just can’t contain it?” Fane looked up at his mother, his eyes drawn together, mouth tight.
Alina sat down next to him on the couch, handing back the black box, taking his free hand in hers. “I don’t know if there is any way to explain or truly understand the bond between mates. It’s not human; it’s beyond the realm of reason and that makes it hard to believe it is even possible. I know you haven’t known her long, I know you are both young, but you will grow close faster than you can imagine. She will become your best friend and you will become hers. Even now I know you feel it, that no one in this world will ever love you as she will. You were born to love each other and that love will grow stronger as time goes on.” Alina wiped a tear from her cheek as she looked upon the face that she had watched grow from an infant to a strong Alpha male.
“What if I don’t make her happy?” Fane’s voice was so soft, laced with fear and worry.
“Oh, Fane.” Alina began wrapping her arms around her only son, pulling him close. “You will make her happy. You will also make her mad, sad, and annoyed, probably a little claustrophobic at times, but you will make her happy. Your wolf will step in when your human side steps out of line. The wolf only sees black and white, all he understands is that she is your mate, that you must love her, protect her, provide for her, play with her, and make her content. Your human side will fill in the gap of emotions the wolf does not understand. She will make you a better Alpha, a better man. You will give her what no other man ever could: the other half of her soul.”
Alina stood up to go, but first handed him a piece of paper. “These are your vows, you can add to them but the first part must be said, for it solidifies the bond.” Then she turned to go.
Fane stood up, and before his mother could make it out the door he said, “Mother, my Alpha, thank you.” And he turned his head, baring his neck.
Alina looked Fane in the eye and held his stare as she told him, “Te iubesc fiul” (I love you son), and she turned and walked out the door, closing it behind her.
Fane unfolded the piece of paper and with hands shaking read:
On this day I kneel before you, my mate, to ask if you will make me whole. Will you give yourself to me, finally calming the beast inside, bringing order to chaos, shining light where there has been only darkness? Will you bind your life to mine, your fate to mine, and your soul to mine and in doing so complete the mate bond?
After Fane read that it would be Jacquelyn’s turn to respond with her answer and her vows. Once they read the formal vows, if they so chose they could recite their own vows. Up until a few moments earlier, Fane hadn't been sure what to say, but his mother had remedied that. Everything his mother had said was what he was feeling. Fane grabbed a pen, sat down, and quickly wrote out the words he would pour from his heart to his mate.
Checking his phone for the time, he saw that he only had fifteen minutes until he was to be in the garden where the ceremony would take place. He grabbed the suit hanging on his bedroom door, stripped faster than he thought possible, and was slipping into his jacket when he suddenly heard a scream in his mind. He fell to the floor from the force of the emotions coming with that scream. He felt confusion, pain, and most of all fear, all-consuming fear.
“JACQUELYN!” Fane sent the thought through their bond. “Where are you? What’s happened?” Fane waited for her response but no words came through, only fear and pain. She was scared and she was hurt. Fane took off at a dead run through the house and out the front door and nearly collided with his father.
“Something is wrong, I can feel it in in the pack bonds. What is going on?” Vasile asked.
“I heard Jacquelyn scream and felt her fear and pain and now I can’t get her to answer me,” Fane answered.
“When was the last time you spoke with her?”
“She told me around 12:15 that they were headed our direction. She sounded fine, in no distress,” Fane answered. He couldn’t keep from looking at his surroundings, expecting at any moment to be ambushed, but by what, he didn’t have a clue.
Vasile was halfway back to the main house before Fane even realized he had w
alked away. Running to catch up, he heard his father on the phone with Decebel.
“Get the vehicles started and the pack loaded. Skender and Boian together, Sorin and you together, I will have Alina and Fane. I want each vehicle to take a different route going towards Lilly’s house. Keep your phones on, be prepared for anything. We don’t know if they were just in an accident or if this is the act of an enemy.” Vasile didn’t wait for a response before he hung up. Just as they reached the door to the house Fane’s mother stepped out dressed in black cargos, a fitted black t-shirt, and combat boots, her fighting gear. She threw Fane a gun and then turned to her mate.
“We ready?” she asked him.
“Yes, let's go. You drive, Mina, just in case we have to engage anyone. Fane, you keep trying to get in touch with your mate. Do you have her cell phone number?”
“No, I never asked for it because we’ve always just spoken through our thoughts,” Fane said in frustration, shoving the gun in the waist of the back of his pants. “Wait, I can call the Henrys and see if they know anything.”
Brian picked up on the second ring. “Hello?”
“Brian, it’s Fane. Did you see Lilly and the girls leave today?” Fane spoke in clipped tones, holding it together by a thread.
“No Fane, I didn’t see them leave. Is something wrong?”
“I don’t know, but I think something may have happened to them. If you hear from them please call me right away.” Fane hung up before Brian could respond. His hands shook as he set the phone down on the seat next to him. He closed his eyes and concentrated as hard as he could on Jacquelyn, on her face, the sound of her voice, the color of her hair, every detail he could think of and he reached out with a push of his power. “Jacquelyn, tell me where you are.” Nothing. “Luna, please answer me, if you can’t with words give me something, a feeling, a picture in your mind, something to tell me you are still with me.” Fane was getting more and more desperate the longer he went without hearing a response from her.
He laid his head on the head rest, frustration threatening to pour out in the form of a huge black wolf. Fane just wanted something even if it was just a memory of the last thing she saw. As they got closer to town, Fane called on the wolf to use his superior hearing and heard the faint sound of sirens.
“Da, do you hear that?”
“Yes, it sounds like it’s coming from downtown,” Vasile answered
“Lilly’s book store is downtown,” Fane told his mother.
“Were they planning to go there on their way to our home?” his mother asked.
“Not that I know of, but I still haven’t been able to communicate with her. When she let me know they were on their way she did not mention stopping by the book store,” Fane told his parents.
Vasile's face looked somber when he said, “If you are unable to communicate with her it more than likely means she is not conscious.”
At the thought of his mate so helpless Fane struggled to hold onto his wolf, and his father, realizing that he was about to lose it, turned to him and placed his hand on his shoulder and let out a low growl. Fane’s wolf submitted reluctantly, but only just, by the presence of his Alpha. Finally they turned the corner and were on the street of Lilly’s book store. As they drove in front of it they didn’t see any sign of Lilly’s vehicle but could hear sirens up ahead. The further on they drove they began to see smoke and then bright orange flames surrounding an SUV that lay upside down in the ditch. As soon as Fane saw the fire, and before his mother could stop the car, he was out the door running at wolf’s speed, not caring if it drew attention, not caring if people realized that there was no way a human could run that fast. As he got closer to the vehicle he saw four figures across the ditch close to the road, as far from the burning wreck as they could get without being in the road. Four figures, two sitting up, two lying down, neither of the latter moving. Fane’s wolf pushed forward, his eyes going wolf blue, his teeth getting longer as he struggled to hold his form, running to his unconscious mate.
Chapter 4
Lilly’s phone rang as they turned off their street onto the service road, headed towards the estate Fane’s parents were renting. She answered it without looking to see who it was.
“This is Lilly.”
“Lilly, it’s Jeff from the store,” she heard her employee say and she noticed that he sounded nervous.
“Jeff, is everything okay? You sound a little tense,” Lilly told him.
“Well, there is a little problem. We have an irate customer demanding to see you, saying something about being ripped off. He won’t go into details, but he is really angry and I didn’t know if I should call the police or what so I called you.”
“If he hasn’t hurt anyone don’t call the police, we don’t need to bother them with this if I can solve it by me coming up there and talking to the man. Give me five minutes and I will be there,” Lilly told Jeff.
Lilly hung up the phone and took the first turn that would lead to her bookstore.
“Mom, what’s up? Is everything okay at the store?”
“I’m not real sure. That was Jeff, he is one of my assistant managers, and he says there is an irate customer demanding to see me. Jeff seemed pretty apprehensive about it so I think I need to stop by, but I will make it quick.”
“It’s no big thing, wolf-man can wait a few moments. I’m not going to tell him we are making a detour, let’s make him sweat a little when I don’t show up exactly at 1:00,” Jacque said with a mischievous smile.
“I don’t think you and Jen should be allowed to hang out any more, Jacque, she’s beginning to rub off on you and I can’t handle more than one evil witch at a time,” Sally said sarcastically.
Jen rolled her eyes. “There’s nothing wrong with making the man sweat a little. I mean, come on, he did fake his death and nearly drive our sweet little Jacque out of her mind. All’s fair in love and war, baby.”
“Well, there is that,” Sally conceded.
They pulled up to the curb in front of the book store and all four of them piled out of the car. It was way too hot to sit in the car even with the air on and besides that Jacque didn’t want her mom facing some lunatic by herself. Once they were in the store, Lilly started looking around, expecting to see or at least hear this so-called irate customer, but there was nothing. Everyone in the store was quiet, perusing through the store, some talking softly to one another. She walked up to one of the employees and asked where Jeff was.
“He said he had to leave, something about an emergency,” the employee named Lisa answered.
That’s weird, Lilly thought. “Well what happened to the customer who was so upset?” Lilly asked.
“What customer? There haven't been any upset customers this morning.”
Although Jacque had noticed that she hadn’t been picking up emotions lately, she could feel something wasn’t right. “Mom, I’m not really liking the sense of this whole situation. Let's go, okay?” Jacque told her mother.
“Yea, I’m with ya, Jac. I’m getting a bad vibe,” Jen added
Lilly felt the same way; something was wrong. They needed to leave but she didn’t feel comfortable leaving the store open. She turned back to Lisa and told her to politely tell the customers there had been an emergency and that the store needed to close, and then asked her to lock up.
As they all got back into the car, Jacque couldn’t stop the chill that ran through her body. She was blocking her thoughts from Fane and even trying to block her emotions because she knew if he thought she was even in the tiniest danger, or that there was even a potential for danger, he would come flying to the rescue and she didn’t feel like the situation was that dire.
As Lilly began to pull away from the curb, Jacque asked, “So mom, what do you think that was about?”
“I’m not really sure. Jeff has always seemed honest. I don’t understand why he would lie about an irate customer,” Lilly answered.
“Maybe he’s one of those disgruntled employees who’s gotte
n his panties all in a twist because he didn’t get that raise he wanted. Or maybe he’s got one of those problems where you hallucinate and see things that aren’t there. Or maybe he’s on crack so he’s hallucinating and seeing things that aren’t there, or hmphmm -” Before Jen could continue, Sally slapped a hand over Jen’s mouth.
“We really need to work on that whole brain, mouth filter, Jen,” Sally said morosely.
“Hmm hmm hmming” Jen grunted around Sally’s hand.
“Yes, yes, we know you're just saying,” Jacque translated for her.
“Well, whatever his panties are in a twist about, as Jen so eloquently put it, they just became the least of his problems considering he lied to me and then left in the middle of his shift.” Lilly pinched her forefinger and thumb on the bridge of her nose. It was times like these that owning her own business seemed like the least brilliant of all her bright ideas.
Jacque was looking at her mom, seeing the tiredness seeping into her like water searching for cracks in a foundation when she heard Jen whistle.
“Check out that tall drink of somin, somin.”
All of a sudden Jacque heard a huge bang. Lilly began to swerve. She jerked the steering wheel to the right to compensate but it was too hard. The SUV began to spin and as they hit the ditch on the side of the road, the car began to roll. Over and over it rolled like a barrel down a hill until it finally came to an abrupt stop, landing upside down with its wheels in the air. Jacque was screaming, hell, they were all screaming. She could feel the passenger side door crush into her side, the side of the front dash slammed into her leg and she felt a bone shattering crunch shoot up her leg and the seat belt was like a noose across her neck. She was so confused she didn’t understand what had happened. Finally the rolling stopped and as the car came to a jarring halt Jacque felt her head hit the side glass window and then it was quiet.