The Alpha's Mate (8 Sexy, Powerful Shifters and Their Fated Mates) Page 14

  "Going to hike?" Julia asked, focusing her attention on flipping through the audiobooks to find the right one.

  "Something like that," the man said. "What's your name?"

  "Uh, Julia," she said, and immediately felt bad for hesitating. He probably thought she was stupid, or paranoid. "What's yours?"

  "Damien," the man said. He held out his hand in front of him, and it was a half second before Julia realized that he wanted to shake hands. She reached out awkwardly, and his fingers wrapped around her palm. The firmness of the grip shocked her—she hadn't expected him to grasp her handshake so tightly. She reconsidered her earlier assessment.

  "Are you on one of the sports teams here?" she asked, in what she hoped was an innocuous tone.

  "No, no," the man said, laughing as though the idea was ridiculous. "What about you? What do you study?"

  "I—I'm not in school here," Julia said. Her face burned hot. "I just work here."

  "How old are you?" Damien asked. "I mean, if you don't mind me asking. You sound young."

  "I'm twenty-two," Julia said. "I never went to college, though. Here's the wildlife guide you wanted." She handed him the audiobook, and he clasped it in one hand.

  "Why not?" Damien cocked his head curiously.

  "Why didn't I go to college? Because it's too damn expensive." Julia blushed at using a curse word, and also at her confession. "I have to stay here, anyway. My grandmother lives here."

  "You take care of her?"

  "I help her take care of herself," Julia said. She smiled at the thought of taking care of Granny Dee: the last person to try to "take care" of her had been swatted with the end of her walking stick on the rear and told in no ambiguous terms what she would do to him if he dared to come back and "take care" of her again.

  "That's very kind of you," Damien said.

  "Oh, and here's the other book you wanted," Julia said, pulling the audiobook from where it hung on the rack. "Fairytale and Folklore of Rural California."

  "Thank you," Damien said, tucking both books under one arm.

  "So you're looking for all kinds of wildlife," Julia said, a question in her voice. "Including fairies?"

  "Including fairies," Damien said, bowing his head a little and smirking to show that her question hadn't offended him. "But mostly I'm curious about your monsters."

  "Monsters?" Julia raised her eyebrows. Maybe this guy was a little bit of a freak.

  "You know," he said, leaning forward toward her so that their faces were only a foot or so apart. "Bigfoot. Chupacabras. Werewolves. You never get any of those around here?" He tilted his head meaningfully, as though he expected a real answer.

  "Not much," Julia said breezily. "Not unless you count that one time I was abducted by aliens. Or the time the Loch Ness monster poked its head out of the library toilet. But you know, there was that one instance when we saw a horde of trolls stampeding through downtown. Is that the kind of thing you're talking about?"

  "Exactly," Damien said, laughing. Julia sensed that he was uncertain about something, she didn't know what.

  "Sorry, no monsters around here," Julia said, a bit regretfully. "Anything else I can do for you?" she asked. Show you around town? And maybe into my bedroom? She shook the lascivious thoughts from her brain.

  "That's it for today," Damien said. He had a look of disappointment on his face, and Julia didn't know why. "Thanks."

  "No problem," she said. "Do you need me to, um, show you out?"

  "I'll manage," he said, lifting the wood cane in front of him. "This got me in the library, it'll get me out."

  "Oh, of course," Julia said, blushing again. "Sure."

  "Thanks for your help," Damien said. "Julia, right?"

  "Yes," she said. He offered a hand in front of her, and she took it timidly. His large fingers enveloped her palm and squeezed tightly. The warmth seemed to burn her skin, and he held on for a moment too long.

  "It was nice to meet you, Julia," the man said. He walked off, his cane sweeping the ground in front of him. Julia's eyes tracked him to the end of the hallway...where a tall, slim blonde girl stood, leaning against the wall. She looked a few years younger than Julia, maybe a freshman here at the college. Damien stumbled as he walked toward her, but she didn't so much bother as uncross her arms.

  "There you are!" she said, grinning at him. "Took you long enough!"

  "I've got the books," Julia heard Damien say. Her heart tore apart as he held out his arm and the girl latched onto him. She tossed her hair and looked back at Julia, her eyes narrowing as she led Damien away.

  He was out of your league, anyway, Julia thought. But the idea didn't help stop the tears from brimming over her eyelashes. She couldn't help but feel that her Prince Charming was walking out of her life, maybe forever, on the arm of a gorgeous, thin princess. Blinking hard, she turned back to her work and tried to forget the face of the blind man who had smiled at her so charmingly.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Damien

  Damien felt her presence before he heard her. At first he thought that he was going crazy or having some kind of mental hallucination. He felt her frustration like an aura of emotion swirling around his own heart, and when she collided with the two college boys in the hallway he felt a jolt of embarrassment, as surely as if he had been embarrassed himself. By the time he realized what was happening, he had already swiveled his body around to listen better. Her voice. He needed to hear her voice. If she was who he thought she was—

  "...stop feeling sorry for yourself..."

  He heard the words resonate inside of his brain, echoing almost. It made him dizzy. He could picture her mouth in his mind, her full lips shaping the words. She sounded young, certainly younger than him. She sounded beautiful. In his mind an image swirled in his brain—fuzzy around the edges, but with a general outline of her long-lashed eyes, her flowing hair.

  His nostrils flared slightly at her anger, and as he stepped forward to talk to her he suddenly found himself growing nervous. Was this the Calling that he felt? If so, that meant that this town was already occupied by wolves, and his pack would likely have to move on. But if it was the Calling—if he had found his mate—then she might come with him. The echoing sound of her voice and the emotive awareness gave him courage. Surely she would feel the same towards him, at least at first. Once she saw his face and knew about his deformity, she might very well decide that it was not worth it. She might choose another mate, one that was stronger, whole, if not emotionally as connected to her. But he had a shot.

  As he spoke to her he felt her emotions shift rapidly. Anger, shame, a stifled desire. He could smell her perfume, a lovely violet scent, but underneath that was the scent of lust, a deeper, earthier smell that called to him and made his body react in response to hers. He suppressed his mounting desire and tried to make small talk, but it seemed that she did not share the connection with him. He found an excuse to touch her elbow and it shocked him. Her emotions, once they were in contact, were as clear as day to him. All of her feelings overlaid his own, separate but joined. She did not feel it, though, or perhaps she was ignoring her feelings because of his disability.

  When she told him her name, he rolled the syllables around on his tongue as though tasting them. Julia. She had to be the one, he knew it. Yet she talked to him like he was a human, like she couldn't sense the intricate connection that had already started to grow and tangle between them. And then, after teasing her about werewolves and getting nothing in response, he realized what was wrong. It wasn't that she thought he was human at all.

  She was human.

  The Calling was wrong. The thought ran through his mind and was abandoned just as quickly. It couldn't be. Sure, sometimes couples would have different intensities of Calling, and sometimes wolves would settle for someone they weren't mates with at all for practical reasons, but he had always heard that once you found your true mate, it was obvious on both sides that it was a perfect match.

  And there was never, never a Ca
lling that would match a wolf and a human as mates. It was simply impossible.

  Yet there she was.

  He turned away from her reluctantly, feeling the connection between them stretch and untangle as he walked down the hallway. He heard Katherine's heels clicking on the tile floor long before the human girl saw her. As soon as Julia noticed who was picking him up, he felt a shock wave of sorrow from her, so strong that even at a distance it hit him hard in the chest. He gasped, stumbling forward. How could she not feel this connection?

  Even though he knew his eyes were blind, he could not help but ache to turn and look at Julia one last time. To picture the image floating in his mind of what she was like. To reach out to her heart. She was hurting, and there was nothing he could do to stop that pain.

  She was human, after all. And humans and wolves never mixed.

  "What are you so lost in thought about?" Katherine said, opening the car door for him. He got in and set his cane down between his legs, leaning his head back against the seat. Dull twinges of pain were all that remained of Julia's hurt and anger. Already the encounter seemed like a dream. He had met his mate, and she was human.

  "Nothing," he said. "Just wondering if this is the right town for us."

  "Jordan thinks it's a good area," Katherine said. "It's a bad economy, so lots of the houses are for sale cheap. And a college town is perfect. With so many people coming and going, nobody will pay any attention to us."

  "Hmm, maybe," Damien said. "Let's see if the wildlife is anything to be reckoned with." He opened the audiobook and popped the CD into the car stereo. Werewolves didn't need to eat other animals, but fresh meat was definitely a plus. Damien really just wanted to make sure there weren't any other packs that would come through the area. Bears and wolves both would pose a problem, whether they were shifter packs or not.

  "It's fine. Jordan smelled deer in the forest when he went out scouting today. And no other wolves, not a single one," Katherine said, driving quickly down the streets and making a sharp turn. Damien hated being in the passenger seat when she was driving, not knowing when the next turn would throw him up against the window made him irritable.

  "He can't smell migratory patterns," Damien said, fast-forwarding the audiobook to the Chapter on large predators in the wild. "Who's to say that there aren't other packs coming through in the winter? Their smells would be gone by now."

  "You don't want to settle anywhere," Katherine said.

  "I want to settle," Damien growled. "For two years I've been trying to find the pack a place to settle. But you of all people should know that we need to find a place without other wolves."

  Katherine shut up at that. Damien could hear her manicured fingernails scratching at the scar that ran across her entire stomach. She'd been left for dead, and she was well aware of the dangers of other packs. But occasionally she could be overconfident. Damien frowned, thinking about how he had connected with the human girl. He had to rewind the audiobook three times before he could focus enough to find out the important facts: that this area was clear of wolves for miles, and that the town that Jordan and Katherine had apparently fallen in love with was the perfect spot to live in. Except for one thing.

  She lived here too.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Julia

  Julia got back to the house just as the sun was starting to set. The dim rays seemed to set the branches of the pines on fire, the red and orange light casting halos on the trees. The river through the mountains shone red, too, and Julia paused on the porch, looking out onto the wide field of her grandmother's property. Her eye caught the sign that the bank had stuck in the front of their yard: Foreclosure. She frowned and went into the house as the sun dipped down lower and lower behind the darkened trees.

  Her grandmother was standing in the kitchen, her arms covered in flour.

  "Hi there, Julia," she said, leaning over to plant a kiss on Julia's cheek.

  "Hey Granny Dee," Julia said. "What are you up to?"

  "Just getting ready for breakfast tomorrow," Dee said, her eyes bright. "We had two new guests check in!"

  "Oh, awesome!" Julia said. The bed and breakfast had been dwindling ever since the foreclosure sign went up in the front yard. Not many people wanted to stay in a place that was being foreclosed on, no matter how cozy and comfortable.

  "How was working at the library today?"

  "It was fine. Busy." Julia smiled as she thought about the encounter with the blind man.

  "I don't think you've ever smiled before when talking about work," Granny Dee said. "Something happened today. Tell me about it."

  "You don't miss a thing," Julia said, letting the grin run over her face. "No, it was just this cute guy who came in. But he has a girlfriend," she said quickly.

  "I'm sure you could steal any boy away if you wanted to," Dee said. "Not that you would, of course. Is he a college student?"

  "No," Julia said. "I'm not sure who he is. I haven't seen him before."

  "A mysterious stranger," Dee said, her eyes twinkling. "Sounds fun!"

  "Don't go making any wedding plans," Julia said, pushing herself away from the counter. "Do you need help with the pastries?"

  "No, no, you just sit right down," Dee said. She pulled a pitcher from the fridge and poured two glasses, adding plenty of ice. "Here's something to take the heat off."

  "Thanks," Julia said as her grandmother handed her the drink. She sipped it. "Mmm, is this lemonade? What makes it red?"

  "It's a watermelon and raspberry lemonade," her grandmother said proudly. "Went out and got a melon for lunch but didn't know what to do with the rest of it. So, lemonade!"

  "It's delicious," Julia said. She gulped down the drink quickly.

  "Oh, and one of the men from the bank stopped by," Dee said, too casually.

  "From the bank?"

  "He said that the proceedings are going forward in two months," Dee said. "I didn't want to worry you about it, but—"

  "But I sent them the money for last month's mortgage!"

  "It's something about the property tax also being late," Dee said. "Julia, I don't know if we can keep this up."

  "We can handle it," Julia said. "I'll try to get more shifts at the library."

  "I don't want you working yourself to the bone just to keep this house," Dee said softly.

  "But it's your house! It's the house you grew up in! And I grew up here, too..." Julia said.

  "I can always find a smaller place. It might be better at my age." Dee shrugged as she washed and dried her hands, but there was a sadness in her eyes that Julia could not bear to see.

  "How much do they want?" she asked.

  "Nine thousand dollars."

  "Nine thousand!"

  "I'm sorry, Julia. You've done everything you can for me," Dee said. "I don't want you to worry about the house. It's just a house."

  "It's our house," Julia said, tears threatening to spill over her eyes for the second time that day. Granny Dee came around the table and cupped her hands around Julia's face. Her skin felt soft and wrinkled, and she smelled like a comfortable mix of lavender and baking.

  "It's the people in a house who make it home," Dee said, looking straight into Julia's eyes. "Wherever we end up, we'll still be family."

  "Okay," Julia said softly.

  "Go relax," Dee said. "You deserve it."

  "Okay," Julia said. "Goodnight. I love you."

  "I love you too, sweet child," Dee said.

  Julia walked up the stairs to her small room. She looked out of her window, but the foreclosure sign in the front yard made her sick to her stomach. Nine thousand dollars. That would take months of paychecks from the library. There was no way that they could get the money in time, no matter how many guests came to stay at the bed and breakfast.

  Closing the blinds, she lit a candle next to her bed. She'd always liked to read by candlelight, no matter how many times Dee told her that it would make her nearsighted. Julia sighed, rolling over on her bed to look for a bo
ok on her shelves. She needed to escape from life. And books always made the bad things disappear, if only for a little while.

  Skimming through the spines on the shelf, she found her finger resting on a book she hadn't read in a while. It was a fairy tale book that her mother had bought her because the princess looked like Julia in the illustrations. She pulled it out and plopped down on the bed, opening the book to the first page.

  "Once upon a time," the story started, "there lived a very smart young princess named Felicity."

  Julia let her fingertips move over the princess's face on the page. The same bright red curls of hair, the nose covered in freckles, the plump cheeks. It looked like her, alright. Even though her hair had calmed down a bit over the years, she still woke up to a fuzzy mess on top of her head more days than not. Her mom said that anybody could be a princess.

  Julia choked up and closed the book, blinking through her tears. Her parents had been dead for over ten years now, and there wasn't a single day that passed that she didn't miss them. While Granny Dee was kind and loving, Julia still longed for someone else to share her life with.

  "There's nobody out there for me," she whispered. The face of the blind man, Damien, rose up immediately, unbidden, in her mind. His lips, his cheek—she felt like she could almost reach out and touch him. She remembered the almost electrical shock that he had given her when he touched her elbow, the warmth that had spread through her body when he talked to her.

  "Not for me," she said, but the memory felt so comforting that she let her thoughts spin off into dreams of Damien. Soon she was dancing in a gown as he led her around a ballroom in a stately waltz.

  "For me." Her lips formed the words, but no sound came from them. Outside in the night sky, the full moon rose soft and white, shrinking as it fell upwards among the stars.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Damien

  Back at the hotel, Damien found Kyle and Jordan talking animatedly over a map about the possibility of buying a house outside of the city. Kyle had brought back a bunch of real estate brochures which were scattered across the map in different regions. Damien walked over to the table and stood behind a chair. His hand bumped the table slightly, but as soon as he felt the slightest touch, he had already reacted and adapted to the obstacle. In public he often pretended to rely on his cane more than he needed too, for his deftness and intuition sometimes made people doubt that he was blind.