Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 73170 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73170 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
I step toward him and his hand flies up in an urgent halt motion, as if I’m too close already, despite the river.
Is he really standing there wordlessly halting me from coming closer while his essence drips down my thighs, while the wound of the mate mark is still fresh on my throat?
My voice comes out strong and infuriated. “Either I come there or you come here. Choose!”
Agony slashes across his face and he looks away. And facts fly through my brain, conclusions that make me even angrier.
“I’m Cicely Oakes,” I tell him. “But you already knew this, didn’t you?”
More pain.
“And Linc is your friend so you’re the reason he suddenly keeps his distance and barely looks at me. Because you know. Because he knows. Right?”
His mouth tightens. So do the tendons in his neck. He doesn’t answer. He clenches his fists at his side.
“Are you gonna look at me? Are you gonna answer me? Introduce yourself?”
He swallows.
I wait.
Finally, he says, “Jared. Stone.”
And I recognize his deep voice. Not because I’ve heard it before. Because I recognize it at a cellular level as the voice of the male who just claimed me. He doesn’t feel like a stranger. But he is. He’s a stranger who looks, right now, like mating with me was the biggest mistake of his life.
“Are you coming here or am I swimming to you?” I ask and I don’t do it nicely.
“Go home, Cicely. Forget this happened.”
My body jolts.
“Get your ass over here, Jared Stone. Right fucking now!”
He shakes his head and lets out a bitter laugh while rubbing his forehead with his fingers.
I’m livid.
“You just… you…” I shake my head. “Did you actually just mate with me… for life … and now you’re rejecting me?”
His expression hardens. “A fucking miracle.”
I frown.
He glares at me, pointing, “A fucking miracle you’re still alive and breathing. You saw what I am.”
He paces, not taking his eyes off me, and it feels like they’re piercing my very soul.
Jared Stone. Cicely Stone. I’d love the sound of that if this wasn’t stinging so hard. An image flashes in my mind. Me, him. Three little boys hanging from his limbs, laughing. Two look like him. One looks like me. And Jared is smiling. He’s happy. He’s looking at me with love shining in his eyes. My heart is in my throat now. Have I just had a premonition?
He’s even more angrily shouting, “You saw it! I have no control over it, black out when it shows up. It’s a killing machine that’s a complete stranger to me. Be smart and get as far away from me as you can. Now!”
I saw it. I was sure his wolf would kill me. I thought I was a goner. Curiosity killed the daft female wolf shifter.
But no. Then he shifted and despite the fact that I couldn’t smell him, my body readied itself. As soon as I felt the switch from cold to hot. Even more when his tongue touched my neck, because every inch of me knew it was right. This was him. My fated mate. Whether it was raw instinct, my wolf and me piecing together the facts, or something in his touch, I felt something right. Real.
I wasn’t made for my mother and father, not for my siblings, and not for this pack. I was created for Jared Stone. And when he was created, something in him was designed to know this, to act on it.
Riding out the single most soul-shattering sexual experience of my existence was not on my bingo card for today, especially not on the heels of the terror I felt at seeing his wolf, at being almost certain his wolf would kill me. A strange male breaching me between the legs without me fighting for my life and dignity? Beyond bizarre. But oddly, my body knew, and now I know. This is right.
“It didn’t kill me,” I remind him.
“By some miracle.” He throws his hands up in frustration. “Tell me, was it wagging a tail? Happy to meet you? Licking your face?”
I sigh.
“You don’t get it,” he adds, even though I haven’t said anything.
He frustratedly drives his hand through his dark blond slightly-longer-on-top fade buzzcut, a pained grimace marring his face.
I growl in frustration. “Nope, I don’t understand any of this. I only know I finally know someone was meant for me. I was meant for them. You’ve always known your female was out there somewhere.”
He says nothing.
“You purposely stayed away, probably told one of my best friends not to tell me, therefore making him be someone he’s not. I’m guessing you knew where I was, who I am to you, and chose to have nothing to do with me, but–”
“Then you do understand. Perfectly. You need to go. I’m hanging on by a thread here.”
Is this really happening to me? I stare, gobsmacked.