Midsummer, or, as most of the pack called it, matesummer. Raine watched the vehicles pulling onto the grounds. Large motorhomes, SUVs packed with members of other packs flooding their lands for the gathering. Resting his cheek against the bark of the tree he was sitting in, Raine grumbled a stream of curses, a nearby squirrel angrily chattering his own stream of profanities back at him.
“Why does it always….have to be.…a tree?” Huffing and
grumbling proceeded his brother, Noah’s appearance beside him, a sour
expression on his face as he gripped the branch overhead.
Shrugging, Raine looked away from his annoyed gaze, and back
towards the impending invasion. As soon as they got settled, all of their
scents would be filling their lands and lingering for weeks afterwards. “I like
trees.”
“I like trees too, to pee on, not to climb. We’re wolves,
and wolves are supposed to keep their feet on the ground.”
“There are exceptions to all things.”
“Uh-huh.”
“What are you doing here, Noah? Shouldn’t you be curled up
with Evan and Holden in your little love nest.”
He knew he’d failed to keep the bitterness out of his voice
the moment his brother’s eyes narrowed at him and wolf amber momentarily replaced
the gray.
“And yet I’m here. I wonder why that is.”
“That’s what I’m asking you.”
“I came to deliver a message, not that you’ll care. That big
brown and white wolf from the northwestern pack is looking for you. I believe he
said his name was Gabriel.”
For a moment, Raine couldn’t breathe. It was like Noah had
sucked all the air out of the forest and left him digging claws into the branch
of the tree to ground himself.
“How’d he look?” Raine managed to grit out between clenched
teeth.
“At first glance you’d never know he was in a fight that
nearly killed him.”
“No one asked him to do that.”
“With the way he was always watching you and following after
you, there was no way anyone was going to tell him not to.”
Sighing, Raine scrubbed a hand over his face, shoulder
beginning to ache from how heavily he was leaning against the trunk. Butterflies
and fear warred in his belly, clenched tight to keep from vomiting up his last
meal. He was not going to think about the gathering two years past, or the
mistake he’d nearly made in allowing himself to be claimed.
“Saw him struggle to lift his backpack with his left arm.
It’s a wonder he can use it at all. I was certain he was going to lose it, with
as mangled as it was.”
“Shut up, Noah.”
Of course his brother didn’t listen. That was part of his
charm, he was stubborn that way, always had been, even back when they were
young pups and Raine steadfastly refused to have anything to do with their
father, Noah’s mother, or the rest of their siblings. Alone. Scared. Grieving
over the death of his mother, he’d become a snarling, feral thing, living in
the small apartment at the back of the house that he and his mother had lived
in for as long as he could remember. He’d bitten everyone that approached,
until Noah.
“My guess is he was still rehabbing it last year, which was
why he didn’t show up to the gathering then,” Noah continued on, as if Raine
hadn’t interrupted. “You should talk to him. It’s the least you can do.”
His brother was right, not that he planned to listen. Nearly
going down that road once was bad enough. Never again. His mother had taught
him better.
“He was alone, if that helps any. No mating marks on his
wrists either, so it’s safe to say he’s still single.”
“So.”
“Stop pretending you don’t give a shit and take the second
chance you’re being offered. I doubt you’ll get a third one.”
“Why can’t you stop meddling and drop it. For fuck’s sake,
Noah, I’m not interested!”
“Could have fooled me, what with the way you called to check
on him every day after he first went home.”
“And then I stopped, which should tell you something.”
“Yeah, that you’re clinging to an irrational notion put in
your head by an irrational woman, who…”
“Do not talk about my mom!”
“Why! Afraid of hearing the truth?”
Snarling, Raine ripped a furrow in the wood. “Leave Noah,
before I forget how much I love you and throw you out of this tree.”
“You’re ruining your life, you know that, right?”
“No. Taking a mate and trusting that I would be their one
and only would be ruining my life. I won’t do it, Noah, and I wish you’d stop
asking me too.”
“I’ll stop asking when you come to your senses and see that there
is room in our hearts to love more than one person,” Noah insisted, not for the
first time. In fact, he was sick of hearing it.
“Not equally.”
“Bullshit!”
“Do you really believe Evan and Holden love you as much as
they love each other?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Then you’re a fool. They had three years together before
they met you. Three years of memories, moments and promises. No matter what you
do, you can never catch up. It will never be equal.”
“If that’s all you think love is then I pity you, Raine, I
really do.”
The look on Noah’s face, disappointed, sad, left Raine
momentarily upset that he’d put it there. Until he thought about his mother,
her tears, the way she’d looked in the mirror, asking what was wrong with her
that his father couldn’t love her. Asking why she’d never be enough. He’d spent
his early years with a broken ghost who’d hug him one moment and scream at him
for wanting to play with his siblings the next.
He’ll drown you the moment I’m not around to protect you,
she’d rage, grabbing him by the arm, shaking him hard enough his teeth clacked
together. Sometimes she’d forget her strength, or claws, leaving deep, bleeding
marks in his upper arm or accidently dislocating it. It had happened so many
times he could do it at will now. A constant reminder of her pain.
“I don’t want your pity.”
“No, you never want anything, do you?” Noah glanced away
from him, over to the slowly filling grove where the gathering would take
place.
“Wrong, I want to be left alone.”
“Fine, wish granted, but I want you to remember this moment
in ten years, when you’re alone and sorry you blew your opportunity with
someone who really and truly loves you.”
With those final words hanging in the air between them, Noah
lowered himself to the ground, shifted, shook himself and disappeared into the
forest. Asshole! He’d be the one to see, in ten years, when he was living in an
add on apartment or back at mom and dads after his two mates decided there was
no longer room for him in the relationship.
If only there was a way to insure a pairing would never
become a tri-bond. Then he’d happily go to Gabriel and explore the
possibilities.
Another idea took hold then, as he watched awnings popping
up on campers and people pitching tents. Maybe he should go to Gabriel anyway,
talk to him and get it out of his system. Maybe they’d prove to be incompatible
and he could stop daydreaming about what it would be like to finally belong to
someone. Hell, maybe he was just looking for Raine to curse him out about the
fight. Hearing Gabriel say he hated him would go along way towards helping him
to stop dreaming about the man.
Decision made, he dove off the branch, summersaulting twice
before hitting the ground in a crouch, sniffing.
Rabbit, squirrel, skunk, deer, moss, dirt, pine, rotting
leaves, cinnamon…
Cinnamon?
That didn’t belong out here.
Nutmeg, dough, sugar…
Those definitely didn’t belong out here.
