Page 6 of Delivered to My Wolves

She sighed and plopped herself and her expensive dress in the chair in front of me. “I did it, okay? Last night after you went to the bathroom, I downloaded the app on your phone and reactivated your account. I didn’t know there would be a match this fast. But you deserve a mate, Haven. Someone to love you and care for you. You deserve what your parents had.”

I leaned back in my chair. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe I thought I didn’t deserve what my parents had, which was also why I fought so hard for others to have that in their lives.

“And when did you plan on telling me?”

“Um, today? Let me see who you matched to. Maybe it’s nothing. Maybe they aren’t right for…holy sex on a stick.”

Hadn’t heard her use that phrase before, which was surprising since Tilly was as foulmouthed as they came.

“What?” I was paying attention now.

“It’s two of them. You would have your own harem. Shit! Seven minutes.”

I took the phone but didn’t dare look yet. I had work to do, and I wasn’t completely sure I was ready for another letdown.

Chapter Five

Collyn

I’d been so busy with new projects, I hadn’t even checked the app. Or at least that was the story I told Fitz when he asked. Indeed, I had been occupied, but the fact that I had agreed to download the app on my phone was never far from my mind. What if we didn’t get a match? Or worse…what if we did.

Sela had told us from the start that we should not stay alone after she was gone. It had practically been a condition of our mating, although not in writing. She wanted us to be happy both with her and without her.

But that was virtually impossible. She had to know it, didn’t she? That we would not be able to have the least bit of happiness once she left us behind. Even though she was in the process of slipping away with each day we spent together, just waking up with her in our arms made it a day worth living. She was so special.

After Fitz went off to bed, one night, I stayed up to watch our home videos. Knowing we would be losing her, we’d been almost frantic to document our time together. After she passed, we’d watched these together often, but Fitz had pulled away after a couple of years, asserting that the sight of the two of us laughing and living with Sela was making it impossible for us to heal. He had tried to get me to stop as well, or at least watch less often, but I hadn’t been cooperative. I did stop watching them while he was around. So there was that.

During the months when we were mated to Sela, the months when she’d been slowly dying, we’d tried hard not to see it. Not that we didn’t take care of her, but her fierce yet gentle spirit had her managing to hide just how weak she’d become until nearly the very end. But looking at our family videos in chronological order, I could see what she’d tried to hide and we hadn’t wanted to see. The slow weight loss, paleness, and other symptoms were so clear now that I wanted to kick myself for not doing more for her. Doing anything to make her feel better, ease the pain that slowly created fine lines beside her eyes.

The healer had no cure, offered no hope.

I never wanted to feel that helpless again.

As the last of the videos ended, my gaze flicked to my phone sitting on the coffee table. Fitz wanted me to check the app. Didn’t he understand that we were stepping into danger? What if we did find another mate and we grew to love her and something happened? We’d never survive a second loss.

But my fingers closed around the device, and I leaned back again on the sofa, swiping the screen to bring my phone to life and reluctantly opening the app. There were so many available profiles to peruse that I wondered how people found anyone they liked. Feeling like I needed privacy for this, and a little ashamed, I headed upstairs to my room.

I brushed my teeth and washed my face, undressed, and combed my hair before being forced to admit I was delaying the inevitable. Sela wouldn’t want me to be a coward. The picture on my nightstand of the three of us laughing at some silly thing or other always made me ache, and I wished I could remember what the joke was. So much I did remember, but it wasn’t enough. Every minute or second that I could not bring to mind was time stolen from us.

While it was ostensibly all shifters, I ran across all sorts of mythical creatures as well as, more shockingly, a few humans. I hadn’t expected that. I read over the FAQ page and learned that while I could look all of these over, the system would suggest matches based on the questionnaires we’d filled out.

It seemed less than likely that the app would find the perfect mate for the two of us. We’d been friends and roommates and even mates to one female together, but our interests weren’t the same in or out of the bedroom, and how could there be two females who would want to be with both of us?

The photos accompanying the bios were almost all of happy, confident-looking people who appeared to have never been harmed by life. They had the appearance of someone looking for their first serious relationship. Were there other widowers? Widows? I scrolled through and found a few in the profiles marked to show they were recommended for us to look at.

But I was pretty sure we would not want a widow. We had all the angst already, and adding someone else who’d experienced a huge loss would make for one maudlin relationship. Or at least I thought so. And it wasn’t a chance I thought we should take. I could just picture the three of us sitting on the couch talking about our dead mates.

I never went to sleep that night, reading one profile after another, studying their photos and their answers to the same questions I’d asked…and as I did, I realized that I was not looking at only people who’d had perfect lives. Without saying in so many words, a number of them conveyed that life had been less than perfect, but that they were determined to go forward and find a new mate. A new happiness.

By the time the sun was rising, I was ready to try. Maybe nothing would happen, but maybe we could find someone to help us move in a better direction. My wolf sure wished I would.

Chapter Six

Fitz

I leaned against the counter in my bathroom, brushing my teeth and listening to a podcast about otherworldly beings. There was a wolf inside me, sure, but listening about aliens, sightings, and firsthand accounts of abductions was enough to make my shifting ability seem normal.

Listening to the stories had been an exercise in actively distracting myself lately but, this morning, even more so. Getting up to turn off my alarm on my phone became a flurry of excitement and nervous energy when I saw the notification on the top of the screen.

---