Page 6 of Lost Mate

Except that wasn’t quite true. Dylan may not have remembered specifics, but he could remember the pain, and that came across their link as if it were Ross being beaten. That was something he hadn’t appreciated about having a mate. He could feel the pain that Dylan had experienced too. He wondered if that worked the other way. If so, they were going to have to stay away from danger.

Cal leaned forward, his gaze fixed on Dylan. “But you feel the pain.”

“I do. Every time I hear the word ‘alpha’.”

Ross held him close. “You’re safe here, honey. I promise. Our alphas are not like that. Not Joe and Cal, not the others.”

He barely knew the boy and already he was calling him endearments. But this was his mate, his forever. Honey was only the start of the names he would heap on Dylan.

“We’re here to protect you,” Joe agreed and there was a murmur of agreements around the table.

“Even me,” Eli muttered.

Milo laughed and leaned against his mate. “Especially you. You’re the worst mother hen of them all. Stop spluttering. You know I’m right.”

“You don’t know how true that is yet,” Owen added. “I didn’t believe it either. Pack meant pain for me. I was a rogue wolf until I came here.”

“You had no pack?” Dylan asked, clearly horrified.

Owen’s mouth twisted in bitterness, but Zeke gathered him close. “I was exiled from my pack.”

“Owen was part of my family’s pack,” Cal said, “until my father and brothers, the alpha and betas, threw him out for trying to show them a better way of working. Owen has more brains than all of them put together, but they wouldn’t listen. They only respect brawn, not brains.”

“The Wild Creek pack?” Dylan asked.

Cal gave a curt nod. “Do you know the name?”

Dylan shook his head. “No, but I don’t know the name of any pack, even my own.”

“Yet, you knew to come here,” Eli said.

“I came for my mate, not for the pack. I felt him from miles away. He was like a beacon in the darkness of my mind.”

Ross had never been a beacon for anyone. He wanted to curl around Dylan and hold him tight forever.

“Don’t say that to Ross,” Eli muttered. “Look at him. He’s just melted into goo.”

Ross glared at his boss. He was a bodyguard, a protector. Not a gooey thing.

And you also melt into goo? Dylan suggested.

He huffed through the link and Dylan laughed.

“Like you’re any better when it comes to me,” Milo pointed out to his mate.

“We’re all suckers for the wolves in our lives,” Joe agreed.

Eli focused his attention on Dylan. “Where were you before, when you felt this beacon?”

“Uh…” Dylan wrinkled his forehead. “I don’t know.”

“That’s enough,” Ross said firmly. “Leave Dylan alone. He’s tired. I won’t let you exhaust him.”

He ignored the collective gasps around the table. He knew why. Ross rarely stood up to his boss or confronted anyone. He was the calm one, the one who just got on and followed orders. He was reliable, not scary like Zeke or a maverick like some of the other operatives.

But Eli gave him a curt nod instead of reaming him out. “Take care of him. I’ll arrange cover for Joe Senior and Peter tonight.”

“We don’t need babysitting,” Joe Senior snarled, but Peter leaned toward him and the newly made wolf subsided.

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