Page 41 of Alpha's Rejected Mate

“I … yes, seven years ago, you crushed my heart and broke my spirit, and it was one of the single worst experiences of my life. It all happened on the one night that was also one of the most painful, but I’m not going to get into that. We both know our history. You’re my mate, and I don’t regret our first time, or last night, and … I know what I want. You can’t leave the pack. You can’t put them second.”

“I’m not going to put you second.”

“That’s why I’m going to come with you.”

Mateo didn’t know if he had heard correctly at first.

“I was just talking with Franny, and she’s going to talk with her dad. She’s getting tired of bouncing around from job to job. She has also said that she has come to love beauty and makeup, and she wants to be the one to take over. I don’t want to lose this shop—”

“You can have another in our pack,” he said.

“Our pack?”

“Yes, our pack, and you can have as many shops as you’d like, and decide where you want them to be. Anything. It’s yours.”

She stared back at him. “I only need one shop, and I’d love to come and visit here. I love the pack here, and Franny.”

“Of course, and they can come and visit too. Franny’s great.”

Harper laughed. “She said you’d say that.”

He wasn’t going to tell her that Franny had been the one to help him.

“And I want to be your mate. I want to have a family, and I want to forget the last seven years. I’d like us to make new memories to wipe out the old ones.”

“Consider it done.”

He would do anything for her.

“Also, I think I’m in love with you as well.”

He cupped her face, tilted her head back, and then kissed her, hard.

This was the chance he wanted, and he wasn’t going to ruin it. Harper belonged to him, she was his mate, and he now had the rest of their lives to finally make it right.

Epilogue

Seven Years Later

“It’s so good seeing our kids playing together,” Franny said.

Harper looked out across the lake to see their kids, William and Thomas, playing. She smiled at her, and also saw their mates. Mateo held their daughter, teaching her how to swim. Poor Bethany, she still hadn’t mastered the art of swimming, and at four years old, she kept saying she wanted to learn.

With the sun beaming down on the lake, everyone was there. This was one of the visits she got from Franny. The last time her friend arrived, there was a huge snowstorm, and they all ended up locked in the house for two weeks. They loved it.

The last seven years had been a whirlwind. She’d left the Silver pack and arrived back at her old pack, and was shocked to see there was a party to celebrate her arrival. Peter and Damon had come to escort them home, not that they needed it. Her parents were staying at the pack, to receive them.

Mateo had been worried about women potentially making a claim for alpha female, but no one did.

Taking the role of alpha’s mate was quite difficult at first. Running her own business had certainly prepared her for that role. Every week, members of the pack came to her with problems. By the end of the first week, she asked Mateo to speed up the work on her shop. Within two months, she had her beauty boutique open. Franny was learning as she went. She had stopped doing the beauty applications at first, much to her own pack’s upset. It didn’t take her long to do the crash course in beauty. It did mean she had to study among the humans, but that was where she found her mate.

He wasn’t human, but a wolf teaching among the humans, and it wasn’t long before Franny was mated herself and pregnant.

With the opening of the beauty boutique, everyone had come to her for advice, to make complaints, and in return, she helped them with whatever they needed on a beauty level as well as within the pack.

At first, she’d hated her newfound role, now she loved it. She loved being the alpha’s mate.

She and Mateo now had two children. William and Bethany, and tonight, she was going to tell him they were expecting their third child.

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