Page 8 of The Alpha Warrior's Mate

“Clay?” I asked. “What is it?”

No matter what was happening, my priority was my mate. He might not know I was his mate yet but I was, nonetheless. If I had to slaughter everyone in this place to get him out safely, I would with a fucking smile on my face.

“I…nothing. What are you doing here?” Though my mate was in a complete state of panic, his voice washed over me, and my wolf preened at the small interaction. The beast.

“Clay, what’s going on?”

He said nothing. I said nothing. We stood there, neither one of us moving, some kind of nonverbal communication flowing between us.

“I…” he muttered. He tried to slip his fisted hand under the desk but I stepped forward.

Gods, I was about to take a big chance but I had to.

This was my mate.

“Clay, did you find something? Something you weren’t supposed to see? Something vile happening right under our noses?”

If I thought his eyes were wide before, they were nothing compared to the saucers they turned into. “How? I’m not saying anything.”

“Clay, look at me. I would never hurt you. I would never endanger you. You know that, right?”

He nodded. “I don’t know how, but yes. I…I don’t even know what to do. If they caught me…”

“Give it to me,” I said, not even knowing what he had so tightly gripped his knuckles turned white. “Whatever it is, I’ll smuggle it out of here. You won’t be in danger. I won’t allow it.”

Chapter Eight

Clay

So many things were racing through my head. I’d been well on my way to panic before he walked in the room and now? Now there were so many unknowns added to that list.

Why did he say his name was Jordan, and now say it’s Jeremy? It hadn’t shocked me that his name wasn’t Jordan. The name never tasted right on my tongue. And, looking back, I’d always known it was a lie because the first time he told me it, he sounded unsure. It was almost as if he had started to tell me a different name altogether. At the time, I thought it was a name that started with P. Looked like I was wrong on that front, but that didn’t matter. What did was the thumb drive he had just asked me for in a roundabout way.

“I can’t give it to you,” I said. He couldn’t know what I was talking about, but at the same time sort of did. It was such a cluster.

Sure, he knew I’d discovered something, but the thumb drive itself—that, he wouldn’t have known about. Or maybe he did somehow. Were there cameras in here? If there were, how would he have access to them.

I was letting myself go down all kinds of unhelpful paths. I needed to reel it in and fast. It wasn’t like he could chill here all day.

My head was spinning.

All I wanted was to have him hold me, hug me, tell me everything would be okay. He wasn’t even a friend, but that didn’t stop me from needing his touch. I must dive deeper into that, but there were more pressing issues at hand.

“I…” He grabbed the bridge of his nose. “Listen, some bad shit’s going down here.”

He didn’t need to tell me that, but the fact that he did—that he trusted me—meant something. And maybe, just maybe that meant that I could trust him too.

Yes, my bear chimed in.

I ignored him. I couldn’t handle this with Jord—I meant, Jeremy and dealing with my beast at the same time. One of them would have to wait and, in this case, it was going to be my bear.

“And I need to make sure it doesn’t happen.” He brought his eyes to mine. “It can’t happen.”

“And that’s why you’re here?”

“Here as in the mansion, yes. Here as in with you? No.” He reached out and, for a second, I thought he might be grasping for my hand, but just as quickly, he pulled it right back again. “I couldn’t…I couldn’t stay away.”

Relief flooded me at his confession. I was glad he couldn’t because I…I felt similarly, which was why I couldn’t give him anything. It wasn’t safe for anyone to have the thumb drive. I wasn’t going to put that on him. If I did, and something happened to him because of me… I shook that thought away, refusing to go down that path.

---