Page 109 of Drama Queen

I wasn’t shiftless. My wolf was stirring. I could sense her in my bones, an ache begging me to shift, to show all those around me that I wasn’t like my mother.

If only that had been the case…

Instead, my omega designation slipped into place first, creating an achy friction against my breasts and between my thighs. My perfume fluttered across that same caressing breeze, enticing my mate to find me since the first perfuming is only detectable by them. My assumption was that no mate waited within this pack since no interest was ever shown growing up. Sure, the tether wasn’t created until your first shift, but mates can sometimes sense each other. Since the Carvers never reciprocated my wandering eye, no expectations were present.

Until Hendrix stepped out of the shadows and growled.

The sound was startling and unexpected, but also shot straight between my thighs, pressing, and holding like a phantom finger. My legs turned to jelly, barely holding my weight, and worsening by the second.

They gave out completely when his next growl turned into a word. “Mate.” His reflexes were sharp, snatching me into his arms, nuzzling and scenting my neck, rumbling his appreciation. “Mate.”

My mind was reeling, wondering if I’d slipped into an alternate reality, as I met his eyes close up for the first time. My breath caught, choking on my next inhalation, as I hummed my agreement.

We were mates.

His eyes blow wide, engulfing his ice, and dilating to midnight. His perplexing expression is something I’ll never forget. The need and longing were overwhelming his features, but something in his gaze was unsettling. Unfortunately, the doubt slipped away when his lips trailed my neck. Until my dying breath, I’ll never forget the sensation of his soft lips against my skin, the tightness with which he held me. The way he whispered “mate” throughout the night, as if I meant the world.

A brief blink after his lips touched mine, and he moved us to Old Man Randy’s barn deep within the trees. In the next instant, he was lying us softly within the straw on the wooden barn floor. His eyes closed tightly, shaking his head, trying to clear the emotion. He was too overwhelmed—fighting off the natural instinct to mate, to claim—my shirt ripped down the middle, baring my breasts to another person for the first time.

My mate.

By the next blink, we were completely naked, and instincts were taking over, creating enough slick for him to easily find entrance. Another first that I’ll never forget.

I’ll also never forget that hours later, after numerous rounds of knotting in many positions, my heart was full of a love I’d never expected. A love that slashes with the sharpest of blades when he stood and dressed without acknowledgment as the sun rose around us. When he glared down at me like I was nothing, stripping me bare of the warmth he just helped create, and uttered the word that will forever seal our fates.

“Shiftless.” Basic. One simple word. A rejection. The longing and reverie replaced by malice in his glacial eyes as he stared down at me, giving me little time to process that the moon had passed its peak and with it my first shift.

Shiftless.

Nothing else said. He turned and stalked away as if I were nothing—a romp in the hay—which fit the bill considering where we’d landed. Emptiness overwhelmed my senses enough that I lay there naked and motionless for a long time until the tickle of our pairing and lost virginity drew my attention back to my vulnerable state.

The rejection reinforced my plan to leave. No family. No friends. And no mates to worry about. I’d turned out exactly like my mother—a shiftless omega.

One

ARES

EIGHTEEN MONTHS LATER

“Mama.Ma. Ma. Come on, sweetheart, say it. Mama.” Evie coos and giggles at the silly faces I’m making as I balance her against my thighs while sitting propped on my bed. Her little fists shove in her mouth, drooling, and gnawing on them as if they held the best treat. Her silver-moon hair matches mine exactly, and even though my soul aches when I gaze upon her, I’m thankful she has her father’s ice-blue eyes instead of my unusual hue.

The emptiness that consumed my soul when Hendrix left me naked and alone after our mat—after we had sex—almost killed me. Quite literally. There’s a reason mates rarely reject each other. Besides being a piece of your essence, rejection can malnourish a wolf until there’s nothing left but death.

Luckily, this little princess made her presence known early with the roughest morning sickness, compounding my malnourishment for months. The doctor suggested lots of rest, which was almost impossible since I had to figure out how to make a living without the support of the pack.

The waitressing job I landed was a lifesaver, providing enough money to rent a single room from an elderly woman until I discovered my true calling: writing.

By chance, I wrote down my experience, leaving nothing out. The truth in all its glory: the pack, shifters, my mates, how they rejected me, the birth of my baby. Everything. I told it all. The human world has always heard legends about the supernatural world. We’d be idiots to think we could keep it from them completely, but in recent years, their outlook has skewed in our favor, paving the way for the unacceptable to become acceptable. Why not take advantage of it?

My pain turned into a budding, lucrative career as a paranormal romance author, and within months, my money troubles disappeared. The debut book that launched my new profession was born of my pain and heartache. Of course, a rework was necessary for that ever-sought-after HEA, but my fantasies helped fill the void. I had many throughout our youth and admit to many more since their rejection.

Book after book, fantasy after fantasy, built around how they’d realize their error and come for me. That when Hendrix rejected me, the others—his brothers—would still come. Surely, they’d realize they were my mates, knowing they’d form a pack one day. But nothing. No one ever came. No one called. Nothing. Which could only mean they agreed with him. I’m shiftless. An unworthy mate.

Being shiftless in a pack is seen as a weakness. A burden and drain on resources. One that I’m grateful for having left when I did. Especially now that Evie’s here. Her childhood would have replicated mine, something I’d never allow another child to experience.

However, among humans, these things are trivial because they don’t exist in their eyes. There’s no such thing as a shiftless she-wolf who was rejected by her mates. Those things onlylive within their imaginations, which is why my books do so well. I bring their fantasies to life, because even though we’re completely different genetically, we all want the same loving relationships.

Evie and I dubbed this morning "lazy Tuesday." We lounged around the house, watching her cutesy cartoons, and eating our fill of fruit and pancakes. She’s always on the go, just learning how to walk from one place to another. If she could avoid plopping to her butt after the first step, she’d be off. I can tell she’s doing it on purpose, scared to venture further, no matter how much coaxing there is on my side.

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