Page 1 of Simon's Runaway Mate

Chapter One

~ Simon ~

She was mine. I’d known it the moment I heard her voice over the phone, demanding I get my ass in gear and drag my alpha to help her brother collect some bad guys and save the girl. Those husky words had stroked right down my spine and given my balls a jolt that had my cock going full mast. I’d been willing to drop everything and go grab her even before I realized the girl she described was Belinda James, the alpha’s sister. Even then, I couldn’t shake the grip of that voice.

It took me a bit to get to Bastion, discover no one could locate Bee, and gather the rest of Bastion’s inner circle, selecting who’d go with and who’d stay behind in case this was a ploy to gain access to the rest of the pack. Then we were off.

A few of the others noticed my preoccupation, and I knew they thought I was worried about Bee. They all thought I was in love with her. Though I’d hinted more than once that I’d be willing to get physical with her while we waited on our mates to show up, I hadn’t been serious. It was an easy offer to make when I knew she’d never accept.

No, I’d wanted to tease and befriend her, to make her feel wanted and accepted by someone other than her brother. For all the people in the pack around her, Belinda always came across as being sad. And alone. So I teased and complimented and invited her to go anywhere and everywhere. To show both her and the rest of the pack that for all her quirks, Belinda was a woman who belonged.

Either way, I wasn’t prepared for what we walked into. The first thing I saw as we entered the abandoned factory was that bastard Mullins tossing away a woman as if she were garbage.

I didn’t think. I reacted. Stepping in, I took out Mullins’ throat and let him fall where he landed as I made my way to the woman. If her voice hadn’t given me a hint, her scent slammed into me, saturating my senses in nothing but her. A growl rumbled up from my chest as I lifted her into my arms. Tiny. Fragile. Human. And irrevocably mine. My woman. My mate. My entire fucking world.

With a brief word to Bastion, I was out the door, following my mate’s scent to a battered Jeep with obvious wear to it. I’d make sure she had a brand new one. Something with all the newest safety features and any bells and whistles she preferred. I eased her into the back seat, shoving her clutter to the floorboards to make space for her. God, she was beautiful. She had thick waves of hair that fell in shades of brown and red to her shoulders. I wanted to sink my hands into it, but I’d already noted the bruising forming on the side of her head. It made me want to go inside and kill Mullins all over again. Any bastard who’d lay hands on a woman didn’t deserve to breathe. One as tiny and helpless as my human mate? He deserved a special kind of hell for touching her.

I dialed my phone as I slid behind the wheel, adjusting the seat and mirrors for my larger frame. The clinic picked up on the third ring. I cut across the greeting with little care.

“This is Simon. I’m bringing in a human. She’s currently unconscious. Cut on her stomach. Doesn’t appear deep. Bruise on the side of her head concerns me. Have a room ready and make damn sure the doctor is there when I get there. I’m less than ten minutes out.”

Silence for several long seconds then, “You’re bringing a human here?”

“Are you questioning me?”

I didn’t have to force the displeasure that filled my tone. Nor did I embellish the alpha growl that resonated from me. My pack was jokingly referred to as the alpha pack just as often as it was the James Pack. I didn’t know if anyone really understood the truth of that. It was a pack of alphas. Most of us were bastards and misfits that had somehow found each other and formed our own pack.

I was often thought of as the easy going one, lesser than the others. There was a reason for that. Only the inner circle realized I was Bastion’s personal guard. To get to him, you’d have to first go through me. My easy smile hid the beast who lives inside me. I’m a brutal bastard, who has no fucking qualms about ripping another wolf to shreds if the situation called for it. Protecting the alpha I chose to follow was my job, and I took it seriously. But it was better if others don’t know what to expect. It gave me the element of surprise. Came in pretty fucking handy at times. Even when there were whispers about me, they were easily brushed aside.

“No.” The voice on the phone trembled, and I easily pictured the young wolf it belonged to. She’d recently finished nursing school and returned to finish her training with our pack now that the Rigton Pack was no more. She was also one we were watching. She’d been known to cause some trouble and had even been stupid enough to bad mouth several of the inner circle. The alpha’s mate among them. There was something off about her. Something I didn’t trust, but I didn’t have time to dwell on it now. “I’ll make sure everything’s ready for you.”

“Thank you, Madison. Seven minutes out.”

I hung up, glancing in the rearview mirror at my still unconscious mate. My cock was thick and hard behind my zipper even though she was in no condition for what I envisioned and probably wouldn’t be for a while. How hard had she been hit in the head? Why wasn’t she waking? What if she didn’t wake up? I shook my head, denying that train of thought as quickly as it started. I reached one hand back, needing to touch her. Her skin was soft, warm, reminding me she was alive, though her eyes remained closed.

I focused on the drive. Then on carrying her inside. On watching the doctor as he checked her out.

I almost took out his throat when my mate groaned and jerked at his touch along her side.

“Whoa!” Dr. Hagerty practically jumped away from the bed when I moved. “It appears she hit her side at some point. There’s a bruise forming, but I don’t think anything’s broken. We’ll take some x-rays to be sure. She might have a slight concussion. I’ll need to do a few tests there also. Which will require me touching her. Even if I may make her uncomfortable, I promise you I’ll do my utmost not to inflict further pain.”

The most beautiful pair of blue eyes blinked open, searching the room before stopping on me, deep pools that invited me to dive in. I could drown in those eyes. Willingly. Eagerly. She blinked several times as if trying to bring me into focus.

“Where’s…” She paused, clearing her throat. “Where’s Hannibal?”

My guess was in a world of trouble. He was probably bleeding out, if not already dead. No one fucked with the James Pack and walked away. Then again, my mate had called and asked for help. Putting two and two together, my second guess was that Hannibal was the brother she’d spoken of. He was probably alive. Beaten, definitely. Maybe broken in a few places. But odds were, the others wouldn’t have killed him before finding out who he was, why he was in our territory without gaining permission first, and why the hell he’d brought a human with him. I was okay with the last part. Otherwise, who knew when I’d have met the gorgeous woman who belonged to me. Of course, I would have preferred the bastard had kept her safe.

“Here.” Madison moved beside the bed before I could find my voice. She held out a cup of ice. “Try these. There’s no bruising on your neck, so I don’t think there’s any damage there. You’ve got a nice bruise on your temple, as well as along your side, and a laceration on your belly. Did you bump into something?”

The insult didn’t go unnoted, and I’d speak with Madison about it later. No one insinuated my mate was weak, and the derision the nurse showed the human was crystal clear. If that attitude remained, she’d be packing up and heading out sooner rather than later. Mates were sacred and treated as such.

Blue eyes blinked again. Though she tried to give her attention to Madison, I was happy to note my mate’s gaze kept tugging back to me. My wolf wanted to howl in delight. The beast wanting to strip and flex muscles to make her ooh and ahh. To impress and entice. I was hard-pressed not to join her on the tiny bed, to lift and pull her onto my lap, surrounding her with me and daring anyone to fuck with her ever again.

“I… Where am I? Who are you?” She managed to include us all in that last question, and I growled again, angered that my mate wouldn’t know who I was as instinctively as I did. Another reminder that she was human.

Madison shot a questioning glance toward me before answering. “You’re at the Rigton County Clinic. I’m Madison, the nurse on duty tonight. This is Dr. Hagerty. And this is Simon Hollister. He’s—”

“Simon,” my mate interrupted, giving a sigh of relief. “You came.”

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