Page 8 of Matched into the Mob

Mate or not, how could I live my life with a shady little shit who sold his soul to Dane? But I paused, considering how I’d react if he’d done the same for us. Hmmm, I’d have had no problem.

You have to mate!My wolf was adamant.

Not yet. There’s no rule saying I have to. I refused to consider the consequences of not mating the human with the rounded butt and dazzling green eyes. And those plump kissable lips. He was a cute package, and he needed to be wrapped in a bow and?—

I shook my head, trying to rid myself of his image. Instead, I had to investigate why he was in our headquarters and what he was doing working with a loathsome group of shifters who’d slit their father’s throat for a cash bonus.

Lust had riddled my mind and body, and I hadn’t been able to take my eyes off my mate, my beast ready to pounce if anyone took an interest in him.

And then he left, scooting out with his friend, and smashing the elevator button and grumbling about it taking so long.

I did what any shifter would do who’d met his mate but hadn’t marked him; I raced after him, taking the stairs three at a time, and reached the entrance of our building with the two humans.

“Leaving so soon?” I got in front of them, and my mate reared away.

“What does it look like?” he snapped. He held himself up, only reaching my shoulder, his spine ramrod straight.

“I’d like to stay,” the other guy added.

“No, you wouldn’t, Josh.” My mate’s eyes clouded with confusion. “Not Josh or Joshua. Nope. Joshie, Josiah, Joseph.”

Color blanched from his cheeks, and I noted his friend’s slack-jawed expression. My mate was… scared? Of what? Not me. It couldn’t be me.

“His name isn’t really Josh.” He fumbled for the door.

“Son, you’re needed upstairs.” Dad had followed me, along with Ben.

I had to go with my mate, but he was shuffling away, putting his body in front of Not Josh. I couldn’t mark him here, so I opened the door and the pair scuttled out.

“Follow them,” I told Ben, “and tell me where the cute one goes.”

He raised a brow. “The cute one, boss?”

“The mouthy guy, the shorter one.”

I instructed Ben to stay on his tail and give me hourly updates. My mate couldn’t get away. Humans were frail creatures, and despite him being involved with Dane in some capacity, they were unused to the subterfuge and trickery needed to survive in the mafia shifter world.

Taking one last look at my mate, I followed Dad toward the elevator.

The speed-dating event droned on. The damned buzzer had me wanting to smash it against a wall. Meeting my mate had meacting giddy, like those guys on the rom-coms Tony and my dad loved.

But there was plenty of laughter from the participants and even one spontaneous mating between a La Luna Noir shifter and a Nightfall alpha. If my mind wasn’t filled with thoughts of my mate, I might have joined in the fun and congratulated the pair.

I beckoned Hawk, but it turned out he didn’t know much, other than he’d witnessed my mate dropping off and picking up Dane at The Obsidian Circle’s headquarters.

“Might have heard his name once but can’t recall. Mick or Michael… something starting with M.”

When the speed dating ended, I asked Ben for an update, and he texted my mate’s address. I was out the door, without saying goodbye to Dad. Punching his street address into the GPS, I accelerated down the road, the sports car responding to my eagerness to reach my destination.

While my mate lived in the city, it was a world away from my place.

The apartment block belonged to another era. Its brick facade was covered in decades of pollution from cars and nearby factories. Bird droppings and peeling paint combined with vines weaving between the cracked mortar gave the impression the building was crying.

A stale odor of overcooked cabbage greeted me when I wound down the window and studied the chipped concrete on the stoop.

But despite the air of decay, the neighborhood was alive even at this hour. The rain had stopped and people chatted to their neighbors, couples strolled along the sidewalk, and a dog on a leash peed against one of the trees lining the street.

I could ring the buzzer for every apartment until I discovered which one was his.

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