Page 1 of Bonded Beyond Trickery

CHAPTER 1

TILLY

After growing up in the Golden Summit pack, I had no idea that spending four years away would take away my home. I know I’m welcome in the pack, especially considering I grew up as the Alpha’s daughter and am now the Alpha’s sister, but there’s something missing here in the pack now.

I left for the right reasons—to follow my dreams of college and experiencing something more than pack life—but Golden Summit doesn’t feel like it did when I was growing up. It’s not the pack’s fault. It’s mine.

I’m not supposed to be here anymore and the lack of connection, the knowledge that my home is somewhere else, makes me feel on edge. It doesn’t help that my wolf is just as restless as I am.

She knows exactly what we’re missing. Who we’re missing.

And I’m not sure how much longer she’s willing to go without her mate. She snarls in my mind, a reminder that she’s allowed me to put and keep distance between us and our mate. I don’t think there was a moment she was happy about it, but she allowed it.

To a point.

“Like you were ever going to allow one of those humans to touch us,”she growls in my mind, knowing exactly where my thoughts were going.

“Of course not,” I mentally pacifier her.

Even if I hadn’t known who my mate was, I always planned to wait for my mate. There really was no other choice, not after watching the strong bond that exists between my parents. Growing up, knowing that the Moon Goddess had already found and chosen the perfect other half of my soul, made the idea of dating or giving myself to anyone other than my mate a waste of time.

I also saw the fall out when someone didn’t wait for their mate. No, it wasn’t always males who couldn’t keep their genitals in their pants either. There were plenty of females who were more than happy to spread their legs for a male. Unfortunately, power seemed to play a part in that.

But I was never the kind of she-wolf to chase power and prestige. Growing up as the daughter to the Alpha and Luna, I had a perspective those power hungry she-wolves never had the chance to have. I saw the sacrifice in being at the top. I saw the strain of being at the top of the hierarchy.

It was drilled into me while I was growing up and was the reason I made some of the choices that I did.

Choices that I couldn’t see past years ago when I made them.

Not only did I grow up with the notion that the pack comes first, that the Alpha and Luna give of themselves to the pack and devote their lives to the pack before anything else, but my parents were convinced that being an alpha wolf myself would mean I’d be mated to an Alpha and become his Luna.

That was a lot of pressure for someone who wanted more than the pack, who wanted more than a high school education, and who had dreams of their own. I knew my dreams would never be put before the needs of the pack. I couldn’t rely on an unknown, future mate to give me the freedom I’d need to go after my dreams.

Which is why I did what I had to do to make sure that I could achieve my dreams.

I would do it all over again.

“Even if that means our mate didn’t wait for us?”I can feel my wolf’s anger pulse through me with her question.“What if he decided he waited long enough and has a chosen mate now?”

I swallow hard and shake my head, trying to put my faith in the Moon Goddess that my mate wouldn’t have thrown away our bond to be with another, even if he has slept with other she-wolves. The thought makes me sick, but I know I can’t do much about it. Not now.

I made my choices.

I should be able to put her mind at ease about whether our mate decided that it wasn’t worth waiting for his mate, but Idon’t. I made sure to never ask about the other packs and what they were up to. I never wanted to know.

Not after the mating ball five years ago when I found my mate.

It was only because of fear and my plan that he had no idea who I was to him. Well, that and a witch who I bought a very specific spell from. The moment I turned 18, I put my plan in motion which centered around a spell that masked my scent from my mate.

The spell, however, did nothing to hide my mate from me.

I knew who Whitaker was to me the moment I walked into the mating ball and saw him. I held my breath, hoping the spell would do it’s job while also wishing I could throw myself at my mate. Whitaker was polite, but there wasn’t any flare of recognition in his eyes as my brother, Crew, introduced us.

It was difficult to reconcile that was exactly what I wanted to happen even as my heart sunk. It didn’t help to have my wolf howling in my mind, her distress feeling like a living thing inside of my chest.

We were both hit with the reality of what our choices meant in that moment. She allowed me to do what I thought was right, and I did what I needed to in order to follow my dreams first.

There was no doubt in my mind that having a mate, especially an Alpha—which Whitaker certainly is—would not have given me the freedom to go off to college.

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