Page 61 of Real

Today it’s time to wake up and cut myself free.

26

Timothy

The warlocks simply get in their van and leave. That may be because Anne keeps telling them stories of spells she’s seen go awry. Or it might be because she keeps asking for articles of their clothing to keep warm. By the time they leave, she’s wearing the pointed hat, the robe, and a pair of fuzzy slippers the omega had stored in their van.

Now that I have my shirt back on, I offer to stay with her while she waits for the paramedics to get here. Buddy is inside, but he doesn’t need me to go inside and make this more complicated than it has to be.

“Did you know my mate is a water dragon shifter?” Anne asks.

“Uh, no. I thought they were extinct.”

She smiles. “Almost. She’s one of the last water dragon shifters in the world. She and our son. When we first met, I knew she was my fated mate. You should have seen her. She was standing barefoot on a boat with the wind whipping through her wild hair, and I thought, ‘She’s mine.’ Didn’t matter that my parents wanted me to bond with another ice dragon shifter. Didn’t matter that she wanted to live in a boat, and I got seasick. Didn’t matter that her hoard was a flock of herons, and I hated the little fuckers. She was mine, Timothy. When someone’s yours, the rest of it just doesn’t matter.”

“But Buddy’s a skatt,” I try to explain. She just rolls her eyes. Her expression reminds me of her dragon face.

“Thank you,” I say. Just in case I don’t get another chance. “For rescuing us from the pits. I would have died in there.”

She waves it off like it was nothing. “Don’t stand out here and talk to me. There’s a young man inside that house who’s a lot more attractive and better dressed. You should be talking to him.”

I know she means well. She doesn’t understand that Buddy and I don’t have fate on our side. Our situation is so different than the one with her and her mate.

I open the front door of the house Buddy spent his entire life in. It’s beautiful and modern with plenty of art on the walls and big windows. Buddy’s standing in front of a watercolor painting of a fox. He looks pensive. Aloof, even.

“Hey, Bud,” I say.

He snaps out of his concentration. “Timothy?”

“Yeah. I just wanted to see how you were doing.” I’d heard all the things Dorian said to Buddy. I’m not sorry he’s dead.

The world is better without Dorian Gray in it.

“I was going to be this mythical hero and stab Dorian with the same knife he used to stab me. It was going to be perfect. My first act as a skatt.” He gives me a self-deprecating smile that’s horribly jaded compared to the Buddy I met last night.

Fuck fate. Buddy is here with me now, and I don’t want to maintain the distance between us. I wrap my arms around him. He burrows his nose into my shoulder and tucks his plastic arms against my chest. It feels so right to cuddle with him like this. I’m so tired, but at the same time I wish this night never had to end.

“I was going to be strong and fierce and show everyone I could be a true alpha,” I admit, even though saying that makes me feel very vulnerable.

There’s something about Buddy that makes me want to shed the layers I wear in front of everyone else.

“A true alpha? You mean a violent alpha.”

Buddy doesn’t understand. To a lot of people, those two things are the same.

“People don’t respect me because I’m not what they expect an alpha to be,” I try to explain.

“I’m glad you’re not,” Buddy says. There’s such conviction in his voice. It’s like talking to a different person. I don’t know if it’s Dorian’s death or the revelation that he’s a skatt that’s changed him so completely, but I’m happy for him. This new version of Buddy is much more confident.

“What if I’m not a skatt?” he asks.

“You are. You were animated instead of one of the wooden marionettes—”

“What if Dorian’s spell messed me up, and I’m not a skatt?” he repeats. “What will I do?”

“Help the Illusors in whatever way you can anyway. Not everyone can be a mythical hero, you know.”

“I’m still alive, and Dorian’s dead. That means I’m not his mate either.” His voice is more urgent now. Less calm.

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