Page 35 of Mated

I let out a little whine as I feel him lowering me to the ground. He’s trying to get me to stand up. I resist by keeping my knees up to my chest as much as I can, like a cat that doesn’t want to be put into a crate. I refuse to start this day. I am going to stay in this happy, sleepy little place for as long as I can.

“Come on, Kira. There’s a pack breakfast this morning,” he says. “A new day, new opportunities.”

Those words make me want to avoid starting the day even more. I wrap my arms around his neck and hold onto him to avoid having to put my feet on the ground.

He wins the battle of wills with some awkwardness, by basically putting me down on the ground on my butt rather than on my feet. I am now out of bed and out of Cain’s warmth and protection.

“What am I supposed to wear?”

He answers by picking out a stylish jumpsuit in a deep cream hue. He lays it on the bed with a pair of matching kitten heels. It’s the sort of clothing that rich women wear to brunch. There’s a silk scarf to presumably match, and a blouse as well. It all looks very nice, and very formal and somewhat stiff. So this is what I’m expected to be. A first lady of wolves.

He gives me a chance to get ready, and not wanting to be churlish, I do as he wants. I get dressed reluctantly and put on more makeup than I usually would. I’ll take anything I can hide behind, including several layers of foundation and a whole lot of contouring.

“You look incredible,” Cain says when he sees me step out of the ensuite. “The picture-perfect mate.”

I know I look good. I look smooth and pore-less. I look like I was airbrushed. If you look very, very close, you can tell that I look absolutely fucking terrified.

He takes me by the hand and leads me out of the bedroom and down the stairs. I wish I could avoid this encounter somehow, but I am here to meet his pack. They’re here, indirectly, to see me.

Memories of the previous evening’s fuckery keep rushing back to me. I embarrassed myself, and I embarrassed Cain. I can’t do that again. I have to act normal enough to be acceptable. I can do that. I’ve worked hard to be able to do that.

The first comforting smell I encounter is that of fried bacon and powdered sugar. Maybe this won’t be as bad as I feared.

He leads me into a banquet hall where I find a long table laden with breakfast foods of every kind. Bacon. Croissants. Pastries. Cereals—though they seem absolutely pointless given the rest of the food. There are mangoes too, and grapes, and I think cheese. Hell, yeah. There’s cheese. But there’s also pancakes. And French toast.

There are smaller satellite tables around the edges where people are already eating and drinking juice, though drinking juice seems like a waste of stomach capacity with this spread in front of me.

I forget about the shame of what happened last night, and the horrible things people were saying about me, and I get French toast with a whole lot of maple syrup and bacon. I am happy, happy in a way I rarely am. I don’t care what people say about it being bad to eat feelings. Right now, eating these feelings is fucking great.

People are saying hello to us. Cain makes introductions. I wish he wouldn’t. I say hello as politely as I can, and do my level best not to show any annoyance at the way every social interaction prevents me from eating my bacon while it is still hot. This isn’t easy.

Cain seems to be happy, more or less. He carries plenty of conversations on while I eat.

All is well, until a very particular woman approaches. I feel her before I see her. Her energy is a lot like Cain’s. Dominant. Impressive. A little scary.

“Not now, Isabella,” he says.

That piques my interest. Cain has been nice to everybody. But he’s practically rude to this woman.

“Oh, but I have to have the honor of meeting your mate. The woman off the streets who became the most important female in the entirety of the pack.”

I swallow my mouthful and look at her, not sure what to do. She’s very pretty and very mad at me, and I guess I know why. She’s jealous that I have Cain and she doesn’t. But that’s not my fault.

“You have beautiful skin,” she says to me.

“Thank you,” I reply, nervous.

“Must be the effects of your mud pack,” she smirks at me, her tone indicating that it’s an unkind dig and not a joke designed to diminish the tension in the room. “Where you come from, is it common to skulk around in filth?Ow!”

I stare, shocked as Abel smacks her quite literally sideways.

“Keep a civil tongue in your head, Isabella.”

If anybody finds that to be a strange interaction, they don’t seem to react. I’d say a good seventy-five percent of the pack here are as focused on breakfast as I am. Maybe they are my people after all.

This interaction is drawing eyes, though. I can feel people looking at us, judging the entire situation. This woman is challenging us all. I kind of admire her, in a reluctant sort of way. I’ve always wondered what it would be like to not worry about making a scene.

Just as I have that thought, she sets about truly making one hell of a scene.

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