Page 43 of Mated

“I don’t think I want to do that.”

She slaps me. Hard. Right across the face. Pain bursts through my ear. Everything goes high pitched and fuzzy as my body responds to the blow.

“What you want to do and what you’re going to do are two different things. What you want to do doesn’t matter. And what you’re going to do is what I am goddamn well telling you to do.”

I cringe away from her, my inner animal and the much smaller, sadder, more scared part of me all aligned with the fear of her. I will do what she says, because there is no room in my body or brain for dissent.

“You see those houses? People come from big cities, like the one you went to, and then they move out here and they buy up the land and build ridiculous houses on it. Then they sit empty half the year. We’ve been hitting a lot of those places for copper. Some of them have it as a decoration. Anyway. You can go up there in your dog form, and you can sniff out anything worth taking.”

I don’t think this is going to go well.

CHAPTER 11

Kira

It didn’t go well.

I am where Colton has been a hundred times before, sitting behind bars, waiting for my aunt to post bail. It’s not even the biggest bail, just two thousand or so. We got a lot more than that in the last haul, so it shouldn’t be long before I see her or Colton. Probably Colton. He’ll want to gloat.

Days pass. A lot of days. More days than Colton has ever spent in a cell, that’s for sure. I think the police are feeling sorry for me. Sometimes they bring me takeaways from the local diner.

I’m numb.

Like a kenneled dog, I feel my will slipping away hour by hour. When I thought I was entirely human, I was stronger. I didn’t need anybody. I could go out and take care of myself because this animal inside me was asleep. But it’s different now. I crave companionship and leadership.

“How are you doing today, young lady?” A kindly officer is at my door with a grease-soaked bag that I already know contains a burger and some half cold fries.

Officer Brady is sixty-five years old. Old enough to retire, but the police pension won’t cover his lifestyle, which in his case, is one official family, and one secret family. I can smell the scent of two women on him from time to time—a side effect from my shifting. My senses are much sharper than they used to be, which isn’t really an advantage when you consider I’m stuck in a cell that hasn’t been properly sterilized in years.

“I’m okay, thank you.” I force a polite smile. I’ve been telling myself that I don’t have to let this situation bring me down. I can keep myself in check and be a good person. I have to try.

He lets out a sad sigh, as if he doesn’t want to say what he is about to say.

“Kira, you’ve got twenty-four hours before we formally charge you. We can’t keep holding you like this.”

“But you do it for Colton?”

“The longest Colton has ever been here is three days. You’ve been here for a week. I’m sorry, but we’re not going to be able to hold off proceedings.”

“Have you told Aunt Ruby?”

“She knows what’s going on. She says she’ll get the money when she can, but like I said, our hands are getting pretty tied here.”

I know he’s kind of, sort of, doing me a favor, and the last thing I want to do is piss off a cop who could quite easily send my casework through to the courts right this second if he wanted to.

“I’m sorry,” I apologize, being obsequious. “I don’t know what’s keeping her. If I could pay you the money, I would.”

“Not your fault, sweetheart,” he says. “I’m sorry for what we’re going to have to do, that’s all.”

I force a smile. “It’s okay,” I say. “It doesn’t matter.”

It doesn’t matter because I don’t matter.

It doesn’t matter because ending up behind bars seems like something that was always going to happen to me. All my efforts to escape the life I was born into have failed, and I know why. Because fate. There’s no escaping it.

Cain used to talk about it, but he didn’t really understand. People with good fates don’t understand what it means to be someone with bad fate. I was born to be trash, and I will die trash. It’s time I accepted that. Fighting it has only ever caused me pain.

Giving up hope feels kind of good. It’s like a tension I’ve been holding inside myself slips away, leaving me free.

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