Page 3 of Aries Mated

ATLAS

Whoa. As my eyes travelled over this woman’s body, I found myself absolutely blown away by who I was looking at. She was stunning, absolutely gorgeous. Those hazel-colored eyes of hers were welcoming and warm, drawing me in. I was taken aback. Even more so because she just said my name. Now that I was studying her carefully, I realized she really did know me. Not just as one of the contestants in the Astro Games, but as a person. I should have recognized her right away because I had seen her photograph so many times. My army cadet buddy, Pi, proudly flashed her picture at me a million times. Sure, she was younger then, we all were, but it seemed like she hadn’t aged a freaking day.

I dragged my tongue along my bottom lip as I watched her for a while, wondering why my stomach was flip flopping. It didn’t really have the right to do that because Pi was my friend. This was his girl. Just because that unfortunate accident took him out of our lives, didn’t mean I got to check her out. In fact, it made her more off limits than ever before. The last thing I needed was to get myself caught up in a complicated romantic entanglement, especially while I was in the middle of the games.

“Hey, Atlas.” Maeve snapped her fingers in front of my face, dragging my attention back to the present moment. Shit, how long was I day dreaming for? Not good. “I said what are you doing here?”

“Oh, right.” I rose to my feet, remembering that I had a man underneath me. “I caught this asshole trying to break in. But I’ve caught him now, so you can put the baseball bat down.”

She started, as if she only just realized she still had the bat raised. She let it drop down by her side with ease. “Right, well, I was ready to handle this situation by myself if I needed to.”

I couldn’t help but smile. I remembered Pi telling me that she was fiery and lots of fun. Apparently, that was still true. “Listen, you don’t need to worry. I can handle this. I’m going to take this piece of shit to the police. You might need to wait here and assess the damage. I’m sure the cops will want to come and interview you about this situation. Not that I think anything is damaged. Unless you want me to do that part? It might be better for you to go back home to keep safe.”

“It’s just that drink’s glass,” Maeve noted, pointing to the glass that got knocked over in the tussle. “I don’t think the police need to come here for that. I can come with you to be interviewed.” She offered me a playful lopsided smile. “And you don’t need to worry about my safety. I have it all under control.” She wiggled her baseball bat my way. “I could have handled this alone.”

I let out a little laugh. “Sure, I can see that. But I’m still glad I was here to help. Ready to get going?”

“Sure, let me just grab my things. I’ll only be a second.”

I watched Maeve walk away, my pulse pounding. She was definitely intriguing in ways that had me a little bit on edge. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do with this weirdness, or how I was supposed to feel. Thank goodness the man at my feet started groaning, giving me a much-needed distraction. I gripped him by his shirt and yanked him to his feet.

“What the hell were you doing here, huh?” I growled at him. “Why would you even think about robbing a place like this, you piece of shit?” He didn’t give me anything. Just a grumbled something incoherent. “Whatever. The cops will deal with you.”

I hated people taking advantage of others. It was obvious to me that Maeve was a hard worker, that she put all of herself into her job. And some bastard wanted to try to take it away from her? No way, not under my watch. Thank goodness I was passing at exactly the right moment. Now that I was thinking about it, Maeve had a child, didn’t she? Pi and she had a son before he was killed. So that made this crime even more despicable. I grabbed the asshole a little tighter and shook him with irritation.

“I’m ready.” Maeve smiled, showing her teeth and dimples.

It was actually a little awkward as I waited for Maeve to close up the bar. It got even worse as we walked to the police station. I suppose because the last time we saw each other was at Pi’s funeral. I was heartbroken then, so was she. We might have talked and shared our grief that day, but I couldn’t really remember. It was such a hard time that I couldn’t recall it properly. There was an intense block of ice between us that I so desperately wanted to shatter. But what did I say? Where did I start? Was Maeve thinking and feeling the same things as me? I couldn’t even bring myself to look at her, to see what she was thinking. This was all a bit weird.

I needed to talk, I absolutely had to, I wasn’t sure how much longer I could be here in this awkwardness.

“So,” I started, but I didn’t get very far with that sentence.

“Did you…?” Maeve started at exactly the same time.

Our eyes met, finally, and we chuckled awkwardly together. At least the ice was broken a little bit now. Cracked anyway. It was something for us to start with.

“You go first,” Maeve offered. “I already can’t even remember what I was going to say.”

“So, how is little Sol?” I asked. He was a safe topic, right? Mothers always loved to talk about their children.

“Not so little anymore,” Maeve reminded me. Yeah, it had been a long time, hadn’t it? Sol was a baby at the funeral, but that was years ago. “And he’s doing…good.”

“You sure?” Her tone belied the truth. “Young teen bears can be a handful. Especially without a father figure around to guide him.”

Maeve scoffed with clear irritation. Immediately I knew I had overstepped my bounds. I needed to reel myself back in. I was only speaking from experience. “Don’t make assumptions,” she snapped. “Everything is good.”

“Glad to hear that. But I mean, if he ever needs any advice about his shifting or anything, I can help…” Shit, I just couldn’t help myself. I’d just told myself to reel it back in, but I couldn’t seem to stop.

“Right,” Maeve replied tautly. “Sure.”

As we fell into silence yet again, there was something a little different about it. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. I was pretty sure I’d done something very wrong, but I had no idea how to make it right.

“Atlas!” Before I got a chance to think of the words to make it right, one of the police officers called out to me. Tex. I met him and the other guys as soon as I started competing. As a police detective myself, I knew how important it was to get to know all the other officers. “What are you here for?”

I held up the guy in my grasp with a withering look in my eyes. “This asshole. I found him trying to burgle Pleasures.”

“My God, Atlas,” Tex laughed. “Sometimes I think you’re on duty all the time. You’re supposed to be competing right now, not working.”

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