Page 12 of Rejected By Blood (Mated in Silence 2)

“Jillian, I never wanted to make any problems for you, but I can’t deny what is between us. When I came here, with my brother, we’d been thrown out of our old pack by the alpha. I wasn’t looking for a mate, just a place to live and try to fit in.”

I spun, arms filled with rumpled clothing, to look at him. He’d been banished? Why? But I didn’t know how to ask, or eve if it was my place. Of course it was...wasn’t it? Did we need to know one another better? But if I was going to upend my hard-won happy life, I thought it might be something I should know. Soon?

“I explained it all to the alpha, of course, I mean we did. It was kind of him to accept us. We’ve tried hard to show our worth.”

Curiosity might eat me alive before I got the information Maybe I could scrawl the question on the floor with that burned wood.

“I-I don’t know what we would have done without the acceptance we’ve received here.” His voice was laden with emotion, and I recognized this was not a conversation we’d be having in writing. It would have to be mind to mind, and that meant letting it go for the moment. “Is this something we should keep?” He held up a piece of wood that after some consideration I recognized as the leg of a chair I’d rescued from a trash pile about a year before.

I shook my head and waved my hand. It hadn’t been that good even then, and Dean had wanted me to throw it away anyway.

“Okay.” He tossed it out the open door to join the pile of irretrievably broken or damaged items. “I wish we could find something you could write with. It must be hard for you.”

My heart beat harder. He got it in a way few did. Not...I wish you could talk. Wish you weren’t unable to speak or my very favorite, what a shame you aren’t different than you are. Shane wanted to help me communicate in the way I did. Accepted me as the person I was with my limitations. I didn’t know what made his former alpha banish him and his brother, but I decided I would accept him in the same open-hearted way. When I stumbled, I’d remember that our alpha wouldn’t have taken them in if they had been criminals, harmed anyone. Plus, just a look at his face told me he was not a bad person.

Would someone evil sleep outside my window just to keep me safe even though I hadn’t taken him as my mate yet? Sure, fate sent him to me, but the ultimate decision to mate did belong to the shifters themselves.

Would a miscreant have fought off the intruder?

And...would anyone but a kind soul be helping with the cleanup? Of course, Dean would if he were here, and I had no doubt he would on his return. But Shane was new to me. I was just getting to now him. And everything I saw, I liked.

Chapter Twelve

“You’ve gotten most of it cleaned up,” Dean’s voice scared me and I jumped. The moon was high in the sky and, if I wasn’t mistaken, it was nearing midnight. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you. I brought back a few rabbits. Didn’t know if there was anything left...to eat.”

At first I felt bad for the way Dean had found out that I had more than one mate, but more and more as I cleaned up in sacred silence, I was glad. Now there was no more guilt or wondering what would happen. Dean would either accept it and Shane or he wouldn’t.

At least, that was the front I was putting up for myself. I’d already turned over the makeshift island. The cutting board and knife were strewn on the other side of the living room so I pointed to it.

He took one look at Shane and gave him a dead stare.

“Yeah, I’ll get it prepped,” Shane said, but he wasn’t smiling. Nobody was smiling.

The rest of the night went on like that. My mates, yeah, I was saying that now, weren’t speaking to each other. Dean exchanged niceties with me and remained civil, but it was cold in our home, colder than any snow-covered night by myself. My body felt hollow and, at any moment I might just crumple into myself and fall onto the floor like a wilted piece of paper.

Shane worked in silence but once in a while our gazes would meet, and he would wink at me.

At least there was a sliver of warmth in here.

“Here, you eat first. We only have one bowl left. Well, one plate too.” Dean spoke to me but it was clipped and cold.

I held up a spoon and handed it over to him. I’d just washed everything in a basin since most of what we owned had ended up on the floor or outside in the dirt.

Dean waved his hands in the air, but there was no emotion on his face. He was hollow like me. “No, you eat first. It’s fine.”

Shane hadn’t even looked up from the shattered bowl he was picking up.

Mentally and physically exhausted, I stomped over to the whiteboard. picked up a marker, and scribbled down something I wanted to say, erased it because it sounded bitchy, and then did it again. I turned it around and showed Dean.

You eat. Not hungry.

It was the truth. Not only had our home been ransacked, but my skin felt dirty like a blanket of mud was on it. Like I’d been violated. My entire life had been violated and tossed about like my belongings.

That feeling was just skimming the surface of the emotions running through me. Dean walking away stripped me of something, trust maybe. He didn’t stick around and face those fears with me. He chose to walk, and it stung more than I was willing to admit.

But he came back, and it gave me hope again.

And Shane was here despite the obvious contempt from Dean.

---