Page 22 of Rejected By Blood (Mated in Silence 2)

I picked up my whiteboard and headed outside. Shane’s head popped up as soon as I stepped foot out the door. He smiled at me, and my heart fluttered.

Want to take a walk with me? It’s a pretty day.

I’d wanted to write beautiful but I couldn’t convince myself that I knew exactly how to spell it.

“I’d love to take a walk with you, mate. Where to?”

He stood up and dusted off his hands on the outside of his thighs. He was a simple guy and I’d noticed even his wardrobe was minimalist. From what I could gather, he had about five pairs of jeans, all the same with the exception of rips in different places, and T-shirts in neutral colors that boasted mountains or sunsets. One of them had some kind of surfing contest thing on the back. He didn’t strike me as the surfer type, but these were the things I wanted to get to the bottom of.

I shrugged. Yeah, I had an idea about where we should go, but I really just wanted to move around, enjoy the beautiful spring day. Enjoy the sunshine.

Soak up the stolen time with my mate.

“Doesn’t matter. I’ve been craving some time with you. Dean isn’t coming home right away?”

I shook my head and made a pantomime of him chopping wood. He wasn’t exactly working with the axe anymore, but Shane would get the point.

“Okay. Let’s go, then.”

As soon as I sidled up next to him, he took my hand. His warm palms were calloused. Mine were as well, and our callouses fit together like a puzzle made of a history of hard work. My whiteboard was tucked under my arm just in case I might need it, but honestly, I hoped he would do most of the talking.

“This place is gorgeous. When we first came here, I took a walk on the east side of the pack lands. I was so caught up in just walking around and admiring everything that I ended up lost and in trouble for not working. Jerad nearly bit my head off. Still, when I have a free moment, I try to go there and enjoy it. Well, that was, until you. Then I found myself lost in these woods. My wolf knew what he wanted, but I was aimless until I surrendered to him. He was right.”

I smiled, feeling my cheeks burn.

This place was beautiful. Every tree had a character of its own. Every leaf a different color in accordance with the level of sunshine it got. I knew every root, the ones that tripped me and the ones who felt like friends.

When I was a girl, I spoke to them in my mind and, while neither of us could speak, I hoped they understood me. They were the only ones who tried.

He stopped talking and, immediately, I missed his voice. I pulled us to a stop and wrote on my board.

What pack did you come from? How old are you? Parents? Family? Friends?

He chuckled as I scribbled down about a hundred questions. “Okay, okay. You want the full story. Good thing we have time.”

While we walked, he did tell me everything. He had come from a pack where the new alpha had gotten power-hungry since his father had passed. He was a slave driver for the most part, and while Shane didn’t shy away from work, he drew the line when the alpha began to force girls to join his harem. They weren’t his true mates--he was just greedy.

“It became too much. Girls were plucked from the fields daily like they were ripe tomatoes or something. We never saw them again. He kept them all in a big room, or that was the rumor, like one of those movies where the king has dozens of women at his disposal. Someone said one of them found their true mate and when the alpha heard about it, he had that male killed. Creek and I came this way, trying to find a pack. Others fled north. This place just called to me and Creek. Now I know why.”

He jostled our joined hands and winked at me.

We spent the entire day together. I showed him the caverns with their gorgeous crystals, and we shared sweet kisses along the way before heading back. My time with him had gone too fast.

We stopped at the river where Dean and I showered. I dipped my toe into the water and was happy to find it lukewarm. The sun had done wonders.

“Wanna go for a swim?” he asked, already taking off his shirt.

Hell yes, I did. In seconds, we were naked and I jumped into the water first. When I emerged from the depths, Shane was in front of me. Droplets of water clung to his long lashes and made his skin shimmer.

“Come here, mate. Gods, I’ve wanted to hold you for so long.”

He wrapped his arms around my waist, hefting me flush with his body. I locked my ankles behind his back and circled his neck with my arms. Ou lips were mere inches from each other. I nearly drowned in his blue eyes, noticing the specks of gold I’d never seen before. He had a small scar above his left eyebrows, and I moved my arm to run the pad of my thumb along it.

“I fell and hit my head on a brick when I was little. It was summer. Bled like a motherfucker. My mom came unglued. A few months later, she passed on. They said it was cancer, but my dad was convinced it was some kind of witch’s spell. I didn’t know. I just missed my mom. She made the best peach cobbler.”

Note to self:make this gorgeous man some peach cobbler. As soon as the peaches were ripe. Or...maybe I could use some of those we’d canned last summer. If any were left. Because I didn’t want to wait months.

I reached up and ran my fingers through his wet hair. His hardness bobbed between us, and I wanted this--wanted this mating more than anything. I leaned forward and kissed him, tightening my legs around his waist, pulling closer and closer, not wanting anything between us, not even a drop of river water.

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