Page 1 of Pregnant Wolf's Mate

Chapter 1 - Macie

To most werewolves running track in human form, wearing restrictive trainers might sound like a dumb thing, but to Macie it was everything. It was her time away from home and family, even the extended family of the pack who were all beginning to look at her, wondering if she was finally going to shift any day now. And so it was upon Silverdale’s university track that her sister, Lottie, found her.

Though she could feel Lottie watching her from the sidelines, Macie couldn’t bring herself to stop. Not until she had completed her final lap, skidding to a halt and continuing to pretend that she hadn’t sensed her standing there while she moved to the area where she had left her bag and her water bottle at the edge of the inside field.

“Macie! Come on! It’s time we headed off.”

Macie cringed at her sister’s yelling. Though it was getting late and there was nobody else about to hear her, she still felt as embarrassed and annoyed at her for having even shown up to come and get her.

Even worse was the male werewolf waiting in the parking lot beyond her, leaning against his pickup truck with his arms crossed over his chest, looking like a nasty piece of work. No doubt Macie’s cousin, now the alpha of the pack since his father’s passing a few weeks earlier, had sent him along with Lottie to make sure she didn’t screw anything up. Or should she guess, so that she wouldn’t screw anything up.

Macie continued to ignore her sister even as she came walking across the track, headed right for her. Making a point of propping herself up on the starting blocks again, she offered Lottie a low growl in the back of her throat to warn her to stay away.

“Macie, this kind of shit isn’t going to go down well with the rest of the pack,” Lottie insisted, reaching Macie’s side and grabbing her by the underarm to yank her off the blocks. “Mom and Dad are concerned you’re going to miss your big night.”

“Whoop-dee-do!” Macie snapped, rolling her eyes. Even from this distance, she could see the way Ray perked up against the truck, looking like he was ready to swoop in and save the day if things got heated between the two of them. A part of Macie couldn’t wait for him to do so just so she could take her frustration out on someone.

“Macie? What has gotten into you?” Lottie demanded, her fingers tightening around Macie’s arm. “Ever since Dash became official alpha, you’ve been worse than ever.”

Again, Macie growled, glaring back at her all-too-perfect sister with her glossy blonde hair, her crystalline blue eyes, and her porcelain skin. She was everything that Macie wasn’t. Beautiful, intelligent, and able to shift at the drop of a hat.

Macie merely shrugged. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Lottie cocked her head and glowered back at her. “Dash has instructed me to bring you back to the manor. He doesn’t want you to miss the ritual.”

“Of course he did,” Macie muttered under her breath. Then, speaking louder, she inclined her head in Ray’s direction and snapped, “And why did he send him?”

Lottie barely glanced over her shoulder. She already knew who Macie meant. That much was clear. Shaking her head, she responded, “Dash thought you might try to offer resistance.”

“When did Dash become such an uptight asshole?”

The growl that erupted from Lottie’s throat, rumbling right up from her chest, warned Macie that she had spoken out of turn. Macie already knew it and so she quickly bit her lip. It was no secret that Dash’s father had passed suddenly upon a short visit home to check up on the community.

“It’s Dash’s first time overseeing the full moon ritual since his dad passed and the whole pack is going to be watching him,” Lottie pointed out, only adding more pressure to Macie’s shoulders. “It’s going to be a big deal, and you get to be the center of attention.”

Bile rose in the back of Macie’s throat. That was exactly what she didn’t want. Unlike her sister, she hated being the center of attention. And what Lottie didn’t know was that Macie had been trying, and failing, to encourage her wolf out for weeks now, if not months. It hadn’t come anywhere near as naturally for her as with the other shifters of the pack. But how was she supposed to admit that on the night of the full moon ceremony, the day she just so happened to turn eighteen?

It was a given for every single shifter in the pack to have turned at least once by then, and Macie only had until midnight to keep to that tradition or she would forever be known as the failure. Not to mention that she was Silverdale, not only by pack but by family, her father being Dash’s uncle and next in line for the alphaship if Dash died without having any heirs. More than one member in the pack would likely challenge him for that leadership if they knew his daughter couldn’t even shift. She would bring shame upon her entire family.

It didn’t bear thinking about, and that was why she came to the track every night after the last university bell rang, because she couldn’t face the hopeful looks on her parents' faces as they asked the same old question. “Are you feeling anything yet?”

The truth was she hadn’t so much as felt a twinge, not even the pricking of a fang through her gums or the spike of a claw protruding through her nail beds. And it wasn’t for want of trying.

As though she saw the anxiety on her face, Lottie wrapped her arm around Macie’s shoulders and pulled her close. “Don’t worry, little sis. It’s all going to go perfectly.”

That was easy for her to say. Everything always went so perfectly for her. Lottie had skated through everything that life had ever thrown at her. She was the golden child of the family and one of the most beautiful young wolves in the pack, with an entire horde of suitors nipping at her heels. Macie on the other hand…

“Come on, grab your things and let's get going before Mom and Dad skin us both and hang our hides out to warn the other pack pups not to mess with them,” Lottie laughed, nudging Macie towards her things. Reluctantly, Macie did as she suggested.

Even as she wandered over to the pickup truck and the aggressive-looking shifter perched against it, he growled, “Would the two of you hurry the hell up? I’m not getting paid to babysit.”

Without waiting for a response, he yanked open the door to his backseat and snapped, “Get the hell in the car.”

Instinctively, Macie snarled back, “I’d rather walk than get in there with you.”

“Ray,” Lottie said warningly, scowling at him, as if to remind him that his position within the pack wasn’t exactly a steady one of late, especially as he had been one of the wolves who had challenged Dash for the spot of the next alpha, his family being one of the head shifter families in Silverdale. But at the end of the day, they all reported to one alpha. Ray might have been alpha had he actually managed to kick Dash’s ass.

Maybe that was why he always acted as though he had something stuck up his ass.

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