2

Mikkel

 

 

 

He’d never understood the whole fated mate shit.

Even though he’d watched his mother succumb to it, and even though he’d watched her happiness expand over the years—and despite the number of pups she had, her ass had never expanded with it thanks to some kind of Lyken voodoo—he still wasn’t sure if he understood it.

But then, Mikkel wasn’t the kind of guy to appreciate fate.

For a soldier, the notion that someone, somewhere, controlled his destiny, wasn’t exactly what he wanted to hear.

He wanted to know that his strengths, his training, his abilities would be what pushed him through the toughest of times. The hardest of missions. A man made his own luck, after all.

But Mikkel knew differently.

Not just because of his mother, but because he, too, had been sent a mate.

He rubbed his chin, still perplexed by the notion as he peered over an infinity pool that belonged in some kind of magazine about Hollywood celebrities.

That was the last time he’d seen a place like this. In a magazine. Or a reality TV show about where the other half lived.

The water was a glossy sparkling turquoise thanks to lights that blossomed in the depths of the pool, highlighting the chic sun loungers around its perimeter and the snazzy daybeds with the shell-like collapsible roofs that overlooked the terrace as well as a million-dollar view of Austin.

He’d never liked Texas.

He had nothing against the people, per se. But a state who threatened to secede from the nation pissed him off. Guerrilla tactics were something he’d been trained to fight in over in Iraq. Fighting it on his own soil didn’t sit well with him.

When he was in the middle of a firefight, putting his fucking life on the line to make sure his fellow Americans led safe lives back home, the idea that his selflessness was being repaid with selfishness just irked him.

He’d only been here less than half a day, so the people of the state hadn’t had a chance to rub him the right way. Because, if anything, he’d seen plenty to dislike in the local packs, but considering this was where he’d be living for a while, he guessed he’d better get over his funk with the Lone Star state.

Mikkel was currently seated on one of the fancy-ass sun loungers that belonged to another man. Watching over the world at rest with a cold beer in his hands as he pondered what the fuck had happened to bring him to this point in his life.

Two days ago, he’d been serving in the Special Forces. He’d been on a short leave after a particularly gnarly mission on the Turkish-Syrian border—totally hush-hush, of course. Then, he’d received a phone call. One, single phone call. And like that, his nice, kinda orderly life had been utterly FUBAR.

In fact, fucked up beyond recognition didn’t cut it.

From the leader of a totally kickass team of bastards who could, and would, and had, saved the fucking world more times than he could count—and no, he wasn’t being big-headed there—to a goddamn babysitter.

A babysitter.

Him.

Fuck.

Rubbing his temple where an ache was starting to gather, he let out a deep sigh. Then, he stiffened when he heard the padding of footsteps against the sleek marble tiles.

A woman.

The woman.

Short. Slender, but curvy in all the right places. . . .

The former he gleaned from the sound of her gait alone, but the latter was from memory.

Thalia Lyndhoven.

She was the reason his life was FUBAR, but as he recalled her a few hours ago, sobbing and panicked and heartbroken, snuggling into his arms like he was the only place on earth that was home?

It was easy to forget the way she’d pounced into his life and changed it all. A few hours ago, everything about her, what she’d represented—a ball and chain—had reviled him. Now? Now, she’d managed to fuck with his brain because the sight of her being. . . .

He couldn’t even begin to explain it.

He was a protector. He was the guy who went out and fought, yet he’d had to watch this too-small woman go out into an arena and battle to the death.

She’d done it, too, and she’d made it look easy.

Her power, her strength, had floored him, even as he’d been half-terrified when her opponent had managed to score a hit. Then, afterward, she’d turned everything on its head again by sobbing out her pain at having taken the trash out by ending the scum’s life who’d raped, beaten, and abused his way around Austin.

She had soul. Thalia was good people, and that was why fighting the mate bond felt more like fighting himself.

“Mikkel?”

The soft voice was modulated, cultured. She was the daughter of the TriAlpha. The leaders of the North American Pack—the Lyken version of President of the United States. So, of course, she sounded fancy.

She’d probably gone to the best schools, had the niftiest education money could buy.

And, God help him, they were mated.

Yeah, he was finding it hard to get his head around that himself.

“Yeah,” he replied, clearing his throat when his affirmation came out half-strangled.

“You okay?”

She stepped out of the house behind him, a house that was worth a cool five million without a doubt. With its front wall of glass, Italian marble floors, gazillion bedrooms, and an interior décor that impressed even him, Mikkel tried to figure out if he was jealous or uneasy about the place.

These weren’t Thalia’s digs. They were her mate’s, Rafe.

He was Lyken like Thalia. But, unlike her, Rafe was not Alpha. Nope, he was Gamma. The lowest of the low.

If the pack had pond scum, the Gamma would be considered as such.

Not his opinion, of course. Just the way the pack’s fucked up hierarchy had it worked out.

His stepfather, a Beta, was kinder to Gammas than most, but even his disdain for the lesser rank bled through into everyday life.

That kind of prejudice was difficult to ignore.

It was pervasive. Stank up a place quicker than a dead body in a hundred degree heat. And yet, Rafe, a Gamma–a rank who were the pack’s cleaners and janitors, the dishwashers at restaurants or workers at fast food joints–was a doctor.

A freakin’ cardiologist.

His house would make a Rich Housewife weep with envy, for God’s sake.

Yet another reason for Mikkel to wonder if he’d taken a tumble down the rabbit hole and garnered a concussion along the way.

“What’s wrong?”

He blinked at the question. “Who said anything was wrong?”

As far as he could tell, she was still standing behind him. So, it wasn’t like she could see his face. . . .

He groaned at the idea she could sense shit about his mood because of the mate bond. Was that even a thing? He really should have paid attention when his mom got all mushy and talked about her mate.

“I can tell. You’re uncomfortable about something.”

Finally, she stepped around, moving into his line of sight as she tucked herself onto the sun lounger at his side.

Jesus, she was beautiful. All golden and blonde, like a walking fucking angel or something. And she was wearing a shirt.

A man’s shirt.

Another man’s shirt.

God.

As she curled up on the lounger next to his, he felt her eyes on him. Though his gaze had darted to her when she’d moved into his peripheral vision, he’d forced himself to look straight ahead. She wasn’t limiting herself however.

“Stop fighting it,” she said softly after a few moments.

“Fighting what?” he retorted after taking a sip of now piss-warm beer, playing dumb even though he knew what she meant.

“The mate bond.”

He sighed, rubbed his chin again—he really needed to shave. He had a hell of a five o’clock shadow, and when it grew out, it was itchy as fuck. Years of shaving to regulation, making sure his jaw was as smooth as silk, had made his stubble coarse and irritating to boot.

“Who said I’m fighting it?”

“Me,” she retorted, but her tone was wry rather than hurt. A fact he was grateful for.

He’d seen her hurt earlier on, and even though she was right—he was fighting the bond, kicking and fucking screaming at it—it had touched him.

She’d touched him. With her icy blue eyes that looked at him as though he’d set the moon in the goddamn sky, and flushed pink lips that quivered with her vulnerability. This creature who could kill with one hand and show him her heart in those Arctic irises in the other. . . .

She was a crazy contrast, and fuck, he did like that in a woman.

He’d watched her execute a man. Had seen her shift into her She-Wolf, and fight with the bastard to the death. This was no limp lily at his side. No wuss or wimp. The woman had guts. Real fucking guts.

And he admired that.

But, after, he’d seen her sorrow. She hadn’t wanted to kill the idiot she’d challenged in a dominance fight. He’d pulled a punk move and given her no choice but to mete out the ultimate punishment.

Still, just because Mikkel liked contradictory women who could maul in one breath and need a hug in another, didn’t mean he had to like his situation.

Nor did he appreciate the connection he felt with Rafe. In a way, that set him on edge more than anything that had happened today.

Mikkel was. Not. Gay.

No fucking way.

And yet. . . .

He shuddered at the memory of his response to the other man. What the fuck was that about?

“Talk to me, Mikkel,” she urged when he fell silent, when he didn’t reply.

It wasn’t an arrogant command, though. Had it been, he’d have just walked off. Sought out the spare bed that Rafe had shown him earlier—a bedroom that looked like it belonged in the Hilton downtown, not in an actual home where someone lived.

No, he thought irritably, her whispered urge was half-plea, half-request.

Mikkel sighed—why couldn’t she be annoying like the rest of the women on the planet? His sisters included. “What do you want me to say, Thalia?” The question was genuine.

He was at a loss of what to do, what to say, what to think and feel. Meeting Thalia and Rafe had fucked with his life in so many ways he was reeling, and he had no way of knowing how to get back on level ground.

“Nothing you don’t want to tell me.” He heard her gulp, and could almost hear the cogs turning in her mind as she changed tactics. “Tell me about you. Why you? Why not someone else? Why did my grandfather pick you to watch over me?”

For a second, he pondered her questions, then he answered as best he could, “I don’t really know why he asked me to guard you. Especially after watching you fight. You don’t need a guard. Especially not a human guard.” Goddamn, Louis could have gotten his facts straight before he’d torn Mikkel from his Special Forces team and dragged him along on this wild goose chase—

“He obviously saw something different in you. Why is that?” she asked, breaking into his grumbling thoughts.

“I can’t answer that. I just. . . . My parents are human. My father died overseas when I was small, but they’d already been split up for a while when he was hit.” His throat choked at the memory. He’d been three, barely old enough to know how to piss in the toilet, and yet he remembered that time as clear as day.

The flag the government had given his family after his father’s passing was still, to this day, one of his most treasured possessions. Whenever he looked at it, touched it, he wondered if the politicians really knew what a fucking sacrifice men gave every day for their country, and contemplated if they even gave a shit when they played their war games. Acting like they were moving inanimate pawns around, not actual human beings.

It wasn’t just the humans who were capable of that. Louis, Thalia’s grandfather, had shown he was just the same. They all were. Politicians, leaders, any fucker with power . . . said pawn’s wants, hopes, and dreams meant nothing to them.

Jack shit.

Thalia had power. Was she like that, too?

Was this an act? Her humility, was it contrived?

When she didn’t reply, made no murmur of grief or apology for his loss, he didn’t take offense. No, he knew she was silently urging him to continue, and he found he liked that she didn’t push. Conversely, and contradictorily considering the subject matter, her patience made his lips curve in a half-smile.

Like that, with her silence, he knew.

Thalia wasn’t, by nature, patient. He’d seen that tonight with the way she’d dealt with the Summerford Pack Alpha and, subsequently, with the douche she’d challenged and ultimately killed.

No, this one wasn’t a politician. He realized that now. She wasn’t slick and sly. Wouldn’t tell him what he wanted to hear just to get him to speak, and because of that, he answered:

“A year later, she met my stepfather. They were mates, and my brothers and sisters are Lyken. I guess I ride both worlds. Maybe your grandfather thought that would be useful for you.” He shrugged. “Aside from that, I don’t really know why he’d pick me to protect you.” It seemed even more fucking pointless than it had when he’d received the call.

A human, even one who’d been trained to their eyeteeth, was nothing in the face of a Lyken attack.

“How does he know you, Mikkel?”

He heard what she wasn’t saying.

Just like her fathers, her grandfathers before them had reigned over the National Pack. They weren’t everyday men. They’d been Kings. How had he come to the attention of one of the TriAlpha? A rare breed of triplets who, as fucked in the head as it was, were born from triplets. And not individually, either.

No, some fucked-up magick voodoo shit made it so that all three were fathers to each child.

Mikkel wasn’t even sure how that was possible, but at the same time, Thalia, Rafe, his stepfather, and half-siblings, as well as twenty other million men and women in this country alone could all turn into fucking wolves. And that didn’t take into account the other breeds, either.

Sometimes, shit just didn’t make sense to a human.

It was best not to question why and just to accept the insanity as real.

If anyone knew that, it was him. He’d been a part of this world almost as long as he’d been alive, and he still didn’t understand it. Not really. Well, he understood it, it just didn’t make much sense to him.

He cleared his throat, turning his thoughts away from the mindfuck that was this world he’d tumbled into by no fault of his own.

“He knows my stepfather. Stephen is a professor, and Louis and he get together to discuss certain things. Anyway, because of Stephen, Louis knows our family. He knows me.” There was no ego in his tone as he murmured, “I’m a decorated soldier. Only the best for his granddaughter, I guess.”

She sat up, the silk of the other man’s shirt whispering over her creamy skin, and it set all his nerves on fire. He shouldn’t be this aware of her, and yet, he was.

Human, he shouldn’t have been capable of sensing what he could. But she was right. Whether he liked it or not, they were fucking mates.

The thought put him on edge, and he lifted the bottle to his lips and drank. It tasted like crap now that it was warm, and getting warmer from the inferno that was his hands, but he drank anyway.

He’d never wanted a wife, never mind a goddamn mate.

Wives were clingy and needy. Throw in a connection that went down to the bone? Jesus H Christ.

Though the idea repelled him, it didn’t take away the power her scent had on him. Just by shifting around on the lounger, it was like it had stirred up the atmosphere. Turbocharged it with her.

She smelled like soap, laundry detergent, and, hell, he thought, closing his eyes . . . His.

He didn’t even know why she smelled like his, dammit. But it was like she scented of everything he wanted to smell in a woman.

Hot and sweet, sinful decadence. Innocent and pure, clean and fresh.

He pinched the bridge of his nose at the thought.

“What is it?”

He cut her a look. “You know what it is.”

A smile quirked along those perfect curves of her mouth. “The bond, huh?”

He sighed.

“Pretty damn powerful, isn’t it?”

Silence was the only answer he could give that wouldn’t choke him.

She leaned forward, her knees almost brushing his lounger as she stacked her elbows on them.

He felt the intensity of her gaze and shifted his from the million-dollar view of bright city lights to her.

Just looking at her made him feel winded, and Mikkel wasn’t the kind of guy who reacted that way to any woman. Jessica goddamn Rabbit could walk in the building, animation and all, and he’d be unaffected—he’d seen, and done, too much shit in his time to get riled up over pussy. But, with her, it was different. So different that he had to blow out his breath, so he could suck in some air to calm himself down because, the truth was, she was exquisite.

Once again, made for him.

His hand tightened around the bottle in his grasp, mostly because if he didn’t, he’d reach out to touch her. To stroke her hair, to feel the silk of her cheek against his skin, to seek her fingers.

Goddammit, she was potent.

“It’s okay,” she whispered, seeming to sense the storm raging within him. “We don’t have to rush this.”

He rolled his eyes at her words and shuffled up on the lounger, dragging his knees higher, so he could mimic her position. Hanging the bottle between his legs as he rounded his shoulders, he murmured, “I’m not a terrified virgin, Thalia. You don’t have to shelter me. I’m okay.”

“I know you’re not a virgin.”

A certain rigidness to her tone had him frowning. She could have laughed it off, but she didn’t.

Had she expected him to wait for her?

While the notion was laughable considering he was thirty-eight years old, he found himself feeling uncomfortable at the steadiness of her gaze.

He wasn’t sure what he was reading on her, and whatever it was, it put him on edge.

“I’m just trying to reassure you. That’s all. You might feel pressured by the situation, but you don’t have to. That’s not my intent. Truth is, I didn’t expect to find you so shortly after I found Rafe.

It can take a lifetime to find a mate, and I’m still young. I was lucky to find him when I did, so meeting you too was way more than I expected.”

He blinked at her candor, but stayed quiet.

“On top of that, I know it must be strange. Even if you are aware of our background, mates are one thing. But to be a second mate? I know how unusual that must be for you.

I’d like to say that if you have any questions, you can ask me. But I don’t have all the answers. Neither does Rafe. We’re working blind here.”

He pursed his lips but nodded. “I understand, and I appreciate your honesty. So, I do have some questions, you’re right.”

“Shoot.”

Her direct gaze didn’t waver as he asked, “I grew up in the pack. One foot in, one foot out. But I didn’t get to take part in pack activities. Not much.”

That had her scowling at him. “Seriously? That’s disgusting.”

“It is?”

“Yeah. Of course it is. You have brothers and sisters, right?”

He nodded. “Sure do. Three brothers and four sisters.” When she coughed, Mikkel found himself laughing. “My mother liked being mated to a Lyken, I guess.”

Her cheeks burned, and a part of him longed for a day when everything was settled, and he could tease her about that. Tease her for being so easy to rile, so easy to fluster. Now she sounded winded as she asked, “So, you were the odd one out who couldn’t attend events and things?”

He wiggled his beer. “Kind of. Big events like the centennials, I got to go to. But anything less, rallies or whatever, it was made known that my presence wasn’t appreciated.”

“Sweet gods, my fathers run a nation of bigots.” She gritted her teeth.

He snorted, though a part of him appreciated her anger on his behalf. Or the behalf of a small, lost kid, he guessed. “Bigots are everywhere,” he told her, meaning it. “Your fathers aren’t at fault.”

She just shook her head. “They don’t help.”

“Maybe not.” He pondered her a second. “Most of what I know, I gleaned off of my siblings, and my stepfather was pretty good about teaching me shit, too. He wasn’t happy with the way I was treated by his pack.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” she interrupted darkly.

Mikkel grinned a little, amused, and he’d admit, touched. “It’s okay, Thalia. I wasn’t offended then, and I’m not hurt by it now.”

“Bullshit,” she retorted. “No way can a kid ever be fine with that kind of situation where he’s continually overlooked. Step-children already feel like cuckoos in the nest. My people helped perpetuate that feeling in you. It’s a wonder you’re. . . .” She firmed her lips as she fell silent, tossing her head in a way that had her hair flying free over her shoulders, and while a part of him wanted to drag a piece of that hair to his nose, inhale her scent, and have his senses bathe in her, he didn’t.

Couldn’t.

Because she was agitated, and it was an agitation that ran deeper than the surface. Something he’d started to realize was a red alert for her. So, instead of reaching for that lock of hair that dangled so prettily over the curve of her shoulder, glinting like white gold in the moonlight, he reached for her hand and covered it with his. He’d seen what happened when she got riled.

Had seen how her She-Wolf ran close to the surface.

He could feel the beast’s anger at his treatment, and knew, if he wasn’t careful, he’d have a pissed off She-Wolf dashing around Rafe’s manicured yard.

Yeah, he wasn’t in the mood to play doggy day-care tonight.

It had been a long day. A hell of a long one. He really didn’t need to top it with a cherry of canine proportions. 

To her words, however, he just murmured, “My family made up for it,” hoping that the simplicity of his statement would get through to her, calm her down.

“I’m glad.”

The simple retort had his lips quirking, but he felt how his admission soothed her, eased the anxiety the She-Wolf felt for him. When she turned her hand under his and dragged her fingers along his palm, he firmed his mouth. He’d have liked to say that he didn’t feel that move down to his cock, but it would have been bullshit.

He controlled the shudder that longed to work its way down his spine.

Barely.

Though he knew it was wise to pull his hand away from hers, he wasn’t feeling very wise. Instead, he slid his fingers through hers, bridging the gap. Uniting them in a way he wanted to deny but couldn’t.

Clearing his throat, he murmured, “Anyway, I know what the TriAlpha is, but why are they that way? And how is it you’re, well, not like them?”

“You mean, like, are they brothers?”

He nodded. “I guess. I know they’re brothers, though.”

“Triplets, to be exact. Although, it’s a little different for Lykens. We have larger litters than humans after all. Something I’m sure you know considering how many siblings you have.”

He hid a laugh at her comment. “More fraternal multiple births. . . .”

“Yeah. They’re rarely identical.” With her free hand, he watched her trace a pattern beside her thigh on the lounger. “For as long as we can remember, the supreme leader of our people has been a set of triplets. What further makes them unique is the fact those triplets share a mate.”

“That doesn’t happen with any other guy, does it?”

She shook her head. “Never. One mate per person, and don’t get greedy,” she joked, her lips curving wryly. “The line continues. The mate has another set of triplets, and their mate has another. And so on.” She pulled a face. “It’s like that in Europe, Australia, Asia. . . . All over the world. The triplets they beget aren’t born of a single brother’s sperm, either.” She tugged at her bottom lip with her free hand, explaining something he already knew but was interested to hear from her unique perspective. “They are, and it’s pure magic but has been proven now by geneticists, born from a merging of the TriAlpha’s seed. In all the years of the TriAlpha, I’m the first non-triplet birth. The first female ever born to a TriAlpha. The first to ever break that mold.”

Pity for her welled in him. “Ouch.”

She blew out a long, long breath. “That about sums it up.” Her fingers tightened on his. “What I do know about my situation, I learned recently. Even then, it’s not much.”

“Then tell me what you do know,” he asked softly, not willing to push her, but interested nonetheless.

“When I was sixteen, and I don’t know why, I had a vision.” The words made her sad. He felt that sorrow tremble through the link that bound them together. “It was of my mate–at the time, I figured there was only one–with another woman. I was too young to watch porn, and I was kind of innocent. But that vision? It was of them having sex.”

He bolted upright at that. “Excuse me?”

“Yeah. It’s as shitty as you’d imagine,” she snapped, eying his hand which he’d tugged free from hers, shattering the tenuous connection that had started to quiver to life between them. “I don’t know which one of you it was. I didn’t see a face. Didn’t really see any part of the guy, I just saw the woman my mate was with at the time.

“That triggered my She-Wolf. She shifted. Out of the blue. Unfortunately, in front of my parents. After that, and when I tried to explain, they didn’t believe me and thought I was rabid.” She flushed.

His mouth gaped. “What?”

“I attacked them.”

“Still, you told them what happened, didn’t you? You didn’t just attack out of the blue.”

She shrugged, but he saw the bitterness in the twist of her lips before she said, “I’m an anomaly. I can’t excuse what they did, not really, even if I can understand their limits.

“We’re stupid when we’re wandering through the unknown after all. I did attack, I did put my mother’s life in danger, and they didn’t know why. There was no way of verifying what I’d said, and they’ve never found it easy to believe me.”

He blinked at that. “If you say so.”

“I do.” She tilted her chin up, and the stubborn move filled him with amusement—despite the way his insides were churning out of pity for her situation. “Anyway, that was the start of it. Female Lyken go into heat. You know that, right?”

He nodded in understanding. He’d seen his sisters during that time. No brother ever wanted to know such a thing—he shuddered. It was way more than a period. A thousand times worse.

“Usually it’s once a year, sometimes, twice. But me?” She released a cold laugh. “I go into heat every month.”

“Are you kidding me?” he demanded, voice hoarse.

“I wish I was. But, over that first year, I learned I had more than one mate. I can’t distinguish features in the visions, but I could sense the man I was seeing was actually men. The fact I go into heat so often suggests . . .” her cheeks blushed a delicate peach, “well, I have to satisfy three men, don’t I? I guess I need the sex drive to match.”

“I guess,” he said doubtfully, overwhelmed by her admission.

“So, there I was. Claiming I could see visions of my mates, plural not singular, having heats every month, and generally shifting out of control because every vision made my She-Wolf rage. . . . Eventually, my parents decided I was a danger to my mother who is half-Lyken, and can’t shift, so is pretty defenseless around our kind. They exiled me to one part of the palace, and I’ve been stuck there until recently.”

Astonishment bloomed. “B-But, school? College?” All the fancy education he’d expected her to have, all the hotspot vacation areas and snazzy resorts where she’d be on first name terms with the managers because she visited so often. . . . That hadn’t happened?

“I had a tutor at first, then I had to learn as I went. They gave me the books.” She shrugged. “I did the best I could. Eventually, they thought I was too dangerous to be around even a Lyken tutor.

“Then, a few weeks ago, an Elder came to the palace. You know what they are, right?”

“Old dudes,” he said gruffly. “They live longer than the average and are like Shamans, no? Are really knowledgeable about something important to the pack? One might know a lot about healing, another about history or shit like that, right?”

“That about sums it up. Well, Bahkir’s one of the oldest. He was resting up in Canada, in a monastery of all places. Didn’t hear about me until recently. Minute he did, he came. Told my fathers that I wasn’t bullshitting. That yes, I had three mates, and that basically, they had no reason to be ashamed of begetting a single girl child instead of three boys.” Another breath whistled out between her teeth. “According to him, I’m the coming of a new age for our kind.”

Staggered by that softly-uttered admission, he whispered, “That’s not a lot of pressure.”

A laugh escaped her. “Tell me about it.”

As he processed what she’d said, he scratched the back of his neck. “Carry on.”

“I met Rafe the same day I met with the Elder. He’d come to the palace to try to sort out the situation in his pack. The man I challenged today, Jason Torres? He was a Beta who was terrorizing the Gammas here.

Gammas have no protection. Even if you were excluded from the pack, you’ll know that, I’m sure.” When he nodded, she carried on, “He came to petition my mother for her help. When he was there, I caught scent of him and the rest, as they say, is history.”

“Do you still see the men having sex with other women?”

Her smile was tight. “Yes.”

He cringed.

“It’s worse when you’re in relationships. I recognize the women every time.” She swallowed as she closed her eyes and turned her face away from his. “That hurts me, but the She-Wolf gets very, very angry.”

That was why she’d stiffened up at his mention of not being a virgin.

She’d been a fucking eye witness to him being anything other than virginal.

She must have sensed his tension because she snapped, “I didn’t want to see it. And I didn’t get off on it, either.”

He frowned. “I never thought you did. Hell, I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy, Thalia.

I might not understand the mate bond, but I’ve seen it first-hand. If my mother had seen my stepfather with another woman? It would have killed her.”

Silence fell at his words, but eventually, she whispered, “I only got the visions when I was in my human form.”

That made a hell of a lot of sense. And not just where it was obvious. “You spent a lot of time as a wolf,” he murmured. She’d been a kickass fighter as a human. Her strength and her confidence in her body evident. But as a She-Wolf? She’d been like fucking dynamite.

Despite himself, his body tightened at the memory.

How couldn’t it?

He was a man forged from strength. Trained to respond to violence, to control it and to use it. To have seen that in another? In one so beautiful, so delicate and yet so fucking deadly? Shit, she was like his kryptonite.

All she had to do was cock an AK47 on her hip and pose in high heels to be his idea of a pin-up girl.

“The guards that kept me contained trained with me as a human because, while they kept me isolated, my fathers knew I needed to protect myself,” she explained, sensing his train of thought. “But in my wolf skin, I used to roam our land. I grew very strong.”

“That’s an understatement,” he said gruffly. What he’d seen today was beyond strong.

“I’m my fathers’ daughter,” was all she said. The simplicity of her words made them pack more of a punch. 

She wasn’t a woman to underestimate. Not that he was in the habit of underestimating anyone in his life. Regardless of whether they were there for a temporary period of time or a permanent one.

Thalia let out a shaky breath. “Please, don’t look at me like that.”

He frowned. “Like what?”

“I’m not a freak. Please,” she half pleaded, “I’m not.”

He shook his head. “You misunderstand me, Thalia.” At her rough gulp, he gently murmured, “If I wasn’t here to protect you, if we were on opposing sides, I’d say you were a worthy enemy.”

“Why?”

Mikkel shrugged. “The outer packaging in no way represents the product.”

“Why do I feel like you just insulted me?” she asked wryly.

“I have no idea. Not when I just gave you the biggest compliment I’ve ever given a woman.”

She blinked, her mouth rounding into a perfect ‘O’ that, God help him, gave him the worst kind of ideas.

She was a woman made for temptation. And Mikkel’s willpower had never been as strong as it should have been.

Shit had just got interesting.

Well, interesting or very, very real, and he wasn’t sure which was worse.