Chapter Six
By lunchtime the following day, Avery was sick of pretending.
After leaving the restaurant, she’d left a voicemail on Jacob’s phone, and then spent most of the night on her couch waiting for him to either come to her apartment, or go to his own.
He hadn’t done either, and the implications tore at her gut.
She honestly didn’t know which was worse. The fact that he was letting her go, or the fact that he was letting her go without a word. He’d asked for her trust, and she’d eventually given it, but apparently, he didn’t trust her in return.
That was the only explanation that made any sense.
First, he hadn’t told her about his ability to change into a bear, and now, he’d ghosted without a word after seeing her with David.
The truth hurt, and under normal circumstances she would just let him go, but their situation wasn’t normal. Even though she wanted to kick herself for falling in love with him, she couldn’t deny the fact that she had, and she didn’t want to see him get hurt.
If he wouldn’t talk to her, then maybe his friends would.
A few minutes later, she walked into Java Corner with more determination than she knew she possessed, and an air of feigned confidence. Layla and Tobias stood behind the counter, and watched her approach identical looks of pleasant caution.
They obviously knew about whatever was going on between her and Jacob, but they weren’t angry or throwing her out, so she figured that was a good sign. Maybe she’d made the right choice by seeking his friends’ help.
“Will you tell me where he is?”
“He said you were with that loser that was in here the other night,” Layla snapped. “Is that true?”
“It’s true, but not in the way that he thinks. That loser was bothering me again, and I was waiting for Jacob to show up and tell him to get lost. Even if he doesn’t believe me about that, I have something else I need to discuss with him. Something…personal.”
Layla’s eyes widened, and Avery understood she may have given the woman the wrong impression, but she didn’t care. She needed to talk to Jacob, and she’d use anything in her power to make that happen.
“Follow me,” Layla said.
Avery followed Layla down the hallway toward the kitchen and out the back door of the shop. A little bit to the right of the door was a staircase, and when Layla started up the stairs, she followed.
On the landing, Layla placed her hand on the doorknob and paused.
“Ready?” she whispered. “He won’t make it easy.”
“I know,” Avery replied. “I’m ready.”
“Good, let’s do this.”
Layla turned the handle, and Avery followed her inside the tiny apartment. Jacob and Logan were sitting at a small table, talking, but they both stood when she entered the room.
“What are you doing here?” Jacob growled.
Surprisingly, his anger didn’t scare her. It pissed her off a little bit, but she wasn’t afraid of him.
“Come on, Logan,” Layla said. “They need to talk in private.”
“No!” Jacob practically barked the order. “You guys can stay, and she can go. I’m done with you Avery. I won’t play those games with you. If you wanted that loser so bad then you just should have said. I’d have gladly stepped out of the way.”
“I don’t want him, I—”
“Oh, right. You just wanted a goodbye fuck!”
Her intake of breath was slight compared to the loud gasps of his friends. If she hadn’t detected the hurt in his comment, then the tears threatening to fill her eyes would win, but she had easily sensed his pain. It was part of that weird connection they shared, but that didn’t mean she would let him get away with talking to her like that.
“You’re being an ass, and it’s not a good look for you, so just cut it out,” she stated, her voice filled with heat. "I don’t want him. In fact, you know I don’t. You also know that I want you, but if you want to pretend that that’s not true, then fine. Whatever. It’s your choice if you want to be blatantly stupid.”
“He showed up at my work, and I was scared. I wanted to end it for good, so I agreed to meet him at our dinner spot, thinking you would handle it. My mistake. That doesn’t matter now, anyway. What matters is that he has a new job, and it’s hunting bears.”
The silence that filled the room was telling, and she no longer wondered if his friends were like him. They were, and they understood the danger they could face if her ex followed through with his new “job.”
“So?”
Jacob tried to remain unaffected, but his voice lacked the heat it had carried a few minutes before. He now understood she knew his secret, but he was still playing dumb, as if to assess her intent.
“So, I don’t want you to get hurt. Any of you,” she said, glancing from him to his friends, and back. “He’s poaching here, for a lot of money, paid by someone he met on the internet.”
“Did he say who?” Logan asked.
She turned her attention to his friend.
“No, but he’s meeting her tonight at the club. I don’t know what time, though. I just know that he’s supposedly getting a big lump of cash up front, and then a payment for every bear skin he delivers.”
“Okay,” Logan nodded. He thanked her, and then turned his focus on Jacob. “We have to move on this as soon as possible, so you have one hour to get to my office. I’ll set up a meeting, and then call the alpha to fill him in. I’ll also call Xander, and see what he knows. This might affect him, too.”
Jacob nodded, but he didn’t take his eyes off her.
“I knew I liked you.” Layla surprised Avery with a hug, and then she turned to Jacob. “I told you so. Now don’t go fucking this up.”
The siblings left without another word, and she could feel her cheeks warming under Jacob’s intense stare. Was it wrong that she wanted him again even though he hadn’t actually apologized yet? It might be, but she honestly didn’t care. Something had shifted between them, and somehow, she knew everything would turn out fine.
***
Jacob stared at his beautiful Avery, and marveled at how brave she’d been. She’d basically walked into the bear’s den, and confronted not only him, but Logan and Layla, too.
Her actions confirmed what he’d known all along…
She was perfect for him.
Unfortunately, when he’d walked into the restaurant the night before, and seen her talking to her ex, something inside him snapped. He was known for having a level head, for never letting his emotions get in the way of his decisions, and yet, he’d acted irrationally, and turned on his mate when she’d needed him the most.
His actions hadn’t gone over well with his bear the night before, and they didn’t make the man proud now, either. Knowing that she’d been afraid, and counting on him for protection, filled him with shame, but the only thing he could do now was apologize.
And keep his fingers crossed.
Hopefully, she would give him another chance.
“You know about me? How? For how long? And why didn’t you tell me?”
“I’ve known since you first moved into the building,” she said. “Almost to the day. I saw you shift once on one of my walks, and I didn’t say anything because I was waiting for you to trust me enough to tell me.”
“And I was waiting for you to trust that I won’t let you go,” he countered.
“That’s kind of hard to believe when you take off at the first sign of trouble.”
She challenged him, and he loved it. He was going to love spending the rest of his life with her.
“You’re right,” he said. “But last night was the only time that will ever happen. I swear. I’ve been waiting for you for so long, watching you with him, knowing you were mine, and seeing you with him again slayed me. I couldn’t handle it, and so I left. I’m sorry I left at all, but more so because you needed me.”
“I was wrong,” he continued, “and if you give me another chance, I’ll never leave you again. I know I don’t deserve it, at least not after last night, but you’re my mate, Avery. You’re the one woman meant for only me—and my bear—and I hope you’ll forgive me, and stay with me for the rest of my life. I know we’ve only been together for a couple of weeks, beautiful, but I love you.”
“I love you, too, Jacob,” she immediately replied.
Then she surprised him by walking up to him, and wrapping her arms around his waist. She placed her ear against his chest, and his arms instinctively closed around her.
“You do?” he whispered into her hair. “You love me?”
“Yes, so much.”
She placed a kiss on his chest, and in turn, he kissed the top of her head, and then her forehead. When she looked up at him, he kissed her on the lips. Slow and steady, as if to seal their fate, but he couldn’t let her go until he told her everything.
“There’s more to being my mate than just getting married,” he said. “I’ll have to mark you, and then you’ll become a bear, too, and have to go through bear training, but I’ll help you. I’ll take care of you. I won’t disappoint you again, beautiful, I swear. Please stay with me. We don’t live forever, but we live longer than humans, and I don’t want to live without you.”
“I don’t want to live without you, either, Jacob,” she said. “Yes, I will be your mate. Yes, to all of it.”
“You’re not afraid of becoming an animal?”
“With you by my side, I’m not afraid of anything.”
***
Jacob looked across the packed club, and nodded once at Logan.
A disco ball hung from the ceiling, and reflected a rainbow of lights across everything, as loud music pulsed from the DJ’s speakers, but Jacob barely heard it.
Instead, he was focused on their mission, and the couple seated in a corner booth toward the back of the building. Huddled together in the middle of the semi-circle table, Avery’s ex chatted with a panther shifter about killing bears.
Fucking panthers!
He smiled as Mason’s favorite phrase fluttered through his mind, and then nodded once at the man hidden in the shadows. Mason was an expert at hiding, but this time his skills weren’t necessary.
Not when they had a secret weapon.
Jacob then turned his attention to the new panther alpha, and nodded once. The man was more muscular than Jacob had expected, but he moved with the smooth grace of a cat.
Xander Devereaux and his brothers wanted peace, and an end to the long war between the bears and the panthers. That was the reason Logan had included him in their meeting, and the reason Xander was helping them catch one of his own.
His two brothers waited outside, and if things went the way they expected, the she-panther would run straight into the path of Grayson, Xander’s youngest brother.
Jacob didn’t envy her.
They all might want peace, but Grayson was still a killer. He’d been trained by his late father, and neither man was known for showing mercy.
Jacob nodded again, and the four of them advanced on the table.
Suddenly, the woman sensed their presence, and when she saw Xander was with them, she tore out of the booth, and ran out the back door without a word to David.
Poor David was still broke, and more confused than ever.
“Hey, David,” Jacob said, plopping down on the booth cushion.
Logan sat down across from him, and Mason and Xander flanked both sides of the table. Even if he wanted to escape, there was nowhere for the man to go.
“Hey,” David said. “What do you guys want?”
His bravado might have been impressive if the fear wafting off of him wasn’t downright suffocating. In the coffee shop he’d been arrogant, and his fear hadn’t been a real factor. Jacob was glad the man was wising up.
“Well,” Jacob said. “Avery told us about your new job opportunity, and when the rangers are busy, it’s my job to keep everyone safe.” It wasn’t actually, but David wouldn’t know that. “Poaching is not only illegal, but it’s dangerous so close to town, so you’re going to have to find another gig. Plus, I don’t think Ashley’s coming back.”
Ashley was the name of his panther friend.
“She’ll be back,” David proclaimed. “We have a date.”
Yeah, that wasn’t happening. His date would be dead soon, but Jacob didn’t tell him that.
“You saw how she ran out of here, right?” Jacob asked, stating the obvious. “You should have followed her, but that’s okay because I need to make a few things clear. When it comes to you, I only care about two things. Hunting and Avery. They are both off limits to you. Permanently. Forever. That means you are never to go near either one of them again, and if you do, then one I’ll put you in jail for, and the other I’ll kill you for. Do you understand?”
David looked at the men surrounding the table, and reluctantly nodded. When he didn’t speak, Jacob clapped him on the shoulder, and gave him a light squeeze.
“I’m going to need to hear you actually say the words.”
The smell of urine hit his nose before the man spoke, and beneath the surface, Jacob’s bear roared in triumph. The loser got the point, and he would definitely never bother Avery again.
“I understand,” David spat out.
“Good,” Jacob smiled. “I’m glad to hear it. Let’s go guys.”
He and Logan scooted out of the booth, and they all walked out the back door that Ashley had run out of. When they got outside, they met up with Grayson, and Xander’s other brother, Nox.
“The girl’s been taken care of,” Grayson said.
Damn!
They’d all killed at one time or another when they had to, but Jacob didn’t want the details, and neither did Logan or Mason. The threat was taken care of, and that’s all they cared about.
They thanked the panther brothers for their help, and both groups went their separate ways.
On the way back to the coffee house, the three of them talked about what a success the night was, and how they were happy that Xander seemed the exact opposite of his father, and was a strong ally for peace between the two shifter species, and what a pathetic loser Avery’s ex was.
When they pulled into the parking lot, however, Jacob tuned everything out when he saw his beautiful mate through the window. She was laughing with Layla and Tobias, and he exited the car without another word.
He had a mate to claim, and right now, that was the only thing that mattered in his world.