Chapter 10

“Confession time,” Thyme said as they sat at an intimate table in a restaurant that claimed to serve the best steaks and seafood in the state. The smell of grilling meat was heavy in the air, and her stomach was growling like she hadn’t eaten in days.

“Do tell, I’m all ears.”

She stared at Remy for a quiet moment, drinking in everything about him. There was a single candle flickering in the center of the table that cast a golden glow to his face, highlighting the smooth curve of his jaw and the bow of his lips, and there in the sapphire depths, was the sweet connection between them, glittering with promise.

“I’ve never been on a date before.”

He hummed. “I think that’s really cool.”

“Dana has dated a lot. She says that if she gets tired of waiting for her truemate, then she at least wants to pick a mate that she gets along with. ‘Test driving’ them, is what she calls it.”

Remy chuckled. “I never went on a solo date, but I did do the group date thing in high school, like for prom or a movie night. I think when we plan to wait for our truemate, that it makes the casual dating thing seem pointless.”

“Definitely. Plus, most of the males in the pride either didn’t like me because they were friends with Leif, or they were scared of my dad.”

His smile made her feel warm inside. “I think my sisters feel the same. I threatened a lot of males to keep their distance, but the girls weren’t ever really interested in dating casually anyway.”

He’d explained about their Angel Mate nature that kicked in when they were twenty-one. His mom had been hot and heavy with a male in her pack before she turned twenty-one, and then he’d stalked and abducted her after she’d mated her truemate, because he hadn’t been able to let go.

“Geez,” Thyme said.

“Yeah, so my sisters were heavily encouraged to not date in the pack at all, to stick to humans if they wanted to go on a date. The only one who never dated at all is the youngest, Kendall.”

“Why didn’t she ever date anyone?”

“I don’t know. I asked her once and she just shrugged and changed the subject.”

Their food arrived—they both had ordered a porterhouse—and they chatted while they ate, about the pride, the towns on Alpha Jason’s list, and their families. She didn’t really want to talk about her family. Her stepmom and half-brother had shown their whole asses and made her feel terrible and embarrassed that Remy had witnessed it all.

He'd had a great childhood and clearly came from a loving and supportive family. What he had grown up with was what she coveted for her own future children.

When their meal was over, they left the restaurant and she was still chuckling about a story he’d shared from his childhood, when he’d tried to sneak out of the house to go hunting with his friends and had gotten busted by his dad.

The moon was low in the sky, casting a silver glow over everything, as Remy and Thyme stepped out of the restaurant and walked toward his truck. The parking lot wasn’t well lit, and something suddenly gnawed at her gut, a warning from her cat that something was wrong.

Tugging on Remy’s hand she said, “Hold on a second.”

He looked down at her, concern on his face. “What’s the matter.”

She swallowed and looked around. “I don’t know. I just… feel like something’s wrong.”

He inhaled deeply and his eyes flashed to the amber of his wolf. “I smell wildcats. Stay close.”

He put his arm around her and they walked with a quick pace to his truck, which didn’t look quite right.

“Damn it,” Remy said, his voice a low hiss.

She gasped when she realized what was wrong: his tires were slashed. “Oh no,” she said, her heart sinking like a stone. She looked up at Remy and saw his jaw clenched, his gaze searching the darkness around the parking lot. “Who would do this?”

“I have a good idea,” he said. His gaze dropped to hers and anger glinted in the amber depths. His voice was laced with a dangerous edge, gruff like his wolf was two seconds away from coming out. “It has to be Leif. I smell wildcats, but it’s a muddled scent and I can’t pick him out and I haven’t met everyone.”

She couldn’t pick out anyone’s particular scent either. “Why would he slash the tires and how the hell did he even know where we were?”

“He’s clearly following us, although I was checking in the mirrors and didn’t see anyone.” Remy snarled a little. “He was hoping you wouldn’t find your truemate so he could take over. He was just a month away from leading the pride when you came home with me. This seems like a warning.”

Her chest tightened with emotion. Holy hell, she didn’t want to think that someone had been following them, watching them.

When she shivered, Remy put his arm around her. “We need to be careful, Thyme. Leif may be more determined to lead the pride than you realized, and Liam, while well-intentioned, isn’t an alpha and clearly doesn’t have enough authority or power to make Leif toe the line.”

“The elders have been in charge since my dad passed away because I couldn’t take over without a mate.”

“Liam is on our side, but Jacob clearly isn’t, so I would assume that Leif feels pretty untouchable with one of the elders on his side.”

She swallowed hard. “What if he comes after us?”

“I can take care of Leif. But we need to be careful. You need to be careful. What he did? It’s a pure, unadulterated warning.”

She blinked rapidly to quell the sting of tears, and then she took out her phone. “There’s a garage in Marin that has a twenty-four-hour tow truck. I’ll have them come get us.”

“That sounds good. In the meantime, we need to get back into the restaurant, see if they have cameras. I don’t want you out in the open, anyway.”

“Okay.”

She called for a tow and then they walked back into the restaurant. Remy learned from the manager that they didn’t have exterior cameras, and were happy to call the police for them, but he said no. It was a pride matter, and human police wouldn’t know how to handle it.

Hell, she didn’t know how to handle it.

“I hate this so much,” she said as she stood near the front door and watched for the tow truck.

“It’s an inconvenience, but it’s better than what could have happened.”

“Like what?” she asked, looking up at him.

“They could have messed with the brakes, tried to run us off the road on the way home, or any other number of things. I’ll take the tire slashing because it’s the lesser of the evils.”

“What should we do?”

His jaw clenched for a moment, then he turned to gaze down at her. His eyes were an amber so deep it was like whiskey. He cupped her face and stared intently at her. “We’re going home and we’re going to mate and mark each other. Not because of what happened tonight, but because we both want it and there’s no reason to wait. And then in the morning, we’ll figure out how to deal with what they did tonight.”

Her heart started to pound as she held his gaze.

Holy crap he was sexy as hell, and she very much wanted to belong to him in every way.

“Okay,” she said, finding her voice after a few moments. “I want that too.”

“Good.” He lowered his head and kissed her, only stopping when the tow truck rolled into the parking lot with yellow flashing lights. “Stay here, I’ll take care of this and call for you when it’s safe to come out.”

She nodded and watched through the window while her mate dealt with the driver and flat tires. Ten minutes later, they were in the cab of the tow truck, that was going to drop them off at her house.

They’d had a crazy hiccup in the evening, but nothing was going to put a damper on what was coming. They were truemates, and their bond was stronger than whatever knife had slashed the tires and whatever bad intentions her half-brother and his cronies had.

She was going to put everything else aside and focus on her mate.