12

IVY

SEEING Adrian after completingmy bond with Elias was awkward enough. The idea of having everyone gather around while I recounted my sex life was somehow worse.

Thea glanced at me with narrowed eyes as she joined the little sharing circle. “Okay, what’s going on? Why are you basically sitting on Elias?”

I grimaced, shifting uncomfortably. I wasn’t exactly sitting on him, but he’d pulled me so close to his side that if I threw my legs over his, I would be. “Elias and I are mates, and we completed the bond last night.” There. Simple, easy, and hard to question.

However, the look Thea gave me, promised many questions, and excruciatingly detailed answers once we were done here. I sighed. What was the point of having a best friend if we didn’t share every gory detail of our lives with one another?

Does she really need to know about our sex life, Angel?

I turned to glare at Elias. Since I have to share with the class anyway? Yes. Yes, she does.

“What are they doing?” Thea asked, pointing between us.

“Talking telepathically,” Adrian murmured. I couldn’t ignore the hurt in his voice, knowing he wished we’d had a chance to complete the bond. “It’s part of the completed mate bond.”

Thea’s eyes widened, and she grimaced. “No, thank you. The idea of knowing someone has access to my thoughts makes me want to puke.”

I snorted. “Sure. Because you wouldn’t use it to constantly send dirty thoughts to that person.”

“Well,” she drawled, grinning, “when you put it like that, I could deal with it. But it doesn’t answer the question as to why we’re gathered around the table.”

“I have a mystery mate.”

“Huh?” Thea gave me a confused look, lifting a blonde brow. “What do you mean?”

“Remember the weird tattoo?” She nodded. “It’s a mate mark. A symbol of a completed bond.”

Thea pointed at Adrian, then at Elias. “But you’ve only slept with Grumpy. Not Prince Charming?”

Beside me, Elias growled, but I couldn’t help but snicker. “Only Elias so far.” I spared Adrian a look that I hope he read as a promise. I owed him a conversation. “But, at some point during my extensive sex life, I apparently formed a mate bond with a Fae.”

This time, Thea snorted as Elias tensed. Extensive?

I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing. “You and I have to recount what we remember about these assholes.”

My best friend shook her head and laughed. “What, all three of them?”

Three? he asked. Did any of them make you come like I did?

I shifted, feeling my cheeks warm. No way was I going to give him the answer he wanted.

“That should narrow our search, then,” Adrian said, clearing his throat.

Men. I shook my head. “Don’t go judging me unless you want to put all your exploits on the table.” I spared both mates a stern look. “Yes, I had sex before knowing you. I am quite happy with my sexual experience. You do not get to judge me. And it’s four, Thea.”

“Who am I missing? We’ve got Sam, Ethan, and Trevor.” She counted each guy on her finger. But she was missing the one who’d been my first.

“Who?” Elias asked quietly, like he sensed what I wasn’t saying.

I blew out a breath. “I knew him only as—” The name caught in my throat, and I cleared my throat.

What’s wrong?

I can’t say his name, I replied, meeting Elias’s worried stare. I just…can’t for some reason.

Before Elias could say anything, Thea’s brows pulled together in a frown as she studied me. “When was this?”

“The summer you and your family went to Europe.” I stared down at the table as fractured memories of that summer flooded me. “I was doing my best to stay out of Kerry’s way. Eloise was young, Kerry had Ginny, and Andrew was still in the picture. So, without you, I was spending a lot of time just hanging out in the forest.” I shrugged. “One day, I was hiking an old path when I found an old hunter’s cabin. I thought it was cool and knew you would find it awesome too.”

Thea gasped. “The lady cave?”

I couldn’t help but smile as our eyes met. “Yeah, the lady cave.” The memories were harder than I’d expected, and it’d been a while since I’d even thought about that summer. “At first, I thought it was abandoned. I was going to walk away when I heard groans. I was seriously thinking about running. I don’t know why, but I didn’t. The door was kicked in, and there he was.

“He’d been beaten. Badly. There were cuts all over his body, and he looked skinny, like he hadn’t been allowed to eat for a while. When he noticed me standing there, he was so scared.” Tears burned the back of my eyes as I remembered the state he was in. Tattered, broken, bruised. He’d never told me who’d done it, but I’d suspected a parent.

His name came to mind so easily. Ry. I’d known it was short for something—but for what, I wasn’t sure.

I glossed over the darker details, deciding they weren’t for anyone else to hear. “I helped him for two months. Snuck food to him and cleaned his wounds. He made me promise I wouldn’t tell anyone, and although Andrew suspected something was up, I could never tell him.”

And I used to tell Andrew things. As much as he’d disappointed me, as much as I never got along with Kerry, I’d had him in my corner. He’d at least been a friend at that time.

“He was my first. Kiss, time, love, I guess. I would have done anything for him. You’d finally returned, so I was going to tell him about how I’d be there less, but he was gone. He’d left nothing behind…like he’d never been there at all.”

For a moment, no one said a word. I could feel their stares on me, but I couldn’t look up from my hands. My heart thundered, and a part of me wondered if maybe…

“It was him,” Elias grunted. “The old tale of never making promises with a Fae? True. You promised not to tell, so you couldn’t tell your stepfather. He’s your mystery mate.”

I released a shaky breath and closed my eyes. “Well, that was easier than expected,” I joked, but no one laughed.

“Could have told you the other assholes were just human.” Thea shrugged half-heartedly. “Now what? What’s his name?”

I opened my mouth, but again, I couldn’t say it aloud. “I don’t know,” I stuttered, tears burning in the corners of my eyes. “I mean, I know it, but I can’t—”

I turned to Maeve, because if anyone had a plan, who knew what to do now, it was her.

But even the team leader looked uncertain. “Ivy, any chance you can remember what he looked like? If he had any distinguishing marks? Tattoos maybe? If he gave you any idea of his life?”

Shaking my head, I slumped against Elias. “No,” I whispered, even though I could pull his face up clearly in my mind. Funnily enough, I’d always thought he was too beautiful for someone like me. “I remember, but I can’t.”

“If he was running from someone, he would have glamoured himself, even against Ivy,” Rowan said, speaking for the first time today. I looked up to find his eyes, but he was looking at his hands clasped on the table. “Finding him without the bond will be hard. We’ll have to wait until he was ready to reveal himself. He’s made sure she can’t tell us anything important.”

“Why is he hiding?” Thea asked. All eyes turned to her. “Like, why bother? We know he exists now, so what’s the point? And how has he hidden for so long?”

I shrugged and swiped a finger under my eye. “Some kind of mind magic from a mage or witch, apparently, and I don’t know what else. Has he been hiding the bond since he left? Or did neither of us know until recently?”

Thea pressed her lips together for a moment and crossed her arms. She had an idea. I could see it playing in her eyes.

“Spill. What are you thinking?” I asked, sitting up.

“Dreams started on your twenty-first, right?” I nodded, leaning forward as her eyes narrowed. “But I’ve seen your back since then. So, it didn’t pop up until after your magic started appearing. You only noticed it after the attack because of your healing shit with Adrian.”

“Could the marks be linked to my magic?” I asked Maeve.

She looked uncertain for a moment before shaking her head. “That’s something we’d need to ask the queen about. He might have been able to block the mark for some time, but reaching out to you during the attack might have…disabled the magic he was using to hold the bond back from you.”

“Why?” I whispered. “Why hide it? Why run? And why stay away? And why the fuck did he show up at all?”

“He knows what he’s doing. At this point, with Ivy’s magic surging like it is, he has to.” Rowan finally looked up and our eyes met. “I’m sorry, Ivy.”

I swallowed down bile as I rose from the table. “Since we’re nowhere closer to figuring out who this mystery mate is, I’m going to check on the girls.”

Elias stood and pressed his hand against the small of my back. I’ll hunt him down if I have to, he said while guiding me out of the room. Don’t waste tears on that coward.

Sucking in a shuddering breath, I nodded. And quietly, I imagined a wall between Ry and me. No more little flower bullshit. No more mystery.

~

The girls were, thankfully, occupied by Marion. I was more than grateful for the older woman. I’d never seen Maisie so enamoured by something, especially not by a butterfly illusion Marion created to fly around the room.

A tingle raced over my skin in warning. Elias lifted his head as I exited the bedroom, his eyes dark and shoulders tense. “Come on,” he said, holding a hand out to me. “Let’s go for a walk.”

“I really shouldn’t—”

“Ivy,” he cut in, pushing off the wall and stalking up to me. “We need to talk.”

I swallowed thickly. I trusted Elias, yet my heart still stuttered with that same insecure fear I’d always felt when I’d been face to face with someone I cared for, who finally realised I wasn’t worth the hassle anymore.

Elias’s gaze softened, and he shook his head. “You are my mate, my everything,” he murmured, “and this isn’t me stepping back, Ivy. We need to talk about what happened in that meeting and what that means going forward as mates. Okay?”

Dammit. I knew he was right. We needed to discuss what happened. We needed to talk about our bond, and I needed to talk with Adrian about ours. I needed to stop running.

Quietly, I slipped my hand into his and entwined our fingers. “It’s a habit.”

“A bad one,” he replied, grunting. “Come on.”

I said nothing as he guided me out of the quiet house. My magic, which had been slumbering since completing the bond, gave a sharp tug towards the basement. Adrian was likely down there, though I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t want to see me yet. I owed him better than all of this.

He understands, Elias murmured through the bond, squeezing my hand. It’s the way bonds work.

I stifled a sigh and moved closer to my towering shifter mate. He led me out of the house and down the short incline towards the edge of the forest, the same path we’d taken last night when…

My cheeks warmed, and I ducked my head as we passed one of the shifters from Jay’s team. Elias gave her a brief nod before giving my hand a squeeze.

We continued in silence for what felt like an hour, though I knew logically it was only minutes. It wasn’t awkward, but it was heavy with tension and everything unsaid. I wanted to laugh at the craziness of the last twenty-four hours, yet my throat was tight with the intensity of what might come next.

Elias finally stopped and turned to face me, our hands still joined. I stared down at our entwined fingers and at the scars littering his tanned skin.

“Look at me, Angel,” he commanded, curling a finger beneath my chin, and forcing me to meet his stare. There was a softness in the dark green of his eyes that seemed so foreign compared to the man I’d come to know in my time back home.

But through the bond, I felt the simmering anger, fear, and his own insecurities below the surface of the calm he tried to emit. If I dug deeper, I could feel that it was threatening to bubble over.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

Elias’s eyes widened slightly, but he shook his head. “This isn’t about me, Angel. This is about—”

“This is about you as much as it is about me,” I interjected. “Last night, you were worried I wouldn’t want you.”

His jaw tensed, the muscle ticking as he averted his eyes. “We have more important things to discuss.”

“Things we could have talked about at the house.”

His eyes met mine again and he sighed. He released my hand and took a step back, putting space between us. Space that felt too large all of a sudden.

I swallowed thickly and crossed my arms over my chest. “What now?”

Elias scrubbed a hand over his face. “You need to know what you’re getting into.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, cocking my head. “Isn’t this exactly what everyone wanted?”

Elias shook his head, his eyes darkening. “What’s happening with this other mate—that should have never happened. Never should have been able to happen.” He paused, throat bobbing as he swallowed.

“I don’t want to talk about him. I thought we were coming out here to talk about us. Last night. You said you wanted to talk about our mate bond. So, let’s talk about it.”

He stiffened, and I could feel him pulling away through the bond.

If I’d learnt anything about my surly shifter, it was that he couldn’t open up. Something in his past had made it so he wouldn’t if those scars were any indication.

“Elias, please.”

His eyes shuttered close as he took in a sharp breath. I expected him to completely shut down. But his eyes opened, and he released his breath, his body completely crumbling as he sat on the forest floor with his back to one of the large trees surrounding us.

Elias stared up at me, and those fears, anger, and insecurity all came to the surface, bubbling over the false calm he’d created.

“The reason I worry about the validity of our bond is because I’m not anything special,” he started, his voice low and gruff. “I grew up in an orphanage that essentially prepared kids to become soldiers for the crown.”

Bile rose in my throat, but I kept my mouth shut. I went to my knees across from him.

“Those who mate the Daughters of Nyx are always powerful. They’re from long magical bloodlines that can be dated back to the rise of Nyx. They aren’t orphaned shifters with nothing to offer.” His lips curled into a sneer as he shook his head. “The mates of the Queen are meant to offer her something no one else can. But I can offer you nothing.”

My chest tightened at his words, at the darkness creeping through the bond. How much he hated that he had nothing to give me. How little he believed he deserved to be here, and how he still couldn’t fathom I would willingly join our lives—our souls—together.

Tears burned behind my eyes, and without a word, I crawled over to him. He didn’t look at me, but he opened himself up for me as I situated myself between his legs.

Elias wrapped his strong arms around me as I settled against his chest. “I don’t care about any of that,” I whispered, a lump forming in my throat. “Because you offer me so much more than you realise.”

His arms tightened around me, our bodies melding together. “What do I offer, Angel?”

I tipped my chin and found his gaze already on me. “You’re my protector, Elias. You’re the guy who stood up for me in front of my mother. You’re the one who took a hellhound down before it could hurt me. You can be a grumpy bastard, but you’re soft with my sisters.” I blinked back tears as I reached up to cup his jaw. “It doesn’t matter what others think because they aren’t the ones I’m spending the rest of my life with.”

I caught the shimmer of tears in his eyes before he closed them. A breath rattled in his chest.

“We’re mated now,” I continued. “And from what I’ve gathered, we’ve got a lot of time to deal with all this.”

“You won’t be saying that when we return to Avalon. And especially not when you find your other mates. They’ll be princes and noblemen with armies and gold.”

I shrugged. “I don’t really care about that kind of thing, Elias. Trust me.” I peeked up at him through my lashes and offered him a half smile. “Anyway, I doubt any of them will boss me around like you do.”

Elias snorted, and his chest rumbled with a soft laugh. “The council will be an issue, too. They’ll question me, our bond.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” I replied, unease swirling in my gut as I considered what that would be like. “They’re going to be questioning a lot when it comes to me, I imagine.”

He pulled me in closer, his breath tickling my neck as he sighed. “You have a meeting with the Queen tomorrow.”

It was my turn to stiffen. “Why?”

“Nothing too serious,” he murmured, kissing the top of my head. “It’ll likely be her answering your questions, checking in about everything that’s happened, and preparing you for when you arrive in Avalon. Kingsley will be there, and so will Maeve, so you won’t be alone.”

My stomach clenched with nerves. Not just over the meeting with the Queen, but over being with Adrian, too.