TWO
“Get her inside, fast,”one of the other skyscrapers commanded, waving me toward the door. Teagan and Ebony both grabbed my arms, dragging me toward the townhouses to the left of Ebony’s. They didn’t seem to be aiming for the one directly left, but the one next to it.
“What? No. Let go of me.” I ripped my arms out of their grips. Ebony let go, but Tea grabbed me again quickly.
“Rocco’s wolf is going to be really possessive,” Tea said hurriedly. “We just want to get you in his house so he’ll chill out when he’s fully shifted.”
A pained yell-snarl came from the picnic table, and instinct took over.
I yanked my arm from Tea’s grip again, spinning around and booking it back toward the hot guy. Though what I was doing made absolutely zero sense, I just felt like… I needed to.
Rocco was on the ground, his body twisted painfully. Common sense told me to get the hell away from the werewolf, who seemed to be shifting forms extremely slowly and painfully, but walking away from him felt wrong.
So I dropped to my knees beside him, leaning over the man. His eyes snapped open when my shadow stretched over him, and when the red gaze bore into me, his body relaxed a bit.
The eyes flicked back to blue for a minute, and then back to red.
“Mate,” he rumbled again, the word coming out mangled in his shifting throat.
“Sure.” I patted his cheek awkwardly.
His hand lifted to rest on mine, and I watched in stunned silence as fur broke out on the skin—before the bone snapped.
Biting back nausea, I remained where I was.
“We need to move her,” one of the men warned, somewhere behind me.
Another one of Rocco’s bones snapped, and he snarled again, fury blazing through him.
“I don’t know why, but I’m not going anywhere,” I whispered to him, as fur broke out on his cheek.
The words seemed to relax him entirely.
My lips twisted in a grimace as the air filled with snapping noises, bones breaking and reforming. Now that he was relaxed, though, the change seemed smoother and faster. Two minutes later, my hand was on a furry wolf cheek.
“Jesse the dog is also Jesse your boyfriend,” I said to Teagan, not taking my eyes off of Wolf-Rocco as he stared at me, remaining where he was lying on the ground.
“Jesse is my mate,” she said, confirming it.
“Someone needs to tell me what that word means right now.” Somehow, I remained calm.
Probably because I was looking at Rocco the hairy animal, rather than Rocco the hot guy. Animals, I could manage. Hot guys, not so much.
“It’s like a husband or wife, but bigger. More permanent,” Ebony said quietly. “When a werewolf chooses you as his mate, there will never be anyone else for him.”
Silence reigned for a moment.
Wolf-Rocco continued to stare at me.
Just stare.
“Like an automatic marriage?” I asked, my emotions somewhere between shocked, thrilled, and disbelieving.
There was another moment of silence.
“Yup,” one of the guys confirmed.
I stared at the wolf. “So… that hot guy. I’m married to him.”