You’re a fucking dick!
“No. It’s no one, Dad. You know, I’m still a teenage guy. I have needs and all of that.” He wanted the ground to open up and swallow him whole. This sucked. Like big time. A whole lot of sucky. Even bigger than he thought possible.
“Well, don’t worry. I know we’ve got some guests arriving in a few days.”
“Guests?”
“Yes, Lionel’s pack. You remember him?”
“The tall guy, lots of hair?” Klaus asked.
“Yeah. You like him, remember?”
He did like Lionel, but he was also aware of the fact that a lot of Lionel’s pack men were unmated. They hadn’t been quite as lucky as the Demon pack.
This wasn’t good. There was no way he was going to be able to cope with all of those unmated men sniffing around Poppy. Shit was going to get complicated, real fast.
Chapter Two
“So, after you work here for a month, you’ll go to Nicole’s,” Anna said.
“Right, Nicole’s.” The alpha’s mate’s beauty shop.
Poppy couldn’t think of anything worse. She didn’t say anything and smiled at her mother.
Anna pulled off her glasses, ones with sharp lenses for her to make the jewelry she made perfect. Her mother was talented and built this business up from the ground up while also raising her.
“What’s on your mind, honey?” Anna asked.
“Nothing is on my mind. I am fine. Totally fine.” She felt her mother’s gaze on her and glanced down at her clipboard, feeling the sickness spiraling in her stomach.
Poppy hadn’t told her mother about the mating. She never told her mother about the bullying from him either.
She knew her mother would be pissed off. It would have caused a whole scene, and the truth was, she didn’t want her mother to go through with it. Poppy didn’t understand her mother’s enjoyment of being with the men, but she kind of got it.
Over the years, she had heard other pack members talk about the loneliness. How empty it was.
“Are you excited?” Anna asked.
“About what?”
“Lionel’s pack arriving soon?”
“Oh, yeah, I guess.”
“Sweetheart, that might be your chance to actually, you know, find your true mate.”
“I don’t think that is possible,” Poppy said.
“Why not? You haven’t found your mate here. It is always possible.”
“Maybe you will find … someone.” She hated lying to her mother. It didn’t sit well with her at all. This was awful.
“It’s not possible for me to find a mate, sweetheart. I have been mated once. It never happens again.”
They had never talked about this. “Not ever?”
“No, not ever. You get the chance to be with your one soul mate. Some mates are lucky and will be together for their whole lives. Others, not so much.” Anna climbed off her chair, but Poppy had seen the pain flash in her gaze.