“Slade,” Finn said.
“Where do you reckon they’ll set us up in the married quarters? Hopefully not near bloody Phyllis.”
“Slade.”
“It’ll be nice, setting up home, having a few kids, getting my bloody mother off my back.”
“Slade, stop!”
We all jumped at the sound of Finn’s voice. I found my fingers digging into the table, my heart racing. His voice was like an iron whip, smashing down on the two of us and forcing Slade to silence. When I discovered I could move, I scratched at my neck. The bite the black wolf had inflicted there had basically disappeared, but the site grew itchy at different times.
“We talked about this.” I could hear Finn fighting to take the reasonable tone I’d always known him to use, but I saw the shake in his hands.
“I love her. She loves me. I couldn’t fucking stop myself, OK? I mean, just look at her...” I struggled to meet Slade’s gaze as he looked at me. That naked look was back and so intense, it would have been a relief to see the old cynical Slade. “I waited my whole fucking life for this, and I found her. She chose me. Never in my wildest dreams did I think my mate was going to be someone like her.”
“You don’t even know her.” Brandon appeared in the kitchen doorway, jacket in hand. “Does she want to live in the married quarters? Does she want to go back to the human world? Does she want to be tied to multiple men for the rest of her life? Does she want kids? Fuck, tell me her favourite colour, and I’ll at least be semi-appeased.”
“Why are you fuckers doing this?” Slade said. My hand shot out to take Slade’s without thinking. The need to do something, anything to stop the unshed tears scoring his throat from spilling was overwhelming. I felt a tension in my chest, something growing as he stared the other two down. “What? You think I planned this? I’m not you, Doc, with your carefully orchestrated interactions.”
“No, but you have some self-control.”
“No, I fucking don’t, and if you knew what this was like, you’d never say a word against me.” Slade’s head whipped around to face mine. “Don’t worry, love. We’ll work this out. We can go stay at Mum’s until this all settles down.”
I needed so much more than that right now. What had just happened? Why was everyone getting upset? What did this mean to Slade? To me? But it appeared I was not going to get time to process that yet.
He is pack, my Tirian insisted, and then I knew exactly what I had to do.
I got up out of my seat and wrapped my arms around Slade, and he shifted back so I could straddle his lap and bury my head in the curve of his neck. That same sense of familiar rightness—like we’d been a couple for years, that we were linked in a thousand ways—settled over me. Since the heat, every touch had become sexual. But for a moment, I experienced a respite from it as I just sunk into him, his arms like iron bands around me, pulling me so close, you couldn’t have slid anything between us.
“Princess...” Slade’s voice came out as an agonised hiss. “Love you.”
When I finally pulled back, a certainty unlike anything I’d ever felt thrummed through my chest. The others could quibble and scrap, but that had no place here. I looked into those hazel eyes and said the words that beat in time with my heart. “I love you too.”
“It’s done,” Finn said, rubbing his eyes. “I’ll tell Kelly.”
Brandon’s only response was to stride over to the door and slam it on his way out.
3
Which is how I found myself standing in a new house, Slade inspecting all the features with relish.
“Come winter, we’ll be able to build a big fire. I’ll be all hot and sweaty from chopping logs,” he said as he swaggered over to where I stood, “and we’ll snuggle up tight—”
“Slade, son of Cheryl.”
We both jumped apart to see an older woman walk inside the door. She held herself with a proud bearing, a long mane of grey hair pulled back into a ponytail. She smiled when she saw me and walked over. “I am Ophelia, one of the matriarchs here, and you must be Julie.”
“Yes. Hello.” God, I sounded like an idiot. “Sorry, what’s a matriarch?”
She took my hand and patted it. “You must have many questions. Let’s sit and talk for a while. Slade, you need to tune into your mate bond.”
“What?” He touched my arm, and his eyes went slightly unfocused for a second. “Oh. Why didn’t you tell me you were feeling like that, love?”
He sat down beside me, arm going around my shoulders. Instantly, a sense of peace settled over me, wiping away what had been mostly confusion and fear. I shook my head, unsettled by the rapid transition, and moved away from him a few centimetres so we were no longer skin to skin. Yup, there it was, that feeling of unease.
“What is that?” I asked the strange woman. “Why does his touch act like a mood stabilizer?”
She smiled at this. “It’s what pack bonds do. They settle us, connect us, make us feel strong. Like a baby getting sk