Page 21 of Puck of My Life

But that was the easy part. “There’s more.”

Walter looked under the cushions. “Really? More how, what and where?” He bounced on the sofa. “This is the best day of my life.” But his excitement faded when he looked at my face. “Oh, maybe not. We’re not back to the tumor thing, are we?”

“This is about us.”

Color faded from his cheeks, and he took my hand.

“When a shifter finds the one person they’re supposed to be with, they’re fated mates. It’s instant, and we recognize our mate by scent.”

“Okay.”

He must have sensed what I was about to say because he hugged a cushion with one hand and stroked my cheek with the other. He teared up and his bottom lip trembled.

“That’s why I stared at you in the store. You were my fate.”

A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Why was that scary? I love that we are meant for each other.” Again his face fell when he glanced at my hands shaking.

And so I told him about packs and my pack in particular. I spoke of Garrick and how he’d discovered Walter was my mate.

“There have never been humans in our pack, and he refused to allow me to mate.”

“Is that a big deal?”

I wished I could stop and pretend the rest of the story didn’t matter.

“I told him I’d leave the pack, but he said I wouldn’t survive, and even if I left, you’d still be my mate, and he couldn’t have that.”

Tears trickled over his cheeks. “And you didn’t fight for me, you chose to leave without saying anything and left me wondering what happened.” He shuffled to the end of the couch.

“Gods, no. I wanted you, but I couldn’t have you.”

What I had to tell him now would scare him, and this might be what sent him running. And how could I blame him?

“If you were in my life, we would have mated. There was no way we could just be friends or live together. The connection is too strong.”

“Right. Why do I feel as though there’s a but coming?”

I took his hand and cupped my cheek. “He said he would kill you if we mated because that was the only way to solve the problem.”

Walter didn’t speak, and I charged ahead, saying how I left to keep him safe, how I’d thought about him every day and grieved our loss.

“You did all that for me even though it hurt?”

I couldn’t speak as my own tears tumbled onto his fingers, and we both sobbed.

“But before the gala, I decided to change my life by taking charge.”

Walter asked me how, and I explained that I had to remove Garrick as Alpha and take his place.

“L-Let m-me guess. This isn’t a walk in the park, right? Scary stuff would have to happen.”

“Yes.”

14

WALTER

I was still wrapping my head around the fact that Archie was a wolf, fated mates were real and not just things in storybooks, and that I was not only his, but he knew I was his from that first meeting. Although looking back, I did too, didn’t I? That was what all of that eight years of not being able to forget him was about.