Unlikely Mates

Startling Revelations

Amanda P.O.V

The scene before me makes me feel uncomfortable; it's as quiet as a tomb. There are hundreds of eyes staring at me with unwavering curiosity down the path. Laura stands behind me; if she weren't there, I would have turn tail and run. I don't like being the centre of attention; it's not in my character. Laura pushes my frozen form forward. I look back at her; hoping she can save me, but she smiles and gestures with her hands for me to continue forward. I nod my head, turn around and stroll ahead. As she said, there is a stage facing the Forrest, at twilight, and there standing beside it is Laura's brother, my captor, Damian.

Damian has dressed up in a beautiful dark suit and tie ensemble; I'd say he looks handsome with his suit and his slick black hair if I didn't despise him so much. 

I reach his evil form standing beside that foreboding stage in record time.

"You look beautiful, my love."

He eyes me up and down like I'm a piece of meat, nodding his head in approval, he holds out his hand to reach for mine. I refuse to hold his hand, for the sake of the sick game he's playing with me. He didn't even have the courtesy of letting me the details of our servant agreement, 'Jerk, Sicko, Nutcase.' I'm insulting him in my mind, so much that I don't notice his hand clenching mine. He pulls me into him; I fight it but, he won't let us part. He bends his neck down, so his lips reach near my ear, he smells slightly of cologne, but mainly pine, admittingly it smells pretty good.

"Play along, if you ever want to see your family again."

He whispers it so faintly only I'm able to hear it. I sigh in submission and agree soundlessly to his words. I do my best not fight him. I smile and lean into his touch as best I can while we walk side by side up the stage, hopefully looking like a convincing couple. Murmurings begin in the crowd; I cannot pick out what each one of the hundreds of them are saying, but I know it has to be about me. I am so nervous right now being in front of all these people. If only for a moment I forget my anger towards him. A growl emanates from Damian as I am standing beside him, still holding his hand. It startles not only me but everyone else into utter speechlessness. Their full attention now on him, everybody is no longer acknowledging me to which I'm very thankful.

"Thank you, everyone, for coming out today, as you all may have guessed I have a special announcement to make."

His mere presence alone is enough to make one submit but his voice, commands respect, 'I kind of like that, ewe gosh no way, what am I thinking, focus, focus.' I punish myself inwardly for thinking such a thing about him.

"I have found someone exceptional, somebody, whom I thought would never show themselves, until now. My mate, Amanda Cartwright." His piercing green eyes burn. He brings our conjoined hands up and kisses mine slowly, using a little tongue. It's somewhat grossing me out how he's doing it, but also feels nice. 'Ah, I did it again, Enough You Stupid Brain.' I mentally slap myself and wordlessly remind myself that he's only doing this for a show, speaking of which I'm so embarrassed I can crawl into a hole and die, not as if he cares anyway. He pulls his lips away and winks at me before surveying the cheering crowd once more. Damian holds his right hand up; the crowd hushes down. The people in this cult seem to respect his authority abundantly, to obey even a hand gesture; it's both impressive and terrifying how much power he maintains over them.

"I introduce her to you all as the future Luna of the Moon blood pack, I assure you when she is of the proper age of eighteen in the next year, we will make it official."

The expansive crowd shows exuberance to his words, 'I have time to get out of this cult before then, I have time.' I close my eyes breathing in and out slowly, but silently, trying to detain myself from a rebuttal of his words.

"Now everyone the sun has set, it is time for us to shift and hunt together as a pack." 

The women with children head off back into the pack house, probably to go home. I watch them walk off; I'm envious; they are allowed to leave when I'm not, 'lucky'. I wrench my hand away from his, this time, successfully, thinking, enough is enough. I twist my body with my back to Damian and start walking off, but something stops me, masculine arms snake around my waist halting me from continuing any further. I don't have to look to know who it is that's entrapping me, I can recognise Damian's disturbing touch anywhere. He rests his head on my shoulder, enclosing what little distance there is between us.

"Don't move. You need to see this."

He lifts his head and twists us around to face what people are still left. I don't believe what they're doing. They're stripping off their clothes, in front of each other, even the women. I don't want to see this.

"Is this what you do around here?"

He chuckles and lets go of me, not answering the question.

"Everybody shift."

In the blink of an eye, cries are heard all over the place. I see body parts changing, morphing into something else, into wolves, 'WOLVES.' I back up not believing what I'm seeing. 'It's only my imagination; it's only my imagination.'

"I told you, you need to see this."

I angle my head in his direction; he's stripped right down to his boxers. He grins, and before my very eyes, his body parts shift and morph into a giant black wolf, towering over me. 'I can't take this anymore.' I feel overwhelmed at this illogical sight. I begin to sway; a feeling of dizziness comes over me. I feel myself start to fall; I close my eyes waiting for the impact. However, I feel a sense of warmth surrounding me instead of the cold floor; I allow myself to slip away into a place shrouded in darkness.

Damian P.O.V

My Beta, who has just returned from delivering my message to her parents, rushes to catch Amanda. I shift back, and put my clothes back on, taking control back from my Jax, my wolf. He's angry at the fact that she's in Eric's arms instead of ours. He wants to rip his throat out for daring to touch his mate. I, of course, don't have much issue with it, considering this is all just a game to me, I don't care about her, but I do want to win her over, so I can successfully triumph in this game and toss her aside before her eighteenth rolls around.

"Help our mate Human, or so help me, I'll disown you."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever Jax." I cut the mind link, 'stupid wolf.'

'Time to play the proper mate, I guess'. I walk over to Eric and take Amanda out of his hold and into mine. Her body is warm and slender, like she may break from the slightest bit of force. I walk off the stage and turn to my Beta.

"I'll be taking her to the infirmary, lead the pack on the hunt, my mates not feeling well."

He nods his head in response and shifts into his grey wolf. They take off, as I walk over to the Doctor's to get my mate taken care of, got to keep up appearances.

The infirmary isn't too far a walk, for me anyway, and the middle-aged male Doctor who runs it is almost always there.

"Evening Alpha, what can I do fo-"

He notices Amanda in my arms. I promptly change my expression to that of concern. Understanding, shown in his change of facial cues, without the need for words.

"I see, bring her in here, I'll take a look."

The Doctor leads us to a private back room. I take her into the well-equipped room that wreaks of that horrible hospital smell and I lay her gently on the bed.

"What happened to her Alpha?"

"I don't know she just collapsed in the middle of the celebration."

I sit on the seat beside her and clutch her warm hands, acting the part of a concerned mate, quite well I might add. Jax's concern, however, is real. The Doctor comes over and touches her, checking for a pulse. I growl at him for daring to make contact with her soft skin, 'wait that growl wasn't me'. The Doctor backs up, apologetically.

"Her pulse is regular; there's no injury or bruising sustained to her body. Has she been dieting at all recently?"

'Damn, I forgot that she hasn't eaten or drunk anything for the last two days. Jax is going to give me an earful now.'

I tell the Doctor that she's been concerned about her weight and that it was her idea to starve herself for a week to lose it, no matter what I said. 'It's a little white lie, but what he doesn't know won't hurt him.' He accepts my explanation, the main reason being he can't argue with me.

"Right now, she needs a long rest; I recommend to keep her here overnight for observation, by one of our nurses."

"Very well."

I accept his recommendation.

"Can I stay with her for the time being?"

I need to stay for a little bit to calm Jax's rage against me and not let him take control as he did earlier; otherwise, this may complicate things.

"Of course, I'll leave you two alone."

The Doctor exits the room, closing the door behind him, leaving me alone with Amanda and one angry wolf.

"How did I get stuck with a heartless bastard as my human?"

He's scratching and clawing trying to take back control, but I won't allow him. I keep hold of Amanda's hands to keep Jax at bay; it seems to work.

"How can you treat our beautiful mate like this?"

"Listen, Jax, I never wanted her in the first place. I will never accept her as my mate, never."

Jax goes silent. I believe he cut off contact with me, an excellent thing too; he was getting on my last nerves.

I take this time to gaze at Amanda's mesmerising sleeping form, taking her all in; 'she's beautiful as an angel when she sleeps.'

"I thought you said you didn't want her."

I hate it when he intrudes on my thoughts.

"Shut up Jax, I don't want her, Period."

I let go of Amanda’s soft hands and depart from the room, Jax whimpers at the loss of contact from our mate, as we exit into the clean, narrow hallway. I don't know what Jax means. I do not find her attractive in the least. I get so deep in thought; I accidentally bump into a nurse in the hall. This incident is a perfect opportunity to prove to Jax that I'm not attracted to Amanda. The nurse wraps her arms around my back, smiling flirtatiously. 'How can I say no to that?' Jax screams in my head.

"Don't you dare."

"Jax stay out of it."

I roughly place my hands underneath her blonde hair, look into her blue eyes,  smashing my lips onto hers, kissing the nurse right there in the hallway. I pull back from the nurse, making sure nobody else saw. I lean down slightly beside her red ear.

"Meet me in my office later; we're going to have some fun."

"Yes, Alpha."  

She nods without indecision, that's how I like them, obedient servants.

I stride away from her and ask the Doctor to assign a nurse to her. I have piles of work in my office to complete, which isn't a total lie, I just don't like doing it, I leave most of it to Eric. Although, tonight I need a distraction. I waltz on up to the top floor and enter my office, finding Eric already there. Eric looks up from his paperwork when he hears me come in. I walk over to my leather chair behind the large desk and sit down.

"Evening Damian, How's Amanda doing?"

If it were anyone else, I would have snapped his neck by now for such disrespect, but Eric's my best friend for all my my twenty years on this earth and Beta as well, I can never hide anything from him, believe me, I've tried.

"It's none of your concern, now how was the pack hunt?"

"It went over well; the meat fell right into our paws."

He knows I don't want to dwell on Amanda, so he answers the question asked of him, although sometimes he doesn't know his limits.

"Oh, before I anything else, here's the written reply to your message that you sent to Amanda's parents, as requested."

He hands the piece of paper over to me. I skim over the page.

"Good they're not going to interfere."

Her parents are smarter than I gave them credit, too bad that didn't rub off on her.

A knock on the door interrupts my thoughts, I know who it is, I can smell her.

"Come in."

The door creeks open, revealing the nurse from earlier wearing a sexy red dress. Eric knows me all too well and exits the room shutting the door behind him, leaving me with my entertainment for tonight.

"Come closer."

She obeys and sways her hips seductively as she walks. She sits on the front of the desk with her back to me. I'm too far from her body to do anything; 'this won't do'. I stand up and walk around the desk till I'm face to face with her, lust evident in her eyes. I grab her hips forcefully and pull her into me, kissing her forehead, and cheeks. Next, I lean in suckling on her neck, smelling of expensive perfume. I pull back, she bites her lips, as an invitation. I'm happy to accept it. I lean into her face, forcing a kiss on her so hard and rough it leaves her panting for air, but still wanting more as I bend her over my desk. 'Moon Goddess, I love being me.'