Trapped Between Three Fated Mates

Chapter 4: One, Two, Three… Mates?

Zoe’s POV.

I’m barely three feet away when a hand grasps my arm. “Wait, please…”

I jerk away from the touch, shocked at the trail of sparks that erupt where his fingers where before. I turn to face him, mouth open to spout insulting words at him for daring to touch me, but those words hang in my throat and only come out as a constrained groan when I try to speak. His eyes turned a bright gold and its intensity pinned me down, engulfing me from top to bottom.

What was happening? What was this overwhelming feeling of longing and awareness? And what was that thing he called me? Mate?

“Who…?”

“Damien,” Chloe’s voice calls after him, whiny and high pitched, I watch her cling to him with a frown on her face, directed at me, and I suddenly want to drag her away from him by hair.

Wanting to physically harm Chloe wasn’t something that was strange to me, but wishing to do so because she was draped around her own boyfriend was just something else entirely.

I really need to get away from these people.

“What’s wrong, babe?” She asks him, shooting me death glares.

“Who is she?” Damien asks, voice gruff as he looks between Chloe and I in what I’d call confusion.

Chloe glances at me again and scoffs. “She’s my twin, Zoe. She’s pathetic. She was raised her in the mortal world and from what I’ve seen, she doesn’t have any drop of magic in her.” She shrugs.

“She’s…” Damien looks tortured. “She’s my mate.”

Chloe looks surprised at first, pulling away from him to stare at me with even more evil in her eyes. “What? That’s not possible… you must be mistaken…”

“I’m not, I’m sure…” he stares at me as he spoke. “I can feel it, I can feel the bond…”

“No! That’s not possible! You!” She grabs me by the arm and I hiss and jerk her grip away. “What did you do my boyfriend, you b***h?!”

“f**k off Chloe,” I snapped and she screeches and lifts a hand to hit me but Damien stops her and I take this as an opportunity to turn and run as fast as I can in the opposite direction.

~~~

Shit was hitting the fan.

Somehow I’d ended up in the cafeteria, which I found better because I certainly wasn’t attending anymore classes till I figured my s**t out. I skipped the next period and watched with a sinking feeling of dream as the cafeteria slowly became more occupied.

As far as I could see though, neither Damien nor his b***h of a girlfriend were anywhere near here so that’s one thing to celebrate. The next point of action was figuring out what in the holy hells was going on.

Mate? What does that f*****g mean?

“Hey, you!” The cafeteria falls silent and all eyes fall on Chloe as she approaches me. I stand, but faster than my eyes can see her minions grab hold me in place. I wince and try to fight their tight hold.

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

“That’s none of your damn business Chloe, tell them to let me go!”

She snorts and leans over me with a sinister expression. “No, sister. In fact I think they’ll hold you down a little longer.”

“What exactly do you want, Chloe?” I ask, beyond frustrated and tired by her shitty games.

“I want you to stay the hell away from Damien, I don’t care if he’s your f*****g mate, he’s not yours!” She hisses.

I lift a brow at her, unfazed. “I couldn’t give a f**k about your boyfriend, Chloe. Same way I don’t give a f**k about your pathetic threats, I have bigger things to worry about.”

“Thanks for understanding,” she says with a mocking tone, then she hops on the nearest table and clears her throat loudly. Everyone’s eyes were on her at once.

“Hello everyone! I want you to meet my twin, she’s a weakling with no magic abilities and no idea of how things work here, feel free to make her feel welcomed!”

Immediately, the whispers start and my face reddens as the students point and laugh at me. It’s something I’m used to. But, why did it hurt so damn much now?

“Look at that, you’re getting the royal treatment already,” Chloe says with a giggle as she was helped off the table by her girls. “Enjoy your stay in Everbloom dear sister. I hope you have a hell of a year.”

I could scratch her eyes out.

~~~

I keep my chin up as I walk down the hallway amidst everyone’s pointing and chittering. If only Chloe knew what I endured for years in the mortal world, then maybe she wouldn’t think that this little stunt of hers could have any effect on me.

I wasn’t going to let myself be put down, especially for something that was mostly out of my control.

Funny how just this morning I’d felt like I belonged here because for once, I didn’t stand out.

I guess I shouldn’t have celebrated fast.

It took me almost ten minutes to find the back exit of the school. I eye the tall fences that serve to keep students in and strangers out, I step closer while I scan the wall, trying to figure out how exactly I’m going to climb this thing.

Usually I stuck around at school, never breaking rules because I wanted a clean slate in order to get into a good college. But now… I was far from home, far from everything I know, in a whole new realm…

With that thought in mind, I walk along the line of the fence, nearly screeching in joy when I see a side that’s slightly broken. I have a very good grip and I was very light for someone my age and height, so scaling this wouldn’t be much of an issue really.

Hopefully.

I didn’t know where I’d go, of course, I had no friends, no family, no idea where I was, no idea of where I’d even go. But one thing was for certain, I wasn’t going to endure another day of this.

I grip one of the bricks and prepare myself to scale it when someone jumps over it, landing a few feet away from me before I could even attempt to climb. I freeze in my spot and turn my head to see a guy with dark red, shoulder Length hair and dark brown eyes that shone with intent and mischief. Something about his rugged good looks hit me hard in the stomach and I couldn’t bring myself to look away from him. I watched, entranced as he puffed out a breath that was undoubtedly smoke. I knew he wasn’t human, but I didn’t know what classification of supernaturals he belonged to.

He flashes me a smile as he dusts his wrinkled uniform pants, then after scanning my face briefly, he finally speaks in a laidback monotone. “You look very familiar.”

I roll my eyes and scoff. “You might know my twin, people say we look alike.”

He doesn’t bat an eyelid at the irritation in my voice, rather he steps up closer to me, and my heartbeat accelerates.

“I don’t know why, but I’m guessing you’re trying to go over the fence. I won’t tell anyone I saw you if you do the same for me.”

I shrug. “Don’t worry, I have no intention of seeing anyone in there ever again.”

He looks amused. “I didn’t catch your name though…”

“Yeah, that’s an overused line. Bye,” I say with a mere glance over my shoulder at him. Something hot runs through my chest next, urging me to look at him again, and this time, I couldn’t look away, and a heated feeling slowly consumed me, like it did sometime ago with Damien.

Confusion slowly began to dawn on me as I watched him inch even closer to me, mouth agape and eyes wide as he spoke.

“You… you’re… my mate?” He looked stunned, and I looked away from him quickly, stomach clenching as the smell of rain emitting from him hit me right in the face.

Without stopping to think, for the third time today, I take off.

~~~

What was happening?

I pause to catch my breath in a grassy area far off from where I’d left the red headed guy. The sky was a lot darker now and I’m sure the school day is long over, I should be returning to my dorms, but other than the fact that I had no idea where it was I was overcome with the irrational fear that I might run into Chloe or Damien or even worse, the red haired hottie that I encountered when I had been about to scale a fence.

The second guy that was mentioning the word ‘mate’ to me today.

Deciding that I’ve had enough today, I decided that I needed to find my dorm, so I’d stay in there forever, because no way in hell was I going to have to deal with any of those guys or the batshit crazy b***h that was my twin.

Refusing to ask for help to avoid passing on this weird fluke of another person referring to me as their ‘mate’, I took to finding the dorms myself and that took me ages.

On finally sighting it, I heaved a sigh of relief and started to walk towards the building when I trip on a tree branch. I let out a small gasp of surprise and brace myself for what will surely be a painful fall, except before I could hit the ground, a sudden gust of air hits me in the face, blowing my hair out of my face right as I got caught by someone.

I feel it again the moment the pair of arms catches me– the tingles, the sparks, and the firm arms around my waist. I jerked away at once.

My dread fades into fear when I blinked up at him, eyes locked with a pair of blood red eyes which were nearly covered by curly dark hair, not to mention the fangs that are very visible behind his plush lips when he speaks in a low voice. “Are you okay?”

I blink, stunned for a moment, and like clockwork, before I can even open my mouth to say something, I feel it once more– the hot, curling feeling in my chest, the longing, the innate feeling of rightness just from looking at him.

Fuck. f**k. f**k.

“You… you look familiar, but…” His eyes widened in stark shock and confusion, just like all the others. “s**t. How the f**k? You’re… my mate. What’s your name…?”

“I’m not– This has to be a mistake,” I say, the shock of the past two interactions hitting me once again.

“What do you mean you’re not— hey… wait!” He called out when I began to backtrack. I don’t heed to his words, instead I inch away from him even more.

I wasn’t going to deal with this damn thing one more time, and so once again, I turned and ran.

I’m not sure of what exactly was going on, but one thing was very certain, I needed to get the f**k out of this place at once.