His Human Mate

Married

Max's POV

What the f**k! I was instantly furious and so was Jack. He was ready to turn and tear the guy’s head off and I was with him. That arsehole has his hands on our mate! In the moment, we didn’t care how many people would see us. I remember that I could already feel my claws elongating and my canines protruding. I had to grip the steering wheel, close my eyes and scrunch my face to concentrate on reigning Jack back in. Breathe. I remember pleading with both of us as my sanity eventually prevailed. She didn’t know I existed. It was not unreasonable for her to have a boyfriend. Finally, I was able to open my eyes and I saw how white my knuckles had turned grasping the steering wheel. I was lucky I hadn’t broken it off. I had been so wrapped up in my own internal struggle that I didn’t realise she had gone. I got out the car, stretched off my legs and looked around. She wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Damn it! I had no idea where she had gone. I couldn’t pick up on her scent. I had no choice but to get back into the car and head back to the pack.

When I arrived back at the pack, I headed straight to my office where I knew Andrew would be waiting. He was there with his mate, Mia.

“How did it go?” He asked.

“I met my mate.” I decided not to beat around the bush. "She works at the university".

“What? That’s amazing!” squealed Mia. “Where is she? I can’t wait to meet her!”

“Fantastic news brother”, Andrew patted me on the back. “Why isn’t she here?”

“She’s human”, I watched their smiles falter slightly as soon as the words left my mouth.

“Oh well that’s ok! It will take some time but she can still be part of this world. We’ll just have to help her adjust,” Mia composed herself and as always, found a positive spin on the situation.

“Tell us what happened”, Andrew sat down in one of the chairs at my desk ready to listen and Mia perched on the arm of his chair and wrapped her arms around his shoulder, both of them watching me attentively. I sighed and moved around to my chair behind my desk. I sat down and pulled out a bottle of whisky and three glasses from my bottom drawer. I poured a generous amount into each and passed them both a glass. I took a swig and explained how I had picked up on her intoxicating aroma when I entered her classroom, how I found her but she hardly noticed me, the agony of having to reign in Jack when we saw another man embrace her.

“So she looked at you but carried on walking? Did she pause at all?” Mia started asking questions while I downed the rest of my whisky and poured another.

“I don’t know, I don’t think so,” I tried to picture the moment in my mind for the millionth time. “I was too busy staring to notice… She might have paused to wonder what was wrong with the crazy man. Why?”

“Well, it’s just that I’ve heard stories of human mates before. They are rare but not unheard of. From what I’ve been told, they can’t feel the bond in the same way as we do straight away, but they do feel a draw to their mate. There will be an attraction. And over time, they develop feelings just as strong as we feel, it just takes a bit longer than the instant connection that we get.”

"Oh," I did feel slightly relived that one day she might actually feel the same way as me. "There is another problem though, I'm pretty sure she has a boyfriend. There was some guy with his hands all over as she left this afternoon".

"Well that might be a small obstacle but he won't get in the way for long brother", Andrew said confidently. "You are her mate, you are destined. You will be together".

"I wish I had your confidence", I just couldn't see how it could all work out so easily. It felt so painful.

"Oo let’s see what she looks like!" Mia burst out excitedly. "She must be on the university website". I hadn't thought of this. All the pictures of the staff were put on the website. I had used it to find a picture of the man I was going to meet today. I hadn't noticed her on it though. Perhaps she worked in a different department, or I just wasn't paying attention when I looked. I can't imagine that I would have missed her though. Mate or not, she was beautiful.

Mia shoved me to one side as she came around to my side of the desk and switched on my laptop pulling it towards her. My heart started to beat faster as she typed in the university URL and started sifting through images of staff members under their "meet our staff" page. She scrolled past the old man from today and carried on. That would be why I hadn't seen her. She was further down the page and I stopped when I found him. My eyes continued skimming the screen as Mia continued scrolling.

"Stop!" Her brown eyes called out to me and her smile made me weak at the knees. "That's her", I pointed at her picture as I continued staring at her face, committing every curve and line to memory.

"s**t, Max."

"What?" Andrew's voice dragged me out of my trance.

"Max, it says Mrs... Is she married?"

"f**k," I rubbed my face with my hands, suddenly feeling exhausted. "I can't do this... She is human, she knows nothing about werewolves or our world. It would take months, if not years, to integrate her and, on top of that, she is married. That's how humans bond with each other. They don't mark, they marry. She has chosen her life partner. It would mean breaking a bond to create ours. It's too much."

Both Mia and Andrew were quiet, a solemn look on their faces. Neither of them argued with me at the time. They let me work through it out loud. I remember that I felt destitute, completely hopeless... Unable to see a way forward.

For the following week, I retreated to my office, skipped training, ignored phone calls, threw myself into random, meaningless work projects. I only accepted visits from Andrew, Mia and a few female friends who had previously helped me waste time. I decided that I couldn't accept the bond and I had to move on. As my destined mate, all I wanted for her was happiness and she had found that before me. I knew it would have been selfish to pursue a relationship with her. I couldn't tear apart her life to make myself happy. But it was so much harder to move on than I had anticipated. I could already feel myself growing weak. When I looked in the mirror, lines had formed on my face, ageing me. I struggled to eat and sleep. My mind was plagued by her. I drank to help drown it out, but it only worked for a short bursts of time.

It was on the eighth day that Andrew intervened.

"Max, you cannot go on like this". He said as he sat in the chair opposite me, having barged into my office to wake me from a drunken slumber, the only sleep I got, induced by whisky.

"I know." I wasn't going to argue. I knew what a mess I had become in such a short period.

"It's not good for you brother, it's not good for the pack. You have got to get yourself together."

"It's harder than I thought it would be", I tried reasoning despite being disgusted with myself.

"I can only imagine how difficult it is. But this is your choice."

"She's married, she has a life, I would destroy all that if I got involved."

"How do you know that you would destroy anything? How do you know that she is happy? How do you know that she doesn't want more? The Moon Goddess chose her as your mate for a reason. You two are destined. There must be a divine reason. There must be something that you can give her that she doesn't have. What if you could make her happier than she could ever be in the life she has now?"

His rant left me speechless and I could tell that he and Mia had been discussing it all week. There was no way they would have wanted me to break up a marriage for no reason. I could tell that they believed that only good could come from it.

"But..."

"No, Max, no more excuses. You don't know. You have no reason not to get to know this woman and try. For the good of the pack. You think it's selfish, but it doesn't just affect you. You are the alpha, it's your duty to run this pack and you have done a damn good job of it so far. So do not f**k it up now just because you are too scared to try. You say that you don't want to break up her life, but I think that you're worried that you can't". I could have been annoyed that he was talking to me this way, but Andrew is my Beta for a reason. He is like a brother to me and he is the only one, other than my parents and Mia, who can get away with being so brash. He's also the only one that always understood.

It's incredible how I still remember his pep-talk word-for-word six months later. That's how long it's been now, since that first day. After this talk, I decided I needed to give myself that kick up the arse. I needed to get to know her. I needed to know what her life was like, how happy she was, before I could decide whether to accept and work on our bond, or whether to abandon it, find a way to reject her and move on.

I listened back to all the voicemail messages I had missed for the week I switched off. Most were from desperate she-wolves that made me want to cringe, but one had me jumping out of my seat. The old man had called me to offer me the job. I called him back straight away, worried that I had missed my chance. Luckily, I hadn't and he invited me to start the following Monday. The rest is history, as they say...

It has been a torturous six months of being close to her and not being able to touch her. But getting to know her has been amazing. We might not be any closer to being together, but I have learnt that she is funny, caring, highly intelligent and would make an incredible Luna. I know that she is married to a wolf, as she often has his scent on her. I don't think she is happy. He definitely doesn't treat her as well as he should. I hate him and think he is a total arsehole. I believe that he is an Alpha as his scent is strong and Alpha's scents are usually the strongest. But I don't think she is a Luna, she isn't marked and she doesn't have the aura. Also, over the months, I have tried dropping hints about shape-shifters and she hasn't picked up on any of them. That begs the question. Why isn't she marked and why isn't she his Luna? Although I am at least grateful for this fact. Claiming a Luna would cause so much more conflict.