He Will Be Mine (New Horizon Book 1)

The Trials Part II

Aly

Once Tyler leaves with Elder Gerard, I try to stick close to Ryan and Mindy hoping that the guys my dad invited for me will leave me alone. It’s not as successful of a strategy as it once was, though, considering that he has Mindy now and no one is fooled into thinking we’re together.

“Elder Gerard being here for only a moment was odd, don’t you think?” I hear a deep, velvety voice speak from behind me as I’m refilling my glass of holiday punch. I can tell he is talking to me by the feel of his breath on the side of my face.

I turn to find that Brent guy standing right behind me. I smile a little, remembering that Tyler used to use the same move. Unfortunately, I can tell from his smirk that Brent seems to think it’s him I’m smiling about.

“No, considering that he is here to see my mate,” I tell him pointedly to give him the impression that I am not as available as my dad may have suggested.

That wipes the smirk off his face.

“Ah, the human. I had wondered about that. It is odd that no one introduced him as your mate, though,” he points out accusingly.

Crap. He’s cleverer than most.

“I haven’t marked him yet,” I admit. “Elder Gerard is here because my mate is determined to prove to my dad that he is worthy of me.”

His smirk returns. “Which is why I’m here. Alpha Kane would rather merge his pack with mine before he lets his precious daughter take a human mate. I can’t say I blame him.”

“Good thing it’s not his decision,” I say, brushing past him and making my way back to Ryan and our other friends.

-

-

Tyler

I wake up in my bed back home, my head throbbing. For a moment, I can’t remember anything that happened or how I got here, but then it all comes flooding back to me.

I failed, and Aly rejected me.

The pain of that realization is too much for me. It’s so much worse than when I learned Matt was her mate. At least then, it was my choice to stay away. Now, I fear she won’t even want to speak to me once classes start back up. I wish I could remember what happened, why everybody got so cold toward me all of a sudden. I let myself cry it out for awhile until it feels like there are no tears left. Then, this feeling of being fed up with being miserable comes over me and I decide to do something about it.

I take my phone from my pocket and wake up the screen to see what time it is. Good, it’s Friday. What’s not good is that the wallpaper on my phone is a picture of us. I throw it at the wall and take some slight satisfaction from hearing the sound it makes when it hits. I know it’s probably broken, but I’d rather pay for a new phone than have to look at that one full of all the reminders of her.

I drag myself out of my bed, not even bothering to shower or change the clothes I’m still wearing from yesterday. I head out to the living room and notice that the apartment is dark and quiet. My mom isn’t here, which makes sense considering that she thought I’d be gone until Sunday. She probably picked up some extra hours at work, which is for the better.

As I lock the door behind me and head down the stairs, I have one destination in mind: liquor store. I am so done with feeling miserable that I’d rather feel nothing at all, so that is my plan for the rest of the weekend. I begin walking the few blocks to the store I have in mind, fantasizing about what all I plan to buy.

I hear a scream coming from a little way down an alley tucked between two buildings about a block from where I’m headed. The sound of it gives me chills and makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I look around to see if anyone else heard it, but no one seems to react as though they did. I take a few tentative steps toward where I heard the sound coming from, just far enough to enter the shadowy region between the buildings and let my eyes adjust to the dimmer lighting so I can look and see if anything seems amiss. I don’t see anything and start to turn and head back the way I was going when something breezes past me and knocks me over.

It takes a moment to regain my bearings after I’ve had the wind knocked out of me. I feel myself being dragged further into the alley, and start screaming and trying to fight off whatever it is so I can get back to my feet. It’s fast and strong, seeming to easily prevent me from freeing myself. I twist so that I can get a better look and realize it’s a person wearing a dark hoodie so I can’t see what he looks like. I kick again, trying to release my foot from his grasp. I can feel the pain from the skin on my back being dragged along the ground, which makes me scream even more. This person seems not to mind.

He stops outside a side door to one of the buildings and works on unlocking it. I kick some more and finally get him to release me. The instant he drops my foot I get up and turn to start running, but he reaches out and knocks me in the back of the head. Darkness overtakes me yet again.

-

-

Aly

Another one of the goons my dad wants me to consider sits beside me at dinner, making me miss Tyler that much more. He says his name is Nick, and though he makes a good effort to talk himself up, I find him utterly uninteresting. I can see why my dad is interested in him, though. He is the fourth son of an Alpha I remember quite well from my childhood, one of my dad’s good friends. I’m sure our dads are excited at the prospect of a deeper connection between our packs.

I can’t keep my mouth from saying exactly what is on my mind, though.

“Why are you even here?” I blurt out finally. “There are three brothers ahead of you on the list of potential Alphas. Why do you need a mate?”

I feel a little bad when I see how his face falls, but I don’t try to apologize or take it back.

“Two actually, since my oldest brother is already Alpha,” he clarifies. “And then there’s his son, just a toddler, but still way ahead of me on the list, as you say.”

“Well, now it makes even less sense,” I grumble, unable to stop myself from continuing to hit him where it so obviously hurts.

“Yeah,” he agrees. Then he sighs and starts playing with the edge of the tablecloth. “I know there’s no chance you’d ever consider me, but I had to try anyway. My mate rejected me, to answer your question. She went with my older brother instead, since he was to become Alpha. So, you’re right. I don’t need a mate. I just want one. You, specifically.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” I apologize finally.

I feel really bad and also embarrassed. I didn’t need to be so rude to him, but I seem to have less and less patience the more I’m forced to meet all these guys my dad picks out for me.

“It’s fine, I get it,” he tries to let me off the hook with a half-hearted smile and a wave of his hand.

“No, it’s really not fine. I’m frustrated with how my dad is always trying to fix me up with people, but I shouldn’t take that out on you.”

He smiles a real smile this time, seeming to appreciate that my apology is sincere.

“If it helps at all, I like you better than most of the guys he picks out,” I tell him, which is true. He doesn’t seem to be as pompous and entitled as the rest. “But I still can’t mate with you. My dad always fails to tell people this, but I have already met my mate. I’m working on convincing him to accept me. And then there’s the other guy, my good friend I kind of have a thing with. He really wants to be my mate, too, and part of me wants to choose him. I don’t have any room left for more options. If I even try to consider you, my head will explode.”

He chuckles at that. “Understandable. I appreciate your honesty, and I get how it’s frustrating. It’s frustrating being on this end of things, too. At least you have options,” he points out, and I realize he is right.

“I hope we can be friends, though,” I add. “I know our dads always have been. I vaguely remember you and your brothers from when we were little. Were you the one with the train obsession or the football obsession?”

He laughs and shakes his head. “Neither. I don’t think we played together much. I was the nerd in the house with my nose stuck in a book most of the time.”

“Oh,” I say, suddenly remembering him.

“Yeah, that one,” he remarks. “The one always getting harassed by his brothers. You always stuck up for me, though. I’ll never forget the time you attacked my brother Jesse because of how he was treating me. He was older and bigger than you, but you didn’t care.”

I laugh and blush slightly as I recall the day he is talking about. “I remember that. I laid him out if I remember correctly.”

“That you did,” he confirms. “And I accept your offer to just be friends. I’d like that.”

As it turns out, I like it too. With Ryan sitting over with Mindy’s family and Tyler gone, I had feared that this dinner would be stupid and boring, but Nick is good company. I stick with him for the rest of the gathering to keep all the other creeps away. We exchange numbers before he goes and promise to keep in touch.

After everyone else clears out and it’s just me, my mom, and some service staff, I really start to miss Tyler and worry how things are going with him.

-

-

Kane

After the last group of guests leave, I can’t fight my curiosity and decide to make my way over to the pack infirmary, which is where Elder Gerard instructed me to prepare a room for him. I have no idea what the trials entail, and before now, have never been responsible for overseeing them, so I don’t know what to expect when I get there.

All the ideas I could have come up with about what sorts of tests could be conducted in an exam room did not prepare me for the reality of it. I knock on the door to the private room and there is no answer. I try the knob, which turns for me, and gently open the door hoping not to disturb whatever is going on inside.

It’s dimly lit in the room, and I see Elder Gerard sitting in a chair leaning over the exam table. Tyler is lying there unconscious with an IV and some monitors hooked up to him. I risk stepping into the room to get a better look and notice that Elder Gerard’s eyes are covered over with white cataracts and he has a hand grasping the top of Tyler’s head. Neither of them move, though Tyler’s eyelids flutter every so often.

I know that Elder Gerard is a rare silver wolf and that silvers tend to possess abilities above and beyond those of other werewolves, but I’ve never seen any of those abilities firsthand like this. I don't know what it is that he can do exactly, but I’m astounded to discover that Tyler’s trials seem to be taking place in their minds. It also occurs to me as a bit of an afterthought that perhaps I’m not meant to see this. Maybe Elder Gerard meant to be discreet about this, and yet the door was left unlocked. If it was supposed to be a secret, he should have locked the door.

Still, I decide it’s better if I give them some privacy since I wasn’t explicitly invited to be here. I turn and leave the room, closing the door softly behind me.

-

-

Tyler

When I wake again, again with the pounding headache, I seem to be in a dingy room in a basement. There’s a big guy in the room with me sitting in a chair near the door and looking at something on his phone. For a moment I wonder if I should pretend to still be asleep, but not seeing any way that it would help me get out of here, I opt for the more direct route.

I attempt to sit up, only to realize that my hands and feet are restrained. Seriously, this week could not get any worse. I regret being the type of guy who can’t just shrug it off when he hears someone screaming. Everyone else seemed to, and I noticed no one came when I was screaming, either.

“He’s awake,” the big guy yells out.

A few seconds later, two other people come rushing into the room. I’m surprised to see that one of them is a woman, and considering her build compared to the others, I can’t help wondering if she is the one who dragged me here. That would be embarrassing.

“I see you recognize me,” she says in a voice that sounds both cheerful and threatening, though I didn’t know it could be possible to be both things at once. “I recognize you, too. I’m sure you’ll try to deny it, but I saw you with Alaron yesterday. And don't bother trying to convince me otherwise. I can still smell him on you.”

She told me not to bother, so I don’t say anything at first. I have no idea who Alaron even is, and most of yesterday is a blank for me.

“Nothing to say, hmm?” she taunts. “That’s too bad. I’ve been looking for him for some time. If you were to tell me what you know, I might be willing to reward you. Your life, for his. That seems fair, no?”

This woman is terrifying, but still, I don’t say anything. I don’t have anything to say, since I don’t know who she’s talking about. I just lie there and silently start praying to everything I can think of that might possibly help.

Before I can even register what happened, she flashes over and looms threateningly above me.

“How did you …” I can’t stop myself from starting to ask, but she cuts me off by cackling at me.

She gets on the bed and crawls over top of me, seeming to slither like a snake. Her being in this close of contact with me makes me shudder, and not in a good way. I realize what she's doing is sniffing me. Once she gets to my neck, she hisses and pulls away.

“The scents of more than one mutt are all over you,” she says disdainfully. “Including a b***h, who I would wager you’re quite close to.”

I realize she means the werewolves, and I find myself feeling outraged that she would call Aly that.

“She’s more woman than you’ll ever be, freak,” I spit out before I can think better of it.

Her eyes flash black and she hisses threateningly, which allows me to see her fangs protruding. Oh man. I just said that to a vampire, I’m pretty sure. I’m also pretty sure that with how I say things before thinking, I probably would have said it even if I’d known.

“Play time is over. Tell me where he is,” she demands, and all the cheerfulness has gone out of her voice. Now it’s just icy and threatening.

“Kill me, if you have to, but I’ll never tell you anything.”

Aly and her entire pack may have rejected me, but I would never do or say anything to put her in danger. Never. Not for anything. Not even to save my own life.

-

-

Kane

The on-call doctor at the infirmary mind-links me only about an hour after I left there, informing me that Elder Gerard has requested to see me. I hope it’s to update me and not to scold me for putting my nose where it doesn’t belong.

Tyler is still out on the exam table when I get there, though the monitors and IV have been removed from him. Elder Gerard is up and about tending to things. He turns to me when I appear in the doorway and motions me in.

“I called you here because I have a question for you,” he informs me. “This young man, he is your daughter’s fated mate?”

I shake my head and explain, “No, she is having some difficulty getting close to her fated mate. This is her close friend. He wants her to choose him instead and decided to go through with the trials because he wants to prove himself.”

“Yes, I thought that was the case. That was what I was told. Only … well, I can’t really tell you much until we’re finished. I’ll just say the boy surprises me, and that doesn’t happen often.”

I find myself smiling at that. For the first time, I actually start to believe the kid could be right.

He starts to stir, and I make my way over to him to help make sure he doesn’t fall as he wakes up. After a few moments he blinks his eyes until they stay open and looks around.

“What happened? Why aren’t you at the dinner?” he asks me. He must not realize how much time has passed.

“He will have no memory of anything that has transpired,” Elder Gerard informs us from where he sits at the desk writing notes.

“Ah, got it. Well, Tyler, you’ve been in here with Elder Gerard for quite a few hours, so the dinner is over now. But if you’re hungry, we can get you some leftovers.”

He looks a little startled by the news, but quickly recovers at the promise of food. “That would be great, actually. And can I see Aly?”

“Of course. She’s been worried about you, so let’s head back inside and go see her.”

“Send him back to me first thing in the morning,” Elder Gerard requests without looking up.