His Lost Mate

Chapter 12

Ares

Freja has been training with King Robert for a few weeks now, and she has learned a lot about her abilities and how to control them. She’s gotten a lot stronger with her training as well. She’s no longer scared to spar with Damon. It’s pretty impressive to watch the two of them train together.

While she trains her mind with Robert, I’ve been searching for Tasha. I don’t believe she’s dead because if she was, we would have heard something from the council by now. Or I imagine Robert would have heard something. I’m currently working a lead from a buddy of mine. He saw her in some shithole bar in New Mexico. Said she looked like hell with one foot in the grave. Tomas thinks if can find her while she’s in this state, we may be able to get any information out of her we want.

I’m surprised she stayed in the US. I half expected her to flee the country, but she may not have the strength to travel too far. The bar she’s been spotted in is off Route 66. It’s a vampire hangout. Vampires and shifters don’t typically like each other, so it’s strange she would be hanging out here. Tomas and I have been here for a couple hours and haven’t seen Tasha yet. I asked a couple patrons if they’d seen her but they said they hadn’t. They both lied. After spending a few more hours in the smoky bar we decided to call it a night.

We got back to our hotel just after midnight. I have one of the bouncer’s a wad of cash and told him to call me if he sees Tasha anywhere, not just including the bar. I hate staying in hotels. The rooms always smell like s*x and the beds are not comfortable. Don’t get me started on the bathroom. I would have slept in my truck but Tomas didn’t think it was a good idea considering we are in a vampire town. So, sleeping on a disgusting, uncomfortable bed it is.

“Dude, just don’t think about it,” Tomas said when he noticed the face I made as I looked at the two beds. “This whole hotel is a health code violation,” I told him and all he did was laugh. I hate being away from home, especially since Freja is there. It was so bad when I didn’t have a mate, but now it just sucked.

My phone started buzzing on the night stand and I looked at the clock. 3:37 in the morning. “Hello?” I answered. “She’s here,” was all the caller said before he hung up. Tomas was up and out of bed before I said anything to him.

We drove back to bar and there’s only a couple cars left in the parking lot. One of them was not there when we left. The bouncer I spoke with earlier pointed her out at the bar. Tomas and I flanked both her sides but she made to point to move.

“Took you boys long enough to find me,” she said, her voice sounding more raspy than I remember. She really did look like hell. She’d lost weight and her eyes were sunken in. She looks like she hasn’t slept in quite some time. And from the smell of her, she’s been drinking a lot. The alcohol tolerance of a shifter is much higher than that of a human. Where a human would be hammered, a shifter might be buzzed.

“Have a drink with me boys?” She asks.

I lift a hand to the bartender and he pours scotch for me and grabs a beer for Tomas. “Where have you been hiding Tasha?” I ask her.

“Oh, here and there,” she says, trying to sound aloof. “I will tell you everything you want to know, as long as you make me a promise.”

“Why would I make any promises to you?” I ask.

“I can assure you, you will have no problem keeping this promise,” she says and turns to look me dead in the eyes.

“Let’s hear it? What promise am I going to keep?”

“I tell you everything and you get to kill me. Put me out of my misery. Deal?” She puts her hand out for me to take her deal.

“You will have to go in front of the council. You’re my proof of the council’s wrong-doings. I can’t kill, at least not until after the council pats for they’ve done,” I tell her.

“You can record my confession. I’m not going back. I want to get this over with so I can die and be with my beloved again,” she says with tears in her eyes. I refuse to feel any sympathy for her. She almost ended my mate’s life. She doesn’t deserve to be with her mate again in the afterlife.

“Why don’t you just kill yourself? Or ask one of these vampires to kill you,” I say.

“You don’t think I’ve tried that?! Something is keeping me here. My body won’t let me die. Every time I’ve tried, my body heals itself no matter what I do to stop it.” She’s obviously not meant to die, at least not yet.

“And what makes you think that I will be able to kill you?” I ask her.

“I don’t know. Maybe my confession will release whatever hold my body has on this earth,” she says.

I lean back to look at Tomas. He shrugs his shoulder, “She may be crazy, but at least you’ll get kill her.” I look back at Tasha and her eyes are pleading with me to take her deal.

“Fine, you have a deal,” I shake her hand to accept. “Let’s get the f**k out of here, it smells like an ashtray in here.”

“There’s a diner up the road. We can go there,” she says. I finish my drink and turn for the door. “You’re riding with me,” I tell her and she nods.

We’re the only people in the diner, which is not surprising considering it’s just past four in the morning. I figure a few old people will stroll in soon though. The waitress is starting to put on new pots of coffee. She brings us all a cup and asks if we want anything to eat. We all decline and she gets back to filling salt and pepper shakers.

“So if you wanted to die, why hide?” I ask her. “Why not just show up at my pack? I would have killed you on the spot.”

“The council has been doing some f****d up s**t for a long time Ares. A lot of it I participated in. But I did not agree with everything they’ve done,” she says.

“But you agreed to kill the blessed wolves. Agreed to torture my mate within inches of her life. That you were okay with? Tell me, Tasha, what were you not okay with?” I’m trying to keep my anger at bay and my voice relatively low but I notice the waitress look over.

“The council isn’t just killing the blessed wolves. They are experimenting on them. They are trying to make some sort of super species. They’ve got a facility where they have blessed wolves as test subjects. I only just discovered this a few months ago. That’s why I won’t go back there.”

“Why does the council want a super species?” I ask.

“I don’t know. I didn’t ask. I was told to capture blessed wolves and bring them to the facility,” she says. “And before you ask, Theo wouldn’t let me bring your mate to the facility. She was his capture and I had no say in what he did with her.”

Hearing her speak about Theo and Freja has my blood boiling. I have to clench and unclench my fist a few times and practice breathing so I don’t jump over the table and tear her head off. I still need her, but as soon as she is no longer useful, she’s dead. We can’t make a scene here. Not in a vampire town. As much as I hate to admit it, vampires best shifters almost every time. They are fast, and their bite is lethal, whereas a shifter’s bite to a vampire only slows them down. A vampire bite to a shifter causes hallucinations, and eventually death if the venom is not extracted, which is very painful.

“I’ve decided to renegotiate our deal,” I tell her. She looks at me confused for a moment, then realization hits her. “No! You can’t take me back there,” she whisper yells.

“Oh yes I can, and I am. Do you really think I give a s**t what you want? You helped the council keep her hidden for years and helped torture her. You’ll be lucky if you get a quick death.”

Freja

“Are you taking it easy on me?” I suspiciously ask Damon after our sparring match. It was way too easy to take him down. He also seemed to be slower. “No, I’m not taking it easy on you. You’re just getting stronger,” he tells me, but I don’t believe him. He hasn’t been himself lately.

“Damon, is everything okay?” I ask him.

“Of course, why wouldn’t they be?” He answers but he’s lying.

“You know I can smell your lie?”

“It’s fine, I’m fine. I’ll kick your ass tomorrow,” he won’t meet my eyes, and it’s not because of my alpha blood. “You know you can talk to me,” I tell him.

“I know, but really, I’m fine. It’s just a bad day,” he says.

“More like a bad month. You’ve been moping around for weeks,” I say. But then it hits me. “You never talked to Claire! You i***t! We had a deal!” He puts his hand over my mouth and looks around to see if anyone is watching us or listening. I slap his arm and he drops his hand.

“Why haven’t you talked to her?“ I ask him.

“I can’t. I’ve tried, but I can never get the words out. And I’m still mad her anyway,” he says. I roll my eyes and punch him in the chest. “Ow, what the hell?!”

“You’re a coward! If you won’t tell her, I will,” I say and turn to go find Claire. She should be at work at the bookstore. It’s the only job she could find. No one wanted to hire her because the pack still views her as a traitor. I had to convince the owner of the bookstore to hire her because I felt bad for her.

“Freja!” I hear Damon call out, but I don’t stop. Claire is going to know how Damon feels one way or another. And apparently it’s going to be me that tells her because he’s too afraid. He’s like a teenage boy; scared to ask a girl out.

I get to the bookstore and before I can open the door Damon slams his hand on the door to keep it shut. “Don’t do this Freja,” he says, his eyes pleading with me. He looks like a puppy. A scared puppy. I can’t help but laugh to myself.

“If I don’t tell her here, I’ll just go wait at her house,” I tell him. I know I shouldn’t be meddling in his personal life, but I can’t help it. “You can walk in there now and talk to her yourself or I will.”

“You are evil,” he says and moves his hand off the door.

“I know, but you’ll thank me later,” I open the door and yell, “Claire, Damon has something to tell you!” She pokes her head up from behind the counter and says, “Huh?”

I push Damon inside the bookstore and he swats at me, “I’m going, you can go now.” I almost push my face against the door to watch him to make sure he actually goes through with it. I just want them to be happy. And I know Claire has feelings for him. I see her watching him when she thinks no one is looking.

I decide to walk back to Ares’ house. As I’m walking I see Ares’ truck driving up the road. He stops when he reaches me and rolls the window down. “You look like need a ride,” he says.

“Oh I don’t take rides from strangers,” I say coyly. He laughs and gets out of the truck and scopes me up into a bear hug. He inhales my scent and says, “I missed you.” He kisses my neck and inhales deep again. His pine scent engulfs me.

“Take me home?” I ask him. “I thought you’d never ask,” he says. “What were you smirking about back there?”

“Oh nothing,” I tell him.

“You were meddling, weren’t you?” He asks suspiciously.

“No,” I say but I know he knows I’m lying. “Fine, maybe I was, but I’m so good at it.”

“You’ve got to stop meddling in other people’s lives,” he says laughing. I shrug because I know I’m not going to stop. I’m too nosey, and I just want people to be happy.

“So, did you find her?” I ask him.

“Yep,” he says.

“Where is she now?”

“At the palace.”

“What’s she doing there?”

“Waiting. We will go there tomorrow and she will answer all our questions.”

“Okay. So she just willingly came back?” I find it hard to believe. Why would she come back here knowing what’s at stake?

“Kind of,” he shrugs. “She didn’t want to come back here but we made a deal. And I kind of changed it. She said she would tell us everything, but she wants me to kill her so she can be with her mate in the afterlife.”

My eyes widen in shock. She wants Ares to kill her. So she can be with her mate. Theo. I don’t believe her. She has to be lying.

“I’m sorry, but, what?!” I say. “She’s lying.”

“She’s not,” he says simply.

“You believe her? Have you lost your mind?” He shakes his around, “Nope, still up there. Baby, she’s not lying. She told me what’s going on. Everything the council has been doing and still is doing. And believe me, it’s pretty f****d up.”

“You really believe her?” We pull into the driveway and before he can say anything, my door is being swung open. I put my hands up to try and stop whatever is about to happen, but nothing does happen. Instead, Elena says, “We need to talk.”

“Holy f**k, Elena! What is wrong with you?! You scared the crap out of me,” I shout at her.

“Oh, sorry. My bad. But we need to talk, right now,” she says and her eyes look crazy.

“Okay,” I say getting out of the truck. I turn back to Ares and point my finger at him, “We are not done.” He puts his hands up and mouths okay as it being dragged by the arm by Elena. She barrels through the door and I yank my arm from grasp.

“What the hell?” I ask, rubbing my arm.

“Sorry, I’m just really mad right now,” she says.

“At me? I didn’t do anything to you.”

“Not you. Tomas. I’m mad at Tomas!”

“Why? What happened? Oh, did he tell you about Tasha? Because I’m pissed at Ares because of that whole situation.”

“No, not that. But the Tasha situation is kind of stupid,” she says. “No, I’m mad because he told me to go back to school. In London!” She’s pacing, just like Ares does when he’s mad or frustrated. But I’m not sure I understand why she’s mad. She came back home on break from her semester. I assumed she would be going back once her break was over.

“Why don’t you want to go back to school? I thought you loved it,” I say.

“I do love it, but it’s in London,” she says.

“Yeah, it is,” I say, still not quite understanding.

“London! A whole f*****g ocean away Freja!” She yells at me. And then I finally understand. She doesn’t want to go back to London because she doesn’t want to be that far from Tomas. “I can’t be an ocean away from him. And why is he so okay with me leaving? Does he not love me?” She starts to cry and I grab her shoulders. She’s taller than me so I have to look up to look into her eyes.

“If you think that man doesn’t love you, then you’re a bigger i***t than Damon,” I tell her and wipe away her tears. Her shoulders sag and she drops her head on my shoulder. She starts to sob when Ares walks in. He looks at her and his eyes turn gold. He’s mad.

“It’s not what you’re thinking. Can you get Tomas here?” I ask him through our mind link.

“Whatever he did, I’m going kill him,” he says.

“No you’re not. Just get his dumb ass over here,” I tell him.

I lead Elena to the couch and make her sit down. “Tell me what happened. What did he say exactly?” I ask.

“He asked me when I was going back to school and I told him I wasn’t going back. He freaked out and told me I was going back. Then he started packing my clothes,” she says, crying so much she almost hyperventilates. It doesn’t make sense. Tomas loves her, he wouldn’t want her to leave. She must be leaving something out.

I’m about to ask her what else he said when the door opens. As soon as Tomas walks in Ares punches him in the face. Tomas covers his nose as it starts bleeding and yells, “Goddammit Ares, what the f**k?!”

“You made my sister cry! What did you do to her?” He yells in Tomas’ face.

“I didn’t do anything. I told her she had to go back to school!” Tomas says. I grab a towel for his nose. He wipes the blood and walks further into the house hesitantly. He meets Elena in the living room and I hold Ares in the foyer.

“Elena, you have to go back to school. You have to finish school. You’re too damn smart to quit,” he tells her.

“Why don’t you want me here?” She asks him softly.

“That’s not what I’m saying. If you would listen to me. You’re just like your brother. Too damn stubborn to listen to anyone,” he says and I elbow Ares.

“He’s not wrong,” I whisper and he grunts.

“I want you here, Elena, but you’re not quitting school. You love it too much. And you only have a year left. I will be here when you get back. I’m not going anywhere. I love you.”

“Why don’t you go with her?” I say before I can stop myself. They all look at me. “Go to London with her. Like you said, it’s only for a year. Take an extended vacation.”

“I can’t leave, I’m Ares’ beta. And what about the council?” Tomas says.

“Ares isn’t alpha yet. And let us worry about the council. We have the king on our side and apparently a crazy woman willing to tell all of the council’s secrets, which I still think she lying about,” I aimed that last part at Ares.

“I can defer my classes,” Elena says.

“No!” Tomas and and Ares both shout at the same time.

“Stop yelling. It’s obviously not getting you guys anywhere,” I tell them.

“I am talk to my advisor about taking some time off. Just until this whole council bullshit is settled,” Elena says. It’s not a bad idea, but I don’t want her postpone her classes and fall behind.

“We don’t know how long that’s going to take,” I tell her. “I don’t want you to fall behind. We can handle the council.”

“I won’t fall behind. Not to brag or anything, but I’m like really smart,” she says, totally bragging. “Im not going anywhere you’re the queen and council is put to rest.” She crosses her arms over her chest, daring me to disagree with her decision.

“You really are your brother’s sister. You two are so stubborn,” I say. Tomas tries not to laugh but he fails miserably. “If you think it’s best, then we can’t change your mind. Talk to your advisor and see what your options are.”

She smiles because she knows she just got her way, like a toddler begging for a piece of cake. Tomas grabs her hand and tugs her to him to engulf her in a hug. She whispers I love you to him and he kisses her forehead.

“If this is all settled, you two go home because me and Ares are going to argue now,” I tell them. They both look at Ares with empathy. They start to walk out of the house and Elena puts her hand on Ares’ shoulder and says, “Good luck big brother.” He grimaces and scoots them out.

“Your sister is exhausting,” I tell him. He chuckles and says, “Not as exhausting as your sister-in-law to be.” He walks slowly to me and I wrap my arms around his waist. I look up at him with my chin on his chest.

“I love you, Ares, and I apologize for the names I’m probably going to call in our upcoming argument,” I tell him.

“I love you too. But can you just hear me out? I haven’t even been able to tell you what she told us. Just let me tell you and then you can decide whether or not you want call me names.”

“Fine, let me hear it,” I say. I sit down on the couch and he sits on the coffee table in front of me.

“Tasha told me the council is experimenting on the blessed wolves. They’re trying to create a ‘super species,’” he say with air quotes. “I’m not exactly sure what she meant by that. I haven’t gotten the details yet. She said her job was to capture blessed wolves and bring to a facility where they are essential lab rats.”

“Lab rat?” I ask

“Yes. I took her to the palace and Robert is holding her in a cell there. We will all sit down with her tomorrow as she confesses her crimes in front of the king.”

“How do you know she isn’t lying? You told me she can lie without being caught.”

“She has no reason to lie,” he starts to say but I cut him off. “No reason to lie? Ares, she’s part of the reason so many of our kind are dead. The reason I was almost killed. Are you really going to put your trust in her? Are you really that stupid?”

“I’m not stupid, Freja. Just listen to what she has to say tomorrow,” he says and takes my hands in his. “I trusted you when it came to Claire. Please trust me with this. Make no mistake, though, I will not forgive Tasha for she’s done. She will die. That was our deal. She tells us everything, and in the end, she dies.”

I blow out a breath. I knew he would throw Claire in my face. I have to trust him, though, he’s my mate. He wouldn’t do something so reckless without good reason. And this is our only chance to get the proof we need to bring the council down. If what Tasha has already told him is true, then this war is going to be worst than I thought. The council creating some kind of super species is not good.

“Okay. I trust you. We will listen to what the b***h has to say.”