Mated to the Enemy

Chapter 4 - Jokes

— Jet —

It smelled like I was still in the forest, but the ground wasn’t as hard as I remembered it being from all the other times I’ve slept outside. I could have sworn that it was the blood moon and I was trying to get Ralph to find his mate, but my mind was addled between feeling comfortable and like I had the hangover from hell. Moving my shoulder, I winced before remembering I had been injured escaping the Blood Crest pack’s enforcers.

Damned wolfsbane.

“You should rest more,” sweet words stirred me further, making me do the opposite of their suggestion. I bolted up right, and soft fingers trailed off my face. I blinked realizing that I had been lying on her lap, and a quick assessment of the room told me that we were in an empty bedroom. There wasn’t even a single chair.

I looked back to the woman, still sitting there watching me with a flushed expression and her hands clasped over her eyes. Her red hair was pulled back, but I could tell this was the woman from before I passed out. Inhaling her scent, she was the reason why this room smelled like the forest. An overwhelming pressure built up in my chest that made me want to get closer to this woman. To stay away from her felt wrong, and yet touching her was the farthest thing from what I wanted to do.

Well, the farthest thing from what I should do.

I didn’t come to the blood moon to claim my own mate.

But that’s what she was.

For f**k’s sake the goddess sent me a mate.

I shook my head.

I didn’t have time for this.

She cleared her throat and waved one of her hands around swatting in my direction. I grinned to myself now that I could see that it was because I was standing stark naked. That wasn’t the usual response females had to me, my alpha aura was usually enough for any she-wolf to be excited by my nudity, but I didn’t make it a habit to show anyone my human form when they could see my face.

There was a small coat at my feet, that I picked up and covered myself with. A flimsy piece of fabric, and hardly large enough to do much, but she finally peeked out from her fingers and sighed in relief.

I bristled at her reaction to me. Why didn’t she feel the same attraction I felt towards her? She was my mate, but she didn’t reach for me, and didn’t want to see me naked. Most people who find their mates can’t stay away, and try to claim them immediately.

Was the moon goddess f*****g with me?

Maybe she wasn’t really my mate at all, and I was more severely affected by the wolfsbane than I thought.

Once I made sure Ralph had his own mate then I would be gone anyways. Killing the fae that murdered my pack was all that mattered. Having a mate was only a distraction… and I knew it was a suicide mission. There was no returning once I found a way through the portal.

Turning to the door I reached out for the handle and she spoke again, “It’s locked. This whole room is surrounded in silver bars. In the drywall, and on the other side of the door. The Blood Crest pack is pretty progressive in their humane holding cells. You won’t touch the silver directly, but if you try to bash your way out then you’re in for a rude awakening.”

“How do you know this?” I narrowed my eyes at her.

She shrugged. “I was conscious when they brought us here. I'd worry more about that nasty infection on your shoulder than whether you can get out of here or not."

"I'll heal," I assured her, while catching myself against the door as my vision blurred. Whatever they injected into me was more than I had recovered from before.

She lifted a brow as if she were waiting for me to eat my words and fall on my face. I was an alpha born from an alpha she-wolf, a rare blessing that made me quite a bit stronger than a typical alpha. If this was what killed me then the goddess had a sick kind of humor to take me before I fulfilled my duty to avenge my pack.

Those green emeralds stared back at me and she smiled.

"You're a lot less possessive when you're more lucid."

"Excuse me?" I rubbed at my head trying to dull the sharp pain.

"You can stop pretending." She sighed and pushed herself up to standing.

My heart hammered in my chest wondering if she felt the same thing I did stuck in a room with her scent. I've heard different things about the mate bond, that sometimes one wolf will feel it before the other, or some don't feel it until it's a blood moon, or even not until they touch.

Did she know that I was her mate?

"I know you're in a lot of pain," she finished, and I breathed out my nose in an exhausted huff. She didn't know, which only served to irritate me instead of giving me the relief I was expecting.

Was that how the goddess was playing things? I was gifted a mate that wouldn't recognize me as hers? I should be happy that I can walk away from her without feeling the need to reject her so that I didn’t drag her with me to Faery one day, but I wasn’t.

I was pissed.

Even a growl rumbled in my throat, which would have frightened most except there she stood with her hands on her hips and shaking her head at me like I was a child. When she grabbed my arm from the wall, and let my weight stumble over her shoulders, I was too shocked to stop her as she guided me back to the ground to sit.

“No need to be all macho, we’re both stuck here for a while,” she said teasingly. I inhaled her scent from the top of her head, and closed my eyes for a moment letting the sensation of home wash over me. I hadn’t felt like there was a place that was mine since childhood, and where ever she was, felt like my new home. Even her touch on my skin was comforting, and if I wasn’t so damned out of it from wolfsbane, I was sure my wolf would be wrestling me for control right now to claim her. Instead, I settled for resting my back against the wall, and pulling her against my chest. Without meaning to I was already nuzzling my face into her hair, and was that a moan?

I coughed to try to hide it, and changed topics to distract her, “It’s a blood moon still, isn’t it?”

She nodded, and it pleased me that she didn’t attempt to wiggle herself free from my hold.

“Then, it’s unlikely anyone will come for us tonight. They’ll finish the ceremony, and everyone will be drunk, and enjoying themselves.”

“Like I said, we’re both stuck here for a while,” she agreed, but there was a hint of humor to her tone. I had this overwhelming urge to say something funny just to hear her laugh.

But, I wasn’t like Ralph. Jokes weren’t easy for me.

He’d say I was too serious for them, but I was merely highly motivated to find the fae that killed my mother.

Awkwardly I added, “For every howl there is a moon in the air…” I cringed I my own stupidity at trying to joke with her. A moon in the air… what the f**k was I thinking? And then she chuckled. Next her hand came up to cover her mouth, and she launched forward laughing.

I guess I wasn’t as bad as I thought?

“That was the worst joke I’ve ever heard,” she said through heaving breaths between laughter.

I blinked, but my arms remained around her despite her rollicking from my horrendous attempt at humor. Going slack, I released her and she finally turned around to face me as I glared at her. But I couldn’t hold my anger when she looked at me with those emerald gems, and her beautiful smile shined at me.

Refusing to smile back, I had my dignity at least, what little was left after that joke.

“Moon in the air,” she repeated, and snorted through her nose. “Because their asses are up.” She slapped her knee, and at this point I knew she was laughing at my own expense and not because of the joke, but because I had said it.

“Are you finished?” I grumbled.

“Are they?” She laughed some more, making an innuendo about the presumed asses in the air from the joke.

“I hardly think they began…” And I couldn’t help a smirk watching how she couldn’t catch her breath. Even if the joke was bad, it still got the result I was going for, and she even placed her hand on my knee to brace herself, forgetting all about the fact that only a small jacket was between us. I realized now that it was most likely her jacket, and that it would be odd for most werewolves to need one on a Blood Moon.

That thought escaped me as her hand moved once more, and it sent heat up my thigh to my loins. Even without my wolf, she was driving me insane. Instincts were just under the surface telling me to claim her, and without the wolfsbane I didn’t know what I would have done just now.

There was a silence between us, signaling that she could tell the shift in the atmosphere. She bit her lip, a nervous habit of hers perhaps, but it wasn’t helping matters. It was taking all of my control to keep myself where I was, unmoving. Her green eyes traveled down before stopping and quickly popping back up to meet my heated gaze. She slowly peeled back her hand, and cleared her throat.

“Sorry about that,” she said while scanning the room as if there was something fascinating on the empty walls, but she paused at one corner where I saw a blinking light.

A camera…

We were being watched.

With her back to the camera she whispered, "They expect us to mate."