Enticing Their Mate (Pack Wars #6)(29)

Here she’d thought Riley was the controlling one. He was right, though. “I have a pizza in the freezer. Will that do?”

Jay smiled and pleasure shot through her. Her hormones must have taken over her thought processes.

“Perfect. I’ll help.”

“There’s not much to do.” It had been a long time since she’d shared the kitchen with anyone other than her assigned roommate. “If you get the pizza out of the freezer and put it on a tray, I’ll fix us some decaf.”


“Sounds good.”

Once the pizza was in the oven, Jay pulled up a chair at the small kitchen table and sat down. “What do you know about shifters?” His tone sounded casual, but from the way he’d glanced to the side, he had a hidden agenda.

She hadn’t expected that question. “What do you mean?”

“Beside the fact we can shift into wolves and heal fast, what do you know about us?”

“The usual. In your human form, you can be as good or bad as regular humans.”

He leaned back in his seat, his jaw tight as if he wasn’t sure how to bring up some werewolf secret that had been handed down from one generation to another. “Do you know that we mate for life?”

The words mate and life had her stomach tumbling. She’d always avoided the whole idea of marriage, or as he would say, mating, but this time, the churning was different. “It’s not a topic I’ve discussed with anyone in detail, but I have heard of it. Remember, the shifters I’ve encountered aren’t exactly looking for a permanent relationship. They’d just as soon kill you, sell you, or f*ck you to death than take you for a mate. Excuse my language.”

He winced then pushed back his chair and came toward her at the counter, his eyes full of concern. “We’re not like those men.”

“We?”

He scrubbed a hand down his stubbled chin. “I don’t even know how to begin this conversation, so I’ll just say it. You’re my mate. And Riley’s, too.”

Her vision turned white and she grabbed the counter. “I’d better sit down.” Jay led her over to the table and held out the chair for her, her questions running rampant. “What exactly does it mean that you and Riley are my mate? As in both of you? And shouldn’t I get a say as to who I want to be mated with?”

His face actually turned a slight shade of red. “Fuck. I’m sorry. I didn’t explain it very well. Yes, you do, only we don’t.”

“Huh?”

“That coffee ready?”

Oh, crap. “Yes.” She stood, and with shaking hands and a mind that couldn’t stop spinning, she poured two cups. “Cream or sugar?”

“No, thanks.”

She carried over the drinks and placed them on the table then sat down again. “Go ahead. I’m ready to hear this, I think.”

“All I can tell you is what I’ve been told and what I feel. Once in a werewolf’s life, someone, something, or perhaps it’s just fate, puts a woman in front of us that we immediately know is our mate. As soon as I saw you, my body reacted and started to change.”

“It’s called lust.”

He smiled and then shook his head. “I’ve been in lust before when I was much younger. Trust me, this was more than that. A sense of protectiveness took hold of my heart and bonded me to you.”

As sweet and flattering as the words were, he had to be mistaken. Then again, she’d seen how Ford and Tyson Summerville had risked everything for Bailey. “You said Riley has these same feelings?”

“Yes, and that scares him. I believe that’s why he ran. But I know him. He won’t be able to resist you for long.”

She doubted that. “While every person is different, exactly what is he afraid of? That I won’t accept him?”

Jay twisted the steaming cup in his hands. “It’s complicated. His mom was sixteen when she became pregnant and gave him up for adoption.”

Because Sarah had worked with human trafficking for years, she’d seen the horrors of what happened to kids when they were separated from their mothers. “I’m sorry.”

Jay shrugged. “He was adopted by a family for a few years, but the first time he shifted, they freaked out and returned him to Children’s Services. The problem was that no one believed them that he’d shifted. The parents were told their mind was playing tricks on them. In the end, the parents said they just didn’t want to have such an odd child. From there he went from foster home to foster home. When he became of age, he joined the Marines in part to get away from all that crap.”

She sucked in a breath, her heart bleeding. “How did he end up at the FBI?”

“Riley doesn’t talk much about his past, but when he finished his time with the Marines, he was recruited by the Bureau.”

Sarah tried to put all the pieces together. “So what you’re saying is that Riley might know I’m his mate, but he doesn’t trust me not to abandon him?”

Jay’s brows rose. “You’re perceptive. I can’t be sure, but that’s what I believe.”

She sipped her now ready-to-drink coffee, and the rich brew soothed her. “Let me ask you this. What if I don’t want a mate? Or rather two mates?”


His eyes darkened. His expressive face truly was a window to his soul. “The woman always has the choice to say no, but that doesn’t change the fact we’ll never be able to be with our true mate then. We only get one chance.”