Never His Mate: a Rejected Mates Shifter Romance (Claws and Fangs Book 1)
Chapter 16

“What did you say?”

“Not the only option,” I repeat. “I’m here. I can help you.”

And help myself too while I’m at it. Watching him sneak hungry looks at me just now, like I’m a fancy cut of steak and he’s been without meat for ages, I can’t help but notice how achy I feel. How empty. Now that I know what it’s like to be skin to skin with Ryker, I’m starved for his touch. I want him inside of me more than I’ve wanted anything else in my life.

It’s just sex, I tell myself. A biological urge.

Too bad Ryker doesn’t see it the same way.

“No. I can’t.”

“Sure you can. If you’re worried about the chains⁠—”

“It’s not the chains I’m worried about,” he bites out. “It’s how you’ll react come tomorrow. You’ll run.”

I try to make light of it. “How can I? I’m locked down here with you.”

“So? You’ll still run. And I’ll chase you again, like I’ve been chasing you this whole last year. Only you won’t be able to get away from me.”

“You can chase me all you want,” I scoff, some of my nerves from earlier tonight returning. I’ve never once thought that Ryker would hurt me—for Luna’s sake, he didn’t retaliate even when I had my claws stuck deep in his chest—but I have to remember that I’m still pretty defenseless. Sure, he’s chained, but I don’t even have my claws right now. Still, I’m an alpha, and we both know it. “You can’t catch me unless I let you.”

“You don’t get it, Gemma. Listen to me. For once, just listen to me. If I fuck you, I’ll mate you. You won’t be able to get away from me because you’ll be mine. For good. Forever.”

I blink. “You don’t mean that.”

He drops his head again, like he’s too weak to hold it up. “Tell yourself that if you have to, but I’m not lying. You know I’m not.”

He’s right. I do.

But it doesn’t make sense.

“It’s just sex.” With Ryker, it’ll never be just sex, but he doesn’t need to know that. “I know it’s the full moon, but couples mate all the time during the moon fever. We’re down here. We might as well make the best of it, right? I want you.” No denying that after our last time together. “I’m pretty sure anyone will do for you right now in your state. Unless⁠—”

I’m looking at Ryker, but in my mind’s eye I see Trish walking boldly inside of the Alpha’s cabin. Maybe she got the wrong message. Maybe she forgot that Ryker would be in his old cabin tonight instead of the one belonging to the Alpha.

I shake my head. “Forget it.”

He’s miserable, but he’s still an alpha. Peeking up at me through the fringe of his eyelashes, I look into his eyes and see his wolf simmering below the surface. “Unless what?”

It sucks. You’d think that, as a fellow alpha, his command would roll right off of me like water down a duck’s back.

Nope. Not when he uses his pack Alpha stare.

“Unless there’s someone else you’d rather have relieve your need.”

His muscles bunch. It’s the only warning I get before Ryker pulls against the chains in the wall, making them creak. Cinderblock dust explodes from the point where the chains are anchored. He’s not loose, but I get the feeling that it’s only because the powerful Alpha restrained himself just in time.

Okay, then.

He grits his teeth as his predator’s gaze locks on me again. “Let’s make something clear. I want no one else but you. You are my mate. My wolf will accept no other, and you’ll only provoke him by saying otherwise. Do you understand?”

I’m speechless.

He snaps his jaw at me. “I said, do you understand, Gemma?”

“Uh. Yeah. I get it.”

“Good.” He stops pulling against the chains, sinking back down to his corner.

“So… does that mean we’re going to do this?”

Poor guy needs something to calm him down. He just about ripped free from his chains, and if a quick lay will keep him from wolfing out entirely… well, he did say that he doesn’t want anyone else.

“No.”

And then, just like that, he puts another crack in my fragile heart.

“You… don’t want to mate me.”

“No. And if you’re smart, you’ll stop offering. I asked you to stay as far away from me as you can. Do it.”

I almost do. He put enough command in his words to have me drawing away from him, but only a spark of fury at his renewed rejection has me holding my ground.

Damn it, it’s last year all over again, isn’t it?

My eyes are drawn to his bare chest. It’s slick with sweat, heaving as he fights a battle with both of his halves. The wolf that wants to claim me, and the male who gave his word that he’d wait for me to come to him—until I did and he rejected my offer outright.

I don’t understand. I can sense it, and it’s… it’s different than his first rejection, but stronger, too. Undeniable. He means it. I just offered to mate him and he said no.

I can feel it through the bond—but it’s a bond that should’ve shriveled and died when he rejected our mating at the Alpha cabin last May. A bond that’s only grown in the days since he reappeared, and that seemed unbreakable following our first mating.

So while he’s pushing me away now, pushing me away again, the bond lingers.

What the hell is that about?

Biting my bottom lip, I stare at the marks covering his left pec. The five pale slashes settled right over his heart. The first time I saw them, I was convinced he had to have used silver to keep them burned into his skin. Why? Because the other way he could’ve kept them just seemed so… impossible.

But now?

Watching him suffer so obviously, I have to admit that maybe it’s not so impossible after all.

See, to perform the Luna Ceremony, to turn a casual relationship into a permanent mating, it takes three conscious steps.

One: Accept your mate.

Two: Mate. Obviously.

And three: Get the moon’s blessing.

To a shifter, that’s the part that makes the union unbreakable. Sure, accepting your mate—saying yes—is the most important step, but if a mated pair sleeps together during the full moon, you’ll know immediately whether the moon’s blessed your mating or not. I’ve never heard of any union where she didn’t—which was why my mom was careful not to trigger the ceremony while she lived with my bio-dad—and that’s why the actual performance of the words, the promises and the vows so similar to a human’s wedding, is what a pack really looks forward to.

Especially for the Alpha couple.

The act of performing the ceremony is a spectacle. A scene. It shows their fellow shifters that the two mates are choosing each other with the pack as witness. Later, when they’re alone with the Luna, it’s cemented.

Done.

I could fuck Ryker right here and we’d be bonded mates only if we accepted each other first; otherwise, it really is just sex. Honestly, I think that’s exactly what his pack council expects us to do. Why else would they snatch me and bring me here during the full moon of all nights?

I don’t think it was planned. At least, not for tonight in particular. How could it be? Ryker told me that he’s spent the last year trying to track me down, oblivious that I was living in plain sight only a few miles away from Accalia. I was promised to Ryker during his Alpha Ceremony. The way those other wolves probably see it, as soon as I came back, it was my responsibility to fulfill that arrangement.

And look at me. I showed up on the full moon.

Fucking fate or what?

But in order for us to do that, the first step is in accepting the bond. I always intended to once I knew for sure he would take me as his, but I gave up on having a fated mate when Ryker rejected me. As for Ryker, I thought he made himself pretty clear last year—until he showed up with all of that ‘mine’ bullshit.

Maybe… maybe it wasn’t bullshit, though.

I can’t stop staring at his chest, and not for horny reasons, either. Well. Not entirely for horny reasons.

“You didn’t choose to keep those scars.”

That… might’ve been the wrong thing to say.

Ryker’s head snaps up. “Like hell I didn’t. You marked me. They’re mine.”

“That’s not what I’m saying.” How to explain? “I always thought you were holding those scars over my head for what I did to you. I don’t know… like you used silver to make sure they stayed so you could remind me I lost control.”

A spark of recognition lights up his shadowed face. “You thought they were battle scars.”

I did.

It’s an alpha thing. On the occasion that one puts on a show of dominance over another, whether it’s a challenge to lead the pack or to claim a mate, there’s usually a bitter battle. Sometimes fatal, always bloodthirsty, the only marks I’ve ever seen left on a shifter came from a fight—or their mating nights.

If I accept Ryker as my mate, he’ll bite me. That’s what we do. He’ll leave his mark on my skin, warning every other male that I’m taken.

And if Ryker accepts me as his mate, it works the same way. If I mark him—whether with my fangs or my claws—the mark would stay, a clear sign that he’s been taken by another wolf.

A year later, the five puncture wounds from when I threatened to rip out his heart are still there.

They could be battle scars. A handmade shifter tattoo filled in with silver and magic. I’m an alpha who was seconds away from delivering a fatal blow to him. They could be—but they’re not, are they?

“Ryker—”

“They’re not battle scars.”

No. They’re not.

“But why?”

“You’ve always been mine, Gemma. I was just waiting for you to realize that. Then, and only when you accept me in return because you want to, will I take you as my bonded mate. Because once I do? There’s no going back.”

He’s not wrong.

Once a shifter takes a bonded mate, it’s ‘til death do you part with no way out.

I learned a long time ago that supes don’t do divorce. If I mate him, even in the heat of the moment, I’ll be stuck with Ryker for the rest of my very long life.

His pained expression softens. “Shit. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“You didn’t.” Luna knows what I look like to make him think so, but I’m not scared. Not of him, or when I’m with him.

But I am thinking about what he just said.

You’ve always been mine, Gemma. I was just waiting for you to realize that…

Clearing my throat, I scoot out of his reach. When did I get so close? “Um. Maybe I’ll go sit over there again.”

He exhales roughly. “Yeah. I think that’s a good idea.”

Since mating’s off the table and we’re going to be locked down here until the full moon finally loses her hold on us, we eventually come to an agreement. I’m going to stay on the far side of the basement, Ryker’s going to stubbornly hold tight to his chains, and we can revisit the whole “mate” issue when the pull of the Luna isn’t working against us.

It’s a good plan. I know that, come morning, I’d only regret mating him tonight. Sleeping with Ryker is one thing. I spent more than ten years wondering what it would be like to have sex with him, and if it surpassed my wildest expectations, the upside was that there were no strings attached. It was a mating, but we weren’t mates. I could live with that.

But with the moon out and Ryker’s confession that he consciously accepted our bond the night I left the pack—otherwise he never could’ve kept my claw marks on his chest—I finally understand why he seemed so convinced that we were this close to completing our bond. On his side, at least, he chose me, he accepted my mark, and the moon blessed our mating when she made me Ryker’s intended. If we mate down here, all it will take is me saying yes, him marking me, and that’s it. We’re bonded for life.

A year ago, that’s all I wanted.

Then again, a year ago, I didn’t know there was a world out there where I could be Gem. Not Omega Gem. Not Alpha Gem. Just plain ol’ Gemma Swann. I sling whiskey and I roll my eyes at the barhounds’ outrageous attempts at flirting and I like it.

Now? Now I’m stuck in Ryker Wolfson’s basement, the moon doing a number on the both of us, and I don’t know what the fuck I’m supposed to do.

I just hope that they’ll let me go when the sun replaces the moon in the morning. The Luna won’t be so powerful tomorrow night, but after the way the pack treated me already, I wouldn’t put it past them to leave me trapped with Ryker until we’re officially mated.

I want to ask Ryker more about this basement setup. Call me a wimp, though, but I decide it’s safer not to. He’s right. I think we’ve done enough talking tonight.

I don’t know how long we’ve been stuck down here together when, all of a sudden, my wolf rouses herself. I’m feeling a lot less queasy—which just makes me notice that I’m starving, for food, for Ryker, I’m not picky—and my senses are a little stronger. For example, I can just about taste Ryker’s arousal for me in the tension-filled air, and the blood seeping from the cuts left behind from his chains.

Someone else is here, though. I’m almost sure of it.

Up above, I hear the door open before slamming shut again. A shadow falls against the cement floor as boots thunder down the steps. It grows taller and taller as they get closer.

I sniff, hoping that my senses are back to full strength as I burn through the poison in my veins. Unfortunately, all I can get is Ryker, and since he’s resting fitfully against the wall, I know it’s not him.

He’s resting—but not asleep—as he proves a second later when he jerks his head up. “Shane.” It’s a guttural snarl that puts me immediately on edge. “Get the fuck out.”

Shane? Shane Loup?

Ryker’s Beta?

What is he doing here?

He wasn’t there with the others. I would’ve recognized him for sure. He wasn’t there—is he a part of this? Did he know what the other packmates have done?

One shocked glance toward me as he sweeps over the basement and I know that: No. No, he did not.

“Gem, I… when I caught your scent, I couldn’t believe it. And when they told me you were with Ryker⁠—”

He shoots his head over his shoulder, finding Ryker. As Beta, he’s careful not to challenge the Alpha, but it’s gotta be tough. Shane’s fully dressed, wearing boots and, oh yeah, no chains. The full moon makes him look bigger, stronger, while it has Ryker more like a beast. Ryker’s definitely more dominant, but his Beta has the control.

“Ah, buddy. I didn’t know it was this bad.”

“Get. Out.”

That should’ve been enough to have Shane dropping his gaze, turning tail, and heading toward the stairs. But it’s not.

Weird.

I think it has everything to do with that control. Ryker said he was a slave to the moon, but it’s his wolf that’s fighting against him. Instead of being a combined soul, they’re ripped apart and, because of that, his alpha strength isn’t enough to command this beta to do anything.

Thank the Luna.

“Let me out of here,” I tell Shane. I’m already scrambling to my feet. “I want to go home.”

“Gemma, no.”

I’m careful not to look at him as I throw my words toward his corner. “Make up your mind, Ryker. You want me to leave, you want me to stay. You want to fuck me, but you won’t mate me. I… I can’t do this right now. The moon fever isn’t just affecting you,” I confess, glancing at him out of the corner of my eye. “I’m not as bad, but I’ve got to get out of here.”

His heavy-lidded gaze is locked on Shane, but when he speaks, he’s definitely talking to me. “Go. But not with him.”

Seriously?

“He’s your Beta.”

“He’s a male.”

Shane steps between us. Brave wolf, considering we’re two alphas trying to fight against the pull of the moon.

“The others don’t know I’m here. If they catch Gem on her own, they’ll just throw her back to your wolf. Is that what you want? You’re a strong Alpha, Ryker. Are you strong enough to resist her again?”

“Shane…”

He quails just enough that I know he’s not completely unaffected by Ryker. “She can’t go on her own. But, if I leave her with you, can you swear she’ll be safer than if she’s with me?”

I open my mouth. He makes it seem like I have no say in the matter. Like he can stop me if I decide to bolt past him and fly up the stairs toward freedom. Okay. Maybe he can since I’m still recovering, but he doesn’t know that.

Unless they told him about the mercury…

I look from Ryker to Shane and back in time for Ryker to let out a frustrated chuffing sound.

“Take her,” he rasps out. His shifter’s eyes are gleaming, but he sets his jaw and points toward the stairs. “Protect my mate as if she’s your own.”

I don’t know what’s my strongest knee-jerk reaction: tell Shane that I don’t need his protection, or remind Ryker that I’m not his mate. Not yet, at least. Not officially.

Before I can say anything, though, Shane loops his hand around my upper arm, giving my bicep a gentle squeeze. I think he knows exactly what I’m struggling with and, like always, he’s being loyal to Ryker.

I get it. Ryker’s clearly having a hard time of it, and Shane is right. Me staying down in the basement with him is both a taunt and a tease and if I don’t take this chance to get away, I don’t think the chains’ll hold much longer. We don’t have to do this now. It can wait, and I’d much rather finish giving our earlier conversation another shot when I have more control.

Ryker, too.

So, instead of shaking Shane off, I stay quiet.

“Don’t worry, Alpha.” He bows his head in Ryker’s direction. “You can count on it.”

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