Page 5 of Rejected Pregnant Mate

Then she stopped, shoulders slumping. "I can't..." Tears formed in her sapphire eyes. "I think I'm too weak. I don't know what I'm supposed to do... This magic doesn't feel right."

I snorted, which made her glare at me. "That sounds like an excuse, Omega."

"Then why did the spell backfire like this?" Her voice broke on the last word, and she pulled her hands from mine, hiding her face as she started to cry. I winced, knowing that being short with her wasn't helping anything, but I was so messed up inside I couldn't control my mouth. I was angry with her for messing with things she wasn't experienced with, and pissed off that I had to be dragged into the fallout of her mistakes, but I also knew that if I hadn't tried to sneak up on her, then this would have never happened.

I watched her helplessly, not knowing how to comfort her. Standing, I moved around the table, knowing nothing except that I needed to touch her in some way, both to ground her and to quiet the pounding need in me, but Nayeli jumped to her feet and moved away before I could reach her.

"Don't," she held up her hands, shaking her head. "Don't touch me, Scott. I mean it."

"Why the hell not?" I snapped, frustrated with her attitude, with the whole situation, and with the fact that her tears were making me want to gather her close and kiss her until she felt better.

"Because you've made it clear that you want nothing to do with me, and I'm not going to let you confuse me again." Nayeli wiped at her cheeks and glared at me. "I've got too much to deal with now without you trying to play mind games with me again."

"You're right. I don't want anything to do with you, Omega," I said, my voice hard even as my palms started toburn with the urge to feel her skin. There was a buzz in the air, something between us unlike anything I'd ever felt before, and I was drawn to her like a moth to a flame. Nayeli always drew me in, but this was something different, like the start of an addiction. It had to be a side effect of the spell. "But now we're bonded. So what the hell do we do now, Nayeli?"

She swallowed thickly and shook her head, looking just as helpless as I felt. "I don't know."

For a moment, she looked up at me, lips parted, and she took a step towards me. I knew it would feel so damn good to hold her, to quench this new found thirst, and I could tell it was the same for her.

I moved forward, too, all logical thoughts fleeing my brain, replaced by the driving need to have her in any and every way. I wanted to taste her skin, her mouth, that sweet spot between her curvy legs. I wanted to make it known to everyone that she wasmineand that no other wolf was to ever touch her. It was everything I’d been fighting against since I rejected her, and in the cloud of lust I was feeling, I couldn’t fathom why in the hell I hadn’t wanted her.

Nayeli lifted a hand, as if she was going to lay it on my chest, but at the last second, she curled her fingers into a fist and dropped her arm, looking frantic.

"I need some air," she blurted out, skirting around me and heading towards the ladder. "Just...stay here. Don't follow me. I need to think."

Wait—" I said, but it was too late. She was already gone. I groaned, scrubbing my hands over my face, and sat on the cushion in front of the table. It wasn't that I wanted to be bonded to Nayeli, but I sure as hell didn't want to be left in the dark. She didn't seem confident in her ability to undo her spell, but I alsodidn't want to break her trust by going to another magic user and sharing Nayeli's secret. If she wasn't able to figure something out, though, it would have to come to that. I wasn't going to live the rest of my life with some twisted, unnatural connection making me obsessed with Nayeli.

Fuck. I was already halfway obsessed with her before the spell. It had been a shock when I first felt the call of a mate, only to find the cousin of another Alpha at the end of it. I'd known Nayeli before she presented as an Omega, and the bond snapped into place. While I'd always found her sexy as hell, I'd never imagined anything between us.

Then the bond came, and Nayeli was in heat. I wanted nothing more than to take care of her, guide her through her heat, and give her all of the relief she needed, but something stopped me.

I was the Alpha of the Shadowbay pack, and Nayeli was the exact opposite of what I imagined in a mate. She was too bubbly, too talkative, too awkward, and I'd always pictured my mate as someone who could stand at my side and help me lead the pack. My mate was supposed to be polished and composed, not a computer geek who completely bucked the idea of a traditional pack structure.

I'd heard stories of how she'd rejected the idea of being submissive to the males in Samson's pack, and then once Samson and Kiera mated and Samson had gone soft, Nayeli's idea of being equal only solidified. She'd never submit to me, and that confirmed my initial feelings about her. Nayeli wasn't mate material, so I had to reject the bond.

Not before I fucked up and kissed her, though.

Soft and eager, the memory of her lips under mine had played through my head so many times since that night. Andwhile the scent of her heat had made me desperate with need, Nayeli herself had drawn me in, making me lose myself in that kiss. Her scent had bloomed under my touch, ripe and ready, and I'd lost my mind in wanting her. I wanted to pin her against the wall and sink my teeth into her neck as I fucked her, marking her as mine and only mine...

I had to stop my train of thought and remind myself of all of the reasons I wasn't going to be with Nayeli. My wolf snarled, pissed off with my logic and longing to break through and mate her regardless, but I was an Alpha. I couldn't risk a mate that wasn't a perfect fit for my pack.

By the time I'd wrestled my thoughts under control, I realized that Nayeli had been gone for over an hour. I stalked over the trap door and looked down, inhaling deeply. There was no sign, and no scent of her.

Dammit, she'd run off, and I knew she wasn't coming back. She was avoiding me, which was probably the smart move, but it was infuriating. I wouldn't let this thing between us linger on for days. No way. We would get to the bottom of this now, and then she would find a way to break this new bond.

With a muffled curse, I climbed down the ladder and shifted. I had an Omega to hunt.

Chapter 3 - Nayeli

I knew I wasn't acting sensibly, but I just couldn't stay in that damned treehouse with Scott any longer. Or I was going to do something that we both regretted.

I cut through my parents' property, resolutely ignoring the sight of my old home, and kept moving. How in the hell did Scott end up there with me when I was trying to cast the spell? It just didn't make any sense. He'd rejected me as his mate years ago, and while I'd seen him in passing, he'd never sought me out that entire time. But right when I needed to be alone more than ever, he found me in my most secret place?

The universe seemed to hate me, honestly.

As soon as I was far enough away that I thought Scott might have lost my trail, I slowed down, glancing back in the direction I'd come from. He wasn't there, at least not that I could tell. It was getting darker by the second, but realistically, I wasn't in any danger. I might be a terrible wolf, but I was still a wolf, dammit. And this was still the territory that had raised me. I had nothing to fear out here.

Still, I could feel Scott; the connection between us was so strong it was almost tangible. I felt it pull tighter and tighter as I went farther, but I knew my mind wouldn't be fully clear until there was real distance between us, and I needed a clear mind if I was going to have any chance of finding a fix for the botched spell.

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