Page 3 of Delivered to My Beasts
I could hear his footsteps before he came in the door.
“Damn, something smells good.” He approached the oven and opened it, letting a cloud of steam out in the process. “You do have a thing for meat loaf, don’t you?” He chuckled. “Have you seen Crew?”
I ticked my chin toward the office. “In there. Said he had some things to finish out before dinner.”
“I’m gonna go wash up and then I have something big to tell the both of you.”
I looked out the window, wondering what Jax’s news was and saw his truck loaded with furniture. He must’ve completed it. That had to be the news. I shrugged it off and went back to preparing the salad and popped some rosemary garlic bread into the hot oven.
Everyone rolled in for dinner, and we put it all on the table.
“So what’s the news?” Crew asked, dishing out the meat loaf.
“Remember we signed up for the app?” he asked, accepting a plate.
“Of course we remember,” Crew replied.
Jax tugged on his blond hair and shook his head. “Yeah, but did either of you bother checking afterward?”
Crew cringed right along with me. I’d checked the app on and off while I was working but since I’d gotten home, I only checked it once a month, maybe less. We hadn’t gotten any matches. There were lots of messages, but they were from females that we weren’t matched to.
Jax was the one who convinced us to trust the algorithm, whatever the fuck that meant.
“Not a lot.”
“Well, you should be. Today, we got a match. Not only did we get a match, but she messaged us.”
The meat loaf and mashed potatoes were forgotten. Crew and I pulled out our phones while Jax chuckled and dug into his dinner
“Her name is Imogen,” I said, not to anyone in particular. I scrolled her pictures and while I was interested in more than a female’s looks, Imogen was gorgeous.
“What do we do now?” Crew asked, not looking up from his phone.
“That’s up to us. Do we like her? I like her. I think we need to read over her profile together and decide if we should pursue her.”
My bear chuffed inside me, wanting me to not only message her but go find her.
Chapter Three
Imogen
The next morning, I woke up and lay staring at the sunlight pouring through the window. How I’d managed to make it through an evening of pretending nothing had changed, I would never know, but a lot of the credit went to my wolf.
She’d been arguing with me about the mating the whole time, rejecting the idea of mating with Mateo partly because she didn’t like the human side any more than I did, but also because she despised his wolf. I’d never heard of a wolf feeling that way about another in their own pack, but I couldn’t blame her.
The feeling of dread I’d experienced every morning for months was not entirely gone, but it was a little less, somehow. I could draw a deep breath without choking on it at least. And it was a few seconds before I realized what that was. What exactly had changed. And what had not.
Learning that things were not as I’d been told, that I had literally been sold, made it impossible for me to go through with the mating. Mateo had pushed to have me move in with him early and save the marking for the actual ceremony, but between my balking and my father’s concern for something happening to ruin the deal, it hadn’t happened.
And now it never would. In order to break free from the situation I found myself in, I needed to have not only somewhere to go but someone to protect me. Which was why the Beasts were the best choice. But if I didn’t hear back from them by later today, I was going to need to find someone else.
Our pack did not intermarry with other shifters, and in doing so, I would be declared rogue. But since that was likely to be regarded as the least of my sins, I couldn’t bring myself to worry about it. Or care. My father’s betrayal meant I would notbe coming back no matter what. I’d sooner starve to death in the gutter than live a lie.
And boy did it feel good to be able to say that. To admit I’d been going to agree to live a lie. I couldn’t even stand the feel of Mateo’s hand on my shoulder—the idea of sleeping next to him in a bed for the rest of my life? Oh hell no. How had I even thought I’d survive it? And how could my father have so little regard for me as his daughter that he would do this?
Despite my anger or maybe because of it, a tear streaked down my cheek and plopped onto the pillowcase. I swiped at its track and sat up then dropped my feet to the floor and felt around for my slippers. Maybe I wouldn’t be leaving today, but it would have to be as soon as possible. With the event coming soon, some of the pack members had been helping out with things like cooking and cleaning, freeing me up for wedding preparations—which, of course I had been avoiding. I would have liked to check the Mail-Order Matings app, but if I didn’t show up soon, someone would come looking for me, and I could not take a chance on getting caught. My father would make sure I never got away.
How had I ever felt like it was my job to protect him?
