Chapter 94: Tangled up in You

NATALIA

I sit at a small wooden table inside ~Chuck’s Palace~, watching my destined mate ladle a huge, heaping portion of dump stew into a bowl.

He brings it over to me, ducking to stop his head from hitting the several mooncatchers that are hanging from the tarp overhead.

He places it down in front of me, and I pick at the food cautiously with my rusty spoon.

I scrunch up my nose as I take the first bite, anticipating the worst. But instantly my wolf howls with approval.

“This is surprisingly delicious,” I say to Charlie, as he sits across from me.

He clearly agrees. He’s shoveling one bite after another into his mouth.

“That’s the miracle of dump stew,” he says. “It’s different every time, but always tasty.”

He looks up from his plate and watches me closely as I take another bite. Under his gaze, I can feel my cheeks flush with heat.

“What?” I ask. “Is there something on my face?”

“No, no,” he says. “Not like I would care if there was.”

“Then what is it?” I say.

“I just can’t believe that ~you~ are my mate. You’re nothing like I imagined.”

“Really?”

~That makes two of us.~

I wonder if he’s disappointed with who I am. Or what I look like.

I self-consciously smooth out my hair and bat my eyelashes.

“You’re more beautiful than I ever dared to hope for,” he says.

I melt at his words as relief washes over my body.

He’s also nothing like what I expected—and he’s entirely gorgeous.

It’s taking everything in me to not lead this burly man over to his mattress and have my way with him.

I can’t believe I’m even having thoughts like that, but our destined mating bond is just so powerful.

I feel a desire for him that I never did for Xavier.

“Natalia,” he says suddenly. Then he stands up and begins pacing around the small hut. “I should be honest with you about something.”

~Oh Goddess…~

~I’m not sure if I can take any more surprises.~

He takes a deep breath. “This is not the first time we’ve been in the same room.”

I force myself to stifle a gasp.

~Did he actually see me that day too?~

“I was working a shift down at Fred’s Grocers when I smelled your delicious scent,” he says. “Strawberry and brown sugar.”

He stops pacing in front of me. “At first whiff, I knew my mate was somewhere in the store. I ran up and down the aisles like a madman searching for you. You were already gone.”

I take another bite of stew to avoid eye contact with him.

He keeps talking: “I searched the pack for you. And when I couldn’t find you, I quit my job and went traveling to all the nearby packs looking for you, too.”

~The clerk did say he had gone on a trip…~

~Was he really looking for me?~

“Again, I had no luck,” he says. “But I still couldn’t get your scent out of my head. That’s when I remembered something my mama used to say to me when I was a little boy.”

“What’s that?” I ask nervously.

“She told me that if I ever get lost and can’t find my way home, I should stay in one place and wait for her to come to me.”

He grabs a mooncatcher off of the table and sits down next to me.

“So I set up this little house in the forest, where the energy of the spirits burns brightest. And I spent my time each day weaving these mooncatchers, praying that someday a moonbeam would guide you here.”

He places the beautiful piece of art in my hand. The thread surrounding the moonstone is silvery. Practically iridescent.

“This is the one that I was weaving today. This is the one that finally brought you to me.”

“This… You made these all for me?” I ask, my voice shaking.

“Everything I’ve done since that fateful day…it’s all been for you, Natalia,” he says. “And it worked. I stayed in one place, and, by some miracle, you found me.”

My heart is racing.

~I don’t know what to feel.~

On the one hand, I’m giddy at the idea of this man’s devotion to me…

But on the other hand, I’m terrified of what he would think if he knew the truth.

A moonbeam didn’t guide me here.

~Not at all.~

I’ve known his identity for years and chose to be with someone else, just for the status.

How could he forgive me if he knew that I wasted so much of his time?

My eyes lock with mine.

He’s waiting breathlessly for me to say something.

So I do.

“Goddess bless the moonbeam that led me to you,” I say.

My wolf cries inside me.

She hates that I’m lying to him.

I hate it too.

But what other choice do I have?

I’m not ready for him to despise me…not yet.

He takes my hand and presses it to his juicy lips. He kisses it and drinks in my scent.

“My strawberry and sugar,” he whispers. “My moonbeam.”

The electricity of his touch charges me up with desire.

If he can make me feel this good with just a kiss on my hand…

~But no.~

I’m getting ahead of myself.

There’s still so much I don’t know about him.

And so much he doesn’t know about me.

He doesn’t know that I’m a liar.

And he doesn’t know that I have a child with another man.

Just then, my cell phone rings.

“Excuse me,” I say, pulling my hand back from him and ruining the moment.

I reach into my little bag and check the caller ID. It’s my father.

“Wow, phones sure look different than they used to,” Charlie says.

“You don’t have a ~phone~?” I ask incredulously.

“Don’t really see the point of them…”

~It’s official: we’re polar opposites.~

I’m laughing when I answer the call, but I instantly stop when I hear the sound of my father’s voice. He’s definitely been crying.

“What’s the matter… What happened?” I ask.

“It’s Alex and Ariel,” my father says.

My heart stops.

“What happened?”

“They’re missing.”

“What? How?”

“We think their plane crashed…”

“I’m coming home right away,” I say.

I tap the phone, hanging up.

My head is spinning.

I can’t make sense of the words he just said to me.

All I know is that I need to get back to the palace. Now.

“Charlie, I’m so sorry. I need to go. There’s been an accident.”

He looks up at me with wide eyes.

“Are you sure that you didn’t just ask your friend to call you with some emergency because you were disappointed with me?”

“No—no…of course not, I just—it’s my sister. She’s in trouble. I need to get to the Royal Pack.”

“Okay then,” he says, standing up and taking my hand. “Let’s go. I’ll drive you.”

“No it’s fine—I’m fine—”

“Natalia, you’re shaking. You‘re in distress. You shouldn’t drive.”

“But—”

“Please let me, Natalia,” he says. “You just found me. I’m not ready to say goodbye yet.”

~Can I really bring this relative stranger with me back to the palace?~

~With his huge beard and his disheveled hair?~

~What will my mother say?~

But then I remember…

None of that matters.

Nothing except finding out what happened to Ariel and Alex.

“All right,” I say. “Let’s go. Fast.”

“My truck’s just up the road,” he says. “And you ain’t getting anywhere fast in those shoes.”

He sweeps me off my feet again, then starts running out the door toward a rusty old truck that looks like it hasn’t been touched in years.

ARIEL

I want to run to Alex—to cut him down from his prison of webs before they cover his face entirely.

But Fate is perched between us, blocking my path to him. I need to deal with her first.

“Why do you want me to be with Xavier?” I ask as her jet-black eyes pierce mine. “Why?”

“I have allowed my sister to reign supreme for far too long now,” she says with a sinister smile.

“Why does that have anything to do with me? Why does it even matter to you who I’m mated to?”

“Because you are ~Ariel~,” she sneers. “You are ~special~. Or at least that is what my sister must have decided, since she intervened and gave you those miraculous healing powers.”

~Oh Goddess…~

~I see where this is going.~

“All of werewolfkind will see the magic of the Moon Goddess through the miracles performed by their queen. And they will all continue to praise her blindly forevermore,” she says bitterly.

Suddenly, I understand. I’m trapped in the middle of a sisterly feud—something I’ve had plenty of experience with in my relationship with Natalia.

We were able to resolve our issues. But it seems this one has been going on for centuries.

“There are things that you do not know about my sister. Dark things,” Fate continues. “Join with Xavier, and see what greatness is in store for you. Instead of letting her use you like a pawn in her scheme while pretending that it’s all in the name of ~free will~.”

“I’m sorry, Fate,” I say. “I’ve made my choice. I’m with Alex now.”

“But every choice has consequences,” she says.

“Is that a threat?” I ask her, trying to steady my wavering tone.

“It is the truth, my child.”

Glancing past Fate, I see that the webs are starting to cover Alex’s mouth. If I stand here talking even a moment longer, I might get a glimpse of what consequences she has in mind.

~It’s now or never.~

I shift into my wolf, the cracking of my bones echoing through the cavernous, dungeon-like space.

I bound over the eight-legged form of Fate and dig my claws into the cocoon entrapping Alex. I pull him down to the ground with a large, painful-sounding crash.

Using my claws, I tear through the rest of the webs surrounding his body.

When Alex is nearly free from the webs, he shifts into his wolf.

~“That way,”~ he mind-links to me, pointing his snout toward a passageway leading away from here.

“So this is how it is going to be?” Fate calls out to me. “You refuse me before I have even illuminated the truth for you? You will run back into my sister’s manipulative arms?”

~“Selene never tried to hold me captive like you’re doing right now!”~ I call back in my mind.

With that, I run after Alex down the nearest passageway.

Fate chases us. I hear her many legs scuttling across the ground, following us furiously.

“You have made your choice, Queen Ariel,” she taunts me. “Now let us see if you can live with the repercussions.”

Her words chill me to my core.

But I don’t look back again.

I just keep running.