Epilogue
Kylian - Two Months Later
“Why did Kade and Dinah have their hand-fasting ceremony here instead of where they live?” Lana glances at the gathered guests, most of whom are SpecOps shifters from Broken Falls.
“You know, I never asked.” I say, my eyes meeting my mate’s who is standing with my brother Kash.
Erick throws me a wink and tilts his head toward the woods, causing a big smile to spread across my face.
I told him that after years of stumbling upon shifters getting freaky in the trees, I have some fantasies I’d like to explore.
While he’s not down with anyone seeing his mate like that—naked and in the throes of passion—he’s willing to compromise.
What he doesn’t know is that I’m not willing for anyone to see my mate that way either.
“Hey Kylian. I don’t think you met my brother when he was last here.” Cricket walks forward with a near duplicate of himself, except his twin has his blond hair cut a lot shorter.
“Crash.” He offers his hand.
I shake it and smile. “You brought Kash home to us. Thank you.”
“I might have brought him home, but you brought him back.” He says with genuine awe.
“That’s what they say.” We glance in Kash’s direction who raises his beer in salute.
He’s slowly getting better, gaining weight and building muscle, but mentally there’s something off and he refuses to shift, although he speaks telepathically all the time.
No one is pushing him, but I know Erick and Kade are worried.
“Meow.” Lana purrs. “Two identically hot, not related, cats in Fortune Falls? You know I have a sister around here.”
Cricket shakes his head while Crash blushes. “My mate is the stunner in the figure hugging pink dress with an itchy trigger finger.”
Lana frowns and looks at me. “Mated. Figures.”
“But my brother is very single.” Cricket pushes Crash, who stumbles forward a step.
Lana doesn’t miss a beat, hooking her arm into Crash’s and making a show of surveying the crowd. “Let’s find Alyssa.”
Cricket chuckles as she drags him away. “Did I just throw my brother to the wolves?”
“Cats, but yes. I think she might eat your brother alive.”
“Eh.” He shrugs. “It’s good character development.”
Doralee saunters over with her brow raised. “Was she flirting with you?”
Cricket pulls her into his side, his hand hovering low on her hip. “Jealous?”
“Not at all, Kitty.” She gives him a look that promises all kinds of naughty things.
He growls and pulls her flush against him. “You know the rules, babe.”
“Yes I do, but we’re at a wedding, so I guess I owe you one.” Doralee grins and then waggles her eyebrows at me.
I laugh. “Makeup sex?”
“Makeup sex.” She nods.
“Excuse us, Kylian. I need to have a talk with my mate.” Cricket lifts her off her feet and walks towards the vehicles littering our front yard.
“What was that about?” Erick is at my side a second later, but I felt him coming before they left.
Actually, I think I knew the moment he decided to approach.
The bond is like that. I know when he’s close, and can anticipate within a second or two when he’ll walk through the door or around a corner.
He said it was like that for him after he scented me, his bear attuned to my presence.
Embedding our serums in each other solidified and heightened our senses.
“Just Doralee picking play fights with Cricket so he has no choice but to ravage her.” I giggle and turn into his chest, sliding my hands under his sports coat and around his waist.
“I bet he hates that.” Erick’s chest rumbles as his bear purrs his content. “Are we ready to take a walk in the woods, babygirl?”
“Yes, mate.” We walk into the trees and head north of the party, the din of conversations muting until I can no longer hear anyone including the terrorists who have the loudest mouths.
Erick pulls me into his arms and lays a hot kiss on me, his fingers pulling down the zipper on the back of my dress as I climb his body, wrapping my legs around his waist. I’m on the verge of begging my mate for more when a voice I recognize floats through the trees.
We both still, our ears pricked, as my father says, “You came. I knew you would.”
Erick lowers me to the ground and pulls up the zipper on my dress, the two of us adjusting our clothes before walking toward my father’s voice. We don’t speak and we don’t project our thoughts, the two of us seemingly in tune without communication.
What is my father doing in the woods by himself?
Yes, my father was a mighty shifter and Pack Alpha at one time, but it’s been over a decade since he lost his bear, and we don’t trust the wolves of Fortune Falls.
It’s the same reason Karter always nagged me about being escorted by my brothers or the cats when I hiked anywhere, because in my human form with no shifter abilities I was too vulnerable.
Same goes for our father—not that any of us would tell him that.
Pushing aside some brush, I gasp when I come face to snout with a golden brown bear who seems to be waiting for me.
My father looks up from his stool in surprise, “Kylian!”
“Dad?” I glance between him and my mom, sitting in a hollowed out clearing set deep in thick brush. “Mom?”
My mom bows her head, but she doesn’t project her thoughts back.
“What?” I shake my head. “I don’t understand.”
My father looks at my mom and then at me. “Your mother came to see her son wed. Isn't that nice?”
“Nice?” Anger rises in my chest and I take a step back into Erick’s immoveable chest.
“Nice!” I bite out and motion between them. “What the hell is going on, dad? How long has—”
Shaking my head, I turn in my mate’s arms and look into his eyes, needing his love and support before I lose my shit again.
My father and mother are hanging out in the woods two-hundred yards from our house and the family she abandoned.
Erick cups my face and caresses my cheek with his thumb, his eyes lightening as his bear comes forward, calling my own.
I take a deep breath and nod, remembering that while I haven’t forgotten my pain, I chose to forgive them. But forgiveness is a process, as I’m learning right now.
Slowly I turn to face them. “Please explain.”
“A few years ago I woke in the middle of the night and sensed your mother was nearby. When I came outside, I saw and then followed her into the trees—” he motions to the hollowed out brush that I’m realizing might function as her summer den “—and here.”
“Did you get your bear back?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “No.”
“Can you shift back into your human form?” I ask my mom who answers me by laying down and putting her head on her paws.
“So neither of you can shift, but can you at least talk to each other?”
“No, Kylian. We can’t.” My father sighs.
“I’m sorry, dad, but I don’t understand. If you can't shift and you can’t communicate, what are you doing out here? Hanging out?”
“Yes.” He reaches his hand out and runs his fingers through my mother’s fur. She purrs and pushes her head lightly against him. “I still love your mother, even if we can’t communicate. And I believe she still loves me. She loves us. I think she’s been watching over us for a while.”
Tears roll down my cheeks. I’ve never known if I imagined her in the cave or if she used some kind of shifter magick to communicate with me. Maybe it was both.
“Why didn’t you tell us?”
He shakes his head, and my father looks a hundred years old right now.
“What would I have said? Here is your mother, but she can't talk to you, can't hold you, maybe can't understand you.
I don't know how much of her is here, but I think she knows who I am.
I think she knows I'm her mate. I tried to get her to come to the house in the beginning, but she wouldn’t.
That's the only reason why I think she knows who I am, and who you are, and why I don't think she would hurt us.”
“But the boys could’ve shifted and tried to talk to her. Karter, even Kade or Kash when they were home on leave, could have tried. Maybe I can—” I reach behind my back to pull down my zipper.
My mother jumps up and turns, pushing through the brush.
“No, Patricia —” my father pleads “—don’t go.”
“Mom.” My voice breaks on a sob.
She pushes her big body through and pauses, huffing before taking off in a run deep into the trees. I stand there heartbroken, unsure if I should shift and chase after her, or grab my brothers so we can track her down and face her as a family.
Erick wraps his arms around me and puts his chin on my shoulder. It’s only now that I realize my entire body is shaking. “Relax, babygirl.”
My father runs his hands down his face and sighs before picking up his stool and folding it closed. He turns his furiously sad eyes on me. “You have to be patient, Kylian. You have your mate now. You have your bear. Enjoy them.”
“Dad—” my bottom lip trembles “—I just want to help.”
“If she wanted your help, I’m sure she’d figure out how to ask for it.
Our mating bond is broken, but in my heart I feel her.
She’s ashamed, and scared, and Fates knows what else.
I would love to have my mate back, but the reality is we don’t know what it would look like if the Fates blessed us like that.
Perhaps the unknown, or the disappointment, or the shame is worse to her than trying.
I don't know Kylian, but what I do know is I'll take my mate anyway I can get her.
And if that means I'm sitting in the middle of the woods talking to a bear who can't talk back to me, then that's what I will do.”
My father pushes past us and walks out of the woods, alone.
“Are you okay, babygirl?” Erick murmurs in my ear, his arms tightening around me.
Nodding, I turn to face him as he loosens his hold. He swipes the tears off my cheeks and I flash him a small smile. “He’s right. I have you now. I have us. While I’d love to have my mom back, it doesn’t change the last twelve years of my life, nor my future with you.”
“Wise words, but how do they feel in your heart?”
I take a deep breath and check in with my heart and my bear who is surprisingly content. She and I are on the same page now, mated and in love. “It’s good.”
“And your bear?”
“She’s good too.”
“How about we go back to the party, celebrate our friends and family, and then after we get home tonight, you’ll dance for me under the full moon.” Erick bends down and nuzzles my neck.
“You want me to bewitch you again?”
“Babygirl, you bewitch me every day. I’ve been under your spell from the moment I first scented you.”
I melt into him and smile. “And then you’ll ravage me in the woods?”
A low growl rumbles in his chest. “You don’t have to ask me twice.”
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