Chapter 22
BAILEY
Stacy texted me.
Stacy: WTF?
I’m not in a good state of mind, but it’s the first message she’s ever sent me, so I call her from the bathroom.
“Bailey?” she answers.
“Hey, Stace,” I greet.
“How could you!”
“Huh?”
“How could you use Malachi to make Jase jealous? You’re gonna get him killed!”
“That’s not what I was doing,” I defend, my face flaming hot.
Shit. She shouted at me. Stacy shouted at me!
“Oh, my stars, Bailey! How could you do that? What are you thinking?”
My shoulders slump. Because she’s right. My heart is sinking. Malachi isn’t under a special spell that means Jase can’t touch him. This could’ve gone very wrong. Jase could’ve hurt him. In fact, I think he did hurt him a little by the way he stopped him with a hand to his chest.
I explain myself in a frenzied flurry. “He asked me on a date just before I left for Italy and I told him I’d think about it. I was thinking before all this stuff started with Jase that I would maybe do that, get some practice.”
“I remember, but things have obviously changed.”
“I was planning to tell him it couldn’t become anything serious since they’re all getting ready to move and there’s no way I want to leave the village permanently.
He clearly didn’t hear about Jase so he asked again and Jase was here being all…
all… Jase. Straight outta BookTok. Doing that book boyfriend BookTok lean over the library shelves while I’m trying to ignore him and setting my underwear on fire with the way he talks about what he’s gonna do to me and then Mal showed up and was being sweet and shy asking me out and I was like…
sure, why shouldn’t I go on a date? Sorry, but I’m not in a relationship.
I’ve never even been on a date in my whole life.
I should be dating, shouldn’t I? I’m twenty-five years old for heaven’s sake! ”
“But you are in a relationship!” she exclaims. “With a scary super alpha who could crush Mal to dust for just looking at his mate!”
“I’m not, though. I told Jase I reject him, so why shouldn’t I go on a date? It’s only to Roxy’s, not like anything would’ve even happened.”
“Why shouldn’t you go on a date?” she repeats like it’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever said.
Then she says, “Jase is a super alpha who has been prevented from claiming his fated mate for days, Bailey. Grey said he’s sleeping on your bedroom floor.
He’s following you to work. And that Grey has never seen him this frazzled and angry in his whole life.
He’s right there! This means he’d follow you to the restaurant, too.
Do you really think he’d sit there and watch you have a date with someone? ”
Clearly, I didn’t think that far ahead.
Her voice goes up even higher as she breathlessly exclaims, “You wouldn’t get to eat dinner with Malachi, Bailey, because Jase would eat Malachi for dinner!”
Yikes.
Shit.
I gulp down a swallow and press my head against the wall. She’s right.
She adds, “I wasn’t here but I heard about how Tyson almost killed Mason for just looking at Ivy, never mind them going on a date together.”
“Okay, okay. You’re right. Shit. Shit, I’m so frustrated. I wish I could shift so I could run all this frustration out. Does it really help?”
“Yeah, it does,” she says, her voice gentling a little.
“I’ll phone Mal and apologize,” I say, straightening up, but unable to stomach my own reflection right now.
“He probably won’t take your call. He’s scared out of his mind!
Caroline messaged me and told me she heard him asking Brody just now if they could move up the move date to get to the new land because you agreed to go on a date with him and that now Jase wants to break his legs.
Mal wants out of here as fast as possible because he thinks he’s got two council alphas who want to see him dead. ”
“Two?”
“Grey knew Mal was trying to get… with me. Grey gives Mal stink eye every time they’re in the same space.”
“I’ll send him a text,” I say. “I wasn’t trying to start problems for Mal. I’m not thinking clearly.”
“Obviously not,” she mutters.
“I’m sorry, okay?” I say a little desperately.
“Okay,” she responds softly.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
“What can I do to help?” Stacy asks.
Just like that. She’s let it go.
“Why are you so awesome? I’m being a horrible person over here.”
“You’re not being a horrible person. You’re acting on emotion, which a lot of us do when we’re under pressure or upset. We’ve all been guilty of that. You just have to make sure you don’t put other people in the line of fire while you punish Jase.”
“I’m not punishing Jase.”
When she doesn’t reply immediately, I repeat myself.
“I’m not punishing him!”
“Who are you trying to convince?” she asks.
I blink a couple times before I gulp down a swallow.
“Anyway… I’m gonna just focus on my petition and on this law change.
I’ve started work on it and if I can make it so females don’t have to go through it, then I can request a review on my situation so that the Young coven spell can be extended beyond the three days. I’ll just… I’ll focus on that.”
She says, “But Bailey? This is you and Jase.”
“There’s no me and Jase. I can’t talk about this.” My voice comes out sounding broken. Because I do feel broken.
Shit, I’m about to lose it. Sadness swamps me yet again and I want to just curl up and cry.
“Okay,” she whispers. “If there’s anything I can do to help, let me know. I’m gonna visit Sherry tomorrow. Maybe you could come.”
“Yeah, right.” I scoff.
“No, seriously. You should come.”
“Are you high?”
“Tell her what you’re doing. Maybe she’ll want to help. And maybe she’ll take comfort in the fact that it might be stopped, you know? Her situation is a prime example of how your petition could help, so… maybe it’d be good for her to sink her teeth into something too. Help the cause?”
I grimace at the notion of working with Sherry Creed on anything. But Stacy isn’t wrong. Sherry could be the poster child for why it’s important for female shifters to have some say over being mated to an alpha and being forced to live with an unbreakable bond when it’s the last thing they want.
I could try to get a victim impact statement.
That could strengthen this case. In fact, I should ask my book club friends to ask around and get me a stack of them from other females who’ve had to mate an alpha they didn’t want.
This way the SCC can see what happens when a female gets stuck with an alpha asshole who ruins her life.
“Think about it. I’ve got to go. But… call me if you need anything, okay?”
“Thanks, Stacy.”
“Chin up,” she says.
“Yeah,” I whisper.
I end the call and turn the water off before I type out a reply to Mal’s text that he sent when we exchanged numbers.
I’m really sorry. I wasn’t thinking about how that might put you at risk. I was just trying to live my life. I’m really sorry. Friends?
I wait a minute after seeing the message is read. No response.
I stick my phone back into my pocket and dare to stare at my reflection, feeling shame. Because what was I thinking, expecting a poor beta who barely knows us and who has been through major trauma to circumvent an angry super-alpha denied his rut?
I’m better than this. Or, I’m supposed to be.
I clean my glasses, splash cool water on my face, and tighten my ponytail, gearing up to go out there, ignore him, and get on with the rest of my day.
***
He’s sitting on the rug against the wall with his head in his hands.
I stumble at the sight of him like this, surrounded by books on the rug.
He lifts his head and says, “Not cool.”
I laugh bitterly. “Watching me try to go on a date? How do you think I felt watching you flirt with everything with a vagina a hundred times?”
His expression hardens. “First, I don’t flirt with everything with a vagina.”
“No. I have a vagina and you definitely never flirted with me before. I stand corrected.”
He’s frowning as he goes on. “All I’ve done is live my life.
If you chose to scrutinize and judge me for every second of it, that’s on you.
Second, I didn’t know who my mate would be when I was just goin’ about my business.
I sure as shit ain’t the first alpha to have a sexual history before mating.
And no, I didn’t flirt with you, Bailey.
You’re Grey’s little sister. How do you think that would go over?
But now we both know we’re supposed to be together, should be in my bed right now with our limbs wrapped around one another, my mark on your skin, our scents on one another. ”
He’s shaking his head, looking at me with disappointment, with hurt.
“Knowing I’m your mate, you make a date with that beta?
Put your hands on him in front of me when you made it so I can’t touch you?
If I’d ripped him to shreds like I wanted to, I would’ve been the bad guy.
But whose fault would it have been, Bailey? ”
“Yours,” I state. “You’re responsible for your actions. But how did it feel, Jason?” I demand, bitchily, forcing a smile that feels foreign on my face.
He shakes his head with a disappointed expression.
I add, “I’m not responsible for your emotions.”
He cocks an eyebrow. “But I was responsible for yours before I knew you were mine?”
My heart is beating too fast.