38. Knot Today, Satan
Knot Today, Satan
Present Day
Mash
It was September after the full moon, so of course I woke up with a stiff neck, shivering, naked, and with a rumbling stomach at the top of the ravine. I peeled my eyes open one by one. Cian wasn’t there, which would explain why I was so cold. Perhaps he’d woken before me and gone for a piss.
I twitched my ears in all directions but heard nothing—no peeing sounds, no footsteps on the substrate—only the not-too-distant call of a collared dove, and the slightly more distant thwunking of a woodpecker.
I sat up. Where was he?
Fuck, I wished I could remember what happened last night. Did we fuck? Did we fight? Did I try to bite him? Shit, did I succeed?
Tentatively, I touched my naked asshole. It was dry and not sore. We hadn’t fucked. So why wasn’t he here?
I got to my feet. “BANGERS?!”
Nothing. No response. I ran my fingers through my hair, scraped them down my face. Dried blood flaked away. No deer corpse, though.
Please, please let that be deer blood.
My hands were filthy, and my body covered in mud. I decided to walk back to the marquee. If I didn’t seen Cian by the time I’d dressed, I would send out a search party.
He’s fine. He’s okay. Nothing to worry about. He’s not hurt. I just had to tell myself this a million more times.
The cubby with my name on it housed only my clothes, folded neatly into a little pile with my shoes at the bottom. He’d been here already and removed his things.
My shoulders dropped, a sigh of relief eased from my chest. He was unharmed. Probably needed to get some proper food or . . . maybe he had to wash the crusty blood from his face. He’d never been great at tolerating dirt.
He was back home showering, or cooking, or napping on clean sheets. I was sure of it. I pulled my underwear on, grabbed the rest of my clothes, and jogged to the house.
Nana and Mam were in the kitchen already. Nana sat at the table with a glass of orange juice, and Mam stood next to the stove, bacon sizzling in a pan. My stomach growled furiously at me. I ignored it and continued to my room.
The second I stepped through the door, I knew everything was wrong. His smell still lingered, but it was somehow absent. Lost. Like it was falling away from me. Like a dream minutes after waking, or the imprint of a camera flash on your retinas, or a footprint in the sand under the swelling tide.
Cian wasn’t here, and neither were any of his things.
His books were missing from the nightstand. His toothbrush from the pot. His hipster cedar shampoo bar from the shower. His clothes from the wardrobe and drawers. His suitcase from under the bed. His C.C. wooden chopping board that Mam had made him.
Fuck.
Fuck.
What had happened last night?
“He’s gone,” I said, barrelling into the kitchen, still in my underpants, dried blood still covering my face. “He’s gone.” I was crying.
“Who is?” Nana said.
“Cian. He’s gone. I don’t know where.” Shit, fuck, bollocks, what had I said? He probably hated me. “There’s no note. Nothing.” I scrubbed away the tears with the back of my hand.
“He wouldn’t have left like that,” Mam said, taking the bacon off the heat and turning the gas off. “A mate . . . can’t just leave. It’s not in their nature.”
Oh, boy, here went nothing. I pulled a chair out and sat down. “Mam, Nana, I need to tell you something.”
“Of course, sunshine. You can tell us anything,” Mam said.
Okay, okay, okay, okay. I could do this. I took a deep breath in. Let it out slowly. “Cian and I were . . . never pre-mated. We were faking it.”
I waited for either woman’s reaction. They side-eyed each other but kept silent, obviously waiting for some kind of explanation.
“I only said that we were pre-mated because I didn’t want you to set me up with Dee-Dee.”
Nana’s mouth formed a tight little O, but no words came out.
Sure, they needed more details. “I didn’t want to mate with Dee, because . . . well, because I was in love with my best friend.” My head fell to the table. “So fucking ironic, I can’t even. I’m still in love with him.” My breath fogged on the lacquer.
There was quiet in the kitchen. Nobody spoke, and I couldn’t bring myself to look at anyone. I’d lied over and over again to the people I loved, and I’d fucked everything up in the process. Every fucking thing.
After a few minutes, Mam placed a plate next to my filthy face.
Bacon buttie, with ketchup oozing out the sides. The butter had melted, turning the edges of the bread yellow. I lifted my head, released another sob. They still cared about me. Even though I’d been the worst son, grandson, and alpha successor ever. Even though I had taken everything they valued and loved and shat all over it.
“Eat,” Nana commanded. I took a bite. It was so fucking good.
“Let me get this straight,” Mam said, sitting in the seat between Nana and me. “You told Nana Rita you were already pre-mated so that you could wriggle out of Harvest Fest, but when she refused to let you ditch, you brought him here to pretend to be your boyfriend.”
“So far, so accurate.”
“What was your plan, Mash?” Mam wasn’t angry, obviously, but there was an edge to her voice. One I wasn’t familiar with. “Were you expecting to return to Remy after the holidays? Are you still going back? Don’t forget you promised Nana you would accept the call of the alpha. Mashew, did you really mean that? Or was that another of your inventions?”
I clutched my chest, my hand hitting the spot of my Good Boys Club tattoo. It hurt they thought I was still lying to them, but it was nothing less than I deserved.
“No, I promise I will accept the call. Next full moon, you have my absolute word,” I said. Mam’s shoulders relaxed. “I think I always knew I would stay, knew it was my time. I . . .” Ah, I might as well come clean. “I got fired from my job at uni.”
“Oh, Mash.” Mam’s arms were around me. Her chest heaved with sobs. “Why the hell do you keep all these secrets from us?” She combed my hair with her fingers. Began picking out twigs and leaves and clumps of dirt and placing them on the table. “All you’re doing is delaying your own happiness. Maybe you think you’re protecting us, or yourself, but sunshine, if you’d been honest from the start, we could have helped you with all of this.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
After a few moments, Nana drummed her fingers against the table. “Let’s go back to your shifter mate.”
“He’s gone. I don’t even know what hap—” Wait. Shifter? I stiffened. “How do you—”
“The boy is very good, I’ll give him that. But goodness me, it’s like asking someone to hold their breath for twelve hours a day while maintaining conversations and doing everyday tasks. At some point, he’s gonna slip up. Besides . . . Bane Thornhelm?” Nana laughed, and even Mam joined in.
“Cian has obviously never grown up around werefolk,” Mam said. “When Nana Rita offered him the name Bane Thornhelm it had been, well—”
“Oh my gods, you were testing him from the moment we arrived.” I pushed Mam off me. “And he failed, and you said nothing?”
“Of course we were testing him. You’re the alpha successor. Any mate you choose needs to be worthy. This is the Cassidy pack, after all,” Nana said.
Mam had sensed my irritation. She placed her hand on my forearm and used her thumb to rub away dried mud. “Bane Thornhelm was your Nana’s boyfriend before your grampy. He was . . . what’s the polite way to say . . . stark raving bonkers.”
I allowed myself one moment to become distracted. “Is that the guy with the pergola in the shape of a fanny?”
“That’s the one,” Mam said.
Nana said, “I heard he has a few topiary cocks now.” She looked at Mam. “Probably for balance.”
“Probably,” Mam agreed.
“No, fuck this.” I absolutely was not about to let them sidetrack me with talk of box boxes and privet pricks. “You both knew he was a shifter, but you never said anything?”
Nana closed her newspaper. “At that point, I didn’t know the relationship was a sham. I thought you were trying to convince me, and the rest of Lykos, that the man you love deserves a place amongst our ranks. And . . .” she said, raising her voice so I knew not to interrupt. “Your mother and I were so frightened you might run off again, we were doing everything we could think of to persuade you both to stay here.”
My head was spinning, aching. I wolfed down the sandwich.
“More?” Mam asked.
I gave her my best, most pleading puppy-dog eyes. The effect was probably ruined by the blood flakes shedding from my cheeks.
I needed to get my thoughts in order before I asked Nana my next question. “So . . . it doesn’t matter that Cian’s a shifter and not were? If, say, things were different and he hadn’t run off or didn’t hate me, would he be allowed to stay as my beta?”
Nana took a big inhalation. “You’ll upset a few folks in town for sure, but you’ll be the next alpha. You’ll get to decide who is and isn’t allowed into your pack.”
“My pack,” I repeated.
“Do you remember when I said it was important to accept the call before you exchange mate-bites?”
I nodded.
“That’s because once you’re alpha, your decisions are not as easily contested. If you’d bitten him before accepting the call, you leave the pack open to a power contest. But with you as alpha . . . well, I can’t imagine many people would want to challenge you, Mash.” Nana picked up her coffee mug and tossed back the last few sips.
A bubble of unadulterated hope rose in my chest.
Mam placed another plate in front of me. This time there were two bacon butties on it. “When did you realise you loved him as more than a friend?”
“I guess,” I said, taking a bite of my sandwich and speaking with my mouth full because I couldn’t resist the scent any longer. “I guess I’ve always known something was different about him.”
“Does he feel the same as you?” Mam asked.
I shrugged. “Sometimes I think so, and other times—”
“Of course he bloody does,” Nana said. “I’ve never seen two people more in love with each other. You remind me of your father and Kimmy. He’s obsessed with you.”
My jaw snapped shut. The bacon fell out of my sandwich and slapped wetly against the table.
Nana continued. “Not to mention the scent bond. That isn’t just the smell of any old couple, that’s fated mates right there. You mark my words.”
I looked at Mam, who was nodding her head in agreement.
“Wait, for real?”
“You’d better not let him get away, Mashew. Where would he go?” Nana asked.
I didn’t answer at first. Couldn’t answer. Don’t let him get away, my brain echoed. But also . . . he didn’t want me around. He’d have left me a note, or a message, or something, anything telling me he didn’t hate me.
Damn it, I wished I remembered what happened last night. Wished I at least knew why he left.
“Um, probably Remy,” I said, my mind about four hundred miles away. “Back to his apartment. I dunno. It’s like eight-hours drive.” There was no way he’d have headed to Bordalis. To his parents. Or would he?
“You can borrow my truck.” Mam stood and fetched her keys from the dish by the window. “But first, I really think you ought to have a shower and get dressed.”
I slapped a hand to my jaw and more blood flaked away, drifting to the tabletop like dirty snowflakes.
“I can’t go after him.”
Cian had made up his mind. He’d obviously been considering leaving me for some time.
“You’re holding me back.”
A sickly sensation swooped in my guts. Was that what we fought about? It felt nauseatingly familiar. But why wouldn’t he leave me a note? He’d know I wouldn’t remember the shift. If he was going to run back home, he could at least have told me he was going, even if he didn’t want to tell me why.
Fifteen years and no note.
My best friend, my soulmate, and now my lover, and no fucking note.
He owed me a proper explanation. I couldn’t bear a third rejection, but I needed to hear the words from his lips. Even after he’d rejected me again, I’d be in no worse a situation than I was right now. At least if he told me he never wanted to see me again, I’d have an official answer. I’d have closure. I wouldn’t have to live in this awkward bubble of what ifs any longer.
Because . . . fuck. What if . . .
Fated mates? Fated mates was bullshit, we all knew that.
“Go shower,” Nana said. “In ten minutes you might feel differently.”
Nana was right. I took a shower and got dressed, and the entire time I thought of nothing but Cian. I replayed the moment on Howl’s rooftop over and over, my brain intent on hearing those words again. “You’re holding me back.” Like a branding iron into my flesh.
I pushed them from my mind and made an effort to refocus. Fifteen years and all I could think about was one drunken confession.
I forced myself to remember more. Sitting with him in the branches of an oak on Howling Pines land. “Oaks are my favourite trees too.”
Kissing him by the ravine a decade ago. “Fine, kiss me then, and I’ll know for sure.”
Kissing him on the felled beech by Mam’s workshop. “You’re saying . . . I could scratch my itch . . . on your post?”
Tying bald sunflowers to Zach and Kai’s mating arch. “That’s us, that is. Me and you. Even if everything falls apart around us . . .”
Our twentieth birthdays. “We should get matching tattoos.”
I let my hand fall to my chest. Watched the dirt slide from the pawprint.
I’d made up my mind. I couldn’t let him leave without hearing his reason why.
When I went back into the kitchen, both Nana and Mam were still there. Nana was doing her newspaper’s crossword, and Mam was drying dishes and stacking them up. Dee-Dee had joined them and was standing at the counter, scrolling through her phone.
“I’m gonna do it. I’m gonna go after him,” I said to everyone, but mostly myself. I needed to hear those words out loud.
“Good lad,” Nana said. She beckoned me over for a hug. I obliged, bent my neck so she could pat my head.
Dee looked up from her phone. “Alright, Mash? Good shift?”
“Eh, coulda been better,” I said with a wince.
There was a crashing sound in the hall and Clem burst through the kitchen door. Her hair stuck out at odd angles, her pinafore dress was crumpled.
“We gotta get you guys proper service down here. I’ve been trying to ring you for the last half an hour.” She turned to me. “I know technically I’m not paying your mate, but I really need him today. We’re so understaffed, and the big brunch is in a few hours. I’m up against it right now.” She glanced around the space. “Where is he? In the shower?”
Mam looked at Nana, made an eek face, then looked at me.
I hesitated. “We . . . may have had a fight last night. I . . . don’t remember, but he’s gone. Bags, clothes, everything, gone.”
“What? Oh my gods,” Clem said, wrapping her arms around me the same way Mam had.
“I’m going to Remy to try and convince him to come back,” I said, though my voice betrayed my doubt.
Was that what I was planning on doing? Trying to convince him to come back? My heart shot into my throat at the idea. Fuck, I wanted that so badly.
“Cian?” Dee-Dee cocked her head to the side. “Cian your mate has disappeared? But . . . I literally just got an email from him.”
“What?!” I was on top of her, snatching the phone from her hand before I could finish my one-word sentence. “What did it say?”
She pointedly took her phone back, raising an eyebrow. Her finger flashed across the screen. She cleared her throat and began to read.
“Dear Dylan. I realise this isn’t the most professional way to approach this. Please forgive my intrusion and abruptness.”
“Oh, he’s so polite,” Mam said. She caught my glare, snapped her mouth closed, and “zipped” it.
Dee-Dee continued. She was smiling, but there was an edge to her expression, as though her eyes couldn’t quite match the joy. “But I feel like I’m out of options. I know we talked about this, and you mentioned perhaps finding me a position in your company. I would like to pre-emptively accept any job offer you think might be suitable for me in either your Remy or Bordalis office.”
Mam slapped a hand over her mouth. Clem gasped.
“I feel as though—” Dee-Dee cut herself off. Turned her phone face down on the countertop. “You know what? We don’t need to hear the rest.”
“Yes, we fucking do.” That was Clem.
Dee sighed. She shot me a look etched in apology.
I didn’t want to hear whatever was coming next, but I needed to. It might help me figure out where he went . . . and why he went. “It’s fine. Continue.”
She picked her phone up again. Read from the screen. “I feel as though I have been stagnant for so long. I am willing to accept ANY—any, in all caps—role you may have going. I just need to shake things up.”
Shit, fuck, ouch. Fucking ouch.
“Also, I hope this will not matter too much, but I must be upfront with you. I am not a . . .” Dee rubbed her nose and grumbled the next word as though she were hiding it behind a cough. “Werewolf. I am in fact a”—she fake-coughed again—“shifter, but felt obligated to keep up the act while in the company of the Cassidy pack.” She sucked in a breath, eyes going wide, as she bounced her gaze between the four of us.
Clem bit her lip and stared at me, then Mam, then Nana.
“We already know about the shifter thing,” Nana said.
Dee-Dee released her breath.
“You already knew? Why didn’t you say anything?” Clem said.
“You knew too?” Mam said to Clem.
“Who doesn’t know? That’d be quicker to answer,” I said. I slunk onto a chair, braced my forehead on my hand. Stagnant. “He’s made his mind up.” My voice was quiet, a shadow of itself.
Stagnant. Bordalis.
“You’re holding me back.”
“No, no, no, fuck that,” Clem said. “Dee, when was that email sent?”
Dee looked at the screen of her phone again. “Uh, about twelve minutes ag—ooh, look at this. I have this feature on my business emails that tells me where in the Eight and a Half Kingdoms they’re being sent from. It’s so I can identify scammers before—”
“Oh my gods,” Nana yelled. “Where did he send it from?”
Dee startled. “Lykos! He sent it from Lykos!”
I was already running out the door.
“I’ll drive,” Mam shouted.
“I’m coming too,” Clem said.
“What about the brunch?” I said.
“What about it?” Nana got up from her seat. “I’ve got cereal—enough boxes of Sprite Pops to last an entire winter—and I can get milk here in no time. Those greedy bastards can make do with kiddie breakfast. Every year we put them up, they eat all our scran and bugger off again. These events might be important to our species, but this—” She waved a hand towards me. “Is imperative to our pack. We’ll be fine with cereal for once.”
Mam drove fast, like stupidly fast, and her speed didn’t change once we’d left the Howling Pines estate and hit the main roads of Lykos.
“Where would he go?” Mam asked as she skidded around the corner onto the high street. The wheels on my side of the car rose off the ground, and chunks of untreated wood slid about in the bed of her truck. Clem fell onto Dee-Dee in the back seat.
“Pack Bean,” I said.
Lykos’s only coffee shop. It also sold books. The place was so Cian coded it practically had a neon sign and an arrow. If he’d stopped anywhere in Lykos to make use of the Wi-Fi before heading home to Remy, it would be there.
Mam pulled up outside the cafe, and I threw myself out the passenger door. Clem and Dee climbed out after me, not even bothering to fold the seat forward.
I recognised the barista. “Hey, Jock.”
“Mash, hey, how are you? Good shift last night? You look how I feel.” He laughed.
I laughed too, if only to keep the conversation moving. “There was a guy in here earlier. Did you see him? Probably bought a double-shot black coffee, extra hot. He’s got dark hair, blue eyes, glasses, neck tattoos.”
Jock frowned at me. To be fair, the morning after a shift was always exhausting. Why they were even open this early was beyond me.
“He’ll have asked for the Wi-Fi password, maybe wearing a yellow beanie.” Of course he’d be wearing his beanie. He wouldn’t have had his werewolf ears any more.
“Ah, yeah. Yeah, I remember him. He was here. Sat over there, typing on a laptop.”
My heart rose. I glanced around the shop as Clem and Dee-Dee piled in. Mam loitered by the door. Beyond her, both truck doors were wide open, and three of the wheels were on the pavement.
“Yeah, he left.” Jock gathered air in his cheeks. Tapped his fingers on the counter. “’Bout twenty minutes ago.”
“Which way?” I asked. I didn’t need to ask, though. I already knew.
“South, towards Borderlands.”
“Thanks, Jock.” I turned and faced the women. “Remy. He’s already heading back to Remy.”
“Let’s go, then,” Mam said.