Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
Given that most of his statement consisted of, "I don’t remember". It had taken far longer than Mitchell expected for them to summon Penrith.
The mind-reading witch had sifted through his head and made sure Penrith hadn’t left anything out of his statements and that he wasn’t hiding anything.
But he really couldn’t remember. He couldn’t remember much of the time he’d been captured. The doctors said it was a trauma response and that he might remember in time. Why he’d want to remember, he didn’t know.
After the mind reader had agreed that he didn’t remember—nor would she tell him what she’d seen, which was a relief—they called Penrith to the meeting room. Someone had brightened up the place with some shiny red tinsel and a small Christmas tree.
Were the decorations for the benefit of the people doing the interview or for people like him, who sat there answering questions?
“So what happens now?” He glanced at the mind reader. Then, at the wolf shifter who was reviewing this case. Mitchell had been a child when Sam had left the pack. At the time, he hadn’t understood why. Now he did. Sam hadn’t left to become an agent; he’d left because the pack didn’t want gay wolves hanging around.
While Mitchell hadn’t been kicked out, things had been uncomfortable for the last few months, and his parents would be glad when he moved out and put some distance between him and the pack. The Outcast Pack gaining official status had been a wake-up call for all the packs, but that didn’t mean things were going to change in a hurry.
“That depends on a lot of things,” Sam said. Agents were the masters of giving out non-answers, it seemed.
“On what?” Mitchell pressed. They’d gotten answers. Now, he needed some.
“Do you intend on continuing to run with your current pack?”
“What’s that got to do with anything?”
Sam stared at him. “Because you’re a familiar. A gay familiar.”
“I’m not gay; I’m bi.” However, he was more into guys than he was girls.
“The pack leader won’t care about that distinction.”
If he started running with the Outcast Pack, there was no way back from that. It wasn’t as if he could undo the bond either, and if he couldn’t undo the bond, Sam was right. His pack would not be thrilled. Was running with Sam’s pack of gay wolves his best option?
His only option?
When he’d dragged his ass out of bed this morning, he’d been angry at the world, the same as every other day, but at least he’d understood it. Now, everything had spun one hundred and eighty degrees and was unrecognizable. He didn’t know where he fit. For the past two months, he’d been trying to figure that out and doing it without all the facts. He rubbed his hand over his face, not knowing where to begin.
“Just something for you to think about,” Sam said as if Mitchell didn’t have enough to think about.
There was a knock on the door, and then Penrith stepped in. The red tinsel over his head was jarring against his black clothes. He couldn’t imagine Penrith celebrating Christmas. He was far too goth for that.
Fuck, what was he getting himself into?
He was glitter and sequins, and…no, that had been who he was.
Guys like him didn’t end up with the hot goth witch. He had never wanted a grim-looking, black-loving witch, but when Penrith grinned, Mitchell found it hard to take his gaze off the witch’s lips. He blinked and forced the thought aside, not wanting Sam to sense too much.
Mitchell was pretty sure Penrith would have never looked at him twice before the capture. Yet Penrith was looking at him now.
Mitchell reminded himself that keeping the bond was the right thing to do. It would be fine, and they'd sort it out. They had to as they were stuck together with magical glue, binding them tighter than any wedding vows.
Penrith shut the door and walked around the table to sit opposite Mitchell, not next to him.
The hair on the back of Mitchell’s neck stood on end. There was far too much magic in the room. There were far too many people interested in what he intended to do with Penrith. If they’d met in a club, Mitchell thought it was pretty obvious what he would’ve done. Now, he wasn’t brave enough to take his pants off in front of another man unless he were wearing rubber gloves and wanting to check how well he was healing or something equally medical-related.
It wasn’t only his leg. He’d lost so much muscle while being unable to do anything but recover. He made a few half-hearted attempts to go to the gym, but he didn’t want to be stared at, and he couldn’t go back to the place where he used to train.
He hadn’t seen his old friends either. Even though the Coven had given him a lie, he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t go back. He wasn’t that person anymore. He wasn’t sure who he was, and maybe that was partly because of the bond.
Sam nodded at Penrith. “Mitchell is considering keeping the bond.”
“That’s not what I said.”
Sam shot him a glare. “Given that you’ve known about the bond for less than a day, at the moment, you’re considering it. You might find that if you spend the rest of the day with each other, you can’t stand each other. We will review this in a week. Until that point, Penrith, you are on leave?—"
“It’s Christmas Day in a week. No one will be in here to review anything,” Penrith said.
Mitchell was surprised he even knew when Christmas was.
Sam pressed his lips together. “Fine, we will review it on the twenty-seventh.”
“So I’m on leave until the twenty-seventh?”
“Yes, so you can spend time with your mate.” Sam gave Mitchell a pointed glare. “Consider my offer.”
“What offer?” Penrith asked.
“To run with my pack because my old pack will cause nothing but grief for you both.” Sam put a business card on the table and pushed it toward Mitchell. “In case you need to contact someone.”
Mitchell felt Penrith bristling at the implication that he would need to call another wolf for help. That had to be the bond.
Then Sam and the mind reader left the meeting room, and he was alone with his mate.
Penrith leaned back in his seat. “Why did you decide to keep the bond?”
“You saved my life. It didn’t seem right that I fuck up yours.”
Penrith snorted. It might have been a laugh, but it was hard to tell. “Having a mate tends to fuck up lives.”
Ouch. “Look, I’m aware I’m not what you want in a mate.”
“I don’t know you, and you don’t know me, so you can’t make that call.”
Mitchell picked up his cane. “It’s pretty fucking obvious.”
Penrith undid the cuff of his sleeve and pushed it up, revealing his forearm. “You’re not the only one with scars. And you’re not the only one who’s lost someone.”
Mitchell couldn’t take his eyes off the web of scars all over Penrith’s forearm. “What are they from?”
But he could guess since he’d licked Penrith's blood.
“It’s how I use my magic.”
“Oh.”
He rolled down the sleeve and did it back up. “Even in here, they make people uncomfortable. On the street, humans think I need a psych ward.”
“And when you dress like that…” He waved his hand at Penrith.
“Like what?”
Mitchell touched the base of his throat. “And the black and the nail polish.”
Penrith tilted his head. “The pentacle was my grandmother's, and she was a powerful witch. As for the black, it doesn’t show blood. The nail polish is because I fucking like it. Is that a problem?”
Mitchell shook his head. “I used to…it doesn’t matter.”
Penrith lifted an eyebrow. “It does, or you wouldn’t have said anything.”
“I used to paint my toenails.” He hadn’t stopped there, either. When he was performing, he went all out with fake nails and eyelashes. It was fun.
“I’m guessing you like bright colors?”
Mitchell smiled. “I do… I did.”
There was no point now.
“Why did you stop liking them?”
“Because I can’t perform, I can’t dance. I can’t do anything. I’m living in my old bedroom?—"
Penrith stared at him. “So move out.”
“It’s not that easy. I don’t have a job.”
“So stay with me.”
It was said so easily that Mitchell wanted to agree. But he hesitated. “Is that a good idea?”
Penrith gave a one-shouldered shrug. “That depends on if you want to give the bond a chance to be more than magic.”
It took him a moment to work out what Penrith was implying. “You mean you want me?”
“You’re my mate.”
He wasn’t sure how to take that. “You only want me because of the bond. Out of duty.”
“I can assure you?—"
“To save your magic.”
Penrith’s gaze hardened. “You chose to keep the bond. Now I’m telling you I want more than magic between us. I’m offering you a place away from your pack. I am making room for you in my life. Perhaps you aren’t ready to move on with yours. It’s much easier to dwell on the loss and feel sorry for yourself.”
“What do you know about?—"
“I lost my entire family in a car accident. I couldn’t save any of them,” he snapped. “You can wallow and cry about the unfairness of it all, or you start over and get on with it.”
Mitchell swallowed. “I’m sorry.”
Penrith glanced away. “Don’t be sorry. You’re alive, do something with it.”
“Like what? All the plans I had before are gone. I have nightmares most nights. I can’t fucking walk.” And he was expecting this stranger, his mate, to have the answers.
Someone had to have the answers, and it wasn’t him.
Penrith frowned. “What can you do? What do you want to do?”
“I want to move out again.” He couldn’t figure out his future living in the past.
“I have a spare room you can use.”
Was Penrith being polite or trying to keep his distance? He was so hard to read.
Because Mitchell wasn’t used to using the bond, he didn’t know what to look for. Mitchell tried to sense the bits within him that were Penrith; there had to be some.
Penrith watched with a puzzled expression as though he could feel Mitchell rummaging around the magic and didn’t know what to make of his clumsy attempts to use the bond. “The more you play with it, the bigger it will become.”
Mitchell smirked, but he wasn’t sure if Penrith meant the double entendre. “Are you worried I’ll change my mind?”
“Shifters can always change their mind about the bond. They will check up on us to see how the bond and we are progressing and to make sure that you are okay. You don’t need to decide the rest of your life now. Just take the first step. However unsteady that may be.”
“How are you being so pragmatic about being connected to me?”
“I’ve had months to grow used to the idea, and almost twenty years of being an agent has taught me that sometimes you’ve got to wait. I didn’t have this kind of patience at your age.”
“How old are you?” Because he didn’t look that much older.
“I just turned forty.”
He was thirteen years older; blood magic was clearly the secret to good skin. “And you’re single?”
“I split up with my partner six months ago.”
“Can I ask why?”
Penrith was silent for a moment. “It came to a natural end. He wanted something more open, and I didn’t. Perhaps the Fates were already bringing our threads together. What about you?”
“Did it hurt that he wanted other people?”
“Of course it did. I wasn’t enough. But I don’t want to be with someone who doesn’t want to be with me.” He was so fucking calm he could’ve been reading the weather. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“I think the longest relationship I had was a couple of years. We were both performers, and he went to America, searching for his break. He was human and didn’t know what I was, and I didn’t want to move overseas and get approval from the local pack.” They were excuses, that at the time had seemed insurmountable.
“Did he find his big break?”
“Put it this way; there is one TV show I will never watch.”
“What hurts more, that he was successful or that you didn’t go?”
“That I didn’t take the chance.” And there was another one right in front of him. He’d agreed to the bond; the next step would be accepting the spare room. “I’ll take your spare room…but I do need to find a job.”
Penrith picked up Sam’s business card, pulled a pen out of his pocket, and started writing on the back. “Since I’m on leave. I’ll be around. Text me. As for the job thing. I’ll take you down to speak to recruiting.”
Mitchell shook his head. “I don’t want to be an agent.”
“You wouldn’t pass the fitness test.”
“Has anyone ever told you you’re very blunt?”
“No, usually they tell me I am abrasive or cold. Blunt is an improvement.” Penrith put the pen back in his pocket.
Mitchell studied him for several seconds, trying to figure out who his mate was. “I don’t think you’re cold, but I think you make decisions clinically.”
“People die if I make the wrong decision.”
How many lives had Penrith saved over his years as an agent? “I’m glad you saved me.”
“You wanted to live. What else was I going to do?” He pushed the business card across to Mitchell.
Mitchell could think of plenty of different options another agent might have made. But Penrith seemed to have a moral compass that didn’t involve what was best for himself.
Mitchell put the business card in his pocket. It wouldn’t take him long to pack up his things and move. He could tell his parents he was going away with a friend for a few days. Maybe by the end of a few days, they would be friends.
“Do you really want me to use the spare room?”
“No, because it will take me a day to clean it out. But I thought asking you to share my bed was presumptuous. This isn’t a hookup.”
And they weren’t dating either, or were they? “It’s more like an arranged marriage where we now need to get to know each other.”
Penrith snorted. “That’s exactly what it’s like. But I will clean out the spare room, so you can have your own space. It’s been on my to-do list for six months.”
He stood and stretched, then walked around the table. “There is one thing I want to do now.”
Mitchell stared up at him, and his pulse quickened. “What’s that?”
“Traditionally, the bond is started with a kiss.”
“You want to kiss me?” Mitchell swallowed, not sure he’d heard right.
“Is that so hard to believe?”
Yes, it was, mostly because he hated himself and didn’t think it was possible for anyone to want him or to find him attractive. But Penrith was his mate, and maybe the magic was drawing them together.
Penrith held out his hand.
And Mitchell took it. They were already mates; a kiss wasn’t going to change that.
Besides, he wanted to know what Penrith tasted like. Would his kiss be cool and impersonal, or would there be a hidden heat?
He stood, and then they were toe to toe with not much space between them. If he leaned forward, he’d be pressed against the witch, which didn’t seem like a bad idea at all. And that wasn’t only because it had been months since he had gotten laid.
Penrith’s hand was warm around his, but he didn’t pull him close.
“Are you expecting me to kiss you because I’m the shifter?” Now, they were both standing. Mitchell realized he was taller by a couple of inches.
“I was waiting to see if you would.”
Mitchell searched Penrith’s dark eyes for a flicker of heat or desire. He didn’t see it. But he felt it blooming in his chest. That was the bond—the connection they shared because Penrith had used his magic to save his life.
Mitchell lifted his free hand and cupped Penrith’s jaw. Stubble grazed his palm. He ran his thumb over Penrith’s lower lip, then he leaned in and kissed him.
His lips were soft and yielded to the slightest pressure as if he had been waiting for this moment for far too long. Mitchell’s tongue slid over his lip and dipped in.
Penrith grabbed his hip and pulled him even closer so there was no gap or guessing. Against him, Penrith was all hard muscle, and for a few seconds, Mitchell could forget everything that had happened. He existed in the tide of heat and hunger, and he wanted to drown in it. He needed to strip off Penrith’s shirt and feel every inch of him.
It was Penrith who ended the kiss. “Claiming my mate on the meeting room table… is not a good idea…”
No, but it was his idea. He wanted to bite him and mark him. “How much are you sensing through the bond?”
“Enough that it is testing my good behavior…I have been holding my magic back because I don’t know how strong the bond will be if I’m not.”
“So, we get to know each other and learn how to use the bond?”
“Yeah.” Penrith stole another kiss as though he couldn’t resist. If he kept doing that, Mitchell might start thinking he did want to use the table. As it was, he smelled the lust on Penrith’s skin, and it was intoxicating.
Penrith kissed him again, slowly and deeply, as though he wouldn’t have the chance again. With their hips pressed together, Mitchell felt every hard inch of Penrith’s desire.
Mitchell rolled his hips, enjoying the feel.
Penrith groaned and stepped back. “Not here. Every bloody shifter on the floor will smell everything.”
“Right, of course.” This was where Penrith worked, and he would have to see these people tomorrow. Or at least when he got off the enforced get-to-know-your-mate leave.
But they were still holding hands.
And they were still standing too close.
“You should probably take me to recruitment.”
“I should.” But it was another couple of heartbeats before Penrith released his hand.
This time, when he looked at Mitchell, there was a heat in his eyes Mitchell didn’t need the bond to interpret.
And for the first time since being caught by hunters, Mitchell didn’t feel like a broken thing.