Chapter 1
Going home after spending the evening with Sharon, Kendrick decided that he’d move to any place that she wanted and damn the fact that he had a pretty good practice right now.
Being a doctor of good standing, he knew that he could get a job anywhere and be happy so long as she was.
It was his life’s mission to make his mate happy in every way possible.
Boy, did he sound sappy right then, and he had to laugh at himself.
His brothers would be teasing him forever about how they’d met.
And he found that he was all right with that as well.
She’d been working when he’d gone into the gas station to thank the owner for letting him leave his car parked in their lot all day.
He’d been hanging out with Conri and Cass for the day at Rainersville for the big traders/swappers days they had every year, and had asked to park his car there rather than drive behind them.
As it turned out, he was glad that he had as Sharon, Sharon Taylor had been hurt on the slicer and needed fifty-four stitches when the meat she’d been slicing had fallen over, and the slicer had cut her up badly.
Taking her to the hospital in an ambulance, he’d gotten rooked into staying until three in the morning, helping with other patients that had come in from all kinds of ailments after spending the day out in the sun.
Taking a nap in the hospital so he could drive home, he had stopped into the gas station again to make sure that Sharon was all right.
He didn’t know immediately that she was his mate, but it didn’t take him long to ask her out.
They had pizza for their first date, and he couldn’t have been happier. When her wound was suddenly healed from his touching her, he knew then without a doubt that she was his mate. His healing her sort of sealed the deal for them, he thought.
Now that he was home and working, he wanted to close up shop and go to see her again. They had talked a great deal when he’d been with her, but nothing earth-shattering. She told him she was as poor as a church mouse, and he told her that she didn’t have to worry about money ever again.
“I will forever worry about money even if I have a billion dollars.” He told her how sorry he was for being so flippant about money.
“Just keep that in mind, as well as I’m not going to be a kept woman.
I like to work. Not as hard as I am right now, but I don’t think I could stay at home and be pampered for the rest of my life.
” She looked at him before speaking again.
“Okay, that’s not true. I could be pampered by the right person, but I need to make sure that I don’t become as large as a house waiting for my husband or whatever to come home to me. ”
“You’ll never gain any weight unless you’re breeding or having children.
Nor will human illnesses claim your life.
I only need to claim you as my mate so that you’ll live a very long and hopefully stitches-free life.
” She laughed, and that was what he’d been hoping for.
“Also, no matter if you’re on the pill or other kinds of contraceptives, you’ll get pregnant if you’re ovulating if we have sex. If we have children, I mean.”
“If we have children?” He told her that he believed that since it was her body and only hers, she would decide when they had children and sex. “I’d like to believe that, but I’ve been around before. I’m not saying that you’re lying to me, but—”
“That’s another thing. I can’t lie to you.
Not that I would, but it’s something in my DNA that prevents me from telling you a lie or even by omission.
To me, it’s the same as a lie.” She just eyed him hard.
“I swear to you on the heart of my mother, who is alive and well, that I’m telling you the truth.
And so you know, if you ask me something, I’m not going to be able to sugarcoat it as much as you might like. ”
“Do I look fat to you?” He said he thought that she was a beautiful creature and that he was already half in love with her. “Good answer. I don’t know about the love part yet, but I like that you can’t lie to me. It might just save your ass if anything comes up like another woman.”
“There won’t be. Ever. I promise you.” They talked about him being a wolf, and she asked him some good questions.
When it got to his age, he told her how old he was, and he wasn’t sure she had believed him.
He was honest in telling her that he was nearly four hundred years old, only younger than his older brother, Conri, by a few years.
“I’ve been waiting for you for all my life. ”
“I don’t have much in the way of family left.
My mom and dad are still alive, but I’ve not spoken to either of them for a decade.
Mom lives in California, and my dad lives in upstate New York.
I hadn’t thought of it before, but they couldn’t be more apart than they are right now.
They’ve been divorced since I was about ten and have never gotten along well enough to allow me to live with either of them.
I lived with my grandma until she had to go into a nursing home.
” He asked if her parents were happy. “I don’t know whether they understand that word or not.
They seem to be their happiest when they’re bickering with each other.
I just stay out of their way. They don’t bother me, and I do the same for them.
To be honest, I don’t know that I’d recognize them if they were to come up to me on the street.
I hate to think about that, but that’s the way I feel. ”
“I’m sorry. Our father was a bastard. He and my brother Conri’s first wife had an affair and stole from the pack.
Since he never claimed her, she wasn’t immortal like we are.
Mom took her immortality from dad when it was figured out what he’d been doing, and she’s never been happier.
” She said that it sounded like neither of them had had a good childhood.
“If not for my mom, I might well believe that. She was our rock and foundation at the same time.”
“I believe in those kinds of families. However, I’ve never experienced one.
My grannie is all right, a little off her noodle at times, but I love her.
She’s in a state-run nursing home, and they treat her fairly well.
I go and see her when I can. She no longer remembers who I am, and that’s sad, but I know her, so that’s all right.
” He asked if she was happy. “Am I happy? I don’t know that I ever thought about that before.
I have a place where I live. It’s not great, but it’s a roof over my head.
I have food when I want it and am glad that my landlord is so forgiving at times. But other than that, it’s fine.”
“I want to see about making you happy.” She told him that she was just fine, and that bothered him somewhat.
She seemed resigned to the fact that she had the essentials and that was all that she needed.
Perhaps it was, he thought with a smile.
She might have the right way to go about life, like she was.
He’d been like that a few hundred years ago.
Bored with life, he’d gone through the motions of the day and did nothing else.
Not even to interact with his family. His mother had told him that he needed a hobby of some sort, and that was when he became a doctor for the first time.
Since working in the hospital at the time, it was easy enough for him to get his degree as a doctor and help those around him.
He thought, too, that his brother Yanick was suffering from that now and needed something to shake up his life.
He’d have to get on him about that before he became too set in his ways.
Today, he had a full day of seeing patients.
His first one was an elderly woman who had been around as a child while he’d been living here.
She was forever telling him how he’d babysat her as a child, and he told her she’d been a naughty child.
They had fun, the two of them, and he thought that was the hardest part of being around forever.
You saw people who were children grow up and get old. It was hard on the heart, he told her.
“What brings you in today, Mary?” She said that her blood pressure medicine had expired and that she needed to see him in order to get her new prescription. “I can do that. When will you run out of it?”
After taking her blood pressure and telling her that she was doing well, he took some blood to make sure that her counts were still reading all right.
She was just telling him about her garden and how she had the biggest carrots this year when his nurse came in to find him.
After excusing himself, he went out to see what she wanted.
“There is the little Allen boy back to see you. He said that his rash isn’t getting any better.
I’m thinking that he’s getting into it daily and doesn’t know any better.
I heard that his momma was having the vines taken off their house.
Could be that it’s poison ivy.” He asked if she’d make sure that his chart was up to date.
“I can do that. But you should see this boy. He’s a mess.
I’d say he’s taking a shower in the vines if I didn’t know any better. ”
After doing a quick exam of Jason, he went back to Mary.
She was concerned about the little fella and told him so.
After assuring her that he was going to take care of them both.
He renewed her prescription and sent her on her way.
But not before he had a large bag of carrots that he was going to be taking to his mom’s house tonight.