Chapter 5
RAFF
I hadn’t slept in days.
The team was on a bus to an away game, and I spent most of it staring out the window while my wolf gnawed at my insides.
It had been like this since the cafeteria. Every day my wolf dragged me toward Thorne's scent as if I was his pet and he was taking me for a walk. And whenever he pulled that stunt, I’d yank him back.
He wasn't handling it well. He’d gone from muted and cooperative to furious and relentless. He paced, shouted, and wailed at night. When I tried to sleep, he snarled.
It’d been so long since I’d had a decent sleep, I couldn’t remember what it was like to put my head on the pillow and close my eyes.
There was a spare seat beside me, and Angelo plonked himself into it and offered me a bag of trail mix. “You look tired, Raff.” He slapped my arm. “You should go to bed early tonight.”
“I’m fine.”
He raised a brow, left me the bag, and went back to his original seat. I appreciated that he didn’t push it, but he was human, and I couldn’t begin to tell him about my problem. “I met someone,” would be all he could understand.
I put in my earbuds and leaned my head against the window and tried not to think about gray eyes and a scent that was both the best and worst thing I'd ever encountered.
The game was a disaster. It wasn’t the team that was at fault but me.
From the first shift, I was half a step behind. My reads were off, my positioning was sloppy, and twice I lost my mark because my focus drifted at the wrong moment. My wolf didn’t care about the game and bugged me, scratching at my concentration as if he were trying to dig his way out.
Coach moved me down to the third line after the first period. By the second, I'd bobbled a routine pass and got caught flat-footed on a two-on-one that forced our goalie to bail me out.
Nobody said anything, but there were sideways glances between shifts from the other players.
I knew those looks because I’d been the recipient of them from Bodie, and we’d both delivered similar ones when we’d played together before he died.
The interpretation was I wasn’t pulling my weight, but they were too professional to call it out during a game.
Midway through the second period, Coach told me to take a seat. He didn’t give an explanation, and I didn’t need one. I sat on the bench and watched the rest of the game while my wolf howled and berated me while what remained of my pride slipped away.
We won the game, thanks to the guys who'd picked up my slack. They earned that victory, and I had no right to celebrate it.
The hotel was a mid-range place near the highway.
Most of the team headed to their rooms after dinner, but I couldn't face four walls and my wolf’s relentless complaining.
I ended up at the bar on the ground floor.
There were a couple of businessmen in the corner and a bartender who wiped the bar constantly as they did in the movies.
I was on my second beer. The bartender gave me looks. She’d probably seen this before and assumed I’d either lost my job, all my money, or I’d been served divorce papers.
But Axel sat on the stool beside me and ordered a soda.
He sipped the bubbly liquid and watched the muted TV above the bar where a basketball game was playing. I appreciated that he didn't lead with the obvious, though I expected he was here to do just that on Coach’s orders.
“An angel passed.” I tossed more beer down my throat.
“Of all the things I expected you to say, that wasn’t one of them.”
“It’s from French, and it’s when there’s a comfortable lull in the conversation. It’s not awkward. It’s just that no one feels the need to say anything.”
He nodded, and we went back to our respective drinks and the basketball game. When he’d drained his glass, he said, “Rough night.”
“Try a rough couple of weeks.”
He asked for another drink and pointed to my beer, but I shook my head and put my hand over the bottle. “I’ve had bad games, but tonight wasn’t that. That was you being somewhere else and not on the ice.”
How I wished I didn’t have to respond, but I owed him an explanation.
“I’m not Coach, so I'm not going to bench you twice.” He paid for both our drinks. “But I've been where you are, and whatever's going on, it doesn't get better by ignoring it.”
He spoke with such sincerity that I believed him. He wasn’t just handing out advice but speaking from experience. He may not have a rebellious wolf, but he had emotional scars.
I stared at bottles lined up behind the bar. My wolf was quiet for once, suggesting he was listening.
“My wolf is about to stage a revolution, and it’s my fault.”
Axel didn’t gush or squeal or say, “What the fuck?” but waited for me to continue.
“I found my mate.”
He sent me a look and put the glass down. “That's usually good news.”
“It should be, but I rejected it, though not formally. I walked away from the guy, and my wolf is losing it. He won't settle or let me focus, and tonight was the result.”
“You’re talking about Thorne, the new chef.”
“How did you know?”
“Because you've been avoiding the cafeteria for a week, and Angelo mentioned you had a problem with the new guy.” He swiveled around to face me. “As a shifter, I understand a disrupted mating bond. I’ve witnessed some, and it’s heartbreaking for both the alpha and the omega.”
Tell him the rest.
“There's more to it. I had a twin brother, Bodie, who died when we were eighteen.” I rambled on with the details I’d related over the years. It should have gotten easier because I’d related them so many times. “When he died, my wolf lost his other half, and the years since have been dark.”
Axel dipped his head, and I wondered about his history and what loss he’d experienced.
I explained how when I scented Thorne, my wolf reacted as beasts did when their human counterpart met their mate.
“It’s supposed to be their beautiful mystical moment that usually only happens once. But underneath there was another scent that belonged to my dead brother.” I told him how I’d never met Thorne previously and couldn’t explain why he carried the smell I’d longed for since my brother died.
“Are you sure it’s your brother’s scent?”
“I spent eighteen years breathing it in. I'd know it anywhere.”
Axel leaned one elbow on the bar. “Your wolf found his and your mate, and both your brother’s and his wolf’s scent was wafting off the guy. Instead of working it out, you shut it down.”
When he put it like that, it sounded even worse. “What was I supposed to do? Walk up to the guy and ask why he smells like someone who's been dead for seven years?”
“Not in so many words, but your method isn't working. Tonight proved that. Your wolf is going to keep tearing you apart until you deal with this.”
He was right, of course.
“Deal with it.” He got off the stool. “Get to know him. You don't have to tell him everything right away, and you definitely don't have to lead with him being your fated mate. He's human. He probably has no idea what he's feeling, if he's feeling anything at all.”
“What if the Bodie connection is something I can't handle?”
“You'll find that out and then proceed to deal with it. But you'll find out by talking to the guy, not by avoiding the cafeteria and playing the worst hockey of your career.” He put a hand on my shoulder. “You didn't come to this team to sit on the bench, Raff.”
He was halfway to the door when he looked back. “What position did your brother play?”
The question caught me by surprise, and I couldn’t figure out why that was important. “Left wing.”
Axel nodded. “Get some sleep. Practice is going to be rough tomorrow.”
I sat there with the dregs of my beer and my wolf who wanted to speak but was doing the whole angel passed thing.
You know he's right, he said finally.
Was knowing it and doing it the same thing? In my experience, they never were.
But my wolf was calmer than he'd been in days, and for the first time since we’d met in the cafeteria, the pull toward Thorne didn't feel like a punishment. It was a direction, and I hoped it would lead me where I wanted to go.