Shattered Mates (Mystics and Mayhem Novels Book 3)

Prologue

Sitting in Maciah’s office, my stomach churns. It’s been nearly a month since the fight in South Carolina. A month of pain and suffering and having no clue what the hell is going on.

Finding out Jules is my mate was like winning the lottery and getting kicked in the balls at the same time. My wolf had howled with joy, but I’d known better.

My joy did not mean that I was ready to claim her, my inner beast snaps at me.

Yes, I’m well aware.

Still, I’ve yet to match his excitement.

Jules is young—too young. And waiting? It’s painful. I know with time it will get easier, but my heart and my mind want two different things and the war between them isn’t fun.

Maciah enters the office I’ve been waiting in, and my tension only rises. He hasn’t said much to me in the passing weeks. His only request has been for me to remain unseen by as many as possible. Until he asked me to come to Portland.

“River.” He takes a seat across from me. “Sorry to keep you waiting. How are things?”

“Fine,” I reply sharply. Being alone hasn’t helped my mood either.

The vampire leans forward, resting his arms on his desk, his muddy red eyes locked on me. “You’re full of shit, but I suspected as much. Your situation isn’t ideal, but I have something that might help.”

While Maciah is my boss, he’s also family to me. I try to keep the two separate, but some days are harder than others.

“What’s that?” I ask, hopeful that he hasn’t just been pushing me out. A wolf forced to be away from their mate isn’t often a sane one for long—even when it’s the right thing to do.

He slides a small vial of purple liquid toward me that rolls across the desk until I catch it. “And this would be?”

“Something for you and your wolf,” he says with a frown. “And a requirement for your next job.”

That instantly has me on alert and setting the vial back on the desk as if it might burn through my skin.

“What job?” I ask. While I knew I was likely coming here for an assignment, I don’t like his tone and I don’t like that he’s requiring me to take something.

Maciah sits back in his chair, then slides toward his filing cabinet where he pulls out a folder. He returns, handing the papers inside to me.

“We learned something a few weeks ago, but we had to be sure it was true,” he says as I look at a few interviews from Astor’s men who we’d captured. “Nobody saw you in that hallway with Jules except the man she killed.”

Son of a bitch.

“You want me to go back undercover.” The words are like acid on my tongue, tearing down my throat and intensifying the now turbulent churning of my guts.

He nods just once. “But not like before.”

A part of me doesn’t want to ask any other questions. No, that part wants to tuck tail and run as quickly back to East Texas as I can, but that isn’t who I am.

I became a protector not because I thought it would be fun, but because this is who I am. I save people and I enjoy it. I just might need to remind myself of that more often.

Maciah continues when I don’t reply. “If you do this—which I hope you will—you’re going to be cut off from everyone, River. You’ll no longer have a phone that anyone other than me has access to. You’ll be forced to give up who you are, and I can’t tell you for how long. It’s a sacrifice I truly hate to ask of you, but you’re the only one I trust for this, and you’re in the perfect position to do so.”

As he speaks, my eyes focus on the papers in my hands. Four different interrogations, all of them pointing fingers at me. Making me out to be the bad guy that Astor quickly favored and who got shit done, making them all assume that I was more involved than I was.

Apparently, I did my job a little too well. I can’t be too disappointed in that, considering it saved Jules’ life and so many others’. Yet, it’s also nothing I’m proud of.

“River, talk to me,” Maciah says as I continue to read the words over and over again. “You don’t have to do this.”

My eyes finally look up at my uncle. “But I do.”

This is my path. I feel it deep in my soul, even if it makes me physically sick.

Not just because he’s right—I am the perfect person for this—but because of Lexi, Lykem’s new mate. She was one of the kidnapped, and before that, she was my second closest friend. I’d been too young to understand things then, but I’m not now.

While we’ve found several of the holding facilities where supernaturals have been kept over the decades, there are still more. More people missing who deserve to be brought home.

Even more so, I need the distraction.

I pick the vial back up and stare at its swirling purple contents. “Why do I need to take this?”

“That’s something Andie created specifically for you and your…situation,” Maciah replies, voice filled with compassion. “Taking consistent, small doses of this will absolve the pain of being without your mate while also giving you increased physical abilities.”

As my next words leave from between my lips, I make sure I’m staring right into my uncle’s eyes as I say them. “You’re going to make me a monster with this.”

His mouth twitches downward, and he has to look away before replying. “We’re going to give you the tools to do the job that needs to be done.”

“Say it, Maciah,” I demand, my wolf rising to the forefront of my consciousness. “You want me to be able to be like them without remorse, without worrying about the mate that I can’t have yet. You want me to be a monster, and that’s exactly what this vial will do.”

His eyes finally meet mine again, and they shimmer with emotions I’ve never seen from the normally stoic vampire. “It’s what those still missing need, not what I want. I promise you that, River.”

And that’s right when my decision is officially made. I might hate what he’s asking of me, but I understand it.

“How long do you expect me to be gone for?” I ask, though I know it won’t change my mind at this point.

“I’d like to say it might only be a few months, but I won’t lie to you, River. It could be years. We’re still not sure how deep this runs.”

A vice wraps around my chest, and before I can consider going back on my previous thought, I pop the cork from the vial, tipping it to my mouth. Years isn’t the end of the world, and maybe it will be just what my mate needs. That is, if she can see this situation as I am now.

I’m sorry, Jules. I hope you’ll forgive me for this, I think, even though we have no mental connection yet. Maybe she’ll at least feel my words one day.

“Tell me where I’m going first,” I say as I swallow the concoction, already feeling as if the bond to not only Jules, but everyone else I care about is slipping away.

You never asked how we come back from this, my wolf says solemnly.

We’ll find our way, I promise. When the time is right.