Declan.
“Mom.” I slammed the door shut behind me as I stormed her suite.
“Yes, dear”, she answered as she emerged from her room. Usually, she would rush to hug me. It was not lost on me that today she didn’t. She folded her arms over her thin dressing gown and watched me apprehensively. I would be hurt, but she always kept some distance between us, even in the brief moments she fawned over me. I acted out a lot as a kid just to get some real hands on parenting, but they let me off with a warning every time. Didn’t they know that you were only supposed to get a single warning before facing the consequences?
“How sure are you that they were mates?” I interrogate her. If Faith was telling the truth and Kyle was her mate, then…………. Connor couldn’t have been her mate. Seconds chances were few and far between, they weren’t a given, and I have never heard of a third chance before. I guess it may be possible, given they never actually felt the bond, but I highly doubted it.
“Who?” She asks stupidly. Who else could she believe I meant?
“Faith and Connor”, I snap. I’m out of patience. I’m out of everything. I feel like a shadow of my former self. For the millionth time, I wish that I could turn back the clock. I hope I can feel the bond again for the first time. I would walk right up to her and kiss her. I would take her to my room and worship her body like it was a temple. I would spend the next six months dating her, doting on her, just love her. The moment the clock struck midnight on her eighteenth birthday, I would bury myself in her, I would mark her, and I enjoyed every day after like it was my last. I’d let her see all the broken parts of me, and I would do whatever it took to build her up. Instead, I destroyed the little of me I had left, I had shattered a perfect woman, and I had driven her into the arms of another mate. Another man would now spend his life doing all the things I couldn’t. I would never see her barefoot and pregnant with my pup that I would pray got all of her kindness, generosity and curiousness. She has such a love for life.
“ I mean, we can never really know, but I feel like they were. It’s the only thing that makes sense.” She rambled to herself more than she was answering me.
“ Why, mom? Why is it the only thing that makes sense?” I push, but I already know her answer. I’ve asked a thousand times over the years and then questioned it a thousand more. I always got the same response.
“Why else would he protect her the way he did. He doted on her. They would have made the perfect pair.” I was surprised. Her answer was much the same, but for once, there was one slight deviation. She has never said the last part before.
“Mom. Why did you want them to be mated so bad?.” I raged.
“What are you talking about, Declan.”
She was being awfully defensive.
“What am I talking about, mother?” I scoff.
“You said they would have made the perfect pair. Tell me why?” I march over to the cupboard and slam two glasses down on the bench. One cracks. I guess it's just me that gets a drink then. I pull the bottle of bourbon I know she has stashed out and pour a charitable amount into my glass and throw it back.
My mother just watched me with a scowl as I poured myself a second glass.
“Well,” I stare back, waiting impatiently for my answer.
“He was so cute with her. It would have made such a good story. I mean, he was ten years older than her, and that may have been a small hurdle for them. Heather is my best friend. It would have been amazing to see our children end up together. Connor was there for her birth, did you know? It was intentional, but still, he was.”
I wanted to snap her in two. Would it have made a good story?
“ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME” I roar? I take the bottle of bourbon and throw it across the room. Pieces of the bottle fly everywhere, sickly brown liquid dribbles down the wall.
My mother flinched away from me.
“What is your problem.” Her hand smacks against her chest. I hate when she acts shocked, or maybe she is, but who cares.
“My problem, mom. My problem is, didn't you ever once stop and think. Maybe Connor was just good with babies. Was he even really that good with her, or did you make all that up in your head because you thought it would be cute to plan a mating ritual with your best friend? Samantha would have been a better fit. The age difference wasn’t so big. And the rogue attack, maybe he was just doing what he thought was right. Maybe he wasn’t such a cold hearted piece of shit that he would consider leaving a two month old baby to defend for herself.”
My mother shook her head vehemently back and forth as if she was trying to shake the cold hard truths off.
“No.” She shook her again, and again she repeated the word.
“Why, mom.”
“I didn’t make it up. He was good with her,” she cried.
“Yes, but that didn’t mean they were mates,” I shout in frustration.
“Why are you saying these things.” She wiped her tears away rather harshly, but they kept falling anyway.
“Because Faith has found her second chance. Which means I was her fucking first.”
I throw the glass next. I just want to watch the whole world burn. Without her, what is it worth anyway?
“She’s lying to you.” She screeches. But Faith wasn’t a liar. She had never been. Even when it would cost her, she always told the truth. It bit me in the arse many more times than I cared to count because it also meant she would never cover for me when I fucked up. And I fucked up a lot.
“Why, mom? Why would she lie?”
“To make you jealous.” She responds before I can even finish asking. But she went out on the date with that guy hours before I showed up. I didn’t even know about it. Faith always went on about saving those things for her mate. I may have done some nasty shit to her, but I don’t think I had the power to change her so entirely that she just forgot who she was.
She wasn’t like her sister Samantha who didn’t care which man as long as it was a powerful one. She was much better than that.
“ or maybe you were wrong. Maybe we both were,” I sigh, feeling defeated. I really had given her up for nothing.
“Why Connor?” Apparently, I just want to continue punishing myself.
“What do you mean?” She sniffles.
“I mean exactly that, why Connor. I get it. You thought it would be cute to see your son wind up with the daughter of your best friend, but why him? Why didn’t you want that for me?” It made more sense. We were the same age.
“I don’t know.” She mumbles.
“Yes, you do.” I stare her down.
“You were only six months old. I hadn’t started to think of you as grown yet.” She defended.
“ didn’t start to think of me as growing? Or didn’t you think of me at all? Connor was the special one. Did I even matter to you before he died? I don’t feel like I did after.” What was wrong with me? Ever since I woke, I have just been spewing my feelings all over the place.
“You say you couldn’t think of me as a man with a mate, but you were happy to think of a baby, who wasn’t even yours and was younger than me as having one.” I didn’t mean to think that aloud but there I said it anyway.
“Of course, you matter to me, my darling.” She crooned. She ignores half of it, and It does nothing to reassure me. It’s not something you just come out and admit.
“You never answered me before. Why didn’t you think Connor could be Samanthas mate?” should I tell my mother that she remembers him? Nah, I squash the errant thought the moment it arises.
“They never really clicked. Connor was a very open child, he was a happy boy who played with all the pups, and all the adults loved him. Samantha enjoyed having attention as long as it was on her and nobody and nothing else. Her toys were strictly her own, and she’d break those that didn’t belong to her. She was always like that. Even as a baby, you couldn’t hold her unless she wanted it. She’d just cry otherwise. I didn’t feel like she would have made the best mate or Luna. But as I said, when it came to Faith, she was a very snuggly baby, loved to be held but was also happy just to wiggle about on her own. Connor loved to hold and play with her. He even asked to visit her family at times. It just made sense to me that they could be.”
“She was my mate. Ever think he could have even been picking up on that?” I snap at her. I find myself getting angry with her all over again. I still have more questions, but if I stay here, I might regret it later.
“I’m taking this.” I swipe the whiskey she keeps hidden in the tops cupboards and leave her standing there all alone.
I head back to my room. I shut the door and pulled my phone out. I do a quick engine search and call the first number that pops up on google.
It takes no time at all, and I have sent the largest bouquet of flowers that the florist has available. I chose to send it straight to Alpha Kyles office addressed to Faith. I knew Amy’s address, Samantha had given it to me, but I’d prefer to show Kyle that he still had some competition.