Chapter 95: Inseparable

Nash

A hunch told me that the guards had spoken the truth. Daphne wasn’t at her home in the Valiant Mountain pack. I couldn’t explain it, but my gut confirmed it. And of course, being a werewolf, she was completely off the grid. I couldn’t track her through the usual means, like credit cards and bank activity. I needed to get information from inside, so I made a call.

Not to Alpha Josiah, but to Josiah’s wife, Olivia. She agreed to meet with me discretely, at a Mexican restaurant in Prosperity Springs.

She was trying her best to be incognito. She wore a baseball cap, with her long hair pulled through the back in a ponytail, and a pair of sunglasses obscured her eyes and most of her freckled cheeks, but it was useless. She was the luna, everyone knew her, and eyes were always on her. Even in jean shorts and a faded t-shirt, she had a presence that oozed power and authority. She was beautiful too, in a strong, full-figured way.

She wasn’t a woman I would want to mess with.

But she was also very kind, understanding, and gentle. It was impossible not to like her.

At least she had secured a table upstairs, in a private VIP section, away from the other customers. She smiled at me when I entered, and gestured to the seat across the small, square table. “Hi Nash, good to see you. I was surprised by your call. Jeez, you look like you’ve been through hell.”

“Thanks. You look great too.” I muttered.

She only laughed easily and sat back. “Fair warning, Josiah will probably show up here within the hour. What’s this about?”

I took out the file I had tucked inside my jacket and laid it on the table. I flipped it open to a glossy photo of Daphne. “I’m looking for this woman. Do you know her?”

Olivia picked up the picture delicately by the edges and looked at it closely. “Yes, I believe I do. She’s one of the Redhawks, isn’t she?”

“Yes, Daphne Redhawk.” I took the photo back from her, and couldn’t help looking at it myself for a second before I slid it back in the file. “I’ve been to her pack, but she’s not there. And they aren’t exactly friendly to humans, so I couldn’t get any information.”

“They aren’t friendly to any outsiders, from my understanding,” Olivia said, “they have very tight security, even tighter now since their mate is royalty.” She seemed to be watching my face a little too closely. “What is she to you, Nash?”

I forced myself not to squirm in my chair. It felt like I was being grilled by my mother, not a woman who was younger than I was by nearly ten years. “She was involved with this bear situation.”

“I thought the bear situation was resolved,” Olivia said, in hushed tones, as a waiter entered to bring our drinks and take our order for lunch. When he was gone again, she resumed. “What does she have to do with it?”

“She was on campus as a student,” I explained, feeling that it was safe to reveal that tidbit of information, now that Daphne had graduated and left the university. “The bear-shifter was known to her and her family, it's the same bear that attacked her brothers’ mate a year or so ago.”

Olivia tipped her head to one side, “Was that why the bear-shifter was there? Was she looking for the Redhawks?”

“I don’t think so. I think it was purely coincidental. I did a little digging and I think the bear’s mate might have been a student at the university. She might have been looking for him there, or trying to reconnect to that part of her past. I’m not sure. She was pretty unhinged.”

The luna nodded with understanding. “Its common, even among werewolves, to lose your mind if you lose your mate. I hear it’s worse for bears, because they don’t get any second chances.”

“I heard that, too,” I confirmed, and shifted uneasily.

“Which brings us back to the question, Nash. Why are you looking for Daphne Redhawk?”

“I…” I swallowed hard, but after a long gaze into the luna’s hazel eyes, I decided the truth was the best option. “I can’t explain, Olivia. I only knew her for a very short time, but I feel like I connected with her. There was something between us, but then things got intense and dangerous with the bear, and her brothers came and took her away.”

I raked my nails through my short hair in frustration. “At the time, I thought it was for the best. You know, with the work I do, and all the differences between us. I had an assignment overseas right after, and I thought the distance would help. But, I can’t stop thinking about her. I need to see her again, I need to talk to her.”

Olivia leaned forward, and put a hand over mine. “Is she your mate?”

I huffed, “I’m a f.ucking human, Liv. We don’t have mates! Just a bunch of dysfunctional romantic attachments that usually end in divorce and destruction!”

“Wow,” she removed her hand and sat back. We fell silent again as the waiter returned with our lunch orders. Olivia had an enormous taco salad arranged in a fried tortilla bowl. I had an order of flautas on a huge pile of Mexican rice. We both got tall glasses of limonada, garnished with wedges of watermelon.

“Before I met Josiah, I didn’t believe in fated mates,” Olivia confessed. “In my home pack, it had kind of become the thing of myths and legends. People were just settling for chosen mates, which isn’t all that different from how you humans do it. My mom ran off and left us when we were still small, so I know all about dysfunctional families.” She stopped and took a bite of her salad, taking time to chew it thoroughly and swallow it before she continued.

“I also happen to know that it is very possible for humans to be the fated mates of werewolves.” A smile played around her lips. “I know this lawyer who is mated to a friend of mine. I could give you his number, if you want to talk to him about it.”

My head began to throb behind my temples. I wasn’t sure if I believed in the concept of fated mates, but I’d heard a few friends talk about it like it was an electrical s.hitshow with sparks flying everywhere. I didn’t feel sparks or shockwaves or anything with Daphne. Only this liquid heat that set me on fire. I sure as hell felt something out of the ordinary. “I can’t stop thinking about her,” I confessed, and poked at my food. “Ever since she left, I feel off. I don’t have an appetite, I don’t sleep well. I think about her all the time.”

Olivia nodded knowingly. “I bet, wherever she is, she’s feeling pretty lousy, too.”

The idea that Daphne might be feeling as bad as I was made me want to throw up. I threw my fork down. “So, how do I find her?”

Olivia smiled, “I’ll ask around, see what I can find out for you.”

I had been hoping that Olivia already knew where Daphne was, but I would take whatever I information I could get. “Thank you, Olivia.”

At that moment, there was a commotion from downstairs, and then the sound of someone big and heavy moving up the stairs. Olivia’s whole face lit up, like Christmas morning. “Speaking of mates…”

Josiah burst into the private room, looking like an over-grown lumberjack, with unruly hair and piercing midnight blue eyes. “Sorry I’m late,” He leaned down and kissed his wife. Not a little peck on the lips, but a full-on, passionate exchange that left me wondering if he wasn’t going to take her right there at the table. They were both smiling and breathless when they finally pulled apart.

Josiah picked up a chair from another table and dragged it over next to his wife. “So,” he propped an arm around Olivia, “What was so bloody important that you wanted to talk to my wife, and not to me, Turner?” He gave me a hard stare that was meant to intimidate me.

It didn’t. I knew him too well.

I wasn’t going to answer, but Olivia did.

“We were having a heart-to-heart about fated mates,” Olivia explained with a satisfied smile. “We think Nash has found his.”

“You? No kidding. Who is it? Someone I know?”

I groaned in resignation. Olivia was going to tell him, even if I didn’t. I flipped open the file folder and pushed it across the table.

“Oh s.hit,” Josiah said when he had looked at the photo. “A Redhawk?” And then he threw back his head and laughed.