Chapter 36: Simon

She slammed the doors behind her as she ran out. I continued to stare at the doors for a few moments. That witch was my mate. She was beautiful beyond anything I have ever seen before. Her eyes. Her eyes! They were purple. That’s why I was having purple electrodes dance across my eyes. And when she touched me---the power I felt from her jolted through my body. I didn’t know what to do but raise my hands in surrender. I must have looked like an idiot to her. I said nothing. Like a high school boy that tried to talk to a popular girl in school. Her scent was strong and still lingered in the room. It took all my power not to mate here right then and there in front of everyone.

The other wolves that were in the room started to move nervously as they stared at me. I cleared my throat and looked around. “Alpha, did you want us to go after her?” A wolf asked in the crowd.

“No, I’ll deal with her later. Back to work everyone.” I said, not as forcefully as I wanted to. I pointed at the wolf holding my grandmother’s arm. “Make sure you take her back to her cabin and make sure she is settled in.” I looked at my Nana. “I will talk with you later.” I looked over to Jared. “You come with me.” I made my way back into the office with Jared in tow. “Close the door.”

He closed the door. “Are you alright?”

“Um, yeah. Actually, better than all right. That’s my mate.” I said as I rubbed my face in my hands, I tried to recall every detail of her. Her face, her eyes, her smell.

“What?” Jared said incredulously.

“That. Is. My. Mate.” I paused after each word soaking it in. I finally found my mate and of course it is not even the same species. But I don’t care. The power that rolled from her as she entered the pack house was more than any she-wolf could ever emit.

Jared stared at me.

“I finally found her,” I said with a laugh.

“I’m not really sure what to do here,” Jared said. “She’s not even wolf.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Did you want me to go get her?” Jared asked, he looked a little scared. He has always been slightly afraid of witches.

“No. If anyone is going to go get her it’s going to be me.”

“Ok. What do you want to do?”

I thought for a moment. I couldn’t just go and grab her, even if I wanted to. That’s considered kidnapping and who’s telling what she would do to me with her powers. I could feel Remus running around in my head screaming “Mate, mate.” Over and over again. Remus couldn’t think of anything else. This is the first time I have heard him this loud in a long time. Usually, he was dormant until I needed him. Now he seemed to grow in my head. “Shut up.” I said out loud, as I tried to calm him so I could think.

“What?”

“Remus, is screaming in my head and I can’t think.” I sat down at my desk and looked off into the distance.

“He’s that loud?”

“Yeah, I’ve never heard him this loud before. It’s a little weird.” Remus was still running in my head but stopped screaming, which helped me to focus.

“What do you want to do? This is a weird situation.”

“Ok, I want surveillance on her for now. Have someone watch her from a distance to make sure she is safe, and nothing happens to her.”

“I’ll get Bruce on it. I’ll have him organize a twenty-four-hour watch routine.”

“Don’t tell him why. I don’t want anyone else in the pack to know that my mate isn’t a wolf. That would only cause tension.”

“Right.” Jared’s eyes turned white as he focused on the mind link to talk to Bruce. After a few moments, his eyes regained their color and he looked at me. “Done. Someone is going there right now.”

“Ok.” I thought some more. She’s angry at me and probably hates me right now. The thought gave me a stomachache. “I have to smooth this over, somehow.”

Jared sat across from me. “I know when I mess up with Greta, I buy her flowers.”

“I’ve never seen you bring her flowers,” I said.

“Exactly, I’ve never messed up,” he smirked at me. “But, if I ever did, I know her favorite flowers are peonies, and she likes jerky.”

“That doesn’t exactly help me. The only thing I know about her is that she smells like lavender, vanilla and honey and she’s a witch.”

Jared thought for a moment. “Gift basket?”

I looked at him and he shrugged. “I guess that could be the best bet. A mix of things and if she didn’t like it all then at least she may like something.”

“Exactly.”

“Where do I get a gift basket?”

“We can order it online and it can be shipped today or tomorrow.”

“What the fuck are we waiting for, let’s order it.” I shouted. Jared grabbed his laptop off the desk and his fingers danced across the keys. He stopped and turned the laptop around to show me.

“Here is a good website. The gift basket can get here tomorrow.” I looked at the first few that were on the website and was dissatisfied. They all weren’t good enough for my mate. I scrolled through the first page and moved to the next. Who would even consider giving a basket to someone they loved containing a sad stuffed animal and chocolates?

“These aren’t good enough.” I said as I reached the end of the last page on the website. I turned the laptop back to Jared.

“Maybe we can construct something for her?” He said as he typed on the laptop. “This website can let you build a basket.” He turned the laptop back at me.

This website had higher end items that seemed to be geared for adults rather than children. This was much better. I took the laptop and hit the button that says, ‘build your own basket.’ I added one bottle of expensive red wine and one of white. I scroll through the addons. “Meat, cheese and crackers go well with wine, right?”

“Yeah?” Jared said questioningly. “She looked a little young though not sure if she can drink wine.”

“It’s fine.” I said as I added a charcuterie board to the list. There were some fancy jams that I added, as well as a box of high-end crackers. “Who would have thought there are high end crackers that cost twenty dollars a box?” I said as I added them.

“You don’t want to go overboard,” Jared said. “You don’t want to overwhelm her.”

I added a bag of coffee beans and stopped. I clicked on ‘look at your basket.’ The basket they presented was enormous. It was piled high with all the items I added with some decorative paper surrounding it. The total came to six ninety-nine, ninety-five. I was happy with this basket.

I turned the laptop back to Jared. “What do you think?”

“Holy shit, Si. Are you really going to spend seven hundred dollars on this gift basket?”

“What? Is it not enough?”

“This is ridiculously expensive!” Jared said exasperatedly at me.

“What would be the spending limit you would spend on your mate?” I asked him.

“Right.” He paused. “I’d say add one more bottle of red and one more bottle of white and you should be good.” His fingers danced across the keyboard again as he purchased the gift basket for me. “It should be here by noon tomorrow.

“There was no way to get it today?”

“No, I just paid one hundred and fifty dollars to get it here by tomorrow.”

I leaned back in my chair. I couldn’t believe it was happening. I had a mate. I thought this day would never come. My Nana was right. “Nana! I need to talk to her.”

“Ok man. Did you need me to go with you?”

“Nah, I got this.” I said as I stood up. Tomorrow, I would give her that gift basket and I’d get to see her again. “Remember, do not tell anyone until I get her here. Understood?”

“Yes, Alpha.” Jared said, he averted his eyes as he responded.

“Good.”

I made my way to my grandmother’s cabin. It was about a fifteen-minute walk, which gave me time to think about this mystery girl who took care of my grandmother. The cabin my grandmother lived in was close to other members of the pack. It was a small village within the packhouse acreage. Many pack members lived within the packhouse boarders. Others opted to live within the small town. I didn’t require my members to live on pack lands. I didn’t want it to become a prison.

I approached her cabin and knocked on the door. “What is it?” I heard my grandmother yell from the other side of the door.

“It’s Simon!” I yelled back.

“What do you want?” She yelled.

“I want to talk.”

“The time has passed for talking.”

“Nana, don’t be like that.” I said as I turned the knob, but it is locked. “Please let me in.”

“No!”

“Nana, please let me in.”

“No!”

“Nana! Don’t make me break down this door!” I yelled through the door.

“No!”

I almost started to order her to let me in but opted for another route. “I want to apologize.” I said more softly.

I heard the click of the door and it opened slightly. My Nana’s face shone partially through the crack. “Go on.”

“Nana, I’m sorry.” I said and put my hands out in front of me as an I give up gesture. “That girl was right. I should have taken the time to take you to the store and spend time with you. It was no way for an Alpha to act, and I’m very sorry.”

“Hmp.” She grunted at me. “Fine, come in.” She swung the door open to let me in.

I stepped through her door and was greeted by a mess of books lying on the floor opened to random pages. “Nana, why do you have all these books out?” I looked around trying to find her nurse. “And where is your nur...roommate.” I quickly corrected myself.

“I kicked her out. She was being too nosey.” She sat down in the center of the living room and started to thumb through a book that sat in front of her.

“You kicked her out? What do you mean you kicked her out?”

“Like I said. I kicked her out. It’s really not that hard to understand, Simon.”

“Where did she go?”

“I don’t know.” she said absentmindedly.

“We are going to get her back and she is going to be staying with you. I don’t like you staying here by yourself.”

“Don’t worry dear. I won’t be staying here much longer.” She flipped a page.

“What do you mean?”

“I’m going to be moving to the packhouse.”

My eyebrows rose to her words. “You are?”

“Yes, dear.”

“What made you come to that decision?”

“I met Violet.”

As soon as she said her name, a tingle went through my body. It was right. Her name was Violet. It fitted her so well. Her name was Violet, and she smelled like lavender. Her eyes were a brilliant purple, and she was powerful. I felt I was getting hard as I thought more about her. Now, I had her name.

I cleared my throat to bring me back to the discussion. “And that made you want to come to the packhouse?”

“Yes.”

“May I ask why?”

She sighed as if I was interrupting her and looked at me. “Because Violet wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“Nana, you are going to need to explain a little more.” I sat on the edge of her sofa and leaned forward.

“Simon, you and I both know that she’s your mate.” She paused and looked at the surprised look on my face. “When she moves into the packhouse she’s going to insist I come and stay there so she can keep an eye on me.”

My mouth opened with surprise. “How do you know she’s my mate and that she’s going to live in the packhouse?”

“I just do. Some things are too complicated to explain,” she smiled. “Plus, a magician never reveals her secrets.” She winked at me.

My heart started to pound. Maybe this would really work out. Maybe I could convince her to move in with me and be the Luna of this pack. I wasn’t sure how it would work since she wasn’t wolf, but we would figure it out.

“And I want to be close to the grandkids.” She said as she started to look through her book again.

A surge went through my body and my dick became harder at the thought of having children with Violet. Violet. I could repeat that name a million times and it would not lose its beauty. “We are going to have kids?”

“Yes, soon too. Within a year.”

My heart started to thud in my chest. The electrodes that danced across my skin when she touched me started to dart across my skin again. “How do you know this, Nana?”

“Like I said, a magician doesn’t reveal her secrets.” She stopped looking at her book again to look at me. “And she’ll need Remus.”

“She’ll need Remus?”

“Boy, do I have to repeat myself every time? Yes, she’ll need Remus. He’s her familiar.”

“What?”

“I swear to the goddess someone dropped you on your head as a baby. Yes, Remus is her familiar.”

I overlooked the insult. “What is a familiar?”

Nana sighed. “A familiar is an animal that has a close relationship with a witch. A familiar witch is few and far between. But when they show up, they are powerful. And Remus, your wolf, is her familiar.”

“Ok.” Was all I could say to her. Not only was Violet my mate, but my wolf was her familiar. We were more intertwined than I thought. That’s probably why I could feel her power so strongly and Remus was louder. “Thank you, Nana.” I said and stood, I leaned over and kissed her head.

“Of course.”

I turned to leave but then stopped. “Did you want to move to the packhouse now?”

“No.” She answered quickly.

“Then you are getting your roommate back until you move to the packhouse.” I said with authority. “No questions, got it.”

She let out a big sigh. “Fine.” She slammed the book shut.

I walked out the door into the dusk and took my time to go back to the packhouse. I looked across the lake at the little cabin. That little cabin that housed my mate. A light was on, I could see a shadow as it walked back and forth in front of the window. It took all my energy not to go run to her. To see her. To bring her back here and mate with her. To show her she was mine. My mind brought up all the naughty things I would do to her when I had the chance. I could feel my dick harden at the thoughts. In time, my mate, in time.