Cursed Mate (Feral Shifters 3)

Amora

Craningmy neck to glance over my shoulder, I look up at the new arrival.

Felicity… isn’t what I expected. She’s of average height, stocky, and with arms more toned than Frost’s beneath her wide-sleeved tank top. Her wavy blonde hair spills around her tanned shoulders in the quintessential surfer girl look, tousled and bleached from the sun.

She arches one brow and stares down at me with eyes so dark brown they’re almost black. Her round face, high cheekbones, and soft features make her look younger than I know she must be, but her eyes seem old. Like she’s seen more than most people do in their entire lifetimes.

“Who are you?” she asks, shifting her gaze from Frost to me.

I readjust my hold on him and stammer, “Um, Amora.”

Her appearance has thrown me a little. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this.

Quinton is showy, larger than life in the worst kind of way, while Felicity’s demeanor carries a different kind of weight. More regal, less violent. Even though she’s the alpha of a pack just like her ex is, she wears her power so much differently. It’s hard to believe the two of them were ever mated, honestly.

Of course I, of all shifters, know that a girl doesn’t get to pick the mate the universe has in store for her. Or three mates, as it turned out.

Seeming satisfied with my one-word answer, or maybe just not all that interested in me, Felicity slides her gaze back to Frost. He’s still slumped against me, not quite unconscious, but lost in a fog from his battle with the shadows. He hangs half on, half off my body, his arms resting on the dirt. Her dark eyes narrow as she takes him in, and then she glances past me to Kian and Malix.

“You’re not welcome here,” Felicity tells them. Although her voice is deep and smooth, seemingly unbothered, there’s a hint of vitriol beneath her words.

Quinton obviously did a number on this woman. I can only imagine that the sight of their shadow tattoos brings up a lot of bad memories for her.

Before I can try to take control of the situation, Kian speaks up.

“We know, Alpha Felicity,” he says in a calm, respectful tone. “If we had anywhere else to turn, we wouldn’t have come here.”

Shock renders me momentarily mute. Where’s his usual growly stubbornness? Since when does he show deference to anyone but Quinton?

Since he’s not Quinton’s little lapdog anymore, I remind myself.

And he seems to have read the situation correctly. Maybe it’s the fact that he called her alpha without prompting, or maybe it’s his admission that he’s aware they’re not wanted here, but the hard glint in Felicity’s dark eyes fades a little.

She meets the questioning gaze Cormac shoots her from where he stands off to one side and nods. “Stand down.”

Her wolves immediately back up, giving the rest of us room, although they don’t go too far. Cormac remains where he is, within striking distance of my mates.

Felicity inclines her head toward Frost. “What happened to him?”

Instantly, my hackles go up. I lean over his body, tighten my grip on Frost’s shoulders, and glance around at the watching wolves. Cormac looms like an immovable mountain behind Malix, his eyes narrowed on us as if waiting impatiently for someone to make a wrong move.

If Felicity’s pack gets even the faintest whiff that Frost is a danger to their alpha, they’ll attack. And either he’ll kill them in that fight, or he’ll be too weakened and out of it from his struggle against his shadows and die at their hands.

I can’t let either of those possibilities come to pass.

Felicity is still waiting for an answer to her question. I know we need to tell her something, but somehow, I don’t think the “it’s a long story” line I gave Cormac is going to fly with this woman. And considering that Frost is literally half unconscious in my arms, I can’t exactly play it off. Haha, one too many beers last night! You know how it goes.

Felicity doesn’t strike me as someone who’s easily fooled. She’s already noticed that something is pretty damn wrong with him, so it’s not like I have an opening to hide it or deny it.

So should I tell her the truth? Fudge the details so he doesn’t sound like a raging killing machine?

At the end of the day, it was her ex who did this to Frost. That alone might be all the proof she needs that we’re here with the intention of joining her. She’s a woman who walked away from her mate for moral reasons; surely that means she’s a woman who understands that a mate is sometimes the reason to walk away from an immoral alpha.

I manage to get my legs rearranged under Frost’s weight so I can plop down on the rough ground. It’s not exactly luxury suede beneath my bare ass, but it’s better than trying to remain in a semi-indecent crouching position with Frost melting off me like the subject of a Salvador Dali painting.

When I’m flat on the ground with my knees crooked beneath Frost’s body, I meet Felicity’s gaze as I say, “Quinton happened to him.”

Her expression doesn’t change, although her eyes narrow a fraction. “Elaborate.”

I don’t feel like it’s my story to tell. Not really. Plus, I’m not certain what Felicity does or doesn’t know, particularly in regards to the three feral shifters. I came into the picture well after she took off and forged her own pack, and until this moment, I only knew her in the abstract. So I look over at Kian for help.

“Quinton forced more shadows into him,” he says without preamble.

I can’t be certain in the bright sunlight, but I think Felicity’s face pales just a little. “More on top of what he was born with?”

Kian nods. “Much more. He called it an ‘experiment.’ I think he thought it would kill Frost, and it nearly did.”

The two of them stare at one another in some kind of wordless communication. A shared understanding, I think, about how dangerous Quinton really is.

Malix breaks the silence and adds, “After it happened, Frost was kind of, you know, out of it. We thought he was too far gone, but…” He trails off and flashes his million watt smile at me. “Amora here is like some kind of lucky charm.”

Felicity’s shrewd dark gaze slides to me. “Oh?”

Something about her appraisal makes me uncomfortable. I don’t want to get into an explanation of our odd, three-way, possibly broken bond or what any of it means, so I just shrug and tighten my fingers on Frost’s skin. “I’m his mate. My presence helps him keep the shadows under control somehow.”