False Mate, True Mate

Chapter 1

Angelique ran up to the house, dark hair fluttering behind her as her school bag bounced on her back. "Mommy! Mommy! Guess what?"

Her mom, Anna, loped out of the woods behind her before shifting into human form. "What is it, dear?"

"I'm a woman now!" the girl announced proudly.

Anna smiled warmly at her daughter. "Oh really? In that case I think you deserve that celebration I promised you. Come on, little one. Let's get some ice cream." With that, she took her twelve year old daughter by the hand and led her up the steps of the back house.

Neither of them noticed the pair of yellow eyes peering from just inside the woods, fixed on the girl.

---

Angelique's eyes were drifting shut. Her mother had kicked the boys out and made a chocolate bundt cake for them to share, with vanilla ice cream melting all over it. After eating that, they'd gone up to her room and giggled while they discussed mates and how now her mate could find her.

She'd inspected her mom's mark, a delicate filigree on her left shoulder. It featured four evenly spaced circles and fine black lines that reached up the side of her neck. There was slight scar tissue inside each circle. Her mom got a wistful smile when she lightly caressed it.

"Some day, your mate will bite you, and you will bite him, and your DNA will make a unique mark that only the two of you will share," she said with so much love in her voice, Angelique almost couldn't wait for her mate to find her.

"But doesn't it hurt?"

"No, dear. It's an act of love. It feels really, really good." Her mom's eyes lit up with something Angelique didn't understand, but very much wanted to.

Now, she was drifting to sleep. Her brother and dad were home again, and everyone was dozing towards sleep. Her sensitive ears could already pick up the deep breathing of her brother in the next room. Her parents' breathing had synchronized, as it always did at night, only the breathes from downstairs...

Angelique's eyes popped open as she heard a stair creak. Suddenly, she wasn't at all sleepy. She crept to the door and peeked out, only to see a tall figure standing on the other side of her door. A hand snapped forward, grabbing her mouth, muffling her scream.

"At last, Joanna, I found you," a deep, masculine voice said with relief. "They told me you were dead, but I know you couldn't be. I finally caught your scent. I found where they hid you from me. We can be together again, Joanna."

I'm not Joanna! I'm not! Let me go! She tried to speak, but his hand was clamped over her mouth as he picked her up from the floor and ghosted down the stairs with her. In desperation, she bit his hand, small canines digging into his flesh. When he yelped in surprise, she screamed, rousing others.

"That wasn't nice, Joanna," was the last thing she heard before the yellow-eyed rogue hit her in the back of the head.