Predator and Prey

Chapter XIV

As promised :) Enjoy!

{Jack}

TWO DAYS LATER, I was called back to meet with the Alpha again. The first words he said when I stepped into his office were, "Let's take a walk."

"Sir? Is there a reason?" I asked, nerves frayed.

"For what?"

"Um... For why you needed to talk to me? For why we couldn't do this in your office?"

"Well, you're here because I need someone to chat with, and we're outside because it gets awfully stuffy up in that office. Do you have any idea how boring it is, sitting in a desk all day, just signing papers and listening to people complain?"

"Uh... No, but I think I get it now."

We opened the main doors downstairs, stepping out into warm April sunlight. There was silence for a moment, nothing filling the air between us but Howard's faint humming. I was pretty sure I recognized 'Paradise City' by Guns and Roses.

"She loves you, you know," he announced out of nowhere.

"What?" I said, blinking as I was startled out of my musings on classic rock music.

"I said she loves you."

"I don't know about that. It seems like all I've done since she met me is screw up her life."

"Oh, you probably have."

I bit back a sigh of frustration. While a wonderful leader, Howard was apparently not all that great at the whole 'comforting' thing.

"But that's what we do to people we love--we come in and turn them upside down, and we ruin perfectly good things, and we fall in love. Very rarely have I ever seen anyone whose relationship with their mate was always clean sailing, who never made each other stumble or fall. That's not why we have mates--it's so there's someone there to help you pick yourself up off the ground when they knock you down."

"Thanks, but I don't think there's a metaphor big enough to explain how utterly screwed up this situation is."

"Why?"

"Because for weeks, I was friends with the dick who attacked her. He was just a guy who lived in her building, and he smiled, and we talked. I said hello to him on the streets... I just don't know if there's anything I can do to make that up to her."

"Wow. You really suck at this. Hmmm... how to make it up to her... Well, how good are you in bed?"

"Sir!" I exclaimed, blushing.

He let out a light chuckle, gripping my shoulders and turning me around to face the other way. I opened my mouth to protest but all that came out was a sigh as my eyes landed on Alex.

She was sitting cross legged in a field a little ways away, laughing as some Were pups circled her, snapping their jaws and barking playfully, trying and failing to tackle her. There was grass in her hair, and a flower tucked behind her ear, and she had never looked so perfect to me.

A little ways away, a group of Weres stood in the shade. I recognized a few--there was Angelina, talking to Celina, who was leaning against a tree next to her mate, Paul.

I didn't know what they were saying, but the look on their faces as they watched Alex made it pretty clear who the subject was and how they felt about her. I bit back a growl, fighting the urge to run over and pummel them.

"She loves you. You love her. So why is she sitting there alone?" Howard asked, looking at me. I ducked my head, scuffing the dirt with my shoe.

"Look, she hasn't spoken to me since we got here. I don't think she wants to see me."

"And have you spoken to her? Have you given her a chance? Or have you been scurrying around, avoiding her?" Howard asked, looking at me knowingly.

"I..."

"Go, Jack. Be in love. Screw up completely and utterly and laugh as you fall, and thank me later."

My Alpha turned around and walked away, leaving me alone with my mate, a few dozen dandelions, and three children.

"Hey," I said uncertainly, looking at her as I walked up.

"Well, if it isn't my long-lost mate." She glanced up at me, laughing at the pale, uncomfortable look on my face. "Relax, Jack. I'm kidding. Now, are you going to help me with these hooligans or what?"

I felt my lips relax into a smile as I collapsed in the grass, and for lack of a better description, my soul clicked back into place.

Maybe it wasn't perfect, but sitting here, covered in shedding fur and saliva and grass stains was a pretty damn good--if messy--start.