Shifting Boundaries

Chapter One

Everett

I checked my watch. It was 11:45 and I was achingly hungry. My next meeting was at noon, which meant that if I hurried, I would have just enough time to go to the dining hall for a quick meal. I should have had at least half an hour to eat, but the alpha had taken longer than usual to review the budget with me. He was a brilliant strategist but didn't have much of a head for numbers. I should have planned for this.

My stomach groaned aloud and I hurried my steps, already planning my meal. A burger sounded amazing, but Sal worked the grill on Tuesdays and she moved slower than my arthritic grandfather, who had a good twenty years on her. No burger, then.

The salad bar never had a long line, but I didn't think I could make it through the remaining four hours of my workday on lettuce.

That left the sandwich station. I grimaced at the thought – it seemed like all I ever ate anymore was sandwiches – but at least they were mobile. I could eat and walk, and maybe I would even get to the meeting room early. I'd get my favorite seat in the corner with an unobstructed view out the window. Having an escape, something better to look at than beige walls and floral prints, went a long way toward keeping me patient.

There was a mob of people outside the dining hall when I arrived. Nerves skittered through me and I had to clench my fists to keep my hands from trembling. What if the delay cost me my corner seat? I tried to slip through the crowd. It was too dense, though, and I realized the mob was actually the worst-formed line I had ever seen.

I resigned myself to waiting and glared at my watch as the line moved forward. At least it seemed to be going quickly, I thought as I approached the front. Only three minutes had passed since I arrived. If I took a prepackaged sandwich instead of making one myself, I could still get to the meeting room early. The bread would be soggy and the lettuce would be wilted, but it was worth it.

I finally got to the front of the line and found the doorway partially blocked by a tiny brunette woman. She focused her eyes on me, looking innocent and friendly until I tried to brush past her to enter the hall. Her mouth, painted a sweet pink color, formed a fierce scowl that disappeared almost as soon as it appeared, reforming into a pout. I would have believed the pout was sincere if I couldn't see the hard edge in her eyes.

"Smell the shirt," she commanded, leaving no room for argument.

"What?" I asked, surprised.

The woman thrust a dark, tattered shirt under my nose and said, "Smell it."

I shook my head in confusion but caught the scent on the shirt on my next inhale. My heart raced and I froze, taking in another breath. I looked between the shirt and the woman, my sandwich utterly forgotten.

Her eyes lit up as she studied my face, first with hope and then with enthusiasm. "Oh my God," she said, gripping my arms. "It's you!"

I took a step back, but didn't gain any distance from her as the crowd pressed around us. My heart still wouldn't calm down and it took a concentrated effort not to snatch the shirt from her hands and press my nose into it. I had no idea what why the woman was here making people smell a ratty old shirt, but I did know that whoever owned it was my true mate.

The woman tugged me through the crowd until we stood in the courtyard in front of the dining hall. "This shirt, it's your mate's," she said eagerly. It wasn't offered as a question, but she waited for me to respond.

Something about her enthusiasm sent warning bells off in my mind, but her grip on me was like iron and even having only experienced the faded remnant of my mate's scent on the shirt, I yearned to find her. This woman was the key to doing that. "Yes."

The woman's eyes filled with tears as she smiled so wide, I thought it must hurt. She threw herself against me in a tight hug and dissolved into tears.

The situation was quickly getting away from me and I had no idea what to do with a crying woman. Zara, my closest female friend, never cried – or if she did, it wasn't around me. I looked at my watch. It was 11:54 and if I didn't start walking right now, I would be late to my next meeting. I looked at the woman who was plastered to my chest and grimaced, then pulled out my phone and texted Geoff to let him know I wouldn't be able to make it to the meeting, after all. I didn't offer him an excuse since I had absolutely no idea what was going on, only that I couldn't leave.

The woman's eyes were still streaming when she pulled away from me and took out her own phone. We stood like that, each typing on our phones, for a couple of minutes. It was enough time for me to log into my work e-mail on my phone and forward Geoff the information he would need to lead the meeting without me.

"You have no idea how relieved I am to find you," the woman said as she tucked her phone away again and wiped at her cheeks.

"I think I do," I corrected. "I haven't seen anyone cry like that in a long time."

The woman's face twisted into a wry smile. "Sorry about that. I've been searching for almost two weeks. I never honestly thought this would work."

I nodded toward a nearby bench and said, "Why don't we sit?" After we settled ourselves, she still seemed to be recovering from her crying jag and didn't offer up any more information. Usually this would have been fine. I could be patient... but I was twenty-five years old and had started to think I would never find my mate. Some people don't, though it was rare. I couldn't keep from asking, "Can you take me to her?"

The woman looked up at me, wide-eyed. "What?"

"My mate. Isn't that why you were out there making people smell her shirt?"

The woman blinked a few times and rubbed carefully under her eyes at the smeared makeup there with a practiced hand. Her expression was more neutral when she looked at me again. "Yes. Your mate is in a healing sleep and needs your help. I know this is sudden, but would you please come with me to the Lakota pack?"

My heart had finally started to calm down, which was good. I was overtaken by nausea at her words. Healing sleeps were serious, like the human equivalent of a coma. We only ever slipped into them when our wounds were severe, and there was never a guarantee that a person would wake from them. Would I really discover my mate's identity only to lose her? "Of course. I'll need an hour to get some things together. Will that be okay?"

Her eyes lit again. "Yes, that's fine. Thank you. I'm Meleri, by the way. I'm your mate's sister."

"I'm Everett. I'll meet you here in an hour, then? Or in the dining hall, if you prefer."

"The dining hall would be good," Meleri said, sniffing. "Could we exchange phone numbers, too? Just in case something happens."

I nodded and we typed each other's phone numbers into our phones. It was hard to squash down the need to ask for more information on my mate – even having her name would be nice, and I really wanted to know what had happened to put her life in danger. Talking would only delay the amount of time it took to get to her, though, and satisfying my curiosity wasn't worth the risk. I could get more details from Meleri later.