Shadow Mated (Ouachita Mountain Shifter Book 5) (3 page)

She’d glanced at him with a small smile. Not the bright one that showed her teeth, but a tiny, careful one. It turned his insides to mush when she showed this submissive side of herself.

“I always thought I’d never mate, but so much is possible now that the pact has changed.” The smile stayed in place as she chopped. “With the way you’ve been sticking close by, I thought…” Her hesitation brought a rosy blush to her dark cheeks. “Well, I thought maybe you’d been considering… me.”

Gash breathed shallow because he couldn’t find air. Considering her? No. He
knew
she was his. There was nothing to consider.

He just needed to keep everyone else from knowing it.

“You?” he’d forced through clenched teeth.

She’d shrugged one shoulder, chopping faster as the smile faded to a phantom. “Yeah. I just thought… maybe. My tiger has considered you, so I thought… I dunno… maybe?”

Fuming and desperate for her to stop this line of thinking, he’d declared, “I don’t want a mate. Ever. You understand?”

He had to make her see, any connection to him was dangerous for her. Simply being her friend was dangerous. But a mate? That was like painting a bright red bullseye on her forehead. Especially now that Felix and the Alley Cats knew where to find them.

“I mean, why the fuck do you think I joined this clan anyway? Why do you think I took that no-mating vow in the beginning? Because I didn’t want to be fucking tied down and shit.” Such a lie. Such a fucking lie. “I don’t want cubs looking up to me and I don’t want a needy female to care for. Got it?”

The chopping knife had slowed, the more he ranted, and when he finally stalled to take a breath, she’d gone completely still.

“Got it,” she whispered. “Thanks for clearing that up.”

Later, when he’d returned to the security office, he ran the tapes back to find that she’d started crying as soon as he’d walked away from the kitchen.

You hurt mate
, his animal accused angrily.

I know. Now I’m going to make it better.

“Please,” she said through another uncontainable sob.

“Shhh. Just…” Slowly, Gash eased to a crouch in front of her, lifting his hand so very slowly. “Just let me help, okay?”

He was going to touch her. His Bailey. He’d never done it before, not even on accident. Only through a screen that beamed a black and white image of her into his office.

His fingers trembled like butterfly wings as he carefully brushed Bailey’s tears from one cheek and then the other, lingering to push the power of their fledgling bond at her. Anything to ease her now. Because he’d had enough pushing her away, enough hurting them both, enough denying what was his. What was
hers
. When it wasn’t helping anyway.

Felix was coming for them whether Gash pretended these people meant nothing to him or not. And after what had happened tonight, his brother would know what a lie it was.

It was time to be honest. With her and with his heart.

Chapter Two

Never let a man see you cry
. That’s what mama used to say. Along with,
don’t let yourself get too round. Careful what you eat. Always push that chest out. Walk like a delicate female, but never appear fragile. Smile when spoken to. Especially if it’s a male. Other females are not your friends. They’re your competition. Do all these things, Baileena, and you will catch yourself a proper mate to put cubs in you. Fail, and you will be cast out of the streak to live on your own.

But mama was wrong about a lot of things, and right about some.

Bailey had been so careful to never let Gash see her tears. Or anyone around the lodge. Because they were hers to bear, and nobody else’s. She cried easily and often. Happy, sad, or anywhere in between. It was her go-to expression since she’d never been allowed to cry as a child. She wasn’t ashamed of it. She just didn’t want any of her friends thinking she was broken because of a couple tears.

But tonight, she’d held it in as long as she could. After the horrid exchange with the shadow clan, everyone had gone home to settle their animals… or so she’d thought. She’d stayed to settle her tiger the only way she knew how: cooking.

Bad idea, Bai. Sandals-with-socks level bad
.

She tried not to look at Gash as he knelt so close she could smell the diesel from the wrecker he’d ridden in earlier. More embarrassing sounds clawed their way up her throat. The scent brought everything back with brutal clarity.

She had watched him through the dining room window as he’d traded places with Owyn. Just before he climbed in the truck, he gave her a look so naked and raw, her stomach heaved with despair at the mere memory. Eyes that gave her everything in the flicker of a moment. His regret, his devotion, his promise. A look that claimed her, no matter his harsh words from before.

She was his.

She feared that’d be the last she ever saw of Gash. And the fate she imagined waiting for him in Memphis was unbearable to think about. But somehow she’d held it together. Somehow, she’d wrestled her tiger away from running after him.

But then he’d silently marched right back in the lodge not thirty minutes later, like there’d never been a group of psychotic wolves forcing him away. Right past the dining room where she was shakily cleaning up the remains of the disrupted party. Like he hadn’t told her with his parting gaze that she was his.

Now she was curled on the floor, bawling like a baby, and embarrassing the hell out of herself. Except… did it really matter? What good was her pride when her clan was in such a hopeless situation?

Owyn had been hurt tonight. Doc, as his mate, had been careless, letting her emotions cloud her judgment. The pregnant mates, Bethany and Josie, were put in danger, along with the most vulnerable of the them all, the clan’s lone young… three-year-old Rhys.

Bailey shuddered, trying to reel in her emotions. But everything was so raw.

And Gash… his eyes were soft like she’d never seen them, and his hand was slowly moving toward her, and things felt very real and surreal at the same time. He was salt in the wound. And the sting was brutal.

She gasped as he touched her. A light brush of his fingers against her cheek to wipe away the wetness of her tears. Then another. Careful, yet sure. And another.

Bailey let the pent up breath rush out as a wave of relief that could only be supernatural wrapped around her heart.

A mating bond.

Gash was trying to use his bond to soothe her, and holy hell, it was working.

Bailey squeezed her eyes closed as another surge of his unique balm washed over her. The muscles that clenched her bones in a death grip released, and she slumped back on her ass, leaning against the cabinet. She was a tangle of legs and fabric, her dress and apron bunching up in a weird way she couldn’t really care about. She heaved another sigh, her sobs fading into the background as her eyes found the wall directly in front of her.

This was…
wonderful
. This feeling of peace. It was lulling her into a false sense of security, but for now, she’d take it.

Gash moved to sit beside her, bracing his back against the very same cabinet. They were quiet for an eternity, or maybe only a moment. There was no way to know. But then he reached between them and took her hand in his, so careful it was like he held a baby bird.

Bailey turned her head to watch him. He stared at their joined hands silently, and she wondered, not for the first time, what was brewing in his mind.

Gash was an enigma. He had a past she couldn’t comprehend, full of trouble and darkness she could never fathom. Yet, she knew his heart was gold. She knew because of the small things. The way he patrolled their land. The way he worked long hours to review security tapes. The time he’d spent getting to know the local law enforcement from the neighboring town of Weston. The guarded gleam in his eye whenever he watched members of the clan from afar. He thought no one noticed, but she did.

“What hurts you?” he asked in his gruff way.

It used to rub her wrong, the way his tone sounded like annoyance. But over time, she’d grown used to it. Even came to like it. Annoyance was still an emotion, and a strong one at that. It meant things mattered to him.

“Hurt?” Her voice shook, but she could speak. That was a step forward. “I don’t think I’m hurt exactly.”

His breath rushed out and his shoulders dipped with apparent relief. “Then what makes you… leak?” he said, gesturing to her drying tears.

Bailey couldn’t help the tiny lift of her smile. Leak. He had the funniest way with words.

“Lots of things I guess. But tonight…” She sighed, resting her head back against the cool metal of the cabinet behind her. “Tonight it was your look. The one you gave me right before you got in the wolf’s truck.”

Gash went motionless, and she shot him a glance. He remained staring at their hands, loosely tangled where his bond was still a hair-thread connection working its magic.

Bailey studied his profile. His shiny dark hair was mussed like he’d run his hands through it recently. His forehead pinched in the center, causing a thick black brow to slash upward in a way that reminded her of a ruthless pirate. Long lashes fringed his eye, and the skin around it crinkled at the corner in some emotion she couldn’t read. The bristle of dark scruff he liked to keep, started halfway down his cheek, underneath the wide slash of scar that marked him from the corner of his mouth to the crease of his eye.

She chewed the inside of her cheek, thinking. An injury like that must have hurt. And what caused it to leave a scar? His animal should have been able to heal it with a much better result.

The ridge of his jaw tightened and the vein in his neck pushed out as he tensed. Bailey pulled her gaze away, not wanting to make him any more uncomfortable.

“So it is because of me.” His voice was a hoarse monotone. “Again.”

“What is?”

“The reason you’re distressed.”

“Yeah,” she sighed, never wanting to lie to him. “I guess it is sorta. But this is helping.” She squeezed her fingers around his thicker scarred ones, pressing their palms together.

His gaze snapped to hers and she almost jerked her hand away. Maybe she shouldn’t have done that. The squeezing or the admitting.

“It is?” he asked, searching her face.

Bailey swallowed hard, dislodging her nervousness, and giving him a quick nod. “Quite a bit actually.”

“Then I’ll stay.”

Good. She wanted him to stay.

But… Gash didn’t want a needy female. He was very clear about that. She should appear strong even if he had found her in a puddle of tears.

Bailey cleared her throat to make her voice solid. “If you need to go—”

“I don’t.”

Staring into his eyes, she thought she saw the flicker of his cat just beneath the copper brown. She’d never seen his animal before. He was a cougar jaguar mix. Very rare among shifters and completely non-existent in the wild. She wondered if he had spots like a jag, or if he was solid like a mountain lion. Orange fur or amber. Speed and agility, or bulk strength.

“What’s going to happen now?” she asked, her voice sounding breathless when she wanted it to sound normal. “W-With the clan, I mean. What’s next?”

With a tick of his jaw, he pulled her hand closer, tucking her arm under the crook of his elbow until her forearm was pressed to his. From fingertip to elbow, they were touching now, and she almost forgot why she’d started bawling in the first place.

Gash sighed, tipping his head back against the cabinet and bringing his knee up to casually drape his free arm across it. “Things got fucked up tonight,” he muttered. “Never wanted this for Ouachita.”

“Of course you didn’t. No one blames you.”

His gaze raked her as he snapped, “They should.”

Bailey’s eyes landed on his chest. Partially because she couldn’t meet that dominant werecat gaze—her tiger was submissive, another reason she’d been abandoned by her streak—and partly because of the rise and fall of his heavy breathing. He was upset. At himself, she realized.

“Is that what you want? For us to blame you for bringing danger to our home?”

Carefully, she met his eyes and found him, brows furrowed, considering her question.

“Maybe I do. Maybe I want Magic to kick me out of here so you’ll be safe.”

“You make us safe. You set up the security cameras. You secured the premises. You take the nightwatch. You make it possible for us to do our jobs around here.”

Gash swallowed, looking away. “I led my brother here. And you don’t know him like I do. If you thought Rigor and his wolves were bad, just wait until Felix gets here.” His hand squeezed hers tighter, bringing the back of it to his chest right above his sternum. She could feel the patter of his heart as it tripped double time.

“Would your brother leave us alone if you left?” She thought she knew the answer, but she had to ask.

Gash was quiet for too many seconds before finally admitting, “No. No, he wouldn’t. It’s why I’m still here.”

“What do you mean?”

“I made a deal with Rigor. He was supposed to take me back to Memphis, but I knew Felix would send a crew here after I was gone, and I couldn’t let that happen.”

“A deal?”

Gash flicked his thumb under the hole in the knee of his jeans. A nervous gesture? The first one she’d ever noticed from him.

“I did what I do, Bailey. I figured out what he wanted most and offered to get it for him.”

Bailey frowned. “And… what did he want?”

Gash found her gaze, his eyes going hallow. “Revenge.”

The word made the air around them go chilly. Left her tiger twitchy.

“And you’re going to get it for him?” Asking gave her mouth a bad taste. She knew where Gash came from was ugly, but he’d changed. He wasn’t that man anymore.

“I don’t want to,” he croaked, and she could hear him breaking behind the mask he always wore. “But the truth is, I’ll do anything—
anything
—to keep you safe. You’re
important
.”

Bailey’s heart pounded, her chest squeezing tighter with each breath until she had no air.

You’re important
.

There was still a hint of the hard shell expression Gash forever had in place, but he’d said… he’d said…

Did he mean it?

“Me?” she breathed, still unsure and not wanting to be shut down as soundly as she had the first time. That had effing hurt. But the look he gave her before he went with Rigor, it meant something didn’t it? Didn’t it?

Gash opened his mouth and then slammed it shut, looking confused, and her hopes came crashing down like a falling Jenga puzzle.

Oh, shit. She’d misunderstood. Her tiger curled into a ball behind her chest, ducking its head in shame.

Once again, Gash went to speak but nothing came out.

Mortification bled like wet paint over her cheeks, so hot she wanted to press her face to the inside of the walk-in freezer door. Her heart raced impossibly faster to account for all the extra blood rushing to her skin. And her fingers and toes went numb, especially where Gash held her hand.

Dear god, she needed to get away from him so she could breathe. Think. Cut her damn tongue from her mouth so she’d never make her stupid assumptions vocal again.

“No.” She gave a little shake of her head and attempted a weak smile. “Okay. I misunderstood is all. You… you meant the clan. All of us.
We’re
important.”

She tried to extract her hand, but he held it too tightly.

“No, I meant
you
,” he said, frowning. “But I felt something through our bond.”

Bailey stilled. He was giving her whiplash.

Sitting forward, he stared like he’d never seen her before, his eyes flicking over every facial feature before digging deep into her gaze. “Hope,” he husked. “I felt your
hope
. Such beautiful hope. It was like the sun shining on morning frost, or some shit.”

Bailey’s eyes went wide, her embarrassment ticking up a notch. She yanked her hand away from his to tuck it close to her chest, her mouth fishing open, searching for a response.