A Life Without My Mate
~~
Westin
~~
Before I had left ho, before I had told Reece that I just couldn’t be in Colorado Springs any longer, I had t my mate. Well, I already knew her. It was a little awkward for really. I had been assigned to Princess Rika when she was sixteen, and watching her for two years before she turned eighteen.
Up to that point, I had never looked at Rika as if she were anything other than my employer’s daughter. I had protected her, and I had made sure that she was cared for, but she was old enough to be left independent at tis, so it wasn’t that intense for . Not at the start anyway.
It was on her eighteenth birthday that everything changed for . It was on that day that I knew who she was to . I knew what I needed to do and how things would end up. It was the way that it always happened, wasn’t it?
No. I was wrong. So very wrong. It wasn’t how all things ended up, not even in this type of situation.
I had known who and what Rika was to when I walked into the castle that morning. I had slled her scent all the way to the underground garage, and it only got stronger the closer that I had gotten to the Royal Tower. Hell, if I had been using my car rather than one of the loaner cars from the garage, I would have known what was going on the mont that I got in it to drive that morning.
When I stepped into the elevator, I had to stop my eyes from rolling into the back of my head, and for the cat ate the canary grin to stay off of my face. I was just really happy that I was alone in there. Still, there was always soone watching, until you got into the tower, that is. And the mont that the door opened into the tower itself, that scent intensified even more.
I followed the sll all the way to the hallway outside of Rika’s room. I was to wait there for her to co out. I was not allowed to go inside unless there was a valid reason. It was understandable under normal circumstances, even more so now. Still, she had to notice the sll the mont that she had woken this morning.
My scent was outside her door, and in the room next to it from when I slept at the castle. That hadn’t happened often, but it had happened from ti to ti.
I stood there, heart pounding and palms sweating, as I waited for her to co out of her room. I was her only guard today, so I didn’t have to worry about anyone else seeing us. And because there was an abundance of peace at the mont, I was usually guarding Prince Reagan as well.
They weren’t little kids that ran off or anything, so it wasn’t that hard for us to manage the two of them at the sa ti. Not to ntion, they were still seniors in high school at the mont, so there wasn’t much they were going to get into during the day.
Finally, the mont ca. I could sense Rika coming toward the door. It was about to happen. She was going to open the door, look at in the eyes, and we would be bonded from that mont on. She was ant to be mine, fate had decided it. And now that she was eighteen, it was ti for us both to realize it.
That didn’t happen though. There were no mutual feelings. There was no instant connection between us. There was nothing at all. Just a teenage girl that was excited about turning eighteen.
"Good morning, Westin." She bead at , but it was no different than usual. "Co on, let’s go. I want to get downstairs." She rushed past and toward the elevator. I looked after her, awestruck. What had just happened? Sh..shouldn’t she have recognized as her mate?
Shouldn’t she have realized what was happening?
I thought that maybe she was just a little too excited for her birthday. It would happen soon. Maybe later in the day or tomorrow. Definitely by the end of the week. So, when that snowy December first turned into the second, then the eighth, and then January first, and moving ever onward with no hint of Rika recognizing as her mate, I started to worry about what was happening.
I had all the classic reactions to her. I was instantly connected to her. I was protective of her, more so than I had been before. I got easily jealous where she was concerned. I wanted to be with her, but I knew that I had to wait until she was able to recognize .
I just didn’t get it. How was she able to go without knowing what I was to her? What was happening? Was this even possible? I an, it had to be, because I was witnessing it first hand and all that, but was it actually sothing that other people have experienced? I needed to know.
I had to find out why I wasn’t connecting with my mate. Or rather, why she wasn’t connecting to .
This went on for months. As Rika and her brother graduated from high school. While they squandered away their sumr vacation. And as they started at the university in August. She never once looked at as anything other than her guard. The entire situation was heartbreaking, it truly was.
I couldn’t tell her anything though. She needed to realize who I was on her own. If I stepped in and told her who I was to her, and what she was to , it might scare her away. Not only that, but she might think that I was lying, because she couldn’t feel it on her own.
And then, if the feelings did co, she would question them because she wouldn’t know if it was her falling for , or if it was my words manipulating her. I was stuck here and there was nothing I could do.
When she started at the university, it was like things had changed. She was a different person. She was interested in the other n on campus and seed to be actively looking for a boyfriend. She wasn’t interested in her mate at the mont, just a boyfriend. She hadn’t dated once in high school, but now she was interested in finding soone to rectify that situation.
And to my dismay, Rika had found him at orientation. Or the person that she thought was going to fill that gap for the ti being. Clovio, a foreign exchange student from Germany, was the object of Rika’s current fascination. And the object of my rage. He didn’t know how much I hated him. How much I wanted to hurt him.
Although, I couldn’t. He was human, and that ant that he was off limits to . Dammit!
As ti went on though, things started to happen. Rika was being duped by that asshat, that piece of shit, Clovio. Him and his friends were Jaegans. They weren’t using the na that they were born with, they were using fake nas that were given to them when they moved to the states. And now they were trying to get closer to the King and Queen.
Clovio and his little friend Warrick were using Rika and Alyssa to do this.
And that day that I got the call that Rika had run away from school with this man, that had been a straw that I didn’t expect. It broke though. I was so furious with her. I couldn’t believe the danger that she had put herself into. The other n that had surrounded them, while human, did not sll right at all. They were evil.
They were an. And they wanted to hurt my Rika.
When I got her back ho to the castle, after she had had her world turned upside down by the revelations from those n, I wanted to tell her what I was to her. She had been so hurt, so lost and broken. I wanted to be there to put her back together again. I wanted to tell her that she was mine and I was hers.
There was no reason to look anywhere else, and that I would hold her and make her feel better.
"Rika?" I called out to her as she sobbed alone on her bed.
"Westin? What are you doing here?" She had been crying so hard that she hadn’t known that I was there.
"I wanted to check on you. I was worried about you. Are you OK?" Just looking at the pain and heartbreak in her eyes had nearly broken . It was so hard not to rush to her side.
"I..I’m fine." She buried her face in her knee and tried to ignore .
"You don’t look fine, Rika. You look heartbroken and destroyed. And I just want you to know that I am here for you if you need ." I wanted to say more, to tell her all of it, but I just couldn’t. Not while she was feeling like this.
"You’re here for ?" She snapped at . "For what? To ridicule and my decisions? To make feel like a worthless piece of shit that isn’t worth your ti? To make feel like every decision I have ever made was the wrong one? What exactly are you here for, Westin?
What is it you want from ? What do you want to do?"
"I just want you to be happy, Rika! That’s all I want, dammit! Why are you like this? Why are you so blind to everything around you? Why can’t you see what is right in front of you?" I very nearly told her right then and there, at least I hinted at it.
"Like hell you want that." She rose to her knees on the bed as she glared at . I knew that she was angry, I just didn’t understand why. "You are always being an to . You are always acting like you can’t stand . And now I am supposed to believe that you want to be happy. That is bullshit.
You are probably happy that I got my heart broken. You’re probably happy that all of this happened to ." It was at that mont that I realized that Rika had noticed that I had been acting different. And she had noticed how much more protective I was of her. She had misinterpreted it as being an, I had not been expecting that at all.
"I am not happy that you are upset, but I will not lie to you. I am happy that you are no longer with Clovio. I don’t want you to be with him. I don’t want you to be with anyone else." Before I could tell her that I wanted her to be with , that I needed her to be with , she cut off with another angry shout.
"You’re just like my parents. You want to be a child forever. You’re treating like a baby. You’re treating like I ant for things to go wrong or sothing."
"I am not." I growled the words at her. "I am not happy about any of this, except that you are not with him anymore. That is the only thing that brings joy. And Rika, the reason for that is I l-."
"SHUT UP!" She snapped angrily and cut off once more. "I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to hear anything else you have to say. Go away! Leave alone! I don’t want to see you ever again." I knew that she ant it.
She couldn’t feel the mate bond. She couldn’t tell that I was the one that she was ant to be with. At least, that was what I had thought it had ant. Now, I wasn’t so sure.
After that night, I spoke to Reece and told him that I was having issues with my mate. I told him that she was in love with soone else, which wasn’t really a lie. And I told him that I needed to get away for the ti being. I was a feline, and not part of the actual pack. I would be able to leave if he allowed to take a break from my duties. Thankfully, he had agreed.
It wasn’t until after the battle was over. It had co to a head not long after that night with Rika in her room. I didn’t see her again at all until I left. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. She had told that she didn’t want to ever see again after all, so I was going to make sure that I gave her what she wanted. At least for a year.
Or nearly that long. I would co back next year, when she should have had enough ti to settle down.
My only truly horrible compensation in this whole thing, was that when I left, I was sent to Wales with Clovio of all people. It had taken everything in not to kill that man the mont that I saw him. He didn’t deserve my Rika, or the pain that she had felt over him. I was going to truly enjoy making him suffer while we were there.
He would deserve all of that. He would deserve anything and everything that I could think to make him do while we were at the Alpha’s ho for that pack. I wasn’t here as a punishnt, not like him, so I wasn’t limited in the way that he was. That was going to be another upside as well. He was going to be my bitch, my dog, my grunt man that did anything that I told him to do.
I spent my entire first night there planning so of it out. That had been so of the first happiness that I had felt in a long ti. Knowing that the man that had tried to steal my mate away from was going to feel more miserable than I was. That would be the true ultimate win for .
Reviews
All reviews (0)