Chapter 3

TARYN POV

Evergreen trees sprinkled with snow rush by me as my feet carry me through their midst. The sharp, cold air stings my face. The scent of pine and snow and early morning sun is refreshing and invigorating, encouraging me to keep my pace as I finish this leg of my morning run.

My thighs burn, but it is a good burn, a burn you only get from a solid workout, from an energizing run. I have started my day this way for years now — since the day of my first shift — and on the days I skip it, I can tell a difference in not just my physical energy, but my mental energy too.

I crest over the final hill and the large, luxurious craftsman style packhouse comes into view, the sprawling lawn holding a fresh dusting of snow. I pick up my pace, the finish line of my personal race in sight, and let out a tiny “whoop!” as I reach the steps in front of the house.

My steps slow, and the image fades, the virtual reality headset signaling the treadmill that the preset workout is complete. I reach up and detach the VR from my face, turn off the clip-on fan, and hop off the machine, grabbing my towel and dabbing my sweat soaked face as I look at the view from the picture windows in the packhouse’s gym.

It is the same view I had during my run, but I enjoy it much more from the inside than I do from the outside. That’s why I use the VR workouts instead of running through the forest in the mountains — it’s too damn cold out there for my taste, and I prefer the safety and comfort of the indoors, thank you very much.

Plus, I am a Southern California girl at heart. I would take the beach and sometimes sweltering heat over the snow and frigid temperatures any day of the week. But family is important to me, which is why I moved to Silver Ridge after my parents passed away. So I could be with my aunt — my mom’s sister — instead of alone and without a family in the pack I grew up in.

The other pack members here think it’s odd that I never run out in the forest with them; most of them do a run out there at least once a week. I don’t mind it in the spring and summer or even in the early fall. But this is only my second winter here, and with Silver Ridge being at a higher elevation than any other pack in the state, my ass is always frozen during the snowy months.

And my toes.

“Time?”

I glance at the treadmill, checking the timer on the machine. “50 minutes,” I reply, turning to look at Blake as she crosses the room. “You?”

The crisp air outside has tinted her ivory cheeks with pink, clear evidence of her morning run. She never shies away from running in the forest. I think she’d even run out there in a blizzard if Alpha Dominic let her. The white stripe in her otherwise black hair is coming loose from her ponytail, falling into her gray eyes. She crosses her arms over her chest and leans against the window in front of me, smiling.

“49 minutes and one second,” she says.

I sigh and roll my eyes, but I walk to the whiteboard on the wall of the gym and add a tally mark under her name.

“We’re tied now,” I tell her.

She unfolds her arms and stands up straight. “What? No, I should be winning?” she says as she walks to the board.

I chuckle and shake my head. Not that it really matters. There is no prize, no end goal. It’s just for fun, just a game she and I have played for the last six years, both of us challenging and pushing the other to be better, to show those who thought we couldn’t do it that they’re wrong.

“The board never lies, Shrimpy,” I say.

Her sharp elbow jabs me in the gut and I grunt, knocked to the side slightly by her hit. Her strength still surprises me, since she’s so much smaller than most female werewolves. But then again, her wolf is huge, which is part of why she’s so strong.

“Damn it,” she grumbles after her eyes count up the tallies and she realizes I was right.

I smile and grab a water bottle out of the gym’s mini-fridge that is always fully stocked with drinks and snacks. I crack open the bottle and take a swig, rolling my eyes again as the doors to the gym open and Alpha Dominic and Beta Dawson stroll in, their massive forms and auras crowding the large room.

“Shrimp,” Dawson says, winking a brown eye at Blake.

“Troll,” she shoots back, flipping him off, and he laughs, returning the gesture.

Dominic heads straight to me, his eyes on me with every step. I chug the rest of my water as he approaches, avoiding his eyes for as long as possible.

“What can I do for you, Alpha Dominic?” I ask, twisting the lid back onto my now empty water bottle, and tossing it into the recycling, looking up at him once I’ve finished.

“I wanted to talk,” he says, crossing his arms, stopping a foot away from me.

“About what?”

“You know what, Taryn,” he says.

'Want me to punch him?' Blake mindlinks me.

'Won’t help,' I reply to her. 'Plus, you shouldn’t punch the alpha.'

'Hasn’t stopped me before,' she shrugs.

My lips twitch. 'Training doesn’t count.'

'Doesn’t it, though?'

“Taryn,” Dominic sighs, rubbing his face with his hand. “Please?”

I shake my head but move away from Dawson and Blake, and he follows. The two of them immediately start taking verbal shots at the other, but I block them out and focus on Dominic.

“Tare, I—“

“I’m going to stop you right there, Alpha,” I say, holding my palm up to cut him off.

“But sweet—“

“It’s Taryn,” I remind him, crossing my arms, my voice firm. “Not ‘Tare.’ Not ‘sweetheart.’”

He blows out a breath but nods. “Right. Sorry. I just — habits die hard, I guess,” he mutters, ruffling his sandy brown hair.

He’s normally put together and confident, but the last few times we’ve spoken he’s been a mess — barely stringing words together and unsure of his actions, his hair roughed up and his normally neat beard longer and untrimmed. He’s no one to blame but himself, though. He shouldn’t have expected anything other than this outcome.

He rests his hands on his hips, and his chin drops to his chest.

I sigh. “Did you actually need to discuss something, or was that just an excuse to get me alone? Because, goddess, help me, Dominic, I am not that—“

“I need a date for Alpha Wesley’s wedding,” he rushes out.

I bark out a harsh laugh and just shake my head, pressing my fingertips into my forehead. “You have an entire pack of willing females. Ask one of them.”

I turn on my heels and strut away, but his hand grabs my wrist, stopping me. I whip my head around and glare down at his hand on my arm, my nostrils flaring. He lets me go with the speed of one shocked, but my guard is up now. He’s not usually one to get physical, but he’s been more volatile the last few days.

“I don’t want to take any of them,” he admits. “You’re the only one I want to take.”

“You only want to take me?” I ask, raising a brow.

“Yes,” he breathes.

“There’s no one else in Silver Ridge you’d want to take?”

“No one,” he breathes, stepping closer to me.

“So, you’re telling me you don’t want to take any other female to the wedding, and yet you can’t commit to me?”

He groans, throwing his arms up in frustration. “That’s not what this is about, Taryn.”

“It is, though, Alpha Dominic,” I reply, my voice raising as I step closer to him. “I told you what I wanted. I want commitment. I want a mate. I want someone who is ready to have a family. And you made it very clear that you weren’t willing to be ‘tied down’ yet.”

“Don’t use my words against me.”

“I’m not using them against you. I’m just pointing out a fact.”

“But we have fun together, Taryn,” he says, resting his hands on my shoulders. “We’re good together, you and me.”

I press my lips together and close my eyes, avoiding his eyes, avoiding those long lashes that should be illegal on a male. He’s not wrong. We’ve had fun together the last year. And he is good. He is so very good.

But that’s all it has been for him. Fun. And when I was ready for more, when I confronted him and laid it all out on the line, he shot me down without even a thought.

I would have understood if it was about wanting his mate, but it wasn’t even that. He just didn’t want to commit. Even though he’d been with no one else in over a year, he still couldn’t take that decisive step, couldn’t agree to see if we could be something more, something serious.

So I walked. I did what was right for me, and put my needs first, and told him we were done.

And I will not let him bat his eyelashes to get me to let him back into my bed.

“But that’s all it is for you,” I say, opening my eyes. “And there is no ‘you and me.’ There is you, and there is me, and that’s it.”

I shrug his hands off my shoulders and walk back over to Blake and Dawson, who both pretend they didn’t hear any of our argument. Even though we weren’t being quiet. Even though we’re all werewolves and have excellent hearing.

“I have to RSVP on the website today,” he says from behind me.

“Then say you’re going alone,” I reply, not breaking my stride and moving to the locker room door. “Or take Dawson,” I add, jerking my chin at him.

“He’s got his own plus one, and he’s taking Blake.”

“He is?” I ask, whirling around. “Is that true?” I lean to the side, looking past Dominic to Blake and Dawson.

Blake’s face scrunches up and she frowns, turning to stare at Dawson with me.

“Uh, Blake, did you want to go to the wedding with me?” Dawson mumbles, rubbing the back of his neck and looking at the floor, his brown hair falling into his eyes.

She stares at him, unblinking. “Weird. But okay,” she shrugs.

“Seriously?”

“It’s the wedding of the year, and I won’t be able to go otherwise,” she says. “And Dawson isn’t so bad. He’s trainable.”

Dawson perks up, but then frowns. “Wait, what does that mean?” he asks.

“Don’t worry about it,” Blake whispers, patting his chest. “See you later, Troll.”

She strolls through the gym and brushes past me and through the doors to the locker room. I gape after her, staring at my reflection in the one-way window of the locker room door. I know she’s just on the other side, waiting and listening.

'He’s going to keep asking you until you say yes,' she mindlinks me.

'And that’s the problem, B,' I reply. 'I shouldn’t have to agree to this to get him off my back.'

'I know, I know,' she says. 'I’m with you on that. But he’s an alpha, and he’s used to getting his way.'

I put my hands on my hips and blow out a breath, looking up at the ceiling. “Selene, help me…” I sigh, then turn to look at Dominic. “Okay. I will go with you. But!” I hold up my finger to stop him as he moves to me, reaching out his muscular arms to hug me. “It’s not as a date, or a girlfriend, or whatever. Just as your friend,” I tell him, pushing my finger into his chest. “Got it, Alpha?”

His shoulders drop, his whole body relaxing, like I just relieved him of a tremendous burden. “Thank you, Taryn.”

“Don’t make me regret this or change my mind,” I warn, then I slip inside the locker room before he can say or do anything more.

I lean back against the door once it’s closed, and shut my eyes, centering myself. I’m going with him to this wedding, but I still need to stand firm, to hold my ground and not let him turn it into something more than what I told him it was.

With newfound resolve, I shove off from the door and move to the row of lockers, where Blake already stands, leaning against them with her phone in hand.

I open my locker and pull out my jacket and my phone, frowning as I see the notification flashing on the screen.

*New message from CookieMonsterBeta on Date-to-Mate.

“What the fuck?” I mutter, tapping on the notification and unlocking my phone. “I don’t remember downloading the Date-to-Mate app,” I think out loud, my eyes scanning the message again.

CookieMonsterBeta: Friday night. 6pm at Rendezvous. You in?

“Ooh, you got a match?” Blake asks, peeking over the top of my phone.

I snatch the phone away and stare at her with wide eyes. “What do you mean ‘ooh, you got a match?’”

Blake scratches behind her ear as I look at her expectantly, her eyes looking everywhere except my face.

“Are you shitting me?” I say, looking up at the ceiling. “You did this?” I ask, pointing at the open app.

“I don’t know why you’re so upset,” she shrugs. “You’re the one who said you want a mate, want someone to settle down with. You’re 22, and you haven’t met your mate here in Silver Ridge, so you might as well start meeting people from the other packs in the area. Date-to-Mate seems like a great idea to me.”

“Yeah, it is a great idea. But not when SOMEONE ELSE makes your account for you. Without permission!” I shove the phone into her hands. “Delete it!”

She grimaces and lifts the phone up, tapping away at the screen with a sigh. “Okay, I will admit I should have asked you first. But come on, Taryn. You need to get out more. You need to meet new people. This is a great way to do that. And this… CookieMonsterBeta… seems like a great guy! He likes freshly baked cookies, surfing, and Tangled!“ she says, pointing at the profile information.

I look over her shoulder at it, reading through his answers. He’s 27 years old, has two cars — an old fixed up Mustang he works on himself, and a new Jeep. He surfs whenever he has the chance to get to the beach, and, as Blake mentioned, he is a self-proclaimed cookie connoisseur.

Since the app maintains anonymity until you go on a date, to make sure matches aren’t made on looks alone, there is no picture of him, and it doesn’t say what pack he is from. But, there are only three packs in the area, so that means the only options are Silver Ridge, Amber Forest, or Crescent Lake.

His username has ‘beta’ in it, so that rules Silver Ridge out, because Dawson doesn’t fit the description at all. And I know from gossip around the pack, the beta in Crescent Lake is not the type to fill out a dating profile. So it must be the Amber Forest beta.

“Just think about it,” Blake says, turning her head to look at me. “It won’t hurt anything to just go.”

I grit my teeth and take the phone back from her. I’m fuming, but I can’t help but agree that she has a point. I want to meet my mate, and he’s clearly not in Silver Ridge. And this guy seems great. Laid back and fun-loving, but ready to settle down.

“Are you going to shower here or at your place?” Blake asks me, grabbing a clean towel from the rack by the showers.

“Girl, you know I have to do that at home. I don’t have any of my products here,” I chuckle, shaking my head at her and pointing at my twists.

“I’ll see you later, Taryn,” she says, waving over her shoulder as she walks into the showers.

I lean my shoulder against the lockers, my thumb hovering over the delete message icon. Then, instead, before I can change my mind, I type out a reply.

Me: I’ll be there.