5

Brandon

I knew this girl was trouble from the first night she moved in next door and knocked on our door at ten p.m. with a plate of goodwill cookies, curtain bangs framing her face and that cheeky smile on her lips. I don’t understand what’s happening to me—actually, I do. What I don’t understand is how Maxine can be my mate.

I want to believe what I felt sitting next to her was something else, but my wolf was very clear.

Mine.

It whispered it over and over. Maxine is mine. My mate. Human mates aren’t uncommon for werewolves, but they are for Lycans. In my eighteen years of living, I never imagined my mate would be human.

A silly, aggravating one at that.

I scratched the back of my neck, staring at my partially shifted hands and extended claws. It took everything in me not to fully shift in the middle of school. If I did, my uniform would shred and I’d have to use the secret exit built for shifters who couldn’t control their wolves.

Millicent Ray is discreet about these things. The school was built by Lycans long gone, designed so shifters could grow up without fear of exposure. There are a hundred protocols in place to keep everything contained.

“Bran? What’s going on?” Johnny barged into the secret room for Lycan shifters to retreat to. We are treated differently from regular werewolves because we are different—more powerful, supreme.

He looked at my claws and then back at me, then he suddenly clamped his hands over his mouth like he understood.

“Your mate? Bro, you found your mate?! Woahhh.” Johnny leaped for joy, half happy and half mocking. Unlike Johnny, Mike and I never cared for finding our mates. After the last coming-out ceremony where neither of us felt any bond, we just concluded our mate would appear when we were a lot older, because our wolves only awakened a few months back.

“Shut up, it’s not funny.” I rolled my eyes.

“What, why? Don’t you like her? Is she not hot? Who is she? What does she look like?” Johnny threw a thousand questions at me.

“Max,” I said simply.

Johnny’s grin vanished.

“Max as in Maxine? Our neighbor?” he asked, stunned.

“Yes.”

“What the fuck? Are you sure? Have you told Mike?”

“Told Mike what?”

Mike strolled in, hands shoved into his pockets. He saw my hand, which was already slowly shifting back, and his eyes widened. “Did you shift in class?” he asked, as if he already knew that wasn’t the problem.

Johnny and I exchanged a look, silently daring the other to break the news. Mike is my twin, which means there’s a strong chance we share a mate. If that mate is Maxine, we have a serious problem. Johnny isn’t our brother by blood—he’s our cousin—but we grew up as brothers after his mom, Amy, raised the three of us as her own.

“Bran found his mate,” Johnny announced.

Mike frowned. “Who? Is she my mate too?”

“I… don’t know. But it’s Max,” I admitted, bracing for impact.

His entire body went rigid.

“Which Max?” he asked, jaw tight.

“What other Max do you know?” Johnny tried to joke, but Mike wasn’t in the mood.

“Well, good luck with your new mate. She’s not mine,” Mike said flatly.

“You don’t know that,” I argued.

“I do. I haven’t felt anything. And even if she is, I reject her. Right now.”

He turned and stormed out.

Mike’s words landed like a punch. My twin—my other half—had just severed something that should have belonged to both of us.

There’s no reasoning with him when he’s like this. Even Mom won’t change his mind. I don’t want to reject Max. I can’t. But this won’t work if Mike refuses to accept her.

“What are you going to do?” Johnny asked quietly. “Reject her too?”

“I don’t know. I don’t want a chosen mate. I want my fated one,” I said, exhaling sharply.

“How is that supposed to work? First, there’s no way Mike accepts her. Second, she’s human, how the hell are you going to tell her? And even if she believes you, she hates us. She’s not accepting any bond.”

He’s right. Completely right. Maxine won’t believe stories about shifters and mate bonds, no matter what she feels. And if she somehow does believe me, she’ll reject us the first chance she gets. Still, a stubborn part of me hopes she won’t.

“I just need to find a different seat and stay the hell away from her,” I whisper, watching my hands return to normal.

“We have AP English next. All four of us,” Johnny said with a teasing grin.

“What the fuck?”

With Mike, Max, and me in the same room, the pull will be unbearable. I can’t sit through that class. I can’t even stay in school.

“Give me the keys. I’m going home. I’ll send Peter to pick you guys up later,” I said.

Johnny hesitated, studying me with something close to pity.

“Give me the damn keys.”

I clenched my teeth. He sighed and tossed them over.

“You’re just walking out?” he asked.

“I’ll have Mom call Myrold. Now go back to hockey practice or whatever it is you pretend to do all day.”

“Real work,” Johnny shot back. “At least I don’t spend every hour staring at a board.”

“You call ice skating and kissing boys real work?” I rolled my eyes.

“What?! I don’t kiss boys!” he argued, storming after me as I left the secret room.

“Well, Dean wants to kiss boys. You specifically,” I said, teasing him about one of his teammates who clearly likes him.

“Unfortunately, I’m not gay. And I’m waiting for my mate who, thank the moon goddess, won’t be a British girl who lives next door and hates my guts.”

I flipped him off as he jogged down the hallway.

Then I saw her.

Maxine stood by her locker, pulling out a book. My heart stuttered. Her head snapped toward me like she felt my stare. Instead of her usual scowl, her brows were drawn together and her expression was so fucking soft, like she felt this too and was just confused. My wolf surged forward again, confirming what I already knew.

I looked away and walked out.

Shit.

This isn’t just about to get messy.

It’s the beginning of the end.