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The Mate He Took for Granted
The Mate He Took for Granted
作者: Rosemary

Chapter 1

作者: Rosemary
The encrypted offer from the Northstar Institute for Biomedical Research arrived on my phone just after noon.

Dr. Hurst squeezed my hand. "Congratulations, Elena. Northstar only recruits once every three years, and you're the youngest researcher in this intake."

She was proud of me, but the smile didn't quite reach her eyes. "The facility is in northern Alaska. Its location is classified, and you won't be free to leave during the first two years of the project. Are you sure this is what you want?"

"I've never been more sure."

I signed the digital acceptance form.

My departure date was seven days away—the fifth anniversary of the night Adrian Blackwood and I completed our mating bond.

For years, I'd reminded him about our anniversary, and every year he'd said pack business came first. Now that I was leaving, there was no point reminding him again.

Dr. Hurst studied me for a moment, then slid a ticket to Anchorage across her desk. "Spend these last few days saying goodbye to the people who matter."

I tucked the ticket and confidentiality agreement into my bag and drove back to the Blackwood estate.

Adrian was cooking in the main house kitchen. He'd just returned from a border patrol, and his black tactical shirt was streaked with mud, with dried blood darkening one cuff. Yet the counters were crowded with Vanessa's favorite dishes: roasted salmon, creamy potato soup, and a raspberry cake from the bakery downtown.

It was Vanessa's birthday.

She'd been married to Adrian's older brother, Marcus, for less than a year when he'd died shielding Adrian during a rogue attack. His last words had been simple.

"Take care of her."

Adrian had taken that promise as gospel for five years.

I stopped at the kitchen island. "I'm home."

Whatever warmth had been in his face vanished. "Tonight is Vanessa's birthday. Don't start anything."

I took a box of cinnamon cookies from my bag and set it on the counter. "I know. These are for her. She mentioned liking them."

He didn't touch the box. Instead, he looked me over as if I might have hidden a blade under the ribbon. "Since when do you care what she likes?"

His suspicion hit the same bruise he'd been pressing for years, but I pretended not to notice. "Give me your patrol jacket. There's blood on the sleeve. I'll send it to the laundry room."

Adrian frowned, clearly thrown by my cooperation. Once, I would've asked why Vanessa always came first. I would've reminded him that I was his fated mate, not some inconvenient guest in my own home.

But I only had seven days left, and I didn't want my last memories of him to be another screaming match.

After a moment, he peeled off the jacket and handed it over. When I checked the pockets, I found a folded receipt from the most expensive boutique downtown.

One ivory cashmere coat. The price was nearly two months of an average pack member's salary.

Five years ago, shortly after Adrian and I confirmed our mate bond, I'd paused in front of that boutique's window to admire the same coat. He'd wrapped his arms around me from behind and promised that once the border settled down, he'd buy it for me and finally hold my Luna ceremony.

The border had been quiet for years. The ceremony had never happened.

Still, as I held that receipt, a foolish spark of hope flickered to life.

[Maybe he remembered.]

[Maybe, before I leave, he'll finally keep one promise.]

There were only two place settings at dinner.

I didn't ask why. I fetched another plate from the cabinet and sat across from Adrian.

Vanessa smoothed a hand over her burgundy silk dress. "I haven't had much of an appetite lately, but the salmon smells amazing."

She was recovering from a mild case of gastritis. Adrian had canceled two council meetings to take her to a private clinic in the city.

He gave her the most tender piece of salmon, then glanced at my plate. Before he could ask, I pushed it toward him. "I ate late. She can have mine."

Surprise flashed across his face, but he passed my plate to Vanessa without protest. "If you like it, eat as much as you want."

I kept my eyes on my soup. I'd lost almost thirteen pounds over the past three months while preparing for Northstar's assessment. My loose sweater hid how sharply my collarbones stood out. Adrian either hadn't noticed or hadn't cared enough to ask.

After dinner, he brought out a silver gift box. "Happy birthday, Vanessa."

The ivory cashmere coat spilled into her lap when she lifted the lid.

She squealed and threw her arms around him. "Oh my God, you remembered! I only mentioned it once."

"Of course I remembered." He straightened her collar with an easy smile. "If you want something, just tell me."

The plate in my hand knocked against the table.

So he remembered the coat. He'd only forgotten who had wanted it first.

Adrian's gaze snapped to me, his expression icing over. "You're not seriously jealous over a birthday present, are you?"

The mate mark over my heart gave a dull throb. I steadied the plate and shook my head. "No. It looks good on her."
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  • The Mate He Took for Granted   Chapter 9

    Dr. Hurst reached remission in early spring.The morning we were due to fly north, the airport smelled of coffee, jet fuel, and wet pavement. Nova slept inside a carrier at my feet while Ash occupied the seat beside me like a retired king. Dr. Hurst was arguing with a gate agent about whether a hematologist's letter entitled her to two extra bags.My phone buzzed.[Alliance Tribunal Alert: Vanessa Blackwood has escaped medical custody. Do not approach. Contact territorial security with any information.]Every instinct in my body went still.Vanessa had been transferred to a psychiatric facility after attacking a guard during her fraud sentence. The facility sat three hours away. There was no reason to think she'd come here.Then Nova hissed.Vanessa stood beyond the security doors in a stolen nurse's uniform. Her blond hair had been hacked short, and rage had carved years into her face. She held one hand inside her jacket."You took everything," she said.Travelers turned. A guard reac

  • The Mate He Took for Granted   Chapter 8

    Dr. Hurst's first treatment cycle lasted twenty-nine days.I spent most of them between the hospital and the guest cottage, reviewing lab data at the kitchen table while Ash slept across my notes. At seventeen, he was more gray than black and deeply offended by travel, but he still yelled whenever I opened tuna.On the tenth morning, I found a small tabby kitten on the porch with a note attached to her carrier.[Ash's granddaughter. The shelter was going to send her outside the territory. No obligation—if you don't want her, I'll find another home.]I looked across the yard. Adrian was repairing a fence nearly two hundred yards away. He never glanced toward the cottage.The kitten climbed into Ash's bed, bit his ear, and went to sleep on his tail. He sighed like a wolf burdened by fools.I named her Nova.Adrian and I spoke only when Dr. Hurst's care required it. He drove blood samples through an ice storm when the courier service shut down. He found an apartment for her nurse near the

  • The Mate He Took for Granted   Chapter 7

    Eight years passed.Northstar's wolfsbane neutralizer began as three unstable proteins in a freezer and became the first treatment capable of reversing acute poisoning after the toxin reached a wolf's bloodstream. It saved forty-three lives during the first field trial.My name appeared at the top of the published study.At the Alliance medical summit in Vancouver, I stood beneath a white spotlight while two hundred physicians rose to applaud. Dr. Hurst sat in the front row, thinner than she'd been the year before but smiling like she intended to outshine the stage.When I stepped down, she wrapped me in a fierce hug. "You did it, Carter.""We did it.""Don't get sentimental on me. I hate a public scene."Her joke couldn't hide how badly her hands were shaking.Three weeks later, the diagnosis came back: acute myeloid leukemia. Even with a werewolf's healing, the disease moved aggressively. Dr. Hurst chose a specialist at the regional hospital outside Blackwood territory because he was

  • The Mate He Took for Granted   Chapter 6

    Once Adrian started looking, the lies came apart fast.The medical-center salary was only the beginning. Vanessa had charged designer clothes, spa weekends, and hotel suites to the widow’s relief fund. The Redfang wolf had helped move the money through accounts outside Blackwood territory. Together, they’d siphoned nearly half a million dollars from accounts meant for families who’d lost wolves on patrol.Marcus's death had made Vanessa untouchable. She'd used his sacrifice as both shield and key.The worst discovery waited in the security archive.Adrian found footage from the night Vanessa claimed she’d tried to kill herself. The camera outside the guest wing showed her entering the bathroom with the same Redfang wolf six minutes before I arrived. It showed the man leaving through the service door with a small vial in his hand.When the paramedics tested her blood that night, they'd found only a mild sedative—nowhere near enough to stop a werewolf's heart.Vanessa hadn't been dying.

  • The Mate He Took for Granted   Chapter 5

    Northstar sat between a frozen inlet and a wall of black spruce, two hours from the nearest town and farther north than most pack wolves ever cared to travel.The work suited me immediately.No one there asked whose mate I was. They cared whether I could isolate a wolfsbane compound without destroying its medicinal properties, whether my trial notes were clean, and whether I could keep my head during a containment breach.For the first month, I slept ten hours a night and still woke tired. Dr. Hurst called it decompression."Your body finally figured out the emergency is over," she told me over coffee. "Give it time to believe you."I changed my number. I kept one email account open because Alliance law required a channel for dissolving pack ties, but I filtered Adrian's messages into a folder I never checked.He sent one every day.[Please tell me you're safe.][I should've listened.][The job is yours if you come back.][I found the music box pieces. I'm having it restored.]That las

  • The Mate He Took for Granted   Chapter 4

    At four that afternoon, Adrian left the council hall with a velvet box in his pocket and a rare sense of satisfaction.He'd spent three months having the Luna ring made. The black diamond had come from the old Blackwood mine, and the silver band carried the crest of his bloodline. He'd even booked the glass conservatory where we'd first met and ordered the same wildflowers I'd carried at our private mating ceremony.Vanessa had called twice during the meeting. He'd silenced both calls.[Tonight is Elena's,] he'd told himself. [She deserves that much.]He hadn't forgotten our anniversary. Not really. He'd only been waiting for the right moment to make up for the years he'd kept me in the shadows.At least, that was the story he told himself on the drive home.The house was too quiet when he walked in. My coat was gone from the hook. The ceramic mug I always left beside the sink wasn't there, and Ash's food bowl had disappeared from the laundry room."Elena?" Adrian called as he took the

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