Rejected (Shadow Beast Shifters Book 1)

If it wasn’t for my newly enhanced senses, I’d have thought they were all dead. It was so still, an eerie silence my only companion as I crept forward. The pack lands were almost never without some sort of revelry, whether in human or wolf form, but outside of the slow rise and fall of chests, there were no other signs of life.

My bare feet padded through the soft grass as I stepped over the wolves around me, careful not to disturb them. All I could think was a second perfect opportunity to escape had been handed to me, and I would not waste it this time.

I had to break this bond to the Torma pack.

To Torin. That fucking bastard.

Now that I was back in human form, I wished there was time to stab him again, followed by a swift decapitation. No coming back from that, even for a shifter. But for now, I’d just have to be satisfied with leaving my joke of a true mate—and never looking back.

By this time, the early morning light had really found its feet, and there was a bite to the sun that suggested today would be one of those “hot” winter days. Generally, those days were followed by a massive freeze, and we’d all wake up to patches of ice and snow.

Not that I’d be here to see it. My very naked ass was on its way out.

My wolf whined gently in my chest, a sad, mournful sound. She’d had such high hopes for the one who would share her soul, and maybe if Torin’s wolf had been in control, it would have been different. Wolves were honorable in ways humans were not.

My wolf whined again, but she didn’t try to enact her will over me. She accepted our fate. Too much hurt existed between Torin and me for it to ever be repaired, and I would die before allowing him to claim us.

He doesn’t want us.

I wasn’t sure who thought that, but it was the fucking truth, and I had to look down and make sure I didn’t have a blade in my chest this time.

Run!

The wolf snapped me out of my musing, and even though I’d been quietly creeping across the field as fast as I could without making noise, I’d missed one huge obstacle in my way: Torin.

He stepped out of the shadows… my mate.

Rejected mate, to be more accurate.

Torin must not have been as affected as everyone else by whatever I did, and he’d come straight for me the second he could. Speaking of, the others looked like they were twitching now too. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Torin bit out, his voice low and rumbly.

A growl spilled from my lips, more animalistic than I’d been able to manage before tonight. “I’m leaving,” I snarled. “To never return. You should be grateful.”

It was Torin’s turn to growl, and unfortunately, his was much more impressive. He stalked a few steps closer, the muscles of his arms and chest tense. Since he was naked, it was easy for me to see his dick start to harden, like he was reacting to me, despite the rejection of our bond.

Spinning, I took off in the opposite direction and got a decent distance away before he tackled me. We wrestled, and not in the fun, naked way. Nope, this was about survival for me, and once again, I was thwarted by the superior physical strength of a male shifter.

If I survived all of this, I needed to develop some fighting skills that would even up the odds in a battle.

Torin hauled me up, his hands wrapped around my biceps as he held me in place. “You do nothing without my permission,” he rumbled. “I. Own. You.”

I kneed him in the balls, and whatever inflation had been in his dick would be long gone by the time he retrieved his testicles from his throat. Shifters were tough, but I had spared no power in that hit, and it was enough to knock him back, his hand cupping himself.

“You are dead to me,” I said quietly, not willing to expend any further emotion on him. “Don’t show your face before me again, or the next time I stab an object through your heart, it will be something that kills you.”

He lunged for me again, but I was already moving, sprinting across the field.

“Stop her!” Victor shouted, a rumble in his tone as he came fully awake.

I didn’t look back, pushing through my exhaustion. Footfalls sounded behind me, closer than I would have liked, and I picked up my pace, almost completely tapped out in energy.

“Sunny,” Jaxson hissed.

Fucker.

Somehow, I found a small reserve of strength, sprinting even faster. Jaxson let out a muttered expletive, the air making the slightest whoosh sound as he dove forward to tackle me. I’d been expecting it, though—Jaxson and Torin were so similar in their approach—and as I judged the direction of his attack, I sidestepped him.

My footing was sure and strong, despite fatigue, and I didn’t lose any time in my deflective move. If being a shifter didn’t come with all this pack bullshit, I’d think it was the absolute best thing that had ever happened to me.

“Mera!” This bellow was from Torin, and I was legitimately getting whiplash from him. Why would someone who’d rejected their mate be so adamant that I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere?

There was no time to ponder that because the alpha must have decided that enough was enough, and as he jerked on the ties I had to his pack, my feet finally missed a step and I tumbled forward. Motherfucker. I’d forgotten about the alpha control, and even though it was weak on me, it was enough to throw me off-balance.

As I pushed myself up, a heavy fist slammed into my temple, and everything went fuzzy and grey around the edges. Shifters packed a mean punch, and while I had no idea who’d hit me, the blow definitely knocked the reality out of me.

It took at least thirty minutes to heal a head injury, and by the time I was back in fighting form, I’d been taken into the pack house and chained to a bedpost. It was a reinforced metal post that looked unbreakable, even for shifters. My cuffs clanked against it as I jerked into awareness.

“Why the fuck is she in your room?” Sisily snarled, jabbing Torin in the chest. The pair of them were across the room as I frantically looked around. “You rejected her, and I want her dead. Right now.”

Torin’s room. He’d brought me to his room?

It was dimly lit, only a small sliver of light seeping through a partially open blind, but with my new shifter vision, I had no issue seeing Torin and Sisily—both clothed now, thankfully—having their little fight.

“She’s my prisoner,” Torin said in a controlled voice. “My father has advised me to think on what I want to do with her.”

“What is there to think about?” Sisily shouted even louder. “You said you love me. You want to make me your mate. Just kill her ugly ass and get it over with.”

Her focus was on Torin, but he was watching me, his eyes averted over her shoulder to meet mine. The self-centered bitch probably hadn’t even noticed that her “love” was barely paying attention to a word she said.

Narrowing my eyes, I tried to kill Torin with mere thought alone, and a small smirk tilted up his lips. I ignored the way that smile still affected me, forcing the memories of his rejection to the forefront of my mind. That was the only thing I needed to remember.

Sisily was still shouting abuse, each sentence less coherent and more tearful, but she was cut off completely when Torin wrapped his arms around her, jerking the shifter-bitch up against his body. His mouth was on hers in the same instant, and this felt a lot like punishment for my lack of reaction to him before.

I couldn’t look away from the absolute train wreck they were. A glutton for punishment and pain, dark agony filled me as I stared.

Sisily moaned loudly, and since Torin wasn’t doing anything except kissing her, I had to wonder if this was all a show for me. Even on her side.

Torin’s hands moved lower to her ass, hauling her up as she wrapped her legs around him. Pain exploded in my chest. He had her cradled against him in the sort of embrace that only a true mate should know. Show or not, this fucking hurt.

I didn’t know all the steps that went into a proper fissuring of the mate bond, but I knew that a public display of rejection like this was one of the early steps. I refused to part my lips and let the howl rising in my chest free, choosing instead to bite down hard on my tongue, using the sharp jab and blood to distract myself.

Torin was trying to break me. In the worst way he could think of, with a woman I fucking detested. But I was an expert at hiding my grief, thanks to their many years of tempering me in the fire.

I could do this.

Sisily was half-naked at this point, panting and moaning all over him like a bitch in heat, and despite the fact that I could barely breathe through the splintering of my soul, I wasn’t going to sit here like the victim.

No, thank you.

“Come on, Sis,” I bit out, grateful my voice sounded calm with just a hint of bitterness. “That porn you’ve been watching is so outdated. No one says, ‘Please, please take me, baby’ anymore. You’ve got to work on your dirty talk.”

Torin’s growl was loud and echoing, so I turned my fake-bored expression on him. “I have to say, after the years of rumors, I expected a little… more.” My eyes dropped to the front of his pants, and despite the thin material of the basketball shorts he’d thrown on, there wasn’t a remote sign of arousal there. If I hadn’t already seen his somewhat impressive package, I might have thought he’d been an asshole all of these years to overcompensate for his tiny dick. But nope, he was just thoroughly unexcited to have Sisily grinding against him. Poor, dumb, desperate bitch.

“You should hold out for a man who doesn’t think of you like a sister,” I helpfully suggested.

Sisily screamed and lunged toward me, but Torin stopped her before she got close.

“She’s jealous.” He laughed, sounding smug as fuck. “And now she gets to watch me bend your perfect ass over my bed and slam my way-above-average cock in your tight little pussy.”

I snorted. “Tight… uh, sure. I mean, Don and Shortie double-teamed her”—I winced—“in the same hole. But, you know, I’m sure those rumors about her peeing a little when she laughs are greatly exaggerated.” I shot her a fake expression of sympathy. “Kegel exercises are gold, babe. You really should look into that.”

Sisily’s cheeks were red, her eyes flaming as she tried to control her fury with some deep breathing. Falling back on my smartass mouth was helping me compartmentalize the pain—it was only hurting my soul at that point, but fuck, who needed a whole one of those anyway?

A little darkness never killed anyone.

Torin had those damn eyes of his on me again, searching across my face, staring in a way he never had before. Like he was seeing me for the first time. I didn’t like it. It made my wolf squirm and a part of me pant like I was the bitch in heat now. No. Thank. You.

When my apathetic expression didn’t change, his eyes narrowed, and never taking his gaze from me, he spun Sisily around and yanked up her skirt. When his dick emerged a moment later, it was finally hard. Guess he figured out how to make it work again.

“You asked for this,” he murmured, and I wondered what Sisily would think if she knew he was fucking her without removing his eyes from mine.

I forced a smirk to tip up my lips. “I’ll give you some pointers. It looks like you need the help.”

He slammed into her, and she groaned, her eyes fluttering closed.

I was desperate to do the same; close my eyes and block my ears, but I refused to look away. All I had left at this point was my pride, and for sure, hell would freeze over before I gave him the satisfaction of seeing me rattled.

Forcing myself to relax, I breathed in and out, pretending for a moment I’d just skipped to a particularly boring porn video. In and out, slam that dick, stare at my face like he was memorizing it.

I held up two fingers. “My score is two out of ten,” I said without inflection. “And that’s only for Sisily’s moaning; she’s almost believable.”

Torin gritted his teeth, fucking her harder, and for the first time since he’d entered her, the bitch opened her eyes. Now both of them were staring into my ragged, tattered soul.

“Good thing you got that chlamydia problem sorted,” I said sweetly. “I’ve heard long term, it can—”

I didn’t get to finish my sentence because Torin had apparently had enough, tossing Sisily across the room so she all but landed at my feet. “Both of you, get the fuck out of my sight!” he roared.

He was the one who left, though, storming from the room, balls flapping in the breeze. Sisily got to her hands and knees, breath still panting from her mouth, and when she lifted her head to growl at me, I figured this was going to end very badly.

I’d been left alone with an unsatisfied wolf shifter. One who hated me. One who was in love with someone who wasn’t her true mate.

Oh, joy.