Her Brother, Her Mate

Hadley POV

It took me a good 10 minutes to calm my racing heart and ease the stabbing pain in my abdomen. Mark came and checked on me at least 7 times, but Mitchel never came by. Not once.

I dragged myself out of the bathroom after washing my face, the cool water easing the claminess of my neck and hands. Everyone probably thought I was pooping, but I would rather they think that than know how much Mitchel’s cold behavior is hurting my bond with him. Everyone except Mark is so focused on setting up everything for the ritual that they haven’t noticed Mitchel ignoring me.

Mark noticed, though. I could tell by the way his eyes tightened when he looked over at his brother, leading me out of the hallway back to my seat. Mitchel didn’t spare us a glance. He actually got up and moved to stand next to Amanda, asking her if she needed help with anything.

“What happened?” Mark asked me.

“I don’t know,” I whispered, sitting back down in my chair.

Mark clenched his jaw, but didn’t say anything else about the matter. He just sat beside me, rubbing my arms and kissing my face over and over again until his mom came back from where she was standing next to Micah, helping him combine several ingredients in a stoneware cauldron. He needed her b***d, and she was gripping a b***d-soaked towel as the wound healed quickly due to her werewolf healing.

“Feeling better, Hadley?” Vivian asked me, patting my knee with her non-bleeding hand.

I nodded, offering her a small smile, “Yes, sorry. Nerves.”

“No worries, sweetie. The preparation for this took a few days since Micah needed a lot of power in his bank, but the actual ritual only takes a few minutes to unbind them. Once the bond is broken, you can have both your mates! Lucky you,” she giggles like a young girl, “I’m grateful you’re so accepting of having them both as your mates, Hadley. This is such an important thing for werewolves. The moon goddess who watches over our kind pairs us with the other half of our souls. If you hadn’t accepted them, it would have been like them losing half of themselves. I know they may be rough around the edges, but they are good boys. They will both love you entirely, and I can’t wait for more grandbabies,” she squeals.

My face heats at her words, and my eyes drift to Mitchel again. His back is turned to me as he leans over a table, studying a leather bound book lying open on its surface. His mom is not a quiet person. I know Mitchel heard her, but he was showing no reaction. That pang stabs behind my belly button again. If I’m the other half of his soul, why is he ignoring me? Why is he acting so cold right now?

Mark’s hand pressed against the side of my face, turning my attention toward him. He rests his forehead on mine. “It’s okay, sugar. I’m sure it’s not you. After this is over, we will figure out what’s wrong.”

I closed my eyes, his proximity and his hand resting against my skin relieving some of the pain I was feeling.

He spoke so low that only I heard him. His mom was now gushing about how cute we were being with each other. I blushed at her words, opening my eyes to see Amanda, Micah and Mitchel were looking at us too.

Micah and Amanda are smiling approvingly, but Mitchel looks indifferent once again, looking away when my eyes meet his. The pang comes back, and Mark growls softly, placing his hand over mine on my stomach.

He whispers and coos words of reassurance, and his hand on my stomach does help, but the pain is still faintly there. Mitchel. What the hell is wrong with you?

Mark POVCopyright Nôv/el/Dra/ma.Org.

Mitch has been treating Hadley like s**t since we got here. I don’t know what his problem is, but I’m not going to sit back and allow him to hurt our mate like he was. I don’t know what the hell happened when he went out to meet that b***h who is practically his stalker, but if he is angry about something that happened with her, he doesn’t need to take it out on our mate.

I can practically feel Hadley’s pain from his cold behavior. It’s hurting their bond, which is in turn hurting mine with her. I know she was hiding in the bathroom, not from an upset stomach like she claimed, but because she was trying to get control of her hurt bond. She is a human. She doesn’t have an inner beast helping her to deal with the pain from a strained bond like we do.

Werewolves have a beast inside them that will feel like a tearing beneath the skin, itching to be released to avenge whatever is damaging your connection to your mate. That’s why when your mate is intimate with another person, it feels like your wolf is tearing you from the inside out.

When Sabrina was trying to seduce my father while she was pregnant with Hadley, my mom felt it and it was tearing her up on the inside. Even if they weren’t having s*x, Sabrina was trying to get my dad to so his power could increase and he could better protect her. Mom felt that in their incomplete bond. Dad confessed to us while he was poking and prodding at us that night after they explained everything about seers and gemini twins, that that was the main reason my mom was so harsh towards Sabrina. Her wolf was driving her to do more than kick her out to defend their bond.

Humans don’t have a beast or wolf to help cope with the strains on a bond. She is feeling pain and has no way to deal with it other than suffering. I don’t know what Mitch’s deal is, but I’m going to kick his f*****g a*s if he doesn’t knock it the f**k off.

Dad motions for me to join him and my brother at the other side of the pentagram. I turn Hadley’s face to mine, kissing her nose, cheeks, and then her forehead. “After this is over, we will figure out what’s wrong. Don’t stress, sugar. It will be okay.”

She smiles hesitantly and nods, kissing my cheek.

When I’m around the pentagram, standing next to my brother, I growl at him too low for Amanda and our father to hear. “What the hell is your problem? You’re hurting her right now.”

He stares down at the ground, “After. I’ll talk to her after this is over. Let’s get through this first.”

What the hell? “Did something happen with that vampire b***h?”

“Later,” he growls.

No, not f*****g later. “If you continue to hurt her, I will kick your a*s, you d**k. Look at her. She is in pain because it feels like you’re rejecting her.”

Mitch looks over to where she is sitting, clutching onto her stomach, bent over in pain as our mom rubs her back, cooing to her and offering her tums and other human medicine to relieve a stomach ache. All of which won’t help her if she is feeling pain because of her mate rejecting their bond.

Mitch’s eyes soften, and I can see tears building in the corner of his eyes. “I don’t deserve her,” he mumbles.

“What?” I gasped, “Why? What happened?”

Mitch shook his head, looking down at the ground. Before I can demand an answer from him, dad tells us to kneel in the center of the pentagram, and to be careful not to touch the outline.

I sigh, then comply, tiptoeing my large body through the intricate lines, and Mitch does the same until we are in the center, then we both drop down to kneel in the center, facing one another.