Page 53 of Collared Mate

“Are you almost ready?”

“Almost,” I call back.

“Come down when you like,” he says. “My father is here. We’re having a drink in the study.”

I finish getting ready and go downstairs. I know I look good. My skin is clear. My hair is glossy. I’ve put it up in a swoopy style that my mother used to do when she was hosting something more casual. There’s a light shag effect framing my face that she didn’t have, but I think she’d be proud of me.

That thought brings tears to my eyes. She would have been so happy to see me with my fated mate. When I was small, she used to tell me that a woman knows instantly when she meets the man she is destined for. I believed every word she said, until she was gone and then the world seemed very cold and not the sort of place where things like fated mates happened. And then… the rest of it.

There are male voices murmuring in the study. I take a breath to steady myself, and remind myself that no matter what form or mood he saw me in yesterday, it is a lady’s right to reinvent herself whenever she sees fit.

I glide into the room in my heels, feeling very much like the lady I was meant to be.

Henry and his father stand up. Henry slips an arm around my waist and presses a kiss to my temple.

“Father, this is Fiona,” he says, introducing me in a very gentlemanly way. “Fiona, my father, Marcus.”

“I believe we’ve met,” I say with some small amount of mischief, extending my hand so his father can kiss it. I might have been feral yesterday, but today I am a lady.

“It’s a pleasure,” Marcus says.

Apparently we’re all going to pretend yesterday didn’t happen. That works for me, actually. It’s also what I’m used to. Half of high society is elegantly maneuvering around various elephants while remaining painfully polite.

Henry gets me a glass of wine, and the three of us sit down and chat.

The conversation risks being stilted, but I ask Marcus about his current business interests, which Henry undersold because it turns out that Marcus has his own pharmaceutical company. These men clearly know how to make something of themselves.

The humiliation of being in the room with the man who threatened to spank me because I’m going to be his daughter-in-law starts to fade about half a glass of wine into the affair.

“So,” Marcus says. “Have you told her?”

“Told me what?” I look curiously at the pair of them.

“No,” Henry says, giving his father a dark look.

“Tell me,” I say.

“Your brother almost killed my son shortly after your father died. He blamed Henry for his death.”

“Dad!” Henry exclaims, clearly annoyed that Marcus has finally bothered with some useful exposition.

“Is that true?”

Henry sighs. “Yes. It’s true. I believe he was set up to believe that, probably by people who wanted to isolate him from his friends and ensure that he didn’t have any social backing once he was in their control.”

“And you come back here, an alpha in your own right and mate his sister,” I say. “Neat.”

The wine might be going to my head a little. Or perhaps I’m just exhausted from all the kidnapping, shifting, false escapes, general fuckery.

Marcus smirks slightly. “We don’t want you to have to choose between your family and your mate,” he says.

“Why didn’t you just tell me that in the beginning?” I ask Henry.

“Because I thought there was some chance you would believe it too.”

“Right, because going along with Rick’s stupid schemes and thoughts has always been one of my favorite pastimes,” I say, letting the sarcasm drip like molasses. “Do you have no faith in me?”

“Of course I do. But you’ve lived a life inside their system. I couldn’t know you wouldn’t side with it.”