Mates of a Human

Epilogue. Part One. Eric

"You dare not!" He mumbled into Michael's chest.

"Have you spoken to your mother yet?" I asked Michael. The poor woman had fainted, but it wouldn't have been wise to remove the omega woman from her pack, so Gabriel had her taken back to her room.

"Briefly," he grumbled. Ah, so he hadn't escaped to the toilet... it had been to the public phones in the lobby. Alex must have found him and dragged him back.

"How is she coping without your dad?" I asked him.  He sighed heavily.  We'd found out a few things since that day, about why Michael's old man sought to tie him to an arranged marriage, about the reason for the debt as well and about the hatred that burdened him to the point that he was unable to think straight.

Old man Haze had already spoken briefly to Michael about it, but Gabriel was able to find out more.  That and when you add in what my mother could tell us without compromising the case and we had ourselves one full on convoluted back story.  And not one that began with 'Once Upon A Time.'

The pack had hidden within their borders for centuries only sharing words with nearby packs from time to time, keeping contact with just those members to find true mates within their ranks.  But when the Pride began to press up against one border and numerous human settlements began to flood spaces in between packs, they became more withdrawn, not even rearing their heads much after the Great War, over a century ago, which had revealed the existence of supernaturals to humans.  Elves had then dropped their glamours and the dwarves came out of their deep dwellings and humans were taught the truth that they had been ignorant of.  (But expectedly, they could not simply except the races and The Second Great War happened.)

I regress too far.  Anyway, so the isolated pack had begun favouring chosen mates over true mates as they wouldn't need to leave the borders and there were currently enough wolves in the pack to prevent inbreeding.  Michael's Great Grandfather had chosen his son 'the perfect Luna' and the pair were wed, Christoph Haze was born.  But the young husband met a human man who had accidentally wandered into the pack grounds and just happened to be his true mate.  The pair couldn't stay away from each other and in the end, they fled from the pack leaving the wife and child behind.  And as it turned out, the 'perfect Luna' was not so perfect, but more than a little unstable and committed suicide rather than care for her son.

And if that did not cause him enough distrust, worse happened.  When Christoph Haze chose his own bride, he was careful and apparently made sure she knew where he stood on the topic of fidelity; if she wanted to be his Luna, she had to choose him over any true mate that might show up.  Her name was Camille Thomas, who became Camille Haze and she was Adriel's mother.  And history decided to repeat itself, but it was not a human man that lured her away, but a bear shifter.  They were caught trying to take Adriel and escape the packlands, which infuriated Alpha Haze and the man killed her and her mate.  Only his best friend, Shaun, was witness and helped create a tragedy.  Adriel was too small to remember. Haze told his pack that the Luna was killed by a rogue bear shifter that had wandered on their land, barely saving Adriel at the cost of her life.  He then went on the rescue and marry Michael's mother, the pack omega.

However, one person did not believe his story, but she could not prove otherwise.  That had been Camille's sister, June Thomas, the woman who happened to be the gamma and holder of the purse strings.  Shaun had admitted his guilt about two years ago to the June when he was drunk and she had embezzled the pack funds and fled in an attempt to find an Alpha to challenge and kill Michael's father.  She planned to use the money to pay said Alpha.  She came across Alpha Rider, who had been trying to find a malleable Alpha with sons in order to give his spoiled bitch daughter what she desired; an Alpha husband, so she could live out her dreams as a Luna.  When Rider had first approached Haze, the old man had actually told him to fuck off, but around this time Pack Law had just successfully completed their first case and Rider used this new law enforcement agency with powers over Alpha's and Kings to convince him to think again.

Originally, Gabriel was mateless and there was only a short period of time before he took over as Alpha, so Haze reluctantly agreed, convincing himself that it was for the good of the pack.  They did not need to know that their own trusted Alpha murdered his wife and said wife's true mate in cold blood and his wife could not cope if he was arrested by interfering do-gooders.  That was his opinion anyway.  Only Evangeline turned eighteen and Gabriel was quickly smitten.  With the obstacle of this true mate, Haze needed a new plan. 

Apparently, after Michael had chosen me over his pack, Haze had done some investigations on breaking a true mates bond and discovered that the Elves also once looked into it with dubious success.  But he could not risk breaking the bond between two pack members.  He considered using Adriel, but Nadine caught sight of a picture with an eighteen year old Michael in it and wanted him.  Again, Haze was reluctant, but his dark secret had already grown more important to him that Michael's happiness, so he sought to convince Michael to return home.

"I think... I think it would have been harder on mum if she was his true mate," Michael said.  Adriel had been devastated to learn that their mother was not his and that his had been killed by his father.  He had remained on the Pride lands ever since.  I wasn't sure that his pursuit of Justin was going so well either, but it wouldn't be too long before that sex-crazed jaguar submitted to temptation and came crawling to Adriel with his tail between his legs.

"What about those elves?" Alex asked aloud.  He had mentioned that they had frightened him to his core and he'd had a nightmare just the night before that they had come for him and the babies.  It turned out that the pair were wanted fugitives; the elven council had warrants out for their arrest for years.  They were twisted siblings who abused dark magic to the point it was rotting their very souls.  Unfortunately, though Shaun had been caught trying to escape, the elves had vanished into thin air.

"Not yet found," I murmured softly to him, needing his shoulder as I tried to reassure him. 

"Hey," Michael lifted his chin upward to glance at him.  "Don't look so down.  I'm fine, both of you are fine and our beautiful babies are fine."

"Oh?" Alex smirked slightly, that familiar twinkle in his eyes.  "So you can predict how they will look now can you?"

"Of course," Michael said, his voice deepening in that sexy way it does, "especially if they take after their mother."  Alex blushed, filling his cheeks with colour.  I began to purr as I imagined three cute little babies with soft brown hair and hazel eyes. 

"They will be perfect."