The Alpha's Mate (29 page)

There was a bowl of soup and a thick sandwich
of roast beef. Elizabeth was hungry and it wouldn’t hurt to eat
before she asked for her clothes.

“What time is it?” she asked as she started
in on the soup. It was good, chicken and dumpling. Not from a can.
In spite of the lack of vegetables, she would miss the food. She’d
wanted to learn how to cook like this. Before the world fell apart
and she had to go.

“Bout two o’clock the day after you’re
thinking it is.”

“What?”

“You heard me. And no, he didn’t hit you that
hard. You were plumb wore out. You kept coming half awake, then
you’d snuggle down like a bear getting ready for winter with this
silly looking smile on your face. I wanted to get you up, but
Marshall said let you sleep. Had that same silly grin,” Maggie
snickered. She climbed up on the bed beside Elizabeth, settled
herself comfortably against the pillows and crossed her legs at the
ankles. “Back’s bothering me some. I’m getting too old for this.
Long about four in the morning yesterday, Charlie Goodman comes
zooming up in that fancy car of his. Gets out, runs to the other
side, drags you out and props you on the steps. GW sees it all and
runs up thinking something bad has happened.

Charlie says, “Tell Marshall Calvin Everest
wants her. She thinks she can run. She can’t. Tell Marshall he
better take care of her or he’ll answer to me. Tell him I’m going
to do what I can to stop what’s coming.”

“Then he tosses that nightgown to GW, says
‘That’s hers. Someone needs to clean her up. She’s a lady.’ And
then he gets in his car and zooms off.” She arched her back and
winced. “He might have stayed and explained a bit more, but like I
said, what he done showed sense. If that bastard has his eye on
you, there’s no place you can hide.”

The soup was gone and Elizabeth didn’t
remember eating it. She took a bite of sandwich. “I’m going home,”
she said.

Maggie laughed. “That’s up to you, but you’re
gonna be lookin’ mighty peculiar hitchhiking up the road in that
see-through nightgown.”

“I have clothes at the Home Place,” Elizabeth
huffed. She couldn’t stay here. She wouldn’t.

“Okay, but the Home Place is chock full of
men fixing it back up.” Her shrug emphasized her sly smile. “Maybe
you city girls don’t mind showing off what you shouldn’t. Don’t
suppose those boys’ll mind either. It’ll give them stories to tell
for years,” she cackled. “And how you planning on getting out of
Rabbit Creek? George has got that baby truck of yours over to the
garage. Probably got it pulled apart already. Needs body work.
He’ll have it ready in a week or two.” The old woman was enjoying
herself.

“Maggie,” Elizabeth pleaded, although she
wasn’t sure how pitiful she sounded around a mouthful of sandwich,
“I can’t stay here. They hate me.”

“They don’t hate you. They’re angry at
themselves, that’s all, and they’re taking it out on you.” Maggie
shook her head as if she was disgusted with her neighbors.

“But why, Maggie? What did I do to deserve
it?”

Maggie reached over and patted her hand. “You
took away their hope, child, and made them look foolish. Those are
both hard pills to swallow.”

“I don’t understand.” She needed a list –
Rules That Wolvers Play By.

“It’s not just the Alpha that needs an
Alpha’s Mate. The pack needs her, too. People turn to her in times
of trouble. She’s the one who intercedes if the Alpha gets too big
for his britches. She’s the only one who’s not bred to submit.”

“I’m not that woman, Maggie. I’m not that
strong.”

“Bah! You’ve showed more grit these last few
weeks than a body has a right to ask of anyone. Finish that
sandwich there before you waste away to nothin’,” she ordered
before she went on. “These folks liked you, saw Marshall take an
interest. Hell, he even fed you that bit at the Dizzy Dish…”

Elizabeth popped the last corner of bread and
meat into her mouth, just as Marshall had done at the Dizzy Dish.
“What does a piece of sandwich have to do with it?” It was so
casual she was surprised she remembered it. But she did.

“In the old days, when a wolver fed a woman,
it was like an engagement, a way of declaring his intentions to the
pack. He was saying he was willing to feed and care for her for the
rest of her life. Nowadays, it shows he’s taken an interest in
courtin’ her. Marshall was showing us he wasn’t mad we brought you
here without his knowing.”

Elizabeth also remembered Marshall’s show of
feeding her steak in front of Gwenna right before they… She shook
her head. She wasn’t going there.

It was all very flattering in its way, but
she couldn’t let the hurt and humiliation go. “I can’t be who you
want me to be. I can’t be some preprogramed genetic freak, ready to
jump in the sack with the first Alpha who gets a hard on.”

“Whew, sounds like you got a bit of anger of
your own there,” Maggie said, drawing back and gazing at Elizabeth
with a critical eye.

“I have a right to be angry. Everyone knew,
Maggie, everyone but me. Why didn’t someone tell me? Why didn’t you
tell me?” Elizabeth flopped back on the pillows.

“What were we supposed to do, send you a post
card – Dear Miz Reynolds, You were born to marry a wolf. Come on
down!” Maggie rolled her eyes. “Truth is, you weren’t supposed to
know anything until we all got to know each other better. Then, if
you weren’t suited to us or Marshall or we weren’t suited to you,
you would have gone home none the wiser and we would’ve stayed here
listening to Marshall give us hell. That’s what happened the last
time. Don’t know what Eugene was thinking sending that one here.
Sometimes I think my brother’s got no talent at all.”

“There was another one? Like me?” She
pictured a whole parade of Alpha’s Mates marching down Main Street.
See anything you like?

“No, not like you. It was long about three
years ago. We run her off right quick. Snooty miss, she were. One
before that we liked well enough, but Marshall, he showed no liking
for her at all. I told Eugene it was too soon,” Maggie said
innocently.

Elizabeth didn’t really care to hear this.
After all, it was no concern of hers what women had shared
Marshall’s life. Still, she couldn’t help but be curious.

“Too soon?”

“Too soon after Marshall’s first Mate
died.”

Died? Creepy Eyes’ wives had died, too. “Is
that how the Alpha’s beat the system? Mate for life, but if I don’t
want her anymore she has a short life?”

Elizabeth’s comment caught Maggie off guard.
The old woman’s shocked look quickly faded into anger.

“Don’t you dare paint Marshall with the same
brush as Calvin Everest. The Mating was a bad one, I’ll give you
that, but Marshall made the best of it. He was good to that girl.
Did everything he could to make her happy.”

“How did she die?”

“She was going too fast down the mountain,
missed the curve and hit a tree.” She turned to Elizabeth and
looked at her squarely. “The girl wasn’t what we needed, but she
was our Mate and nobody wished her dead.” She frowned as if
deciding how much she should say. “When Marshall first came to
power, he was too young to be the Alpha. We all knew that and it
was why some thought to contest it. With a little push from some
others,” she added sourly.

Elizabeth wondered if she meant Charles.

“Oh,” Maggie went on, waving the memory away
with her hand. “Most of us knew he had it in him. He was strong
enough, but not wise enough and wisdom takes time. When his mama
passed a couple of years after he took the mantle, Marshall knew it
was his duty to provide the pack with a Mate. When he found Lisa,
like most young men, he was thinking with parts other than his
head. And that boy was stubborn, just like his daddy. He was the
Alpha and his decisions were law. There was no talking to him.”

“Did Eugene Begley bring her here?” Was that
woman like her? A mistake?

Maggie was indignant. “My brother had nothing
to do with it. Marshall found her on his own. First time Eugene met
her, he just walked away shaking his head. He knew.”

“But you said a minute ago, the last one he
sent was a mistake.” This was getting more and more confusing.

“A mistake for us, maybe not so much for the
Alpha. He didn’t seem sorry when she was gone, though. He’d learned
a hard lesson with Lisa. A good Mate needs to match the pack and
the Alpha and be happy for herself.”

It was another proof that this was all wrong.
Elizabeth had never been more unhappy in her life.

Chapter 31

Maggie left with the promise to return with
clean clothing, but she extracted a promise from Elizabeth in
return.

“You go get yourself a shower and wash and
fix your hair. And while you’re in there, you think hard on this
place and the folks you’ve grown to know. Not those folks
a-frownin’ at you that you hardly know by name. I’m talking about
the ones you’ve had a chance to see inside of, them that have had a
chance to see inside of you. You tell me you don’t like the woman
you are better than the one you thought you were and you tell me
you still don’t belong in Rabbit Creek, and I’ll help you
pack.”

Elizabeth promised, but she didn’t think it
would change anything. Everything she’d felt since coming here was
based on a lie. She hadn’t been blossoming into the woman she was
always meant to be. She was the product of some genetic mutation
that was programmed to trigger when in close proximity to that
other genetic anomaly; an Alpha wolver.

And everyone knew. Every single one of them
knew. In hindsight, she could see the clues. She could hear the
comments made and covered.

Elizabeth understood, on a logical level, why
they couldn’t tell her what she was. They had a whole secret
culture to protect, but hadn’t she proved her trustworthiness from
the very beginning? “
How? By secretly meeting with Marshall’s
brother, another Alpha?”
Okay, she had to admit it would look
bad from their point of view.

She had thought they liked her. They’d seemed
genuine, but how could she be sure? She knew that Marshall was
loved and respected. Were they kind to her because they wanted
their Alpha to have a Mate? She’d never had real friends before so
she had nothing to compare.

“
No
,” she decided. She could suspect
some of them of falsehood, but not all. Max was genuinely
remorseful about keeping all this from her and genuinely grateful
for Elizabeth’s aid the night of the attack. And hadn’t Gwenna
turned to her to save George? Gwenna loved George more than
anything in the world. Would she have handed his care over to
someone she didn’t trust?

And then there was Maggie, blunt spoken and
honest. She wasn’t the kind of woman who could dole out false
praise.

“I might not have any experience with
friendship, but I grew up in a world of false smiles and
platitudes,” Elizabeth said aloud. “I know the difference.”

She couldn’t stop turning it over in her
head. Whatever their original motives might have been, some of
these people had liked her.

Would she be as hurt and angry as she was, if
she hadn’t liked them? She was hurt and angry because she still
liked them and wanted to be a part of their lives.

“You won’t win. We won’t let you.”

Those were the words she’d screamed at Creepy
Eyes. Not I won’t let you, not Marshall won’t let you, but ‘we’.
She thought about how easily she’d accepted this hidden culture
that stretched the boundaries of reality. Any normal person would
have indeed locked herself, screaming, in the bathroom. But
Elizabeth had never felt normal until she came to Rabbit Creek.
That, in the end, settled it for her. She was meant to be here.
Rabbit Creek was her home.

But would they let her stay, knowing she was
an Alpha’s Mate without being their Alpha’s mate? Marshall was at
the crux of it all. What was she supposed to do about Marshall?

Elizabeth brushed out her wet hair and dried
it with the blow dryer she found beneath the sink. Maggie had yet
to return with fresh clothes, so she had no choice but to re-dress
in her nightgown. She climbed back in bed, tucked the covers around
her and thought about Marshall.

The worst part was she’d known it. From the
very beginning, it didn’t make sense. Why would someone like
Marshall look twice at someone like her? Answer: he wouldn’t unless
some outside force compelled him. She couldn’t fault him for it. He
was as much a victim here as she was.

Elizabeth sat up straighter on the bed and
angrily placed her hands on her hips. She kicked out with her foot
because she couldn’t stamp it.

“Bullshit!”

He wasn’t a victim. He couldn’t help feeling
those urges any more than she could, but that didn’t mean he had to
act on them. He knew what she was and he took advantage of it. He’d
turned his sex-o-meter, or whatever the hell you wanted to call it,
up and made her feel things she never thought she was capable of
feeling. He made her see lovemaking as a joyful coming together of
two people who were sharing something special, something precious.
But it wasn’t special. It wasn’t precious. It was all smoke and
mirrors.

He had a duty to provide the pack with a Mate
and she apparently fulfilled the essential requirements on his list
of Things To Look For In An Alpha’s Mate. Well, she wouldn’t be,
couldn’t be reduced to a series of checkmarks on a list.

“Come in,” she snapped when Maggie tapped on
the door.

But it wasn’t Maggie. It was Marshall who
stepped through the door with a pile of clean clothes in his
hands.

“I can’t marry you,” Elizabeth blurted, “Or
mate with you or whatever it is you do.” There. It was done. It had
to be said no matter how much it hurt.

Marshall raised his eyebrows and the corner
of his mouth quirked up. “Have I asked?”