A Mate's Wish (Ouachita Mountain Shifters 0.5) Read Online Free PDF Page B

your back in a pinch.
    As long as you didn’t break the code: no life mates. No exceptions.
    “Did you break it?” Magic’s too calm voice came from the doorway of the bathroom. “The faucet?”
    “It was already broken. The whole reason I’m here.”
    “Yeah.” Magic leaned against the counter, crossing his arms. He stared at Renner past one arched eyebrow. “How you doing?”
    Renner picked up the wrench and went back to tightening the nut. “I’d be better if I could get this leak fixed.”
    “I know this situation is fucked up.”
    “Understatement.”
    “I just want to make sure we’re on the same page here. You can tap all over that, Ren, but it’ll have to end sometime. You get me? You can’t mate.”
    Ren tossed the wrench away in frustration. “Yeah, I get it, okay?” He stared into the shower wishing it was a window to the outdoors instead. He felt trapped in the small space with his closest friend breathing down his neck.
    “Do you ever wonder if this is right? If we’ve made the right choice? Our clan will die out with no young. Do you worry about it?”
    He turned to face Magic and the pain in his friend’s eyes made him want to cut his own heart out.
    “Every day, man. Every fucking day.” Magic’s hand absently rubbed the tattoo branded on his forearm. “But then I remember what happens when you blindly follow tradition and I… I can’t see any other way. The code is there for a reason, Renner.”
    Renner knew all the damn reasons. The mountain cats weren’t like the ones in Africa. There wasn’t a pride. There was no such thing as family, or family values. There was blood born from a union of two, but there was no love. Not for each other and not for the young who’d come later. It was all urges. The urge to fuck. The urge to hunt. The urge to procreate, but only for the purpose of continuing the race.
    After the mate, the female belonged exclusively to the male, but not necessarily the other way around. Renner remembered his dad coming and going as he pleased, his mom crying at night because he was with another female. But the shit storm never stopped with the parents.
    Renner had never understood the way the cats loved. Not until the hunters got his mother. He’d watched from behind a rock, Layna trying her best to cover his eyes but miserably failing. His father came from out of nowhere, leaping on one of the hunters. His teeth latched onto his throat, viciously tearing. They shot him multiple times, but he didn’t let up. He’d give his life to protect her.
    When they ran away, bloody and beaten, he’d limped over to her lifeless body and laid himself on top of her. The blood poured out of his wounds, puddling on the leaf covered forest floor. He could have changed, healed. It would’ve taken time, but his wounds weren’t life threatening.
    But… they were life mates. She dies; he dies. A choice they’d made long before Layna or Renner. And his father honored it that day, choosing to die with his mate. 
    When Renner was old enough to exist on his own, he was dropped at the nearest hospital and told not to return to the lodge until he began the change. Nice and all, but ten-year-olds can’t exactly fend for themselves. Not according to the humans at least. So it was off to social services. It was by the grace of something greater than him, that he ended up with the Robertsons.
    Once all the elder cats were gone, the clan made a drastic change. Magic had his own reasons for the code, but Renner, Layna, and the others were all in agreement: no life mates.
    He rubbed his palms over his face. “What if it was different this time?”
    Magic frowned. “It won’t be. Mountain cats aren’t family friendly, and that girl out there deserves a fucking family. Don’t be an asshole.”
    Renner clenched his fists. What about him? He deserved a family too. And he’d had one for three years, with the Robertsons.
    “Don’t you ever wish you could have that too though? Are you