“Or maybe they love someone else more,” I rebutted.
“No such thing. Rejecting your mate causes both of you an immense amount of pain, to the point it can drive a shifter to go rogue. Or some sacrifice them to gain power, but they have to carry the pain of their mate dying at their hands.”
“I guess that means I’m stuck with Kenzo.” I smirked, trying to lighten the mood. I hadn’t talked to Halo in detail, but I did know her mom killed her dad, and I was sure that was on her mind.
Letting out a sigh, Halo gave me a half smile. “Cut him some slack. Bellum was a hot mess. I can only imagine what it felt like to think your mate was a whore. Him and his bear are probably feeling extra protective.”
“Was she really that bad?” I was curious about my evil twin, Bellum. The way everyone acted like she was the biggest whore in the world threw me. If she came from me, she should have been far from promiscuous.
“I mean, most of the pack has had a piece of her. Not Creeland or Declan. Yves has, which is why Zamiyah feels intimidated whenever you’re around. Bellum was something else.” Halo chuckled.
“Why would Kenzo stay with Bellum knowing how she was?” The frown on my face couldn’t be hidden. I didn’t like the thought of Kenzo being with anyone else other than me.
“He thought she was his fated mate, and he loved her despite what he knew. Bears are very loyal to their mates.”
“I guess. I still don’t see the big deal with the fated mates.” I shrugged.
“Have you seen Kenzo around another woman?”
“Nope, and I wouldn’t care. I’ve never been the insecure type.”
“Sure, you aren’t.” Halo side eyed me with a mischievous smirk. “I’m hungry. Are you hungry?”
“I can eat. What do you have in mind?” I cautiously responded. I had no idea what Halo had up her sleeve, but I knew she was up to something.
“Cool. I wanna stop by Amaree’s to check on A'Miracle. Then we can change at my house and go to this cute little loungein town.” Halo had a sneaky look in her eyes as she paused momentarily like she was thinking before she waved for me to follow her.
I got up, reluctantly following behind Halo and praying she wasn’t leading me into something crazy.
Chapter Sixteen
KENZO ATALLAH
“You’re stubborn,”Cree said to me, looking amused as we sat at the bar of his restaurant Let’s Eat.
We’d spent most of the day going over the older Books of Time to catch up with everything that was going on. There were so many things we’d never known about. Apparently, The Great Prophecy had been there since the very beginning. When the Original Fate first created us, it took a lot of Fate's power. Fate had to rest for a millennium. In the time of Fate’s rest, evil started to grow in the shifters’ hearts. Once Fate woke up, sadness filled Fate’s heart upon seeing the evil that had filled the shifters’ hearts over Fate’s absence. Fate vowed to never leave her precious beings again. Fate sent a piece of themselves out to be reborn.
Once the piece of Fate was reborn, that piece would relieve the current Fate of their duty. Every thousand years, a Phoenix shifter was born, and it was a signal to Fate that the rebirth had started. The rebirth was put in place so Fate would never have to exert all of their energy to the point of exhaustion. Rebirth would happen until Fate became whole again, marking the age of peace and harmony. We were never big readers, but the stuff in theBooks of Time had me wanting to know more about the history of Fate and shifters.
“I’m not.” We mugged Cree, not caring for the smirk on his face.
“But you are, and if you want, I can give you some advice to save you some trouble.” Cree chuckled before taking a sip of whatever he was drinking.
“Advice from you?” We looked at Cree with a brow raised. Cree was our boy, but let's be real. He wasn’t the best to take advice from. That wasn’t to say he wasn’t knowledgeable because he was, but this was something he didn’t take seriously enough. Just last year, he was parading around a fake mate for whatever reason. We weren’t judging Cree; however, there were certain things you didn’t play with, and one of those things was the sacredness of a fated mate bond. In our opinion, there was never a good enough reason to hide your fated mate. To each is their own, though. Although things with Cree and Halo worked out for them, in many other cases, things would have gotten a lot uglier.
“Aye, I see that look. I know I have done some dumb shit concerning my mate. That’s why I’m tryna help you, though. I see myself in you. We both want control. The thing is, control isn’t always the best way to go about things.”
“No judgment here. I’m just saying you have an interesting track record in choices.”
“More like selfish. I was only thinking about how Halo and my decision would benefit me without thinking about the bigger picture. I didn’t take the time out to think about the pain I was creating in my mateship with Halo. I’m working on them now, but I can’t help to think about how things would have been had I done everything the right way,” Cree responded in a reflective tone. His face matched the seriousness of his voice.
“You live and you learn.” We nodded our head in agreement. One thing I’d learned about Cree was he was never serious and joked more than he was ever serious. We could count on one hand how many times Cree was serious. If he was being serious now, we knew to listen to what he was saying.
“Absolutely. But let me save you the trouble of having to learn the hard way. All this stuff going on with Bellamy and Bellum, it gotta be a lot for you and your bear to deal with. I know for a fact from my experience believing my mate was dead and finding out she was still living, it has you and your bear feeling extra protective. I get it. Don’t push your mate away because you are scared of losing her again.”
We instantly knew Cree was speaking on us not wanting to take Bellamy to the Sanctuary of Life. Were we scared to lose Bellamy? Nah. It was the fact that she wanted to go check on another bitch-ass male shifter. She had to be smokin’ pixie dust if she thought we would be okay with some shit like that. I loved that Bellamy wasn’t anything like Bellum, but I hated that she didn’t understand how the fated mate bond affected us. We really wanted her to hurry up and get her memory back because she had us feeling like we were mated to a fucking human. Thank Fate that wasn’t the case for us. We would have been pissed if Fate had mated us to a trifling-ass human. Hell, having Bellum as a mate would have been more tolerable than being with a human.
“We aren’t scared of losing her.” Our top lip curled in disgust at that thought.
