Jesse narrowed his eyes. “Sure you’re not making that up just cause you want to keep me here? Cause it smells like bull.”
Matt was going to wring Jesse Turner’s neck before either of them were very much older. “I donotwant to keep you here,” he shot back, the words ringing oddly hollow. His wolf protested the lie, and he shoved it down hard. “Damn it, Turner—I’m trying to save your hide.”
Jesse sighed, rolling his eyes like this was the biggest inconvenience of his life. “Fine,” he said. “Guess I’ll listen.”
Matt took a steadying breath, trying for the calm that had eluded him since Jesse’s arrival. “I’m not saying we obey all the non-shifter rules, but you have to know what they are in order to work around them. And they change. The National Council—oh, God, you won’t know about that either, will you?”
Jesse just looked at him, but his expression practically screamedNo shit.
“Okay, so each of the bigger packs has representation on their state’s shifter council. Those councils report to the Shifter National Council, which handles things at the national level, sort of like the federal government. But everything’s still subject to non-shifter federal law.”
Jesse was frowning. “But if we all have to obey the same laws anyway, what’s the National Council actuallydo?”
Good question. At least he was paying attention.
“Mostly, they just draw salaries and argue over procedure.” Matt forced down his contempt and set out to answer Jesse’squestion more fully. “They lobby Congress on our behalf, and they deal with shifter-related issues that we don’t want non-shifters to know about. Say a couple of packs get into a territorial dispute. Non-shifters wouldn’t understand our way of settling it, with claw and fang, so it’s easier all around if they don’t know. And once the National Council recognizes the outcome, it’s official.”
Jesse scoffed. “Sounds like a bunch of guys in suits thinking they’re important.”
“Pretty much,” Matt agreed, as he ran through his mental checklist of what else Jesse should know in case he spent time with other shifters in future.
He shoved his chair back and poured himself more coffee, bitterness in his mouth as he realized what he had to do. If he were an alpha worthy of the role—and that was doubtful enough—he had to give Jesse the knowledge to protect himself. Which meant, he’d have to tell him about mates.
If Jesse ended up in a pack and didn’t know about them, he could get himself killed just by saying the wrong thing, looking at someone’s mate wrong. And Matt couldn’t live with another death on his conscience.
He sipped the coffee. It was too hot, but he needed that almost-pain to ground him as he sank back down on his chair.
“Mates are real,” he said abruptly, and again, it didn’t sound like his voice. Too tight. “Christian and Dave are mates, which is why, right now, Christian would love nothing better than to gut you. You hurt Dave.”
Jesse shrugged, looking sublimely unconcerned. “Mates, boyfriends. Don’t matter what words you use, means the same thing.”
Oh, God, the temptation just to shrug it off along with Jesse. But he couldn’t. He had a responsibility.
“It’s not the same,” he said. “Every shifter comes into this world keyed to another person. Someone whocompletes—”
He stumbled over the word. That couldn’t be right. That was what he’d always been taught, and the word had come out automatically. But he wasn’tincompletewithout Jesse Turner. That was ridiculous.
He took a steadying breath. “It doesn’t mean you can’t love someone else, just that, when it’s your mate, it’s different somehow. That’s what everyone says, anyway.”
“So what, you just wake up one day and find out you’re stuck with someone? That’s bullshit,” Jesse objected. “And what about people not built that way?”
Anotherdamngood question. Jesse was sharper than Matt had given him credit for. And he was ashamed to realize Jesse’s last question was one he’d never asked, even of himself.
“I don’t know,” he confessed. “Maybe they have a different relationship with their mate. More like a platonic one?”
Jesse didn’t look too convinced. “What if you flat-out don’tlikeyour mate? You just get stuck with someone and told,This is him? Cause I know exactly what I’d do if someone tried that shit with me.”
Yet another excellent reason to add to the catalog of excellent reasons why Matt was never going to breathe a word of what he knew.
“Yeah, but you’re contrary as hell, aren’t you? You’d argue up is down if someone told you otherwise.”
Jesse snorted, then flashed that smile again. “Reckon so,” he admitted.
God, that smile. It still did things to Matt.
Something in Jesse’s posture had loosened, just a little, so Matt took a chance. What he was about to tell Jesse was important,though it made Matt uncomfortable.Emotionsmade Matt uncomfortable.
“I get that you’re not interested in being part of a pack right now,” he said. “But you have to realize, Jesse—we’re pack animals. Weneedother shifters.”
