ChapterOne
Four years ago, Remy Ibhere met his fated mate.
At least, he thought he had.
Except they’d ultimately gone their separate ways without acknowledging that rather important bit of information.
His body, his mind—really, his bear was insisting it was time to figure it out. The idea of seeing her again, of making that connection, it was like a tick digging under his skin and refusing to let go. An uncomfortable analogy, yet accurate.
Maybe even more accurate was the sense that her bear was calling to him. Which also made no real sense because they hadn’t spoken at all in those four years. Not once. Not a text or a follow on social media. Not an unannounced visit—and he’d told her where he lived; hell, he’d invited her to move to south Louisiana with him.
Instead, she’d said she had unfinished business to take care of, and truly, neither of them had been in the right headspace to deal with the monumental changes that came with accepting another person into their lives for the long haul.
He still wasn’t sure he was prepared, but his bear was, and he was sick of fighting with the animal. They were supposed to be of one mind, yet the damn animal in his head refused to let him have his way.
He’d met Mallory, his potential mate, under extenuating circumstances. And she’d told him something she probably didn’t share with many people.
She’d been abused as a teen. A young girl on the verge of becoming a woman, who had just experienced her first shift, which tended to happen when shifters reached thirteen or fourteen years of age.
Her pack leader’s brother. Fucking prick.
Remy had no idea how old the man was, only that he’d been an adult and he’d taken liberties Mallory hadn’t wanted him to take.
Remy had no other information about the man. Not his name, what he looked like, not even the specifics about where her pack was located.
All he knew was the man had violated Mallory and her pack was somewhere in northern Minnesota.
And Remy’s bear had insisted they come up here, to the wilds of the north, to find this man and exact revenge on Mallory’s behalf.
While his moral compass was admittedly gray, the needle had never drifted into murder territory.
First time for everything, he supposed.
He shivered, leaning against a tree on the edge of a beach that rolled out to Lake Superior. This downy coat was hardly making a difference against that wind whipping his shaggy hair into a frenzy.
He should’ve waited until summer to start this journey. By the time June hit, it was so freaking hot and humid in southern Louisiana, Remy would’ve been damn near ecstatic to take off on this mission.
His bear hadn’t been willing to wait. The beast had decided enough was enough. It was time to find their mate. To avenge the wrongs that had been done against her.
Cold-ass weather be damned.
He watched the figure standing on the beach, huddled inside her own thick winter coat, staring out over the churning water.
It wasn’t Mallory. This woman was much older than Remy or Mallory. A couple of decades older.
She was also a Kermode bear. He’d seen her in her bear form, with her pale, cream-colored fur.
Just like him when he shifted.
Kermodes were rare; in fact, there were probably less than five hundred in existence, and of those, probably less than fifty were shifters.
His friend Peter’s mother was a Kermode bear. Peter’s bastard father—now dead, and not even a little missed—had exiled her from his pack when Peter was a kid, too young to understand what was happening. Peter’s pack was in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, just across the bay from here.
It wasn’t too much of a stretch to think this lonely looking woman, who was staring wistfully out over the waves, might be Peter’s estranged mother.
This wasn’t the reason Remy had traveled all the way across the country, but maybe doing this good deed would offset the very bad one he planned to do as soon as he found Mallory’s pack.
Pushing away from the tree, he stepped onto the sand and called out a hello. She whipped around, immediately taking a step away, definitely leery of his presence.
