Evie laughed, but then her dark brown eyes turned grave. “Seriously, Keith, do you really want to do this? I know what it’s like to come from a place where everything’s set in stone and it’s hard to do something different. So does Iz. We have your back if you need it. There are ways to hold onto your home without caving to what the people there want, especially when it comes to something this important.”
“Besides, you could still meet your mate,” Simon said.
That made the room fall silent for a moment. Marrying a total stranger andthenmeeting your true mate was a terrifying prospect, and they all knew it.
Keith had seen the power of the mate bond firsthand, and the depth of feeling that went with one made him ache with longing. Before he’d come out into the world, he’d believed that true mates were rare and that there was no point in hoping for one: even if therewassomeone in the world who was absolutely perfect for you, the odds of the two of you finding each other would surely be slim-to-none.
But now he knew that it didn’t work that way. Mates had a way of finding each other, making choices that led them into each other’s lives. In the outside world, a lot of shifters found their true mates. Iz had been so drawn to Logan that she’d found him even when he’d been imprisoned in a psychopath’s underground dungeon. And Cooper’s mate, Gretchen—Keith’s old colleague—was on another shifter Marshal team whereeveryonehad found their mates. It happened all the time.
But not with unicorns. Their isolated little enclaves and history of carefully arranged matches didn’t give them much of a chance to follow their hearts. It was hard to wander into your mate’s orbit when you were strongly discouraged from wandering at all.
Keith was one of the few who’d had a real shot at finding his mate, and once he knew that it wasn’t the longshot he’d always believed it was, he’d daydreamed about it. Of course he had.
But while he’d had mild, passing infatuations, the real lightning bolt had never struck him.
Maybe he just wasn’t a good fit for true love. Maybe all his old faults, like self-righteousness and severity, were still part of him, no matter how hard he’d tried to move past them. He wasn’t sure he really deserved the kind of deep, unconditional love some of his friends had found. It would make sense for him not to be anyone’s best, truest option.
“Ihaven’tfound my mate,” Keith said, breaking the silence. “And I’ve had enough long enough to do it. Maybe it’s time to try something new.”
“I know some people who have had arranged marriages,” Evie said thoughtfully. “Not ones assembled by a committee, but ones where the couple’s families introduced them and sort of shepherded them along, and they didn’t ever do a lot of actual dating. It can work, especially if both people are trying. I know you would be, definitely.”
“Keith always tries.”
The deep voice startled him, and judging from the way Simon straightened up and Evie almost fell out of her chair, Keith wasn’t the only one to jump at it.
It was Vin.
Keith had worked with Vin Callendar for two years now, and he still didn’t understand him. Vin was a mystery. He wasn’t exactly rude, but he wasabrupt, and his presence tended to put everyone on edge. Even Simon, who could be relaxed in the middle of a shootout, tensed up around Vin.
It was like there was something wrong with him that they could all sense, even if they couldn’t see it.
Which was ridiculous. Keith had never seen Vin act with anything other than complete integrity. He was a good person: principled and completely trustworthy. He just glowered a lot.
But for some reason, he set off some kind of internal shifter alarm. Every time Vin was near, Keith’s unicorn flared its nostrils and lashed its hooves against the ground. It tossed its head like it needed to be ready to thrust its horn straight into some imaginary threat that evenitcouldn’t identify. It was always sort of shamefaced about it afterwards, and it never had any explanation for him. It was pure instinct.
He was pretty sure Vin could sense the unicorn’s reaction to him, too, no matter how hard Keith tried to ignore it.
That was probably what he meant right now:Keith always tries. You should see how hard he tries to act normal around me.
Keith tried even now, forcing himself to smile. “Everyone’s been telling me I might as well marry them instead.”
“I know,” Vin said.
There was a beat while everyone waited.
Vin did not propose to Keith.
That was probably for the best, but the end of the joke sucked all the air out of the room. All Keith was left with was uncertainty.
He lingered in the office long after everyone else had gone, trying to get his head straight. Tomorrow, his whole life could change. He hadn’t felt like this since the night before he’d left home to become a Marshal. Back then, though, he’d been so young and inexperienced—and so arrogant, and so grounded in a world where failure wasn’t an option—that he’d just been able to convince himself that he would, through sheer willpower and desperation, keep himself from messing anything up. Now he wasn’t nearly so confident.
Was he really going to do this, even though it would change everything?
The Silver Council had sent him Iris Lightfoot’s picture, and the unopened envelope had been in the top drawer of his desk for days now. It felt like an unexploded bomb. The second he looked at it, she would become a real person, not just part of an abstract question of whether or not he wanted to follow the Council’s direction.
But shewasreal, whether he ever looked at her picture or not. Somewhere out there, she might be sitting up late too. Did she want to marry him? Was she scared? Excited? If he backed out of meeting her, would she be humiliated or relieved?
He wasn’t sure he could get any of that information from a picture, but he had to try. He slit the envelope open and let the photo slide out.
