Instead, I smiled and nodded, keeping the grin plastered on my face as I bid the Oracle goodbye a few minutes later and walked toward home.
I didn’t let the smile or the bounce in my step dissipate until I was certain I was alone. Once I was, though, that smile dimmed to nothing. I rubbed my face as exhaustion kicked in, mixing and blending with anxiety and dread. I let those emotions show for the briefest of moments before I resurrected my grin and headed back through town toward my apartment.
I got back home and collapsed on the couch, feet kicked over the armrest while I slung my elbow over my eyes. I took a deep breath, letting the news sink in.
Drake. The Oracle had just told me I had to mate the man who had broken my heart all those years ago.
Most of the time, I was able to find the bright side of things. I could typically hunt it down in the worst of situations and cling to it like a life preserver. I sometimes made a game of it, searching for the upside of something that seemed dire. This time, however, I couldn’t see it.
I had spent the last several years of my life getting over Drake. I had finally gotten to the point where I was comfortable in my own skin and able to be happy in almost any situation. Now, after all that, I was being dragged back to him.
It isn’t fair, a voice said.There’s nothing fair about this.
I couldn’t do it. Not this, not after everything Drake put me through. Except I couldn’t get out of it, either. I was stuck in this position with no way out. I was about to be tied to a man I wanted nothing to do with for the rest of my life.
There had to be a way out.
You could run away, a tiny voice in my head whispered.
I stiffened, recoiling on instinct. I couldn’t leave Silver Falls. This was my home. It was all I had known my entire life. My parents might have been dead, but I still had roots here. Rachel, for one. And I loved my job. The idea of starting from scratch in a town I knew nothing about, with no friends or support network, seemed absurd to even contemplate.
But as the thought took hold, sinking roots into my brain, the more appealing it became. I mulled it over, picturing what it would entail. I would need to move quickly, before anyone tried to start the mating ceremony. I couldn’t bring everything, just a couple of suitcases and whatever else could fit in my car.
I couldn’t come back, either. That was something I needed to acknowledge. Because I doubted I would be allowed to leave a second time now that the Oracle had decided I had to be mated. I would have to disappear entirely, too. Emma had moved to Adobe Creek, and she’d been dragged back to Silver Falls when she had to mate Elias. I would have to disappear entirely, cut off all contact, not tell anyone where I was going, or even say goodbye. It would raise too much suspicion. It would mean abandoning Rachel, Amelia, and Jessie, another of my friends.
I would hate leaving Rachel and other aspects of my life, but it was the only way to get out of this arrangement with Drake. Because if I stayed, there was no way I could escape it.
Stay in town, where I knew everyone and everything and felt comfortable and would mate Drake. Or leave all this behind, but be free for good.
I already knew the answer.
I stared at my closet where my suitcase rested on the very top shelf. Could I even do it? Would the pack let me, considering what the Oracle had decided, or would they drag me back?
I gritted my teeth, my fingers curling. I had to try.
Committing myself to what I was about to do, I pushed myself to my feet and walked over to the closet. Standing on tiptoe, I nudged the suitcase off the shelf.
There was one final moment of hesitation and apprehension as I pulled the suitcase open on the bed. I could still change my mind, could put the suitcase back, and accept my fate. The second I started packing, that would be it.
I thought about everything I loved about the town. I thought about Amelia and her school. I thought about Rachel and Isaac. I thought about Jessie and me running through town, laughing as we decided what to do next.
I thought about Drake telling me fated mates didn’t exist, that we weren’t mates, that he didn’t feel anything for me.
I opened the top drawer of my dresser and began throwing things into the suitcase.
Chapter 2 - Drake
My jaw clenched as I stared down at the notes, glancing between them and the pages on my laptop. On the wall, the map of Silver Falls and the desert surrounding it had several pushpins jabbed into it, each one marking where the wraith or one of the imps and other lesser demons helping it had attacked. Most stayed clustered in the northwest, but the more recent ones had shown a migration south. The wraith was cooking something up. The problem was, we had no idea what it might be.
The only current solace we had was that Rachel and Emma had managed to create wards surrounding the town that stopped the wraith from invading the town the way it had done previously. So long as the pack remained inside the wards, they were more or less safe. It gave us a bit of breathing room and eased the fear of the town, but it was a bandage, not a solution. We needed to end the wraith once and for all. We had gotten close twice before, but it had always managed to elude death at the last minute.
So far, we had gotten lucky. But if we didn’t manage to kill the wraith soon, then there was no telling what sort of problems lay in store for us down the road. We needed to end this once and for all.
A knock sounded on the door.
“Come on in,” I said, expecting Oz or Sam, maybe Elias.
Instead, when the door creaked open, a small woman with graying hair and a cane strolled in. She gave me a small smile that seemed to indicate centuries of wisdom.
