Lover Claimed (15 page)

Go to him. Make him happy,
that crazy
part repeated in her head. It took all she could to pretend as if
she were having the time of her life while trying to ignore the
feeling of wanting to be next to him in her heart.

But what if he’d been right? What if they
were tied together? What if he was her mate?

She wouldn’t be alone anymore. She could have
someone else to talk to besides Trudy. Maybe someone would love
her.

She clamped down on those thoughts.

No ties, Meisha.

If she needed to run, Lajos would just be
another thing she’d have to leave behind.

With a heavy heart she’d pulled herself from
the ocean and walked past him, heading to the room. Lajos followed
behind; she could feel him. She didn’t turn to talk to him, but
entered the room and went straight to the shower.

She tried not to think about it anymore,
pushing the thought of her and Lajos as a couple right out of her
mind. It was hard. But it was what must be done. She finished her
shower and dressed quickly. When she opened the door she found
Lajos waiting for her.

He still looked miserable, even though they
weren’t near the water anymore. But when he looked up at her, she
spotted something else behind his eyes—longing.

* * * * *

Lajos reached out to hold her arms. “Meisha,
I’ll have to go back out tonight and I just want to make sure
you’re good with staying behind. I don’t want you to be upset with
me.”

“Why would I be upset with you? Could it be
because you left me last night and you think you’re about to do it
again? Guess what, it’s a free country. I can go wherever I
want.”

She still doesn’t get it
. “There’s a
reason why I left you last night.”

She wiggled free and brushed past him to put
her things in her bag. “Yeah, you told me. You think I’m weak.”

He winced at having the words he’d used the
night before flung back at him. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

She put up a hand. “Lajos, I really don’t
want to go down this road again. Let’s just forget about all this
business. I need to find out if the Russian shifters are working
for the Yaruzi and are trying to get at my family and you need to
find out if they’ve been hired by some unknown person to stop the
audit on your business. After this is done, I’m going home and you
can go your separate way.”

His wolf projected pictures, first of
Meisha’s back, meaning she was mad at them. Yes, Lajos already knew
that. Then of Lajos on the ground incapacitated. Yeah. If Meisha
tried to leave him they wouldn’t be able to function without
her.

“There are two things we have to clear up.
One, you can’t go with me and my team tonight, it’s too dangerous.
We’ll catch the shifters and deal with them appropriately.”

“I really don’t want to hear this shit
anymore. I’m going with you this time.” She dangled her keys in the
air. “Like I said, this is a free country.”

He held up his hands. “Just hear me out.
There’s a perfectly good reason why I want to keep you here where
it’s safe.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “If you tell me
one more time I’m too weak, I swear to Oprah that I’ll fuck you up,
right here and now.”

He tried his best to hold back his chuckle.
Keeping all of his teeth depended on it. He’d read all the ways
she’d wanted to hurt him before he fell asleep, and he had to give
it to her, her list was quite comprehensive. “Meisha, sweetheart,
you’re my mate. If anything happened to you I wouldn’t survive. We
couldn’t—my wolf and I would die without you.”

He watched her reaction, waiting to find out
how she would take the news. Curious? Happy?

She frowned. Not the reaction he was looking
for, but hey, this was all still new to her. “Just because your
wolf likes me you’ll die if I die?”

“He liked you the first time we first met.
Imprinting is something deeper. It means we’ll be together for the
rest of our lives.”

She nodded. “Um hm. Just like you told me
before, we’re stuck with each other now.”

He grimaced at her choice of words. “I really
wouldn’t say that. We’ve found each other. We’re mated—for
life.”

“Did I miss something?”

“Huh?”

Although on the outside she appeared calm, he
could almost feel the energy from her anger crackling through the
air. “You and your wolf mated with me and now you expect me to be
stuck with you for life.”

“Look, maybe I’m not explaining this right.
I’ve never had to explain this to a human. A wolf would
automatically know what this meant. Maybe I should call Andras and
have him explain it to you.”

“And I would want to hear this from Andras
because…”

“Because he’s your Alpha.” He searched his
brain for another comparison. “Um, just think of him as your
boss.”

When both of her brows rose, he was
definitely sure he’d gone about this the wrong way.

“So you’re my mate. You’re in charge of
protecting me because I’m a weak and fragile human. And since I’m
too dumb to understand the logistics of what this means for me,
Andras, my new boss, will explain it to me.”

He wanted to shake his head, but although she
was saying it in a less than desirable tone, she still had the gist
of it.

“
And
the decision to mate with me and
bond our forces forever was made without my knowledge and input,”
she added.

“I told you there’s no planning for it. No
wolf plans for this, it just happens.”

“So for humor’s sake, tell me something. If
you had the choice, who would’ve you picked?”

“Honestly?”

She nodded. “Honestly.”

“I would’ve picked another wolf. Someone who
wouldn’t expose the pack to vulnerability. Someone who would live
as long as I would. Someone who I wouldn’t spend the rest of her
life worrying about.”

She turned away from him, but before she did
he saw the pain reflecting in her eyes. “I’ll find someone who
respects me. Someone who loves me. Someone who sees me as an equal
and someone who wouldn’t mind spending the rest of
his
life
worrying about my wellbeing.”

He rested his hand on her shoulder, needing
to feel skin. He just wanted to make this right, but not at the
cost of possibly losing her. “I’m not upset that we’ve joined.
You…you’re…”

How could he find the words to tell her that
she’s more woman and wolf than any female he’d ever met? That her
vulnerabilities were perfect, that her weaknesses were also her
strongest points and that he’d go to the end of the earth for
her.

She pulled away from him. “No need to explain
yourself, we were being honest. But you and your wolf are
forgetting one thing, Lajos. I’m not a shifter. I don’t have to
abide by your rules.”

“Meisha—”

She turned around and faced him. Her eyes
were red and watery. “I reject your claim on me.”

Chapter
Seventeen

The day had gone to hell in a hand basket. He
hadn’t really chosen her. According to him it was just something
that happened.

Whatever
, she thought as she raced
down the street on her bike with the wind whipping at her
clothes.

She wasn’t his. Just because they’d fucked
didn’t make it so either. She should’ve stayed with her first
impulse and avoided any kind of physical relationship with Lajos.
At least things would’ve stayed the same and been less muddled.

The sex had been amazing, the best she’d ever
had. And afterward, after he’d come, there was a sense of euphoric
joy in the air. Like this was it. She’d finally found the one for
her.

Could it have been the imprinting?

She didn’t know.

Why did he have to go and imprint on me?

Why couldn’t they just have kept fucking
until they had to go their separate ways?

Lajos wouldn’t fit into her world any more
than she would be able to fit into his. What would her parents
think about all this? She’d brought Trudy in and she’d almost been
killed. And what would the other wolves in his pack think of her if
she let Lajos trail after her and the Yaruzi got to him? She
couldn’t spend the rest of her days running from the Yaruzi and
two
shifter packs.

In no time at all he would forget all about
her and move on. She didn’t need his help or protection. She would
show him. She’d get the information on the shifters that he’d
failed to get last night.

He’d said she’d been lucky when she brought
down the shifter at Trudy’s business. No, it had been calculating
smarts. She used it then and she could use it again. It wasn’t like
these guys were the smartest kids on the block. Hell, neither was
Lajos as far as she was concerned. It had taken a few quick
movements to lose his tail on Ocean Drive.

After their big blow-up, she’d gone and done
the second thing she’d wanted to do since coming to Miami. She hit
Collins Avenue. Of course he’d followed her, staying a safe
distance away. She ignored him while she perused some of the local
boutiques. She hadn’t intended to buy anything, but that hadn’t
stopped her from going from store to store, wearing Lajos down
enough for him to drop his guard and, when he did, she got rid of
him.

She got on her bike and then she was on her
way. Lajos would spend some time looking for her at the shops. Then
he might even go back to the room hoping to find her there. When he
finally realized that she’d left, he would try to follow her, only
to find that his bike wouldn’t budge. She’d pulled enough wiring
out of his console and threw them away to assure that. Now he would
be the one waiting for her to come back with information.

She smirked at that. She’d heard him on the
phone explaining to his brother that he was afraid to get any
closer to the shifter house for fear of being found out. That’s one
thing she wasn’t—afraid. She could go to their house, get inside
and find out the information she needed. Either they were working
with the Yaruzi or they weren’t. After she had her answer she could
go her separate way, leave Lajos to finish his investigation on his
own.

A stab seemed to piece her heart.

I don’t want to leave Lajos.

I have to. It’s for mine and his own
good.

She made a left at the light and took the
long road through the affluent neighborhood. If this were a
leisurely trip she would’ve decreased her speed and taken the time
to appreciate the tropical-looking houses that were painted in an
array of bright colors. They didn’t have houses like these in
Japan. These were peach, pink and green houses that were
beautifully decorated with stonework. When she’d first moved to the
States she knew she wanted a home of her own, but that dream was
long gone. She had to work two online teaching jobs to make ends
meet and to stash a nice sum away for her “getaway” fund.

She’d been a child then, thinking she could
have what normal people had. Getting a house meant putting down
roots, and that was one thing her dad had warned her against. She
could never get complacent about staying in Jacksonville.

It was sad when she really thought about it.
She’d have to leave her best friend in the world and the kids at
the Boys and Girls Club, but, in reality, if she were dead she
would be lost to them anyway. And a boyfriend, even marriage and
kids was out of the question. Now that would be putting down some
serious roots. What man in his right mind would want to marry a
woman with that kind of baggage on her head?

Maybe one that could protect me.

She snorted at the intrusive thought and made
a right at the next street.

Lajos might think he can protect me, but he
can’t. Not against the Yaruzi.

It didn’t matter what he was on the inside.
The Yaruzi were evil inside and out and there were more of them
than there were of Lajos.

She drove down the street, noticing the
houses on this one were far less nice than the houses she’d been
ogling just moments before. She spotted the house where her and
Lajos had stopped two nights before and kept going. She crossed
over to the next block, noting every house she passed.

There it is.

Just as Lajos had described it, a blue
two-story house. A light shone through the bottom floor windows,
while the top floor windows were dark. She also noted two cars in
the driveway and a truck parked on the street. She kept driving
past and onto the next block. When she got there she looked for
somewhere to hide her bike. She spotted a restaurant and turned
into the parking lot and parked in an empty space between two cars.
She wanted her bike to blend in with the patrons’ vehicles and not
stand out in any way.

She took her helmet and stored it, but kept
on her gloves. She didn’t want to leave any fingerprints behind in
the house. Just her luck they were doing all types of illegal shit,
and when the feds came to bust them and dusted the place for
prints, hers would be all over. No thank you. Part of being in the
witness protection plan meant she had to stay out of trouble and
keep her nose clean, which wasn’t the easiest thing to do.

She jogged up the block toward the house,
making sure to keep to the shadows and close to the houses. When
she reached the house that was next to her target house, she went
around to the backyard. It was dark, no light shone and, most of
all, no dogs to bark and alert the entire neighborhood of her
presence. She crept along the back of the house, not wanting to
activate any motion sensor lights if there were any. When she
reached the six-foot wooden privacy fence, she put her ear to it,
listening for any sounds coming from the yard next to the one she
was in. Hearing none she jumped and grabbed the top of the fence.
She slowly hauled herself up to peer into the back yard.

Empty.

From her position she could see light peeking
through dark curtains on the inside of the double glass doors. The
second floor windows in the back of the house were just as dark as
the front windows. A curtain in one of the windows blew in the
light breeze. No screen.