Accepting My Twin Mates

Badru

The warriors that had done their best to keep up, pounded their way to us just as Astennu and I shifted. I hated to admit defeat, especially where my mate's safety was concerned. But, on this occasion, we had lost... we had lost big time and I couldn't feel any more like a failure as I did.

Nine wolves trotted up to us in total, solemnly awaiting instruction.

“We're being called back, so we need to leave this to you. Split up into two parties, I raised my head to each of them in turn. “And follow the roads as far as you can without putting yourselves in danger. Stop any vehicle you catch up to, no matter what!

“And on your way back, only one of you should drive the abandoned pack vehicle to return it; my brother added. “We need to preserve as much evidence as possible!

Without another word, he turned and shot away in a streak of inky black. He was still blaming himself for this, as though any of us could have guessed someone was about to target our mate. We weren't foresight wiccans that saw visions of the future. How were we to know? All he did was lead our training class on a run, and all our mate was doing was going on a simple meetup with our mother over tea, a mere minutes away from the main pack house... where was there any inherent danger? “We should have told her we loved her and not chickened out; Baniti whimpered, a myriad of regrets reeling through him.

“I know... that mistake’s on me, not you...

I had been wanting to say it from the moment I knew she was my mate, before that even. I should have said that night four years ago when we were alone in the events hall. And instead, I had been an a*****e, pushing her defensive walls higher around her already heavily guarded heart. I wasn't a fool. I knew the distance Astennu and I had started at with Evie was all down to me and my thoughtless actions. And still, after the hurt I had caused, she gave me a chance. Even when my stupid mouth reared its brainless head at the hot springs, she quietly seethed through her anger with me and patiently heard me out, waiting for my epiphany to drop that she had already worked out for herself.

With his head start, Astennu would have been a struggle to gain any ground on, but strangely enough, in just a few short minutes I was by his side. I noticed my own swiftness had lessened along with my twin's, an unseeable force, so slight I could have almost missed it, tugging at my chest. It didn't want me to leave our mate, but we had nothing more to go on except running aimlessly further from our pack. What we needed was to regroup and assess what had been discovered so far. Even I knew that much.

“Do you think Konstantin went looking for Evie?’ I mind-linked as we zoomed past our borders.

As he hadn't been joined to our pack yet, the limit of his mind-link would only go so far with us. Sadly, the only person he would be able to mind-link with at any distance was Evie, as they shared a deeper bond through blood.

“What would he be following? Evie is unconscious; my brother's voice faltered. “He was only able to track her before because he had a conscious bond he could follow. And wouldn't he at least make sure a message got to us?’

He had a point. I could virtually envision Konstantin grabbing the first wolf he came to and demanding they pass on a message, probably calling us volchata (little wolves) in the process.

“Aste, this could be why he didn't answer his mind-link this morning!

At the time, none of us thought anything of it. Evie had reached out to ask if her father wanted to join us over breakfast, despite her having no appetite. But she never received a reply and thought he was still asleep.

“But who in their right mind would try and kidnap a full-grown lycan male single-handedly?’ My brother yelled in frustration. None of this made any sense. How had any part of this ploy been accomplished so perfectly without a single patrol being alerted? This was why we needed to regroup, to piece together all we knew so far instead of speculating an endless array of possibilities.

The white gleam of the pack house came into our view, a hive of activity flitting about the outside under the direction of Beta Kate. She looked exhausted, faint shadows lining under her eyes, yet she was indefatigable in her command.

“Hey, pups; she ran a consoling hand over our wolf heads, dipping to kneel before us. “We're not leaving any stone unturned... but I need to warn you, it's not looking good for the lycan, Konstantin

Reading the questions bubbling through our expressions, she answered before we could ask. “Go see your father. I think he's still up there and he'll tell you what he’s found!

“Has anyone checked on Lucy? I asked cautiously.

Like my brother, Finley was silently my number one suspect over all of this, even though I had zero proof, yet. In no way did I want to believe Kate abetted her son, if he was the culprit. She had a hand in raising us. She was as close to an aunt for my twin and me growing up as a blood relative could have been.

I did. She wouldn't answer her door and when I checked her window, she was fast asleep in bed. Poor girl must have been exhausted and didn't close her drapes; Kate's eyes clouded in sorrow. “I didn't have the heart to wake her!

She grabbed us each a pair of joggers from the backseat of a pickup nearby, so we could shift, and headed off to direct a small troop of trackers circling the pack house. We quickly raced up the small flight of stairs leading up to the pack house's main door and burst through.

“Let's split up for now. Go find dad and deal with whatever is going on up there,” I nodded to the main staircase. “I'l go make sure Lucy really is in her room”

He nodded and took the stairs three at a time, vanishing in seconds. Baniti whined at the loss of his twin's presence, apprehensive that he was out of sight. My wolf's usual exuberance and hyperactivity had reversed to an anxious and fidgety mess, pacing nonstop that we had been so many steps behind and blind to this ambush on our mate. Just as I was, he fixated on every little detail we could have missed that signalled something was amiss.

I rushed all the way to Lucy's door, pounding on the surface with a force that threatened to punch through the wood.

“Lucy! Come on, open up!”

No answer.

I wracked my brain, desperately trying to remember the number I had seen Evie punch in for the lock. My second attempt did the trick and, sure enough, in a tiny mound curled up, lay Lucy, a tuft of pale red hair poking out of the top of the blanket. Gingerly, I peeled back the sheets, relieved she had on a baggy t-shirt.

“Lucy!” I whisper yelled, shaking her by the shoulders as gently as possible.

“Lucy! Come on!"

I was verging on yelling, shaking her a little more roughly. She was alive and breathing, so how could she be this far asleep? “Wha?” She slurred groggily, her eyes clumsily blinking open. “Urggeh, the light,” she winced, burying her face in her quilts.

I quickly shut her drapes to and took a knee by her bed.

“Lucy, I kinda need you to sober up and fast”

“But I'm not drunk... 'm just tired” she tried to sit up, struggling with her coordination. I placed my hand on her back to ease her upright, watching as the sleepy fog began to clear from her face. “Alpha Badru? W-why are you here?"

“I think after everything, you can just call me Ru," I shook my head, trying to get back on point. “There's no non-shitty way to say this, so I'll be direct. Evie has been taken and Konstantin is missing. It's happened in the last few hours. So I need you to take a second and tell me everything you remember from last night.”

“W-wha-what?" Her eyes glistened immediately, fat tears spilling down her cheeks and her bottom lip trembling.

She whipped the blankets to the side and tried to stand, her legs ungainly collapsing under her feather-like weight. I caught her just in time, her body caving forward in on itself as an overwhelming grief poured from her.

“I can't... I can't feel him.” she heaved, her body shaking.

She shoved me aside and stumbled to her bathroom, hurling up her stomach contents into the toilet bowl. I leapt over the quilts she had dragged with her and held her hair back, grimacing at the acrid odour of acidic vomit.

“My water bottle,” she croaked with a cough, her hand flailing in the direction of her bedside table through the doorway.

I rushed to grab it and hand it over to her, just as she flushed the handle. More and more, I was suspecting her state wasn't simply a reaction to her distress. She sat back on her heels, slowly rinsing her mouth and gargling to spit out the contents. Sipping on her bottle, she drew heavy and ragged breaths between choked sobs.

“Lucy... I'm sorry, but I need to press you for answers. When was the last time you saw Konstantin?"

“Last night,” she hiccuped. “I had a late shift I volunteered to cover in the pack house that ran till 4am. That's why I stayed there, so I didn't wake him. They were short a hand, so I offered.”

“4am? Did you notice anything unusual around the pack house?" I crouched to her level. “Even if it seems like nothing." “No... I was last out... I grabbed my... my wat-"

Her body was drooping as she spoke, her limbs growing slack and nearly dropping the metal bottle in her hand. I took hold of it and Lucy before her head could make contact with the ceramic toilet. Her symptoms were far too familiar for comfort. I sniffed what little remained of the bottle’ contents, the rest had spilt on the floor. Aside from the metallic tinge from the material it was made from, I could smell nothing else present within it.

“she’s been drugged, just like our mom and our mate.’ Baniti whispered.

Just what in the ever-living-F**k was going on in this pack?!