Chapter 28: The Rejected Mate

Ethan

Rowan’s chestnut hair was falling around his face, casting long shadows over our sharp, shared features. Looking at him was almost like looking in a mirror sometimes but with lighter, wavier hair. He had my build and my height, and there had been times when someone had approached him from behind, thinking it was me, and vice versa.

But he had his mother’s emotionally driven personality. He was sensitive, shy, and somewhat boyish in demeanor. I had hoped sending him to Red Lakes would break him out of it.

But as we sat in Rowan’s lodgings, a big log cabin overlooking a large bluff leading down to the sea below, I could see l had been very, very wrong.

Kacidra was sitting on the other side of the living room, her hands folded in her lap. She was the one Rowan was supposed to marry. And judging by the look on her face as she gazed at him, her blonde brows knitted in a tight frown, she wasn’t all too pleased about it. Neither was Rowan.

“What happens if she rejects me?” Rowan was picking at the seam of his jeans, his light blue eyes downcast and focused on everything, and nothing, at all опсе.

“It’s supposed to be dreadfully painful,” Kacidra quipped, but she quickly shut her mouth and looked at the floor as I gave her a stern, fatherly look of disapproval.

I would give anything to see Kacidra and Maeve go head-to-head.

*Are you certain you’re being rejected?” I asked, scanning his face. Rowan shrugged, looking up to glance at Kacidra.

“Hanna hasn’t spoken a word to him since he’s been here,” she said, but then bit her lip, shaking her head.

“She’s said one word to me-”

“Rowan, don’t-”

I watched them, an unspoken exchange passing between the two youngsters as they glared at one another. “What exactly is going on around here?”

“Do you want to tell him, or should I?” Rowan peered over at kacidra, who significantly paled.

“I don’t think we should,”

“We could use his help, Kass. Please.”

Kacidra sucked in her breath, looking from Rowan to me. I was growing impatient with them, the two of them having been so secretive since I had arrived in Red Lakes the day before. I had been missing Rowan and was excited and incredibly shocked to see his progress on the solar farm when I arrived. The entire project was nearly complete. The crew in charge was busy running lines to the buildings and houses in the village, with Rowan overseeing everything

Oh, yes, Rowan would get his radio towers. He had earned them.

And Rowan should have been excited about that, but he was forlorn and distracted, constantly in the company of Kacidra, who hovered around him like an anxious bird, her eyes wide and mouth at his ear.

I had made it clear within an hour of arriving that I had no expectations that they would marry, unless they chose to go through with it. Rowan had found his mate. Kacidra had no interest in marrying Rowan and sacrificing her own happiness in the event she found her mate in the future. Rosalie and I wouldn’t force them into a union, even if Eugene demanded it.

Rowan could, and would, marry Hanna. She was his mate, after all. Their marriage would still unite our packs.copy right hot novel pub