My Hateful Mate

MEL POV All it took was one whiff of his alluring scent and I was done. It was spicy and sweet, like rum spice, a combination of yumminess. My initial reaction was extreme titillation, all my nerve endings felt on fire. There was a little dread. This wasn’t the plan after all. In my head, there was still more I wanted to do before being tied down. That feeling didn’t last though. Keyla made sure of that. The need to see where the scent was coming from took over and I was no longer the rational shewolf I knew myself to be. I searched the restaurant frantically for the owner of all that deliciousness. I was met with the perfect picture of tall, dark, and handsome. A vision of perfection with tattoos that ran up his neck and down his arm. Those were the ones not covered by his shirt and I was dying to see what he was hiding. He felt my gaze on him and he turned in my direction. Our eyes locked and there was a hardness in them that startled me. It faded a little and they locked with mine. Those deep brown eyes went to my lips and then back to my eyes, he made a move as if he was going to come hither, but something stopped him. His eyes hardened once more after he shook his head lightly. What could be more important than getting a closer look at all this? My ego would be hurt if I hadn’t seen the flash of desire he tried to hide before he turned away and walked out of the restaurant where I was having dinner. Under normal circumstances, if he were some rando, I wouldn’t give him a second thought. But he’s my mate. Keyla kept pushing me to follow him and claim him as mine. There was one problem. He is human. A human on a mission, it appeared, because he clearly liked what he saw. He felt a pull to me, but instead of taking the time to vie for my attention, he had me throwing away my plans. This was not a good start, not at all. I wasn’t here to find him, let alone chase after him. Yet here I was dropping some money on the table and rushing to my rental. He had me acting like someone I wasn't, doing things I'd never done before. I was literally going full on stalker on his ass. If I were human, my behavior would be unacceptable. Good thing I'm a shewolf because Keyla was screaming “Go get our man!”. Assuring me that what I was doing wasn’t all that crazy. I mean, what if I never found him again? It would be torture to know he’s out there somewhere far away from me. It’s funny how everything seems logical when the mate bond is at play. When your wolf is driving you, nothing is too extreme or unreasonable. I, Melanie Michaels, who did not want to find her mate until she was good and ready, followed this man for an hour and a half! I have never so much as followed a man to the door as he left my apartment after I dismissed him. If that wasn’t bad enough, when he stopped in a cheap motel in the middle of nowhere, I spent an hour debating if I should go knock on his door and make him mine. Keyla was all for it, the ho. But I kept thinking how crazy this all was. He’s a human and there is a huge possibility he will recognize me from the coffee shop. How do I explain following him here? I was arguing with myself and my wolf when he came out, looking like he was about to go paint balling in the middle of the night. Camo gear and all. My eyebrows furrowed as I saw him walk back to his car and open the trunk, shuffling things around. “Kiki! Our mate better not be some terrorist or something.” It would be my luck. “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” She scolded. Maybe I was being a tad suspicious. How could I not be? I’m out here like some damn spy watching his every move. If I knew his name, I would be all over his social media gathering intel. “You have to admit that he looks awfully suspicious right now Kiki.” I couldn’t shake this feeling in the pit of my stomach. “You’re just saying that because you didn’t want to find our mate yet. You’re making excuses.” She hissed at me. Maybe. I decided to listen to Keyla for now and keep a positive mindset. Our mate looks delicious in camo. That’s a positive thought. He obviously likes nature if he comes all the way out here away from the city, another plus. As I added more and more things to the pro side of my mates list, I proceeded to follow him further away from where I was supposed to be. The city. I was lucky I had wolf vision because it allowed me to follow at a further distance. Otherwise, he probably would have noticed that I’d been behind him this whole time. There were very few cars going in this direction at this time of night. Everything about this seemed off. I kept driving but reached for the glove compartment and pulled out the satellite phone my dad gave me. To think, I’d argued him to death, telling him I would never need it. That he was being overprotective and ridiculous. I’m a wolf after all. Being in an isolated area like this shouldn’t scare or worry me. The thing is, I’m not worried about myself. What if something happened to him while he was out here playing Rambo? Twenty minutes later, he turned into a dirt road. That’s when I decided to park my car on the side of the road and follow on foot. I was fast enough after all. I closed the door and was about to lock it when I remembered the phone. Can’t be too careful. It didn’t take me very long to find his parked car after ten minutes on foot. What the hell was he doing out here? “Goddess… I hope he’s not the next Unabomber.” I grumbled and tried to find his scent. I caught it and began to walk in that direction but stopped when I smelled something else. Something with a much stronger scent. A Rogue. Though it didn’t smell gross like usual, which meant it probably spent time in the human town as a lone wolf. My heart was beating out of my chest as the fear that the Rogue would find him and tear him to shreds sunk in. I needed to be careful though. I wasn’t a warrior and Rogue's were used to fighting in order to survive out here. I can’t cha cha my way out of this one. “We can handle one Rogue.” Keyla assured me. I sniffed the air, trying to see if there were any others out there. Nope, just that one. Peeking from behind the bushes I saw the dark figure of the Rogue feasting on a poor bunny. Its head popped up and sniffed around, probably smelling me or Ranmbo. I ducked further, as I looked around the darkness. “Where is he?” Keyla asked. I continued to look around, but his scent had gone faint. Then I heard a cracking sound. It wasn’t very loud, but it was closer to me than the Rogue. I looked up and found my mate perched on a tree that was a few yards farther than I was from the Rogue. I wondered if he saw me lurking around in the dark since I wasn’t very stealthy. It didn’t seem like he had since he was looking through the scope of his gun, completely engrossed in what he was doing. What a minute… Was he planning on shooting that Rogue, but why? He began messing with his gun and, although I didn’t know exactly what he was doing with it, I knew he was preparing to take a shot. The Rogue wasn’t attacking him or anyone else. In fact, I doubt she even knew he was there.“s**t, Kiki!” I groaned at the realization of what was going on. This can’t be happening. I wanted to scream and curse the Moon Goddess for my bad luck, but I didn’t have time to do either of those things. I made a split-second decision and stepped on a twig, alerting the Rogue. It quickly looked in my direction and hopped behind a bush, hiding itself. I could hear it stalking around, making its way over to me stealthily. The need to get my ass out of here was strong but I couldn’t find it in me to leave him here. When I looked back up at the spot where he was in the tree, I noticed he wasn’t there anymore. I calmed myself and listened. I could hear paws stepping lightly to my right and two feet barely making any noise to my left. They were growing closer and closer. I wasn’t sure who was the bigger threat. The Rogue who just killed Thumper or my mate. The Hunter. My stomach lurched as I let reality sink in. My mate was a Hunter, and he was going to kill a Rogue. If he found out what I was… he would kill me too. “No! He wouldn’t.” Keyla argued and I hoped she was right. I felt him stop and I knew he was getting ready to take another shot. The Rogue was a few feet away from me at that point. Still hiding, but not very well. I couldn’t let him do it. I popped up and waved my hands at the Rogue. “RUN!” I screamed. “Get down!” He yelled, a deep frown on his face. The Rogue diverted its attention from me to him. Did I just put my mate in danger in order to save a Rogue?