Shameful by May Dawson
6
Legacy
That night,I dressed in a long pink gown. I left my black hair down loose, and it fell across my bare shoulders and swept down my back. I stared at myself in the mirror for a few long moments, thinking about what my father hadsaid.
I wasn’t entirely sure I was ready for everything to change.
Once I was mated, my relationship would move fast. Except for the very rare instances when the mating bond is broken, fated mates court and marry each other in months.
I rubbed my palms across the silky skirt of my dress. Sometimes shifters attended the mating night for several years before finding their mate, who might not be of age yet or might be in another pack. But when I thought about the way Lucas looked at me, I thought tonight might be the one and only mating ceremony I ever attended. I had to try to remember every bit of it. My parents both reveled in their memories of the first time they looked at each other andknew.
I could almost imagine magic in the air as I stepped into my sandals and walked out the front door. The cool evening breeze toyed with my hair. Courage and my parents turned, and my mother’s face melted into a smile, her eyes bright. I loved when she looked at me that way, full of pride.
“You are so beautiful,” my father said, giving me a hug. He held me for a moment, and I thought he was going to say something more before he releasedme.
“She always is.” Mom hugged metoo.
The stars were already out and sparkling. The wind blew the pine trees around our house, and the forest seemed hushed, as if the world was holding its breath knowing the wolves would play tonight.
“Good luck.” Courage’s tone suggested I would needit.
I’d been feeling as if I wasn’t quite ready to leave my familiar, happy life behind, but Courage’s words snapped my spine back to attention.
“Some of us don’t need luck,” I remindedhim.
Tania’s Jeep turned into the driveway. She laid on the horn, just because it pissed my parents off, and my dad winced.
Tania hopped out of the car, smiling. “Sorry, Mr. Quinn!”
My mother rubbed her forehead. “You look lovely, Tania.”
My parents had always filled in for Tania’s—as much as anyonecan.
“Thanks. Cross your fingers for me that my number doesn’t come up tonight.” She raised her hands aloft, middle fingers folded over her pointing fingers.
“I figured you’d wait for me to come of age,” Courage drawled, and I whirled to smack my brother’sarm.
“Don’t you dare,” I hissed at him. “That is my best friend.”
“Maybe someday I’ll make her your sister.”
It was just like Courage to piss me off on my way to the most important night of mylife.
“Ignore the dweeb,” Tania said, jerking her head toward thecar.
But honestly, she didn’t look at my little brother as if she was ignoring the dweeb.
My father cleared his throat like he was going to say something sappy, which would probably make us both cry, and I’d spent way too long perfecting my smokey eye makeup forthat.
“Don’t wait up,” Tania told my parents. “Your daughter and I plan to get drunk and rowdy at the afterparty.”
“No, we aren’t,” I told them, walking backward. “You know me. I’ve never in my life been rowdy.”
“First time for everything,” Tania said cheerfully, opening the driver sidedoor.
“Call me if you need anything.” My mother seemed nonplussed, but then, she’d been a young shifter once too. “Like a ride home. Or a smack upside the head. I’m always available.”
“Love you!” I called, then ducked into thecar.
I turned on Tania in exasperation. She was smiling to herself as she started the car and headed back up the driveway. It distracted me from the last glimpse I had of my parents—my father looking worried, my mother laying her hand on his arm and looking up at him in her reassuringway.
“Why are you like this?” I demanded.
“Why are you and your parents so darned cute?” she demanded. “They love you so much. They even like you. It makes mesick.”
There was laughter in her voice, but we’d had a lot of late night talks. I knew how much she longed to be loved. Without Tania, I might’ve taken my parents for granted instead of knowing myluck.
The two of us drove out to the wide open green fields that surrounded the alpha’s house. Pine trees swayed in the distance, highlighted by a moon brighter than usual, bright as an eye watching overus.
It was strange to step out into the cool night air in my gown and feel my heels sink into the soft earth. The other young adults of the pack milled around in their best clothes. Not that we’d stay in them forlong.
I ran my fingers through my hair once nervously. Goosebumps pebbled on my skin. The air still carried the fresh scent of ozone and wet grass from last night’s rain, and it made me think of Lucas’s face when he grabbed me and kissed me in therain.
The night felt full of promise. Also, I wanted topuke.
Tania said, “Here we go,” and I made myself smile at my best friend.
She gave me a long look. “Oh, stop that right now. You and I know each other too well to fakeit.”
“Besides,” she added under her breath, “you probably have a lifetime of faking it ahead of you, if tonight turns out the way I expect.”
Why were Tania and Courage both being so rude about Lucas? It made me feel torn between them, and I hated it. Did they really think something was wrong with him, or were they just resentful of any kind of change? “Tania, I love you so much, but sometimes I want to punch you in theface.”
“Best kind of love there is,” she returned.
The two of us headed across the damp grass to join the others. It wasn’t long before the doors swung open from the alpha’s house, and Cyrus and Lucas strodeout.
Cyrus clapped Lucas’s shoulder, muttering a few words. Lucas nodded, then joined us. He flashed Tania his most endearing, handsome smile, then turned it on me. His hand slipped across my lower back, just for a second, as he took his place besideme.
I caught a few murderous glances from other girls in the pack. Their envy bothered me. Tonight, the goddess of the moon would decide who we were fated to marry. Lucas and I had a crush on each other, but crushes were so fragile. Something deeper would happen tonight.
Maybe I should’ve been able to relax into the idea of fated mates, of destiny. But now that we’d arrived, the promise of the night made me feel as shaky as Tania.
Suddenly, no matter how handsome and strong Lucas was, I wasn’t sure I wanted him to find me tonight. I wasn’t sure I wanted anyone to find me. Tania and I might have been twenty; we might have been attending college. But in the eyes of the pack, we were still kids—until tonight. Until the moon shone on us and our mates foundus.
She reached out and grabbed my hand, and I thought maybe she realized I had cold feet. Was my face that easy to read? Then I caught a glimpse of her pale lips and square shoulders. She was looking to me for comfort. I squeezed herhand.
She glanced at me, and I mouthed, what kind of latte are you going to want when you’re hungover tomorrow?
Because maybe we’d still have college and the Crosby cafe, for a while.
And no matter what, we’d still have each other, forever. We’d be wives and then mothers in the pack, but we’d always be best friends. I’d make her coffee in my kitchen or she’d make me coffee in hers, and we’d chat together as our kids grew up aroundus.
Too late, I realized that the alpha was speaking.
“Tonight,” Cyrus was saying, “You will become adults. Some of you will find your mates, your happiness forever—”
I hoped Tania wasn’t rolling her eyes. Somehow even though she’d grown up in pack culture, she still thought it was ridiculous that it was mating that marked our transition.
When Cyrus finished talking, he gave the signal. Wordlessly, the female wolves peeled to the left, the males to the right. Shifters can’t be very modest, but the idea of stripping in front of one’s potential mates was unappealing.
I followed the clump of girls into the shadows of the forest. There was a long white table set up in the woods, eerie in the moonlight.
There, with pine needles and damp leaves underfoot, I stripped off my dress and set it on the table. I tucked my sandals underneath my dress.
“Everything’s going to be okay,” I promised Tania, who was folding her dress for the fourthtime.
She gave up and dropped it on the table. “You don’t knowthat.”
We can control our shifts. But a night like tonight called to us, when the moon hung in a full, glowing circle that seemed to brush the treetops. I would’ve wanted to run tonight even if it weren’t ordained.
Together, Tania and I turned to face the moon. Her knuckles brushed mine, and I could almost hear the nervous hum of her anxiety.
I winked at Tania, and she managed to smileback.
Then I threw my head back and let the shift rip through mybody.