Mated to the Moon (Portal City Protectors Book 6) by Georgette Clair (little red riding hood ebook free txt) 📗

the markers went a bit haywire. If that happened out in the field, the wolf wearing the gear would alert scent-sensitive paranorms because the smell wavered unnaturally.

“You won’t beat me, little bastard. I wonder if the waves–”

“Alpha mate.”

Fabiana froze. Uh oh.

She spun in her chair to find Raphael resting against the doorjamb. Billie hovered behind him and stuck out her tongue .

Fabiana narrowed her eyes playfully. “You little rat.”

“Should have listened the first time. Goodbye, Fabiana,” Billie sing-songed as she skipped away.

“So she went and got you, huh?”

“She shouldn’t have to. Just like our Alpha, your care is primary to everyone in this pack. They can see you’re tired and you are working yourself to the bone.”

“We don’t know when Skuld is coming and this needs to be ready.”

“Not at the cost of your health and well-being.”

She sighed and rubbed her tired eyes. “I promise I’ll be finished in the next two hours and I’ll go to bed.”

Raphael rubbed his chin and stepped fully into the room, dark strands of hair sliding across his forehead. As usual, he donned his signature all-white attire. “And what if you come across another error that needs to be fixed before production?”

Fabiana didn’t answer. She never liked to lie, but if the problem he presented did occur, she’d be working on it until sunup if her mate didn’t come fetch her.

“Go ahead and keep going.” Raphael leaned against the table holding samples. He was careful, only touching where the table was bare, but she still looked it over to make sure before turning back to her computer.

“Adonis and I grew up together in Guatemala. I had it rougher than him though. He was royalty, bred and raised there and the golden child of the local leader.”

Fabiana paused but didn’t turn around, too afraid he may stop.

“Me? I was a halfie, son to a white mother and Guatemalan father. Most of the time, despite my father’s position, his children from his first wife were considered the heirs. I was just something he should have been ashamed of.”

She spun around and faced him. “That ridiculous.”

“But you understand, being Family and all.”

He had her there. Most good Italians and the Family married others in the human world. But, as they were wolves, the mate overrode Old World prejudices. Luciana—Fabiana’s mother—was a high-class Italian woman bonded to a cruel man. Her mother once told her Primo hadn’t always been that way, that being made a wolf had altered him. She’d blamed Arturo for changing her husband forever.

“Adonis and I never should have met, but he had a penchant for running away, and I found him. Or maybe I should say my nose did. He’d just learned to shift, and not all the men around his father were wolves. They didn’t know his secret and shot at him, thinking he was a stray. Tomás, my father, always told me that bringing Adonis DeLuna into our home that day was one of the best decisions I’d ever made. Later, he probably thought it was the worst.”

“What happened?”

Raph shook his head. “You want to know the rest, come to the dining hall.”

“You can’t just leave me on a cliffhanger like that. I hate those.”

“Of course you do. You’re a woman who doesn’t like to leave things unsolved. This is a puzzle you’ll never guess, and it’s the one night you’re going to get to try.”

And the bastard left. He just left after starting that story.

Adonis knew a lot about Fabiana and her history, but she was sad to realize he didn’t often share much of his past with her. He kept her focused on who he was now. And as much as she could appreciate that, she wanted to know more, needed to see what made him the man he was today.

“Raphael is an asshole,” she grumbled as she stood from her chair.

Her joints popped, and she stretched to give them as much relief as she could before taking her half-eaten sandwich with her to the dining hall. It didn’t take long to get there, and the hallways were empty of anyone but the soldiers at this time of night.

Those who worked at the shows or attractions were on the strips and the families weren’t in the main house. It was eerie how everyone adhered to an unspoken schedule in this place. Their lives were not only the pack but their own personal ones, with plenty of time to focus on what they needed.

“You made it,” Raphael commented with a smile when she entered the room and dumped her leftovers in the nearest trash bin.

A steaming plate of roast beef, mashed potatoes, and a hunk of bread waited for her. The scent of it alone made her mouth water and her stomach growl.

“Good, I got you here.”

“The story got me. Now continue.”

“Pushy, pushy.” Raph chuckled. “I always keep my word. My father and mother helped Adonis heal, and when he shifted back, my father called his and arranged a meeting.”

“A meeting to get his missing kid back?”

Raphael bit his lip and sighed. “Our fathers were leaders of drug cartels, Fabiana. They don’t simply head to the nearest police station. We were Born wolves, adding strength to our smaller numbers, but Adonis’s father, Antonio, had a larger group backed by splintering cells from Zetas in Mexico. He was mean and cruel in his punishments, but we had saved his heir.”

Cartels. It explained quite a bit.

“This was a chance for an alliance,” Fabiana mused.

She knew how these families worked. Either Raphael’s father would demand it, or the gift Antonio had to give would equal the value of his son’s life, his heir. This was the way of blood oaths like that.

Raphael nodded. “Exactly. My father was at least smart enough not to