Page 52 of Wild Fires

“How the hell would you know that?”

“I may not be all up in your business, but I have seen the two of you coming and going. I can hear you laughing together in the hallway. She makes you happy, Ryan, and you deserve to be happy. She's your true mate, isn't she?”

I cringed as guilt settled into my gut.

“Holy shit. She really is.”

“Shut up. You don't know what you're talking about.”

“For a great politician, you have a terrible poker face, little brother. That's probably why so many people trust you to do the job and be straight with them about everything.”

“Is she really your true mate?” Dean asked.

I sighed. “I don't know. Maybe.”

“You don't know? Have your birds even met yet?”

“Not exactly, but sort of. I saw her bird for the first time last night as I was flying away after watching her burn to death, so forgive me if I'm struggling to figure things out this morning.”

“It's not morning, dude. It's almost dinnertime. You slept the day away.”

“What?”

“You heard him. You slept the day away. Everyone's been out looking for you for hours,” Elias said.

I groaned. “They aren’t wasting public resources on that, are they?”

My brothers laughed.

“There's the Mayor Davenport we know and love,” Dean teased.

David walked in behind them. “They found him,” he yelled out.

Soon Mom, Dad, Gia, and Kim all joined him as they tried to cram into the closet with me.

“You have got to be kidding me,” I mumbled. “I'm fine. Go away.”

“You've never been fine when holed up in this closet, sweetie. What is going on?” Mom asked.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Gracie Montgomery is his true mate and he had to watch her die yesterday so she could rise from her ashes like a phoenix,” Dean explained.

“Gracie?” Dad asked.

“You found your mate?” Mom cried.

“What the hell are you doing hiding in here then? She's not actually dead,” Gia said.

“Language, Gia,” Mom automatically corrected.

“You do know I'm a grown-ass woman now, right?”

Mom scowled at her. “We'll discuss this later. Now why am I just finding out about your mate?”

“Maybe because I just found out about her.”

“But you two have been sneaking around for over a week now. How could you not know?” Kim asked.