The Scents of Proxima Ch. 02

She trusted Cole to keep his temper, but this other cat was entirely unknown. If the mutant cat shifted, she was going to be in trouble. She tried again. "Cole, you can let him go. He wasn't hurting me."

As she said it, Beth realized it was true. As scared as she had been at being physically lifted off the ground and held there against her will, his hands had been gentle in their grip.

"He was scaring you."

"I fell. He caught me." Beth was having trouble forming coherent sentences.

"That doesn't give him the right to not let you go, Beth." Cole still had an edge to his voice, but he wasn't growling anymore. The stranger hadn't moved, but Beth could still feel growls rumble through his chest. She had to lean back to look up into the other man's face. His eyes were wild. Beth's heart pounded in her ears.

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David wrestled with himself. Every instinct demanded that he protect his mate from the tiger who had interrupted them. She had been in his arms! He tried to find the words to explain, but for the first time in his life, he found himself wanting to give in to his baser instincts and destroy the man who thought to take his mate away from him. But she was still between them and he didn't want his precious mate to get hurt.

David glanced down at the woman before him. She stared up at him, eyes wide, face flushed, pressing back against the other shifter. He opened his mouth to tell her everything would be okay. As he inhaled, he smelled her fear. Everything came into abrupt clarity as his rational mind caught up with the situation.

She wasn't afraid of the other shifter, she was afraid of him! He wrenched his arms out of the newcomer's grip and stumbled back. What had he done?

"Come on Beth, let's go." The tiger wrapped an arm around the woman's shoulders. His mate glanced at him one last time but allowed the other man to lead her away.

Davis's brain and heart clashed. He wanted to run after them, to explain, to rip the other man limb from limb, to apologize, to.... He locked his muscles in place. He couldn't talk, he couldn't move, he couldn't think straight. He could only watch as the tiger whisked her away.

Once the pair were out of sight, and David's nose had finally cleared of her scent, he sagged to the ground. What had happened? What had he done? He thought back...

Time had seemed to slow when he finally caught her unadulterated scent as she walked out of the enclosure. Hal had been right! David struggled to believe it, having only known disappointment and heartbreak for so long. This beautiful woman was his mate pair. When she'd smiled at him, he'd been utterly spellbound. A part of him had known he was being overwhelmed; he'd held his breath, trying to gain enough control to speak to her rather than just kiss her senseless before he even knew her name.

Then she'd tripped. He'd caught her, pulling her to him. Feeling her pressed so fully against him had been incredible; the whole world had clicked into place. She'd spoken to him and blushed.

With his pulse echoing in his ears, David hadn't been able to hear what she said, but he'd been enraptured by the way her mouth moved. He'd locked himself in place to keep from ravishing those sweet lips. He'd wanted to do this right but his need for her had burned through him.

She'd said something else, and then, she'd reached back to take his hand! It was as if she could read his mind and sought to comfort him. David's heart had soared! He flexed the hand she had held. It hurt. Why did it hurt? David looked down to see blood streaked across the back of his hand.

The wound had already healed, one of the benefits of being a shifter, but she had dug deep enough with her nails for blood to flow. How had he not felt that?

David was dismayed. Why had she felt the need to draw blood? They were mates! They were supposed to be drawn together. The only rationalization he could make was that she had been trying to use a little bit of pain to snap him out of his stupified state. He had to find some way to explain, to apologize! He cast his mind back to when the tiger had pulled her away. Beth, he'd called her Beth.

Her first name and enrollment in his uncle's class gave him enough information to start his search. He could track down where she was living on campus. David started to stride up the path. The records likely wouldn't have her exact room number but it would get him close enough to track her by scent.

A realization struck him as he called her scent to mind. She wasn't a shifter! There weren't any other mammalian markers in her essence. David stumbled to a stop and sank to the ground, horrified. She probably hadn't even been able to tell they were a mate-pair. The poor woman must have been terrified!

Oh god! She hadn't been trying to break him out of his stupor or take his hand, she'd been trying to remove it. She'd been trying to disentangle herself from a random stranger who'd held her off the ground with one hand pinned behind her head. He must have seemed nothing less than a monster!

There were no words strong enough to remedy this! How could she forgive him? She would probably thank her lucky stars if she never even caught a glimpse of him ever again. He couldn't just show up on her doorstep unannounced, trying to apologize, she'd panic! David groaned, head dropping into his hands. What was he going to do?

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Hal was happy for David. It sounded like the man deserved a lucky break. Hal hoped that the large cat would have more luck with his mate pair than he was having with Beth. Despite his longing to have her close to him, Hal was trying to give her the space and time to get used to him.

The separation did overcharge Hal's need to keep Beth safe, to do everything he could to ensure her well-being. It's why he'd gone over to the large, agitated shifter in the first place, to make sure there hadn't been a threat to his precious mate. If the massive shifter was provoked, he could shift unexpectedly. The cat's superior nose could have detected some predator that Hal's couldn't. The waste facility was fairly close to the wall... Once Hal had ascertained that his mate wasn't in any potential danger, he'd relaxed. He'd even felt proud of himself for coming up with the idea for David to hold the gate for everyone.

Hal glanced down the path, wanting to see Beth one last time before he left for the day. He scanned the faces of the students trickling up the walkway. Beth hadn't come back with the rest of the class.

Dread pooled in Hal's stomach. He sped towards the composting facility, not bothering to stick to the path. Hal burst out of the small stand of trees that separated the waste facility from the rest of campus, the compost enclosure coming into view. He skidded to a stop.

David stood in the middle of the path, watching Beth be led away by a tiger Hal had seen her with before. Hal's stomach dropped out completely. He knew that look on David's face. He felt it on his own every time he had to let her walk away from him. David had a mate-pair with Beth too... Shit.