Page 4 of The Vampire's Soul
“What’s her name?” Ari asked, standing gracefully and circling his desk. Then he propped his ass on the edge and crossed his arms.
Fuck.
“Ella.” Mack slid his hands into the pockets of his black sweatpants. “It’s not like...she’s not my mate.”
“No?”
No.
But yes. Except it wasn’t a possibility now. Not anymore. Not since Callan bit him and changed his DNA. Changed who he was. Turned him from a vampire into a hybrid with a big fucking black and gray wolf inside.
Callan, his alpha, had sought him out, along with Noah, Eva, and a dozen others he’d bitten, once he knew something was wrong.
It wasn’t premeditated. The alpha had no idea himself. He’d just escaped from the science lab at BioZen after being kidnapped and tortured for months. It was there his own DNA had been messed with...and the rest now history.
Now there were over a dozen vampires able to shift into wolves and, as far as they knew, also walk in sunshine.
Something they hadn’t yet delved into, for obvious reasons. If it turned out only a couple could, well, the rest would turn to ash.
That would suck.
When Callan had come for him, he’d had his brother, Michael, take care of the private gym he owned in Seattle and hit the road with them. He’d sensed something wasn’t right when his own bite wound wasn’t healing.
Leaving Ella had been hard.
Then again, he’d spent his whole life avoiding the mating bond that just grew louder and louder every day. Avoiding, but not completely ignoring, it. Or her.
Now it was too late.
“I’m a hybrid, Ari. I can’t tell her I’m a wolf, you know the king’s rule.”
“If she’s your mate—”
“No.” Mack held up his hand. “I won’t do that to her. She’s on her way to Maine now. I’ll make sure Ella is protected, but I won’t drag her into danger.”
As in him.
What if he bit her, and she fucking grew a tail.
There was no way Mack was going to infect her with this virus. As they sometimes referred to it.
Instead, he’d rented a house, so if things turned into a global existential crisis, he could quickly get to Ella and protect her. Seeing her sexy little body and eyes that begged him to mate and fuck her hard up against the wall—that might be him, to be fair—on a daily basis would be too dangerous.
For them both.
“Well son, good luck, because if another warrior decides he wants to—”
Mack narrowed in on Ari’s smirk like it was a bullseye on a dartboard. If he’d had a knife in his hand, he might’ve thrown it smack in the middle and wiped the humor from the ancient’s lips.
Which would be a big fuckup.
Still, he blocked out the vampire’s words because Mack knew exactly what would happen if some of the warriors laid eyes on Ella. She was stunning. With long brown hair and deep matching eyes, she was the epitome of beauty and health. Hell, he’d always thought she could model for all those skincare and hair products.
Instead, she creates social media content for companies. It’s her own business. Ella can work her own hours from home and if someone does want to do a daytime video conference, she just uses blackout curtains.
Mack knew as he installed them for her.
Anyway, she purposely chose foreign clients. It was the middle of the day in Australia when Ella wanted to work. But most of the time, she was doing the art stuff. Mack didn’t have a creative bone in his body, so he just nodded when she told him.
