The Fake Mate
Lana Ferguson
To my oldest friend, who at the time of publication of this book most likely still hasn’t finished it because of the “weird wolfy shit.” I love you, asshole. You don’t know what you’re missing.
1
Mackenzie
“I’m seeing someone.”
In retrospect, the lie comes much easier than I thought it would. It feels icky, lying to the woman who’s raised me since I was twelve, but in the face of my seventh bad date (or has it been eight now? I’ve honestly lost count) in three months—it also feels necessary.
My grandmother, Moira, has a reaction as immediate as it is expected. “What? Who? Someone from work? Is it someone I know?”
I know if I don’t shut down this line of questioning quickly, it will spiral into a full-blown interrogation.
“No,” I say quickly. “You don’t know him.”
I think that this part at least isn’t so much of a lie, since I don’t know him either. Since he doesn’t exist.
My grandmother means well, she does, but her taste in men—be they human or shifter—is downright terrible. I have caught movies with shifter model train experts who wanted to scent me on the first date, I have gotten coffee with human data analysts who asked if I could somehow keep my tail in human form (I don’t even want to explore the thought process there); every bad date has only solidified the idea that I am better off focusing on my job rather than my grandmother’s wishful thinking that I will find a nice man to settle down with and give her a litter of grandchildren. As if I don’t have enough to deal with. Sometimes I think Gran is no better than the dates she sends me off with when it comes to my omega status.
It’s rare, what I am—but it doesn’t make me all that different from any other shifter. Maybe once it did, back when shifters were still living in secret underground hierarchy systems unbeknownst to everyone else—but now it just means that I have an annoying stigma following me around that I’m somehow better in bed than other shifters. I swear, anyone I’ve ever told has expected me to spontaneously go into heat at a whim. Hence, I mostly keep it to myself nowadays.
“How long have you been seeing him? How old is he? Is he a shifter? I know how busy you are, dear, but I’m not getting any younger, and it would be so nice to hear the pitter-patter of—”
“Gran, it is way too soon to be thinking that far ahead.” I shudder at the thought of crying babies. “It hasn’t been that long. It’s still new. Like, very new. Practically still has the plastic wrap on it.”
“Oh, Mackenzie, why didn’t you tell me? Are you trying to break my heart?”
“You know work has been insane. We’ve had four bar fights in the last month—not to mention the pileups from all the black ice we’ve been getting . . . It’s been an utter nightmare in the ER. I think I’m getting carpal tunnel from all the stitches I’ve given lately.”
“You work too hard, dear, couldn’t they transfer you somewhere not so . . . fast-paced?”
It’s a question she asks often, but she knows my answer already. I love working in the ER. Even on the most harrowing of days, I still go to bed at night knowing that I’m saving lives.
“Gran . . .”
“Right, right. So tell me about your mystery man. At least give me a species, dear.”
I know the most obvious choice to keep her appeased.
“He’s a shifter,” I say, still feeling icky for lying. “You’d love him.” I make a quick decision based solely on knowing that Gran will see right through me if I try to say I met my mystery man anywhere else, since I don’t really go anywhere else. “I met him at work.”
I can practically hear her clicking her heels together. She’s probably doing a little dance in her kitchen as we speak, thinking that her granddaughter is finally going to settle down with a nice wolf who will give her and my grandpa grandchildren. It makes me feel that much more guilty. Thinking about the model trains date strengthens my resolve though.
“I have to meet him. When can I meet him? You could bring him to dinner . . . You haven’t been to visit in too long, honey. It would be so nice to see you and your new friend.”
“No, no,” I say quickly. “I told you, it’s new. We’re taking things slow. I don’t want to jinx it, you know? It could . . . make things awkward at work.”
“At least give me a name, will you?”
I panic, unable to think of a single name. There are dozens of eligible fake boyfriends working on my floor at this exact moment, and I can’t recall any of them. Is this punishment for lying to Gran? Is the universe cursing me for being a bad granddaughter? I can feel my hippocampus practically melting into a puddle of goo in my head, blanking on even one syllable that might wrap up my poorly planned lie in a neat little bow.
“Oh, well . . .” I can feel my mouth going dry as I scramble for something, anything. “His name? His name is—”
Now, I can count on one hand the number of hospital staff at Denver General who I don’t vibe with. One of the benefits of being, at twenty-nine, one of the youngest ER doctors is that everyone treats you like the baby on staff, and while it can get annoying sometimes, it means that I have made very few enemies while working here the last year. In fact, I would even go so far as to say that most people I’ve come to meet while working here like me. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t exceptions. I mean, I’m likable, I think. As long as the other party in question isn’t trying to sniff my neck.
However, that isn’t to say that every one of my work relationships is all sunshine and roses. And of course it’s with this thought that the break room door opens, revealing thick, midnight hair that nearly scrapes across the top of the doorframe, attached to the massive frame of one of the few physicians who fall into the “don’t vibe with” category. His permanent frown set in a wide pink mouth turns my way, settled below piercing blue eyes that regard me in the same way they always have in the time I’ve known him—a stern look that says he’s unhappy to have another living, breathing person in the same room he’s entered. And of course because the universe seems to be punishing me for my white lies before I can even finish getting them out—it is his name, unfortunately, that is the first one that my brain seems to be able to formulate.