Total pages in book: 48
Estimated words: 44411 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 222(@200wpm)___ 178(@250wpm)___ 148(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44411 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 222(@200wpm)___ 178(@250wpm)___ 148(@300wpm)
Chapter Two
“What are you doing?”
At the sound of her mother’s voice, Leah spun around from where she stood at the easel in her bedroom. Luckily she hadn’t had her paintbrush lifted to the canvas, or she would have ruined her work.
Sucking in a breath, she set her free hand over her heart. “Mom, you scared me.”
Her mother stood in the doorway, hands on her hips, eyes narrowed. “And again, I have to ask, what are you doing?”
Leah opened her eyes wide and nodded toward the canvas. “What does it look like I’m doing? Painting.”
Her mother glanced around the room, frustration wafting off her. “Leah…”
She didn’t need to say more. Leah knew her mother was exasperated, and she knew why. She just couldn’t bring herself to care.
Leah’s sister, Khloe, squeezed around her mother to enter the room. “Oh… Yikes.” She winced as she headed for the dress hanging against the closet.
Leah’s mother groaned. “I told you Khloe and I would be up here in ten minutes to do the final fitting. Why aren’t you dressed? There’s paint all over your arms, your hands, and your face. You’re going to have to shower before you can come anywhere near the dress.”
Leah had gone to her room intending to put on that stupid dress, but she’d found herself lured to her easel instead. Anything to avoid reality. She didn’t even want to look at the dress. She had the sudden urge to fling her paintbrush that direction so it got splattered with blue paint and was ruined.
What would happen if her ceremonial dress was destroyed two days before the claiming? Based on what she knew about the tradition, the mating was going to happen no matter what. Even if she shaved her head, sliced up her face, and went to the ceremony naked, it would happen.
She didn’t have the balls to cut her hair, though, and there was no way she was going near a sharp knife.
“I’m never going to understand you,” Khloe declared as she turned toward the bed, leaped into the air, and landed with a huge bounce. That was Khloe. Filled with energy and spunk. She was grinning. The happy child. The one who took everything in stride. The one who’d embraced the ridiculous mark she’d been born with from the moment she’d been old enough to understand what it meant.
Leah, on the other hand, hated the stupid mark she bore and what it represented. Why couldn’t she have been skipped? Khloe was jealous that Leah was a year older and would be mated off before her. Leah would gladly trade places in a heartbeat. She’d wished a million times that she could burn that mark or cut it off. What if her arm were amputated? Would she still be forced into a barbaric union with an old man she didn’t know?
It was extremely rare for two sisters to both bear the mark. Of all the shifters living in the valley, some families went generations without producing an heir with a mark. It was just Leah’s dumb luck that her family had two daughters and both were fated to be claimed by a stranger in an antiquated custom that should be abolished. It surprised her that no one else seemed to agree with her.
For her entire life, she’d been told how lucky she was, what a privilege it was that she would be whisked away to live among strangers in the mountains. She was meant to be grateful and feel proud. All Leah felt was bile rising in her throat.
“It’s so unfair,” Khloe said, crossing her arms and pushing out her bottom lip in a fake pout. She was such a happy person that her eyes were still dancing while she pretended to be angry.
Leah couldn’t help but laugh. Even though she and her sister disagreed wholeheartedly about this mating custom and had very little in common, they’d always been close. “How about if we trade places? You can pretend to be me and head to the ceremony in two days. I’ll run off and hide in the mountains so I never have to go at all.”
Unfortunately, Leah was not kidding. She would do that in a heartbeat if she thought it would work. It wouldn’t, of course. For one thing, her mate would scent the difference before he even got to the ceremony. For another thing, their marks would not match. Tempting, though.
“Leah, you’re getting paint on your day dress,” my mother pointed out, her voice laced with exasperation. “There are paint stains on every one of your dresses.”
Leah lifted the brush of blue paint and dragged the tip down the center of her chest, leaving a long blue line.
Her mother gasped, eyes popping out of her head.
Khloe giggled. “Mom, chill. It doesn’t matter. She’s never going to wear that dress again, remember?”