A Curse of Fate (Shifter City Fated Mates #1)

Chapter 39

Chapter

Thirty-Nine

O n the inside, the hockey stadium was massive. Not that it didn’t look like it from the outside, but it was even bigger than I expected. Bigger and absolutely packed. We’d driven here in Hunter’s Range Rover, with a bouncy Kellan in the backseat, adrenaline for his upcoming game rocketing through him.

“Share some of your energy,” I joked at one point when he rocked the car as we stopped at lights.

He’d leaned over the center console. “Wish I could, Emme. My parents would have certainly loved it, since I’ve always been this way. Far too much energy to contain.”

Hunter had insisted I take the passenger seat, but I’d practically shared it with Kellan as he hung over me the whole drive anyway.

“He’s the only one of us with a normal family,” Hunter chimed in. “Hard to believe, I know.”

It was equally hard to believe that Hunter Reeves was making lighthearted remarks and jokes. “I’m happy to help you murder any evil family members,” I offered, only half kidding. It pissed me right off that these alphas had dealt with a variation of the same cruel, lonely shit as me. Maybe worse, if the depths of pain in Finley’s eyes were anything to go by.

Kellan all but purred as he buried his face in my arm. “You say the most romantic things, Shortcake. I don’t know what we did before you were in our lives.”

Hunter even laughed at that, though he didn’t comment further.

When we’d arrived at the stadium, surrounded by cheering shifters clad in mostly teal, gold, and white jerseys, I found true excitement flaring.

“There are more red jerseys than I expected,” I said, leaning closer to Hunter after we took our seats.

He’d tried to force me into their corporate box, but I’d wanted to be close to the ice. Our seats were right behind their bench, center of the action.

Hunter took in the rows of red and gold jerseys. “Yeah, a lot of shifters travel consistently for the games. The puck wolves and bears especially.”

I’d already learned those titles were reserved for the females who tried to bag hockey players, even if only for one night. The very thought of any of them being near Kellan… or even Finley, had me raging. Not that I had any right to care.

“When do the teams come out on the ice?”

“They’ll be out for warmups soon.”

I couldn’t wait to see what warmups entailed… Was it mostly stretching and skating laps?

Lights flashed around the arena as music pumped, and I loved seeing all the shifters with their plastic cups of beer and plates of nachos settling into seats. Hunter got a lot of lingering stares from shifters not used to seeing him down here with the plebs. Or maybe it was the fact that he was the entitled alpha of the strongest pack in the city and looked freaking gorgeous in his charcoal suit.

This alpha controlled his space without saying a word, and the fact that all the seats around us remained empty felt like a testament to his strength and power.

“Would you like any food?” he asked, glancing over at a group of girls giggling nearby. They were spilling their beer and fries in an attempt to catch a first glimpse of the hockey players.

“Actually, I’d love snacks.” Do not ask me where my giddy excitement came from, but like my first cinema experience, I was pumped to watch this game.

Hunter whipped out his phone and shot off a text message. I had no idea who he was messaging to bring us food. Probably one of his many assistants.

When the music grew louder, shifters started jumping up and down in the stands, waving their arms in a weird pattern. It was all fascinating, like I’d stumbled into another world.

A few seconds later, my phone and Hunter’s beeped, and I opened it to find Kellan had messaged our group chat.

Golden Boy: *Image Attached*

Hunter ignored his phone and leaned over to stare at my screen. I almost forget to click the image, distracted by his energy licking down my skin. Swallowing roughly, I pressed the message and waited for it to load. A few seconds later, a snort of laughter escaped me.

Kellan had sent a picture of Finley standing in the middle of the locker room.

At first, all I noticed were his muscles… so many muscles encased by perfect, dusky skin. Like the other alphas, Finley was stacked, which I saw clearly because he only wore a pair of tight, white boxer briefs. Oh, and socks.

Hunter cleared his throat, and I was surprised by his low laughter. “Fin is going to murder him.”

“Why? Because he sent this phot—” Oh fuck.

I’d been so focused on his broad shoulders and ripped muscles—yep, I was shallow—that I’d missed two important details in the picture. One: Finley was absolutely furious, his face menacing as he leaned toward Kellan. And two: right on the crotch of his underwear, over the impressive bulge, was my face.

My fucking face.

“What’s happening? What’s the point of Kellan doing this?”

I was startled to find Hunter looking amused. This alpha rarely, if ever, looked amused. “Finley is extremely superstitious when it comes to hockey,” he explained, waving at the image. “Whatever socks and underwear he wears for the first game, he wears for the entire season. No wavering. We’re lucky his superstitions don’t go as far as not washing said items.”

A closer look at the image revealed small bears all over his socks, with a word I couldn’t read at the top. “So… Kellan made sure those boxer-briefs were all he had to wear today, and now he’s stuck with my face on his dick for the full season?”

I wasn’t sure if I should be impressed or mortified. I was pretty much a decent mix of both.

Hunter lost it as a burst of laughter escaped him, and if I’d thought we had attention on us before, it was nothing compared to now. Everyone in the vicinity stared at him like he’d just created snow from his tears. Or like an angel had fallen to Earth and now walked amongst mere mortals. Okay, that was how they usually looked at him, but the awe had certainly amped up with his display of amusement.

“It’s really not funny,” I grouched, feeling heat in my cheeks. “Finley and I already have all the issues without Kellan piling on.”

As his laughter faded, Hunter cupped my face. “Finley needs a shifter like Kellan to keep him from spiraling. Our bear has a lot of trauma in his past, and he’d fall into it without our golden wolf.”

That settled my embarrassment, and I decided that if it took my face on his crotch to lighten the mental burden of Finley’s life, well… I’d sacrifice for the greater good.

Hunter released me right as our phones chimed again.

Golden Boy: *Image attached* *smiley emoji* *wink face emoji* *heart eyes emoji*

Wondering what I was about to see this time, I opened it to find an image of Finley again, only this time Kellan had taken it without him noticing. And weirdly, he wasn’t glaring any longer. If anything, he looked confused and sad as he stared down at his underwear.

“This will all work out,” Hunter whispered near my ear. “Let the process take the path it needs.”

My throat grew tighter as I nodded. Not that I had any idea what was going to happen in the future, or how anything would work out, but it hurt me when this pack hurt. I hated to see it.

Hunter leaned back in his chair, and my darker thoughts were cut off as he draped his arm behind me. They weren’t super roomy chairs to start with, and he had already been half crowded into my side with his bulk, but now I was surrounded.

The heat of his dominance stirred my omega energy, and my wolf preened like a horny bitch. Both of us wanted his mouth on our skin again, which was a terrible idea.

A terribly great idea.

The more I entangled myself with these alphas, the harder it got to remember the reasons I’d stayed away from here in the first place. I’d spent years running and hiding, and it would all be for nothing if I gave in now.

The stadium brightened and I almost forgot about Hunter’s arm as the players emerged. Teal, gold, and white-shirted shifters zoomed out onto the ice, and the crowd screamed and cheered, jumping in their seats. These guys were celebrities, and it hadn’t escaped my notice that I wasn’t the only one wearing a shirt with Kellan’s name and number on it.

In fact, most of what I saw in the stands were twenty-two Jackson , thirty-four Thornton for Finley, along with fifty-eight Yamamoto and eighty-four Newton . The players wearing those four numbers remained close on the ice as they skated around and waved to the crowd.

Kellan stopped at the glass where we sat, and without his helmet I could see the absolute joy written across his features. He’d never been more sunshine than he was on the ice.

He pressed his hand to the glass, and I barely resisted the urge to rush down the steps to return the gesture. Kellan tapped his hand to his chest and then blew me a kiss, before he skated off with so much grace it was hard to believe he wasn’t flying.

He rejoined Finley and the two other popular-with-the-crowd players.

“That’s Kenzo Yamamoto and Christian Newton,” Hunter said as I watched their group, realizing number eighty-four was Kellan’s friend from the bar. “Kenzo is Finley’s chosen brother. They grew up together, and Christian is Kellan’s best friend. They also grew up together, but don’t have the trauma bond of Fin and Kenz.”

Trauma bond . I’d always wondered if the bond part helped with the trauma part. I’d never had any bonds in my life to know. Plenty of trauma though.

I couldn’t take my eyes off Finley and Kenzo as they fucked around on the ice, skating between cones, and racing up and down the rink. After a few minutes they dropped to the ground near our seats, and I lurched forward. “Uh, what’s happening?”

Hunter chuckled, more relaxed than I’d seen from him before. “Got to warm up their groins.”

They were warming up their groins alright as they spread their legs and humped the ice. Kellan lifted his head, threw a smirk my way, and I wished I could say I looked away. I did not.

Thankfully, before I combusted, they moved on to other stretches, drills, and skill work. It was telling how distracting our side was that I barely even noticed the Red Pandas warming up too. Neither team crossed the center of the rink, staying strictly to their side.

After a few minutes of antics on the ice, both sides returned to their locker rooms, and the anticipation grew in the stadium.

Everyone was ready for this game.

The first of the season.

“Are the entitled alphas from the other cities here?” I asked, relaxing against Hunter’s arm, despite my best efforts to ignore it.

“Yep,” he rumbled, sounding annoyed. “They’re in the largest box over there.”

He pointed toward a glassed area situated high over the center of the ice. Best seats in the house, except if you wanted to be down here in the action. “Should you be up there with them?”

“An entire game up there would have me wanting to throw myself through the glass just to escape.”

I glanced up once more, and I swore I felt eyes on us from that box. “Well, it’s good that you’re down here with me, then.”

His arm flexed behind me, and my skin tingled from the contact. “Nowhere I’d rather be, little omega.”

He’d said the same thing earlier, and as my heart pounded in my chest, I wondered how he could utterly destroy me with a single sentence.

The strobe lights went wild, and I focused on what was about to happen, right as the scent of toasted marshmallow hit me. I turned to find Slade dropping into a chair in our row, not the one directly beside me, but the next one along.

In one of his hands was a giant plate of nachos and in the other a beer.

Slade was who Hunter had been texting about food.

Dragon delivery at our service.