Free Shadowing the Teacher (Perfect Pairs Book 3) by Tamsin Baker

on me the whole time? Or just now?”
    Her? She’d barely looked at another guy when they’d been going out.
    “I have to go, Bill.”
    Tears slipped down her cheeks, and she wiped them away.
    “You owe me a real explanation, Sam. We’ve been together for over a year, and now you’re telling me that it was all just a waste of time?”
    “No, of course it wasn’t. We had a great time together, but…”
    “Yeah, so great you want to end it. What the fuck’s really going on, Sam?”
    A sob rose, and she sniffed as her nose began to run. She took a breath and said the last sentence she could manage. “I have to go, Bill. Goodbye.”
    She hung up amidst noises of anger from him. She didn’t want to listen anymore.
    Her knees shook, and she fell back into a large armchair, crying out as the pain thumped her in the chest. She’d known Bill wasn’t perfect, nowhere near it. He wasn’t even “perfect for her”, as she’d always hoped she’d find in some other imperfect person. But it still stung that he’d been so mean to her when she’d done nothing wrong … or had she? She gulped and reached for a tissue, wiping away the tears on her cheeks and blowing her nose.
    She had done something wrong, and she had to live with that.
    She believed in karma, so she hoped these two men, this Perfect Pair, were her karma. For being a good person in the past, and they weren’t just another tool for punishing her for not being quite good enough.
     

Chapter Eight
     
    Reid paced the sidewalk, his feet making a screeching sound every time he made an abrupt turn on the concrete. He swiveled again, and the noise made him flinch, the hairs on his spine sticking up in protest.
    “Would you just relax, please?” Kane asked him as he stepped out of the motel, his psychologist voice in full flight.
    Reid clenched his jaw, grinding his teeth together in an audible way.
    “I. Don't. Want. This.”
    He couldn't begin to articulate how he was feeling. Hot depths of anger and frustration with excitement and fear thrown in. He didn’t want to feel like this, and hadn’t felt anything like it in so long his head was spinning with the sensations. It was a sickening combination that made his heart pound and his jaw clench tight together.
    “You are going to give Sam a chance, Reid. We talked about this last night.”
    Reid glared at his brother as Kane made his way around the car and climbed in the driver’s side as though he owned the world. How could his brother feel so confident?
    “True, but that doesn’t mean I like it.” They had talked about it, but that didn't mean Reid liked what his brother was making him do, nor did he agree with his twin’s assessment of the situation. He didn’t want to talk to Sam, nor did he want to get to know her.
    “I still can’t believe you called me on a promise I made you a decade ago.”
    Kane chuckled. “You owe me a life, Reid. I’m your brother, and I think that should be enough, but since you are being so bloody stubborn, I’m calling in my favor. Do this for me. I need it. Help me.”
    Reid glanced away, uncomfortable with his brother’s begging. A long time ago Kane had saved his life, literally. He’d had a bad car accident driving home from football one night and sliced open his femoral artery. Despite his strong healing shifter genes, he’d been bleeding out before his own eyes.
    Kane had sensed his pain, found him, and gotten him to the hospital in the nick of time. He owed his brother, big time. But that didn’t mean he was going to just take on a new wife for his brother’s sake. There was no bloody way.
    But he’d speak to her, give Kane the chance to find out for sure.
    “All right. I’ll behave. Although I don’t know why you need me. You could talk to her alone.”
    Yeah right. As if a Perfect Pair would be any good on their own.
    Reid heaved a huge sigh. If Kane was right and they’d been wrong in thinking Amanda was their true mate, it would be like finding