Free Wolf Unbound: Aspen Valley Wolf Pack by Amber Ella Monroe Page A

being with this person. The fucked up part about it is that true mates are also hard to find. There’s no guarantee that we’ll ever find one in our lifetime. Maybe one in fifty of us ever find our true mates.”
    “Wow. So what happens if you don’t find your true mate?”
    “We go on with our lives. You can be with someone even if they aren’t your true mate and you can also love them just as fiercely.”
    “Like Melisandra and my dad.” Her gaze dropped to the table. “When I first met her I was skeptical about her intentions. She spent so much time with my dad while he was supposed to be grieving our mother, but she also helped him get through a tough time.”
    “We all need someone like that in our lives,” he said, meeting her gaze.
    “Yes, we do.”
    “We should get back on the road. A driver will meet us near the county line. He’ll take you to see Johnston, the family lawyer. I’ll stay here and follow the lead you gave me about Simon. You can stay at my lodge in Aspen Valley while you get things straightened out. I don’t think you should return to Cross City until everything is settled. I mean, really settled.”
    “You’re right,” she said. “I don’t want to be in the same city with Simon anymore. The sooner he’s gone, the sooner I can revamp the tavern.”

Chapter Eleven
    A utumn had been scared as heck the first time her dad had taken her riding on his motorcycle. At the time, she was barely a preteen. In his lifetime, he’d had a total of three riding accidents that put him in the hospital and gave everyone a good scare. Well, everyone except for him. Despite the incidents, he rode the motorcycle to work nearly every day. To this day, she was still cautious about bikes—and the bad boys who rode them. While riding with Garrett, her arms wrapped around his waist and her chest pressed against his back, she felt secure. But she hadn't let her guards down completely. She still worried about whether she'd truly be free and clear of Simon and that stupid arranged mating deal. Every day there was a setback, but as soon as she thought she was doomed to give a year of her life to Simon, something happened in her favor that gave her more time to fight the issue. She knew her luck was running out, but she was never the type of woman to give up easily.
    Simon had already demonstrated that he was far more dangerous than she had first realized. His threats and hurried attempts to mate on his terms, only proved that she'd have to take extra precautions. Especially if getting the tavern back meant living in the same town with him. Maybe luck was on her side yet again with Garrett’s new plan. Or maybe not.
    She sighed and evaporation fogged the helmet visor.
    Garrett turned his head slightly. "You okay?" he asked, projecting his voice above the furious flow of the wind.
    She nodded.
    "We're almost there."
    She was ready to meet his lawyer, but she wasn't ready to leave Garrett. Not just yet. They had only just met and she wanted to learn more about him and about his life as a wolf shifter. If all that he said was true about his intentions to remain a bachelor because of his profession, she wasn't sure how receptive he'd be to the idea of ever seeing her again. He'd said it himself—he never stuck around long enough for any long-term relationship to develop.
    They rode another fifteen minutes before she began to recognize her surroundings. The lake they were approaching flowed between three neighboring counties. When she was younger, her family used to come out here almost monthly to go fishing or swimming. That was before times got rough, before mom died in that car accident, and before things went south with the tavern.
    Garrett slowed down a bit and snatched off his helmet. He turned off of the main highway down a long-winding road and looked off into the distance.
    “There,” he said, lifting a chin in the direction of a white sedan parked near the side of the road. “Our driver is