Chapter 15.

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"I'm impressed," I said seeing Richard and Ashton sitting at the kitchen island as I took a seat.

"Impressed about what?" My beta asked confused.

"The fact that no one died yesterday." I laughed as he threw a dishcloth at me and caught it before placing it back on the table, "Seriously, you two seem to be able to run things well together."

"Which is more than we can say for you two, isn't it?" Richard smirked.

"We get on just fine, thank you." I rolled my eyes as I heard Karabo snort from the entranceway before he leaned against me from behind as his arms rested on my shoulders, his hands securing against my chest. I smiled feeling him kiss my temple. "When not considering pack stuff." I shrugged and turned my head to kiss him. It was supposed to be just a quick peck but after the initial contact, we both just leaned back into each other for another, longer kiss.

"Would you two like us to leave you in private or shall we record you eating each other's faces?" Richard asked.

"Well, since you suggested it and I doubt either of us mind," I laughed as he flipped me off before the pair of them joined in.

"See you later, some of us have work to do." Ashton said. The betas were still running things on their own.

Karabo chuckled as he sat down beside me after the pair had walked out and he sighed.

"I've never had this much free time." He chuckled, "What do you want to do?"

"Give me a tour, Karabo." Every time I had gone touring with my friends, I had not paid much attention to the sights.

"A tour... mmm. Alight." he grinned.

Karabo took the request quite literally and gave me a very personal tour. I ended up learning much more about him than the city, like where he went to school; like me, he had attended a human school, where he hung out most of the time growing up, which places he avoided because he resented the vibe, which places he avoided because his mom would kill him if she found out he stepped foot there. It was a lot of fun because each place came with its own story and I began to understand him more. Even growing up as an Alpha, he had hated hunting, he just generally hated hurting or killing anything. That was sweet.

"Oh, here." He stopped the car in front of a hotel.

"Let me guess, the first place you got laid?" I faked a huge grin pretending to be very excited.

"Yes." He replied with a nervous smile. My own smile fell.

"Seriously?"

"No." He smirked. I rolled my eyes as he began laughing. "It's actually... uh... first kiss."

"At a hotel? How old were you?" I asked

"Thirteen. 7th grade. Our grade went to a theme park before coming here to get some lunch on our way back home. My friends and I snuck up to the roof and I ended up alone with this guy."

"Guy?"

"Yeah. Richard's cousin, I had a huge crush on him at the time." I knew it was stupid to be jealous of someone Karabo liked when he was thirteen but I resented Richard's cousin instantly and hoped we never met or I would not be able to hide the petty disdain I suddenly had for the guy. "What about you? First kiss?" I felt my face heat and quickly got out of the car. The sound of the other door opening made it evident he immediately followed me before he leaned on the top of the car to look over at me, his chin resting on his crossed arms. "Is it juicy?" he asked excitedly.

"'Juicy', Karabo?" I grimaced. He stared at me, his face unchanging and his brown eyes still sparkling with excitement. I chuckled, "No, it's actually quite nauseating." I said turning to walk into the hotel. I grabbed his hand as he ran up beside me and kept the smile plastered on my face despite feeling my chest tighten.

"Tell me," he said.

"Mmm... I've always looked at relationships as huge unnecessary distractions, so my first kiss was somewhat by... force when I was fifteen." I frowned at the thought.

"Force?" He asked.

"Maybe peer pressure," I chuckled, "I was at my friend's sixteenth birthday party and a group of us began playing spin the bottle. Everyone wanted me to 'loosen up' so after constant pestering, I joined in. Of course I cheated, since I've always been so good at using magic I made sure the bottle never landed on me. Ash noticed and began doing things to distract me and when I spun, I ended up caught in watching Ashton demonstrate to everyone how he could almost do the splits – it was incredibly funny but I forgot to push the bottle and it landed on..." I drifted.

"On?" Karabo asked, his brows raised in anticipation.

"Ben," I mumbled under my breath.

"Ben?!" He exclaimed causing some people in the lobby to turn to look at us. I gave the people around us a crooked, apologetic smile and covered Karabo's mouth muffling his "Ben was your first kiss?!" shout.

"Yes. Now be quiet about it. We all agreed never to mention it again and neither should you, pretend I never mentioned it," I said while entering the elevator. "Or I'll compel you like I did the rest of our friends." I never compelled Ben and the others unless I was desperate and ready to have them be angry at me for a few months. Months were not an exaggeration.

"You can't compel me, I'm your mate..." Right, that and he was probably too strong being an Alpha, "I wish I could compel." He added in a disappointed mumble and I laughed.

We rode the elevator up to the third floor from the top of the building before taking the stairs up to the roof, ducking behind walls whenever we saw someone who worked there until we stepped outside.

"Not bad." I shrugged seeing a great view of the city surrounding the hotel building. His first kiss was a lot classier than mine.

He laughed as he ran up to the ledge and I watched him lean onto it feeling somewhat concerned about the amount of energy he had while being so high up before running my eyes over the rest of the roof. There was a garden on the far side of the roof and I was certain some of the staff spent their breaks up there because it looked so peaceful.

"Eli, look over here. I forgot how high up this is. Don't you think it's really high?" My eyes were drawn back to my mate who was now leaning onto the ledge so much that he was on his tippy toes as he stared down towards the street.

"Karabo –" I began calling for him to be careful but felt my heart stop as he slipped with a surprised cry and disappeared over the edge of the wall. My feet moved before my mind even contemplated what I was going to do and I sprinted over to him faster than I had ever moved in my life. I froze in surprise when I had jumped onto the ledge only to find Karabo laying safely on another section of the roof while grinning back up at me. "You're a fucking asshole." I hissed trying to hide how much he had just scared me as I hopped off the ledge onto his side of the roof. My heart was pounding in my chest and if I didn't know how to control them so well, my hands would have been shaking.

"You don't look too upset," he frowned.

"You would have survived," I shrugged nonchalantly. I smirked seeing how upset he was that he had not shaken me, at least he thought he had not. He was obviously still trying to get back at me for the water incident.

"Do you feel anything?" he mumbled sitting up.

"What?" I asked confused.

"Nothing," he said pushing himself off the ground and jumping onto the wall. I climbed up beside him and chuckled kissing his cheek, it didn't change his mood.

"I feel a lot," I mumbled into his ear. He looked at me questioningly and I smiled. "I came up here to kiss you," I said.

He chuckled. "I would rather you didn't," he replied.

"Really? Fine. I'll just go find a random person downstairs –" I began to climb off the wall but stopped as he grabbed the front of my shirt.

"I know I've said I don't like violence, but I will kill you, Eli." He said seriously. I laughed as his serious face broke into a smile. "Fine. But it's your fault if I compare this to my kiss with Jared. Jared was a really good –" I cut him off leaning into him quickly.

His lips tilting into a smirk against mine made me squeeze his waist gently causing him to pull back as he laughed but I quickly followed the movement to kiss him again. As he purposely tried to block furthering the kiss by biting his lip shut, I chuckled despite feeling a tight, nagging feeling in the pit of my stomach. He laughed when I gave a groan at his withholding and I took the moment to enter his mouth while his hand reached for my neck to pull me closer. I couldn't focus much on the moment with him as my focus strayed to the fact that it was going to be one of our last together, at least for now. Instead of just enjoying our time together, I was trying to memorize the taste and feel of his kiss, how his fingertips felt against my skin and even though I needed air, I didn't want to move away from him until I absolutely had to. When we finally broke apart we were both out of breath and I felt his breath brush my face as he gave an almost nervous chuckle.

"That-that was... Is something wrong?" he asked softly.

"Of course not." I smiled pecking his lips gently.

"Alright," he grinned.

"Can we go back to that mountain?"

"The one we saw the lights from? Sure." I gave him another smile before turning to look at the city around us. "Just so you know, Jared doesn't measure up." He mumbled.

"Well, obviously." I laughed as he shoved me and then burst out laughing as I slipped off the wall before I went to push him off as well.

-----

"My brother called," I said staring up at the stars. Karabo was lying beside me on the grass. After spending a few more hours in the city, we had raced up the mountain before settling into comfortable positions on the grass talking about random things while watching the sky darken and lights turn on in the city below. Tamia was fascinated by the galaxy and stars so I had picked up quite a few names listening to her point things out every time she could when our family went out at night. Karabo brought up a game where we would listen for animals in the forest and I would have to guess what was making a particular sound. There was a lot more diverse wildlife around his pack than back home and most of my incorrect answers got him laughing before he explained what the sounds actually were from.

"Danté?" He asked.

"Yes, um... My Dad...seems to be sick."

"Sick? Is he human?" Karabo asked. I shook my head.

"No, and he's not the only one... I have to figure out what's going on." I said. We lapsed into silence and the only noise around us for a few minutes was the distant splashing from the river, occasional hooting from owls, and the sound of the wind blowing against the leaves.

"You... have to go." He nodded slowly.

"Yes. We're leaving tomorrow." I said.

I waited for Karabo's reply but he didn't speak so eventually I sat up and looked at him. His eyes moved from the sky to me.

"What do you want me to say, Eli?" he asked. I really didn't know. He sat up and hugged his knees looking over the green spread out in front of us, "I could say don't go... but we both know that won't happen... How could I ask that? Your dad's sick..." He sighed, "I could try to convince you to move your pack here, but how could I expect you to do that if I would not? I spoke to some of the elders, Eli. If we have a vote, they would win, and why not? Moving either of our packs would only be in our own interest, but we know we have so many other people to think about. We can't uproot our packs and move them overseas; it's just not fair to anyone but us." I nodded slowly biting my lip.

"Right... Even if we did merge, who would be Alpha?" I muttered.

"You?" he asked. If anyone wanted to lead a pack, they would have to fight that pack's Alpha. Usually to death. Was he suggesting that he thought I would win in a fight between us? I thought hearing something like that from him would make me feel triumphant and I'd tease him about it but at the moment I just felt deflated, my stomach twisted and chest slightly tight with anxiety that came at the thought that soon I would be oceans away from him.

"I would never fight you," I said. He gave a sad smile.

"I wouldn't fight you either..."

We went silent and I watched his face, he still had not moved his eyes from the forest but they were a little glossed.

"I'll miss you," I whispered.

He looked at me and I felt my heart break seeing the hurt and fear in his eyes. He really was terrible at hiding his emotions...

"Please stay," I was shocked when he spoke. "I know it's impossible, but I... I'm just hoping..." he whispered. I stared at him blankly before drawing him into a tight hug that somehow instantly made me feel so much better and so much worse at the same time. "I'll miss you," he mumbled.

I shut my eyes to force my tears back before pulling away from him and smiling.

"You're a terrible Alpha." I teased.

"Coming from an Alpha like you that means nothing," he replied. We chuckled. I watched him as he lifted his hand to my face and smiled as the warmth cupped my cheek while his eyes narrowed at me, "Good luck, you impulsive idiot." I laughed and he chuckled moving to kiss me. As I leaned into him, I found myself once again trying to memorize everything in the moment; what he felt like, what he tasted like the shape of his face, his scent.

It was interesting that there was no immediate hunger that usually was supposed to come with being near my mate, I did not want to have all of him because I knew experiencing that would just make everything worse. Marking him would just make leaving so much more painful. Even my wolf just felt dormant and dismal.

We broke apart and I chuckled as I hugged him, trying to lighten up the atmosphere a little bit. I stared at the trees behind him feeling him press his face into my neck as he held me back causing me to hold him even tighter. We were already pressed together but I felt like I was so far away from him already and it terrified me. I shut my eyes patting his back lightly before letting him go, afraid that I would not be able to do so if I held him any longer.

I grinned at him and watched him smile, but as always with Karabo, it was so easy to see through. His eyes clearly showed his hurt and fear. I smiled lifting my hand to his cheek.

"I would say we should visit but I don't want to get either of our hopes up." Something would undoubtedly come up.

"We should get some sleep." He nodded.

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