Chapter 4 : She'll Never be My Mate

Tristan

I normally didn’t lock my office door, but I really didn’t want anyone bothering me right now. I was uncharacteristically flustered, and I wouldn’t allow my students or coworkers to see me in this state. Once Lillian left, I moved quickly from the classroom to my office.

I let out a long suffering sigh and shook my head. I dropped my bag onto my desk and collapsed into my chair. I had tried so hard to keep my composure during the lecture—even more, my authority. But I could feel it crumbling under her gaze. Her wide-eyed gaze…

What the hell just happened?

I leaned back and glared up at the ceiling. I must have angered the goddess in some way for her to do this to me now. I couldn’t think of anything specific I had done, but there was no other explanation for the painful tension in my chest.

I had found my mate, and it was...my student.

Astrid Fleisher.

The last time I had seen her, she was a stick thin and freckle faced kid. I never imagined her growing up to be so beautiful. I didn’t even recognize her when she ran into me in the hallway. She was as clumsy as ever. I guess some things never changed.

I closed my eyes as the memory of her body pressing into mine came to the surface. I forced it away. I can’t do this. There were so many reasons why I couldn’t think about her that way.

A knock on my office door drew me out of my thoughts. I wanted to ignore it, but I could tell by the weight and insistence of the knock that it wasn’t a student.

I groaned and went to open the door. As I suspected, it was Gregor. My co-worker and the closest thing that I had to a friend at the university, Gregor often came to my office when we were both between classes.

I pushed the door open and went back to my desk without a word.

“Is it true?” he asked.

“Is what true?” I replied.

“Is Astrid Fleisher taking classes here?”

“That got around fast,” I muttered.

“Shit,” he said as he plopped into the chair across from my desk. “I didn’t think my class list was right—I mean, no one’s heard from her, in what? Se—”

“Seventeen years,” I finished for him almost automatically. When his brown eyes shot to mine with slight suspicion, I cleared my throat. “It’s not a big deal,” I assured him. “She’s just another student and should be treated like one.”

Gregor let out a huff. He ran a hand through his light brown hair, and it was then that I noticed the little gray flecks coming through it.

Gregor was a few years older than me, making him around 17 when she left. He was just old enough at the time to not know what was really happening to her with the other pups—what really made her shrink away into herself.

It’s part of the reason why I felt compelled to help her; to prevent someone else from feeling like they had no one. That they were alone.

“Why do you think she left?” Gregor asked, his voice breaking through the silence.

I turned my attention to him. It was a good question, and one that no one knew the real answer to. The Alpha never gave anyone a reason, and anytime it was brought up, he’d immediately shut it down. Eventually, the questions died out. But the rumors didn’t.

“I heard all kinds of crazy rumors over the years,” Gregor continued, as if he were reading my mind. He was staring at his phone, scrolling through something as he spoke. “People said that she was dead. That she was killed by an enemy spy from another pack, or that she had been in some kind of accident. Others said that she was sent away—that she had no wolf because of her human blood. But none of those explanations ever made sense to me, though.”

“Well, they were clearly wrong. All of them,” I replied.

“She must have returned because of what happened with the Luna,” Gregor stated.

I could hear the solemn in his voice at the mention of her, and I felt a pang in my chest.

The Luna’s sickness was a mystery to us. Much like Astrid’s disappearance, the Alpha never gave the pack a straight answer about what happened. We knew that the Luna had been sick for a while and that the healers were frequenting the packhouse.

Then, it was announced that she had passed away. We were all shocked and saddened by her loss. Despite being a human, the Luna did a great deal for the pack. I wasn’t sure that we would recover from her loss.

A lot of people started talking about Astrid after her death. They wondered if she would come back for her mother’s funeral. She didn’t, but she was back now. Maybe Gregor was right.

“Whatever the reason, she seems to be taking her classes seriously,” he continued, shoving his phone in his pocket as he got up from his seat. “I just checked her schedule. She’s taking on a more than full course load this semester. Most people would never take on that amount of work voluntarily. I can’t imagine she’ll leave without finishing the semester.”

I had to agree with him. She seemed to care a lot about school. My heart fluttered at the thought of getting to see her more—spend more time with her. I cursed under my breath, ordering my wolf to get itself in check.

But I couldn’t deny the sensation the thought of our earlier run-in caused in me. When she hit me, all I could think was that I had to keep her from falling. As my arm wrapped around her, I felt the curvature of her body; how perfect it was…

And the way she froze in embarrassment and just sat on my waist staring at me was as endearing as it was irritating. I can’t believe I didn’t recognize her at first. Maybe I’d been too distracted—I was running late. We both were.

But when I did notice her, boy, did I ever.

Her hair had been white-blonde when we were kids, but it had warmed to a golden hue. Her scrawny frame had filled out nicely, and her face had changed from that of an awkward girl to a pretty woman.

She was beautiful—stunning really. And she was my student. This was going to be such a problem.

“Her name was a late addition to the roster. It wasn’t on my original printed copy,” Gregor said.

I stared at him for a second. I was so distracted by my thoughts that I didn’t realize he was still talking. I really needed to keep my wolf under control.

“Maybe the university wanted to hide her attendance or she pulled some strings to sign up after admissions closed,” I suggested.

She hadn’t been on my roster until today, either. I thought that seeing her name there was a joke until I started to read it out loud. The moment her name left my lips, I realized that she was the woman I had run into just a few minutes before.

I also realized that the uncomfortable feeling that had been bothering me all morning had grown exponentially. When my eyes met hers, I knew what it was. The pull.

“I guess that’s above our pay grade,” he said with a lopsided smile. “Are you coming to the department meeting tonight?”

“I’ll be there,” I replied dismissively. “I always am.”

“Yeah,” he laughed. “Okay, I’ll see you then. I have some work to do before my next class.”

I nodded and waved to him as he left. He closed the door behind him.

I groaned and let my head fall to the desk. I’d worked so hard to advance my career to this point. Nothing mattered to me as much as my work and my reputation. I was on the verge of a promotion to head of my department. If word got out that my mate was one of my students, the scandal would ruin me.

Everything that I’d worked for would be taken from me. And I wouldn’t let that happen. I couldn’t.

There was a time when finding my mate was the only thing that mattered to me, but that time had passed. Maybe if Astrid hadn’t left the pack and we’d grown up together…

No. There was no use focusing on hypotheticals. Astrid hadn’t been around and I hadn’t found my mate. I had given up hope eventually, and put all of my energy into my work. Now, I was a well respected professor at the largest university in the kingdom. I had a sterling reputation. My coworkers and superiors respected me.

I worked hard for the life I had. I had to. I only had myself to rely on, and while it made me cold, it also made me stronger.

I wasn’t the most popular guy, but for my career, I’d learned to be approachable. Academics is a lot like politics. You have to know how to put people at ease and make them like you, otherwise they won’t give you a chance. It doesn’t matter how qualified you are if you come across as a jackass.

It took me a long time to figure that out.

Astrid couldn’t derail my career. No one could. No matter how painfully strong the feeling in my chest was, I wouldn’t give in to it.

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. The feeling was so intense it was impossible to ignore. But, surely it would grow weaker with time. I would get used to it, I would have to.

Eventually, it would be easy to ignore. That’s what I would have to do, ignore it.

I wouldn’t let Astrid or anyone else make me lose sight of my goals. The pull wasn’t going to make me sacrifice the life I’ve worked so hard to make for myself.

Astrid might be fated to be mine, but she would never be my mate.