“Good to know.” August shot me a rueful smile that dimmed the insistent pounding inside my belly.
Great. My stomach was now endowed with an emotional barometer that broadcast August’s mood. My gaze drifted to his stomach. He’d never once clutched it. Did my emotions not register the same way with him?
His smile waned, and his jaw hardened again. “Is there a way, besides death, to break this bond, Frank?”
“Yes.” Frank leaned back in his chair and shook his head like a teacher facing two petulant children.
“How?” I asked.
“You shouldn’t want to-”
“How?” August asked, voice firm.
“If mating bonds aren’t consummated-”
“Consummated?” I asked.
“The bond snaps into place through sexual relations.”
My cheeks lit up like brake lights. Oh…
“As I was saying, if they aren’t consummated by the next solstice, the bond disintegrates.”
Rolling the hem of my sky-blue camisole between my cold fingers, I said, “You’d just have to stay away for six months, August. You were planning on deploying for that long, right?”
Slow seconds passed before he answered, “Right.”
Frank’s features were scrunched in disapproval. “You’d be destroying something sacred.”
Pounding on the door made me jump.
“Frank?” Liam.
Oh, crap. I wanted Liam to come in as much as I wanted to share another meal with the vile hunter who’d killed my father, Aidan Michaels.
I pressed my clammy palms against the nape of my neck, trying to lower my body temperature.
August cocked an eyebrow, as though waiting for my approval to open the door.
I reasoned that Liam deserved to hear what was happening. And yet, I abhorred the thought of him finding out. I was afraid of what it would do to him… to us.
I finger-combed my hair so that it draped around my cheeks and nodded.
August stepped away from the door at the same time as it flew open. And then Liam was standing there, crowding the entire space, slashed, bloodied T-shirt flapping. Although the cut over his heart had sealed shut, the remnants of the pledging ceremony had left behind a razor-thin pale mark and reddish smears. Like Liam’s chest, my wrist had also sealed shut, yet the place I’d sliced still smarted.
He shut the door behind him with a bang. “I waited. I’m done waiting. What the hell’s going on?” he demanded, a brittleness to his tone.
I rubbed the thin streaks of dried blood on the inside of my wrist, careful not to skim the knit skin.
Silence.
The sound of it was so hostile that I almost explained everything, but the words kept jamming in my throat.
Slowly, Frank said, “I was explaining to August and Ness the dynamics of mating bonds.”
“Mating bonds?” Liam’s eyes flared. “Is that why-why they smelled like they’d-”
I cringed. “Please don’t say it. Please.”
“Like we what?” August asked.
Maybe I would leave. Race away from Boulder until I didn’t feel like I was about to die of embarrassment.
No one spoke for a long second. At least, not out loud. From the surprise rippling over August’s features, I suspected Liam had finished his sentence through the mind-link.
I couldn’t sit here any longer. “I need to go home,” I said, shooting up.
“Home?” Liam lifted one of his dark eyebrows.
Right. He expected me to go to his home. “To the inn.”
There was a tiny hitch in his breathing. This doesn’t change anything, Ness. His voice stroked my harried brain.
“Doesn’t it?” I whispered hoarsely.
Not to me.
Frank had gotten up too. He clapped a hand on Liam’s shoulder. “It’s not wise to get between mates.”
Liam shrugged off Frank’s hand. “With all due respect, Frank, it’s not wise to tell your Alpha what to do.”
Frank let his hand drop. “You’re right. I apologize.”
“Besides, we both know firsthand that mates don’t always end up together,” Liam added.
Did Frank have a mate? Or did Liam have one? No. If he’d had one, he would’ve known why August and I smelled like we’d… like we’d-Ugh. I couldn’t even think it without growing embarrassed.
“When do you deploy, August?” Liam asked.
A vein throbbed in August’s neck. Even though his expression didn’t betray his annoyance, I felt the insistent pop-pop of it deep in my belly. I didn’t understand the reason for it since the choice to leave was his. Liam wasn’t chasing him away.
“In the morning.” August’s gaze hadn’t moved off my overheated face.
“If you’re going back to the inn, Ness,” Frank said, “can you take Jeb with you? Eric got him here, but he needs to hang around a while longer.”
“I don’t have a car… ” Or a license. First thing tomorrow, I’d stop by the DMV.
“I’ll give you and Jeb a lift. Let me say goodnight to everyone,” Liam said.