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“Does this make you angry?” he asks, and the earnestness in his eyes tells me he’s just trying to make this mating work. So, I answer him with a short shake of my head. His attention moves back down to Simone. “You are not as angry a male as you would like us to all think you are. I have yet to see you break anything, and I was warned by Simone’s friends and by my brother that you were prone to throwing things.”

I snort and pull my hand back to my lap. I let myself fall back onto my back at the foot of the bed, my head resting on Rallan’s shin and my eyes watching the ceiling. “I haven’t thrown anything since Simone’s been back in the tribe.”

“But you have thrown things?” Rallan asks as though he’s curious about me and not like he’s judging me for having very real, very problematic anger issues that I need to get under control.

“I have.”

I don’t like telling others about my shortcomings. In the collective mind, any weakness can be exploited by others, and my inclinations toward violence when things don’t go my way can be used to exile me. Not that I’d mind being exiled.

I’ve thought about throwing a big enough fit back on Earth just to get my mind separated from the others so I can join Simone. The only reason I don’t is because I know there are so many humans on Earth who could thrive on this planet.

“I think I would like to see this,” Rallan says, the hint of curiosity turning into full-blown amusement. “I think it would be entertaining to watch you destroy things. Do you do it with the weird glowing things?”

“They’re my body.” I frown harder and glance at him out of the corner of my eyes. “I’m made up of energy that I contort into this shape. So, I guess, yeah, I break stuff with my glowing things.”

“Yes, I would like to see it,” Rallan says with a nod like me telling him it’s my body doesn’t phase him in the least. I’m about to tell him that I don’t want him or Simone to see me like that when he continues. “When you transformed at the river, it was very interesting. I knew it was you somehow as the energy skated across the top of the river, but when I threw Simone, I was mostly hoping you could reform in time.”

“Didn’t you make her tell you how much she trusts you over and over again before you did that to her?” I ask, cocking one of my brows at him.

“You told me you would not be listening,” Rallan counters, which is a fair point. I can hear and see way better than the humans or demons, but I did promise Rallan I’d allow him to woo Simone on his own out in the river.

“It’s hard when I knew she was out there being touched by you,” I say as a defense. “I needed to know she was enjoying herself. It made it easier to stay on the shore.”

“Not easy enough,” Rallan says.

“Yeah, yeah, well, you pulled her out of the water with everything on display. Was I supposed just to stand there and let you taunt me like that?”

“I was curious how long you would last.” Rallan shrugs, and it’s then that I realize he had no interest in keeping me on the shore today. He wanted to test me to see how far he could push me before I came for Simone. Now, I just need to know why.

“You knew I would come for her?”

Rallan scoffs like I’ve said something stupid. There’s a brief pause where he realizes that I’m serious in asking, and then he clears his throat. “If there is one thing I have learned from the males in my tribe, it is that you do not deny one partner access to the shared mate. Males have fought over much less, and I wanted to see if you were similar to my species in that way.”

“I didn’t fight you, though.”

“No, you protected our mate,” Rallan says. “You might not have protected her when she was left on this planet, but I do not think that you will not protect her with every part of your being. If you had known, I am certain you would have kept her safe from all the woes of this planet. Instead, you did not know, and I was blessed to find her. Now, we can protect her together.”

“That doesn’t explain why you came up with this elaborate plan of bringing her to the river to see if I could handle you touching her.”

“You think it is all about you,” Rallan wiggles lower in the bed until he’s on his back. This is his universal cue that tells me that this conversation will be over soon because as soon as he’s done wanting to talk, he’ll pretend to be asleep until he actually falls asleep. “Maybe you should think about everything I got out of today. I felt my mate’s lips on mine, watched her break apart on her other mate, and then got to grope her while she was soaking wet. Today was a wonderful day for me. I got everything I wanted out of it.”

I blink a few times, unsure if Rallan is being serious right now. We planned the trip to the river three days ago. There’s no way he’s been thinking of ways to undermine the plan to change it just enough to get what he wanted. There’s no way.

“Are you serious?” I ask, scowling when I see Rallan close his eyes and squeeze them tight. It’s ridiculous because I can tell he’s forcing them together to pretend to be sleeping. “Rallan, are you seriously telling me we made up a plan together, and thewhole time, you were scheming ways to change it just enough so you could kiss her?”

I don’t get a response. Of course, I don’t get a response. I’m left to debate on my own whether or not Simone chose a second mate clever enough to pull something like that off. I think about it for so long that before I know it, Rallan’s breathing has deepened, and he’s fast asleep with his arms locked around Simone.

I shake my head at the thought of him being clever enough to pull today off and then stop thinking about it. Whether or not he actually planned this, he did get everything he wanted, just like he said.

I stand in the doorway, watching them sleep for a few more minutes. When I’ve had enough, for now, I pat the doorframe twice and head back out into the tribe.

I don’t need sleep to recharge my body in the same way that Rallan and Simone do. Sure, I need to recharge once every few days, but it’s more of just cycling through my own energy. It takes a few minutes at most and then I’m fine to continue as normal.

My plans for the night consist of doing rounds around the tribe to make sure nothing feels amiss. When I finish doing that, I work on the houses we’re fixing up for the first round of humans and the males who have come to help.

When I get bored, I’ll go stand in the doorway of Simone and Rallan’s room and watch them sleep. Really, I don’t get nearly as much done at night as I do during the day, but watching them sleep calms me in a way I never knew I needed.

So, when I’ve only been working for an hour before I find myself standing in the doorway, counting their rhythmic breaths, I’m not surprised. I wouldn’t be surprised if one day I find myself standing here all night just watching them.