Page 10 of Burdened Bonds

Renzo swings his legs. “Nah, I don’t think he is.”

I shake my head, tears bubbling in my eyes. “No, you don’t understand. I saw … I saw him get hit.” A sob tears from my throat. “By a bolt meant for me.”

“Little rabbit,” Renzo says, more firmly this time. “He ain’t dead.”

Pip squeaks his agreement, trotting over to me and climbing into my lap, licking at my face.

“Not cool, little man,” Renzo says with disdain, “I’ve seen where that tongue’s been.” I hear the man stand, the bed creaking, and then his feet on the worn carpet as he stalks towards me. He crouches by my side and slides a forefinger under my wet chin, lifting my face to his.

“He isn’t dead. I think he was very, nearly, pretty dead,” I sniffle, “and that’s why you’ve been so damn ill. But you’re back with us now, so he must be safe.”

“What?” I say, his eyes – one brown like bark, one green like the grass – swimming through my tears. The man is insane. It’s what I’ve been told. It’s what I’ve witnessed. And his words make no sense to me. Tristan nearly died and that made me ill?

“I think,” he says, slowly, like he’s explaining something to a confused child, “Tristan boy got hurt, very badly hurt, and it sent you, his fated mate, into a malaise. One you’d still be lost in if he were still ill, if he were dead. But seeing how you’re making a lot more sense to me, and to little man, than you were an hour ago, I’m assuming, he’s out of danger or healed or something.” He shrugs.

“We’re not fated mates,” I say automatically.

“Yeah, you are,” he says, pinching my chin. I swipe the back of my hand over my face, wiping away all the salty tears. His words have calmed me and I wonder if there are any truth in them.

“We’re not bonded,” I tell him and the corner of his mouth twitches as he notices I’m not denying the fated mate part anymore. “We never sealed the–”

“Bond? Yeah, I think you did.” He quirks an eyebrow. “If you’re worried that I’m going to be jealous about you fucking other–”

“I’m not sleeping with Tristan Kennedy!” I snap. “And why would I care what you thought?”

“I don’t get jealous.” He peers into my eyes. “It’s not something you need to worry about.”

“I haven’t slept with Tristan Kennedy!” I repeat, louder and with more force this time. We’ve kissed once – for about precisely ten seconds – and he fingered me once in that moment of madness in the classroom. Neither of those were enough to seal a fated mate bond. The assassin might have guessed right about the fated mates part but he’s wrong about this.

“Huh,” Renzo says, rocking back on his heels. “You must have done it some other way, then?”

“What?” I say, my cheeks heating. If he means the fingering … He can’t read my thoughts like Stone, can he?

“You must have sealed the bond through some other means.”

Really? Is he right?

I concentrate in on the sensations deep inside my gut, where my bonds lie. It doesn’t feel like it did before. There were two bonds, strong, connected, vibrant. And now, now there are three…

But if that were true – if we had somehow sealed the bond – wouldn’t I be in agony right now, the way I was with Azlan whenever he first left the room. And sure, my stomach hurts a bit, but not like that.

“If we were newly bonded mates, I’d be writhing around in agony right now due to our separation.”

“You were,” he says, “I made you a potion for the pain.”

I shake my head. “There’s only one way to remove that kind of pain and it involves …” I trail off, my cheeks sizzling.

“Fucking? Ha!” Barone says. “Is that what the enforcer told you? He’s more deviant than I gave him credit for.”

“He didn’t … it’s just something I know.”

He shrugs. “I made a potion. It made the pain go away.”

I peer down at my stomach again, even more confused than when I first woke up three minutes ago. I’m in my old house. I have no idea how we got here and no idea where everyone else is. I reach for my mates through the three bonds, trying to find them, trying to connect with them, but the distance is too far, the bond too strained, stretched thin.

I huff in annoyance and rub at my stomach.

The man crouching opposite me watches the movements of my hand.