Page 44 of Change

But it didn’t mean that I was happy about it either.

“What does it mean for the whole mate thing?” she asked, her ashen expression lifting to meet mine. “It doesn’t matter anyway, I guess,” she continued, not giving me a chance to respond. “Dr. Kohler said I can’t have children—”

“That’s not what she said.” I didn’t like where this was going. She was giving up any hope at all. “You’re just latching on to that because you don’t want to consider the alternative.”

She sucked in a sharp breath, the bare skin of her throat briefly capturing my attention. But her words brought the conversation backto the present. “But Ican’tget that physical.”

“There are a lot of things you keep saying youcan’tdo,” I pointed out, lowering my glass back to the table. Hadn’t she ever considered that she’d been the one creating her own limitations? “Stop focusing on that. Whatcanyou do?”

She blinked at me. “What do you mean?”

“You agreed to see Trinity today,” I pointed out. “That was something you could do. You’re still running away from Do Yun, for whatever reason, instead of going to therapy. That’s something else you’re choosing to do.”

Her cheeks turned dark. “I am not—”

“You sit in my lap,” I continued, ignoring her dark glare. Distracting her with anger first seemed to work best when trying to get a point across. “You’ve let me hug you, but are you comfortable with that?”

Bianca peered at me through her lashes, face red. “I keep having this conversation.”

“Not withme,” I emphasized. “Although the four of us play by the same rules, we are not interchangeable. You’re mymate, and quite frankly, I don’t care about the others. You’ll have your own relationship with them. I want to discussus.”

She averted her eyes. “Okay…”

I reached across the table, grabbing her hand and lacing my fingers through hers. She looked at me, mouth slightly open as her cheeks flushed. “I need to touch you sometimes.” I inclined my head toward our entwined fingers. “Nothing sexual. But I need to be able to feel you, to make sure you’re okay. Is that all right with you?”

She nodded.

“I don’t know what side-effects we’re going to have from this mate bond,” I warned her, “since this has never happened before.”

“Okay…” she began, biting her lip as she tilted her head curiously. “What do you mean?”

Here we go—the moment I’d been dreading.

“Mates share a physical and mental connection, or more in some species,” I explained. My knee started to bounce nervously, and I hoped she didn’t notice.

I had to look confident—for her.

“So, like my connection with Julian and Miles?” she asked.

A surge of jealousy made my vision flare, and a bitter taste touched the back of my throat. “Can we not talk about anyone else right now?” I begged, my thoughts clouding.

More than anything else in the world, I did not like to share.

“Okay,” Bianca said again, her green-flecked eyes moving over my face. “So what—”

“I can hear your thoughts,” I blurted out.

She stopped breathing, her fingers tightened over mine. A long moment passed, the chatting of the other patrons sounding far in the distance, before she finally sucked in a long, shaky breath.

“Like, if we officially become mates?” Her voice was tentatively cautious, and she leaned forward, placing her elbows on the table. “You can hear my thoughts then?”

If.

I shook my head, banishing the thought from my mind. This wasn’t the time to focus on that. There was too much else going on.

“No.” Despite the growing knot in my stomach, my chest began to feel a little bit lighter. I hated lying more than anything else in the world, and secrets should never exist between the two of us. “Now. When I’m in my dragon form.”

She recoiled, but I didn’t let her go, and her brows drew together as the beginnings of a quiet anger began to stir in her eyes. “Sincewhen?”