Page 84 of The Runaway

“Yes, sir,” Niles said, leaping to his feet and heading for the door. “Of course. Absolutely.” He looked at Adalene, who was still sitting rigidly on her chair. “Shall we, um… go and talk about this?”

Adalene stared at him for a moment, then seemed to suddenly catch on. “Yes,” she said, jumping up and following Niles to the door. “Right. Yes. Let’s…” The pair of them rushed out the door, which closed just a fraction too loudly behind them.

Once they’d gone, Antoine sighed. “Well, then,” he said, turning to Dante. “You and Connor may as well go and feed the horses. We’ll continue this discussion tomorrow. And Lucas, can you ask Albert to go and inform Baron Bardet that he’ll need to come to the estate to confirm the bonding? It’s too late to do anything about it today, so tomorrow would be best, but if not, just get Albert to find out when the Baron’s available.”

“I’ll let him know,” Lucas said, hopping up and quickly leaving the room.

Dante stood up, stretching his shoulders, then he gave Antoine a knowing smile. “Just another ordinary day, right? Hopefully there are no more surprises until at least tomorrow. Come on, Connor. Let’s go get these horses seen to.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

After the rest of the crowd had left the room, Gabriel sat back, waiting for Antoine to pick up their previous conversation. Despite having told Niles and Lucas that they’d continue tomorrow, it was a fairly sure bet that Antoine would want at least a few more details today, along with Gabriel’s perspective on some of the more notable events of the past week.

Antoine leaned back in his chair and sighed. “Interesting times,” he muttered, casting a weary look Gabriel’s way. “I’m happy for them, though – Niles and Adalene, I mean. They put a lot of effort into this, and it’s nice to see it pay off. Even if this wasn’t quite the way I expected it to come about.”

“Everyone says we don’t quite know how the bonding process works,” Gabriel pointed out. “In a way, it makes far more sense for it to happen in an unexpected way. They were trying for over a year. If what they were already doing was working, it would have happened well before now.”

“Fair point,” Antoine said. Then his expression turned contemplative. “So what about you and Connor?” he asked.

“What about us?”

“You seem close.”

Gabriel raised an eyebrow at that. “How do you figure that? We’ve barely said two words to each other since we got home.”

Antoine smiled at him. “As you walked up to the front gate, you put your arm around his shoulder and kissed his hair. You asked him twice if he needed anything before he went to bathe with Adalene. And when Adalene announced that she and Niles had bonded, the first person you looked at was Connor – along with plastering an altogether too sappy and bereft look all over your face. I don’t think anyone else noticed,” he added, at Gabriel’s alarmed look. “But I pay far too much attention to the wellbeing of my estate to not notice the subtle details.”

Gabriel shook his head. “I think you’re seeing things where there’s nothing to see. Yes, I’m fond of Connor. And yes, I developed a certain protective instinct around him while we were in Paris. It was a dangerous place and you haven’t yet heard the half of it. But Connor’s not looking for anything permanent. He’s far too independent for that.” Even as he said it, Gabriel felt a stab of disappointment. In Paris, Connor had been all fiery opinions and righteous anger. But before that, when they’d been camping – an episode that seemed like it had happened months ago, when in reality, it was barely two weeks ago – he’d been all shy seduction and surprised pleasure, his lithe body fitting perfectly against Gabriel’s. Gabriel hadn’t had time to miss the intimacy while they were in Paris, too focused on anticipating the next random act of the crowd and on tracking down food and shelter. But now that they were home – albeit that they’d been back for only an hour or so – he was already feeling restless and uneasy, knowing that he’d have very few opportunities to see Connor in the normal course of the day. Even having him as far away as the next building was unsettling, given that they’d hardly been more than five metres from each other for more than two weeks.

A sly smile tugged at Antoine’s lips. “So you don’t think there’s any chance of him wanting to bond with you, then?” he asked, sounding thoroughly smug about it.

Gabriel rolled his eyes. “Look, just because you and Niles have both found happily bonded bliss, that doesn’t mean you can go around trying to set everybody else up. Connor’s perfectly happy with the way things are.”

“I’m sure he is,” Antoine said, with that same smugness. “I’m just not sure you’ve quite realised how things are.”

Gabriel frowned at him. “What are you getting at? If there’s a problem, just come out and say it. I’m not in the mood for all this prevarication.”

“There’s no problem at all.” Antoine reached over and picked up a small mirror on the side table. He handed it to Gabriel. “Quite the opposite, I’d say.”

Gabriel took the mirror automatically, but continued frowning at Antoine. “What…?”

Antoine nodded to the mirror, so Gabriel looked down at it…

“Fuck me…” The eyes staring back at him were bright gold. “That’s not…” he began, before his brain seemed to simply shut down. As he watched, the gold bled out of his eyes, returning them to their usual brown colour. “That’s impossible,” he said. “It can’t be Connor.”

“Have you slept with anyone else recently?” Antoine asked. One of the key components of a bonding was an exclusive sexual relationship, and Antoine was well aware of Gabriel’s aversion to mating with the estate’s omegas.

“No,” Gabriel said, knowing the relevance of the question, but not quite able to make the connection in his mind. Connor would never…

“Or is there someone else you’ve run off with into the woods?” Antoine asked, pressing the point home. “Or taken on a trip to Paris? Or granted him his heart’s desire by allowing a mere slave to make life-altering decisions?”

“But a bonding is… It’s permanent. And irreversible. And it ties us together for the rest of our lives.” Okay, so Gabriel had just said the same thing three different ways, but this made no sense. “I don’t want to control him.”

“Nor does he want to be controlled,” Antoine agreed. “He’s made that very clear, not so much in words as with his actions. He understands the practical limits of both his position and the world at large, but at the same time, he very much wants to be given a choice, whenever a choice is possible to be made. And somehow, you’ve managed to give him exactly that. Hechoseto go camping with you. Hechoseto go to Paris. I can’t say I know the full details, but I’d also bet that hechoseto mate with you, out in that forest. Because you did mate with him, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” Gabriel said, the word coming out on a sigh.

“That’s not something you need to be feeling guilty about,” Antoine said, his expression torn between sympathy and amusement. “If you and Connor have ended up bonding, I’d say he enjoyed it just as much as you did.”