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“Because I shouldn’t give a shit that some random pride member recently mated, right?” he clipped, his gaze flying back to hers. “No, I shouldn’t care. I shouldn’t care that, having transferred to another pride, she won’t be under my protection or within my reach. But then, you’re not a random member, are you?”
She went still, and she sensed her sisters and Lori do the same.
A smile of self-derision curled his mouth. “I fought that knowledge for a while. What you said to me all those years ago… it was true, wasn’t it?”
Yes, but there was no sense in saying so. Their chance to mate had passed. “It was a crush.”
“Now, that was what I kept telling myself. Whenever doubts nipped at me, I squashed them. The times I found myself deliberately seeking you out, I dismissed them. And any curiosity my cat felt about you, well, I just plain ignored it. But then I heard you were mated, and that kind of ripped off my blinders.” He clearly wasn’t happy about that; missed the bliss of ignorance. “What you claimed is true.”
Quinley sighed. “It doesn’t matter either way. We’re both mated to other people. Both happy.”
“Happy?” he echoed, his brows snapping together. “You don’t even know the cat you mated. He’s a fucking stranger to you.”
She blinked, taken aback by the vehemence in his voice.
He took a step closer. “If you were really intent on an arranged mating, you could have chosen someone you knew. Do you know how rare it is for two shifters to imprint on one another when they have no foundations on which to build? You’ve practically set yourself up to fail.”
Quinley inched up her chin. “I don’t believe that.”
“You didn’t care who you mated, did you? So long as you were away from me, you weren’t bothered.”
Quinley frowned. “I wanted to be out of the pride before you and Nazra ascended, yes. But it wasn’t the reason I took a mate.” She’d done that for herself. “I could have transferred somewhere else without doing that. You’re flattering yourself a little too much here.”
His eyes dropped to her neck. “Did you let him brand you?” He reached out as if to move her coat collar aside.
Quinley jerked away from his hand. “That’s none of your business.”
“You did, didn’t you?” His nostrils flared. “For shit’s sake. If this mating goes tits up, you’ll forever wear his mark.”
And this was his business how? “I don’t plan for it to go tits up. But if that happened, it’d be my problem. It’s nothing you need to concern yourself with.”
His expression tightened. “Just because I didn’t claim you doesn’t mean it’ll be okay with me if you’re unhappy.”
“It never bothered you before,” she couldn’t help but snipe.
“Because I didn’t before know what I know now.”
“And you think that having such an epiphany means you get to seek me out? That you get to come here and express your thoughts on my decisions or actions?”
Unreal.
Her positively enraged cat honestly wanted to claw his eyes out. “You have no say in what I do or don’t do, Zaire. Your thoughts on it don’t matter. You have a mate. Concern yourself with her. I don’t need to hear what you think or feel about anything.”
Quinley skirted around him, careful not to let her body brush his, and pulled open the door.
“Must feel good,” he said, his tone a taunt.
She glanced back at him. “What?”
“Being able to walk away from me like I once did you.”
“That you’d think I’m so bitterly bitchy just goes to show you know nothing about me.” Silently asking the universe to at some point throw him in a nest of fire ants, Quinley strode out of the salon.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this edgy,” said Deke.
Dragging his gaze away from the neighbors bickering at the opposite side of the cul-de-sac, Isaiah looked at his fellow enforcer. “What?”
“You’re antsy,” said Deke, his hip propped against the lamppost. “So much so that just seeing two of our pride mates having one of their usual petty squabbles is putting you on high alert.”
