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Their conversation died off while they resumed shooting at the targets. But no matter how many arrows he sent flying through the air, he couldn’t get his mind off what she’d said. No, he had to ask.
“Um…is there someone your feelings have changed for?” Yichen waded in, praying to all his ancestors this didn’t blow up in his face.
“What?” Meimei’s voice cracked as it jumped so high it was almost a screech. Her own shot flew off into the trees, nowhere near any of the targets. “No! Of course not! That’s crazy. You’re all my family. I’d never do that.”
Uh-huh. Yeah. He believed that.
But the smart thing was to leave that one untouched.
Nope. He bowed his head and concentrated on helping her archery technique. When he was done, the first thing he was going to do was wake up Rei and tell him about the land mine he’d narrowly dodged.
No, the first thing he was going to do was kiss his mate awake and tell him how wonderful he was.
Then he was going to tell him about the land mine.
After that, maybe they’d speculate on who Meimei had feelings for.
Couldn’t be Chen. Nah. Or himself.
Xiang?
Oh, Gods no. Not a chance.
Junjie? Xiao Dan?
He needed Rei to help him figure this out.
Chapter 26
Rei
Climbing over the wall was easy enough to accomplish, even with his bad knee. The sun was drawing near the horizon, and all the little vampires were tucked into their beds. Even daywalker Xiang was napping the early morning hours away.
The real hard part was sliding out from under Yichen’s arm, as it was possessively wrapped around his waist. Not so much the escaping part. That wasn’t difficult. It was finding the will to slip away from his lover.
Yichen had come to his room with the wildest story about Meimei developing feelings for someone within their clan, and he was terrified to figure out who it was.
Rei—being nosy and wanting to know everything—had immediately tried to leave the room so he could begin a very important investigation. Yichen had needed to resort to sex to keep Rei from leaving.
Yes, so terrible for both of them. So sad.
Alas, someone was here, and it was better if he handled the matter without the rest of the clan there to “help.” Well, maybe not so much better, but safer.
Safer for him.
Unless Yiyi discovered he’d sneaked away. Then he was in for a world of hurt.
Landing on the opposite side of the wall, Rei brushed his hands off against each other and moseyed into the woods that abutted three sides of the Zhang clan property. For once, he couldn’t sense the huli jing lurking about. Either the fox spirit was off monitoring the fae army or running an errand for Xiao Dan.
Magic lingered in the air. Shifter mixed with hints of old magic from the former blood witch. Tinges of earth magic from Moon’s friends. He could pick them all apart and follow them to their sources. They were as unique as the fragrances from different flowers.
While the shifter and earth witches were flowers, the fae magic that had permeated the area was more like the dirt and rain from which these powers grew. The only catch was that he wasn’t sure who had dared to come to the Zhang compound. If he wasn’t confident that this person had come alone, he wouldn’t have dared to leave the protection of the grounds.
Deep down, he hoped it was Trin. Too much time had passed since his last encounter with his half brother. He could be dead for all Rei knew. His father could have reached the end of his tolerance—or sanity—and killed Trin, leaving Rei with no “safe” inroads back to the fae palace.
With a sigh, he leaned on a tree and pulled a dagger from a sheath on his belt, using it to pick at the nonexistent dirt under his nails as he waited. Someone was close, watching him between the tree branches. Time ticked by and neither of them made a move.
Sweat slid along the nape of his neck and soaked into the collar of his shirt as the heat and humidity climbed with the sun in the sky. Birdsong filled the air as more creatures woke to start their day. Yet, even as peaceful as it all seemed, tension crawled along his skin with tiny pinprick claws.
