“Cheers,” I mutter. “Don’t get used to it.” I huff a quiet breath.
He shifts his weight, looking out over the same stretch of land I’ve been staring at like he’s piecing his answer together properly. “All right,” he says. “So—fated mates. Yeah, there’s instinct. Biology. The bond. That whole ‘you’re mine, I’m yours’ thing baked in from the start.”
“Sounds healthy,” I mutter.
“It can be,” he says, glancing at me. “Or it can be a disaster if the people involved are idiots.”
“Sounds about right.”
He grins briefly, then sobers again. “But love…,” he continues, slower now, more thoughtful. “That’s not guaranteed.”
I look at him properly at that. “It’s not?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “Nah. The bond gives you the connection. The pull. The… framework, I guess. But what you do with it? That’s still on you.”
Huh. “That’s… surprisingly reasonable,” I admit.
“Shocking, I know.”
I snort.
He nudges a rock with his boot, then looks back at me. “With me and Kael,” he says, “it wasn’t exactly smooth.”
I glance at him. “Yeah?”
He huffs a quiet laugh. “My mate didn’t even show up for two years.”
I blink. “You’re kidding?”
“Nope.” He shakes his head, still sounding faintly offended about it. “I’m here, dragged through a bloody rift, trying not to die, and my supposed ‘fated mate’ is already in this world and just… doesn’t bother.”
“Harsh.”
“Very,” he agrees. “Didn’t even know he existed at that point. Just thought I was having a rough go of it on my own.”
I snort softly. “And then?”
“And then I see him,” Sonny says, his expression shifting slightly. Not softer exactly, but more grounded. “And it just—clicked.” He taps his chest lightly. “Didn’t understand it. Didn’t trust it either. But there was this pull, and I couldn’t ignore it… despite trying to.”
I nod, because yeah. I get that.
“But I didn’t just roll over and go, ‘Oh yeah, destiny, let’s go,’” he adds quickly. “No chance. Bloke had to work for it.”
That pulls a grin out of me. “Good.”
“Too right,” he says. “He’d been here all that time, building his own life, doing his own thing. Meanwhile, I’ve just been trying not to get eaten. He wasn’t getting a free pass.”
“Fair.”
“But the feelings?” Sonny continues, a little quieter now. “That wasn’t just the bond doing the heavy lifting. That was us. Choosing each other. Every step of the way.”
I nod slowly, letting that settle.
“So you think…” I hesitate, then push through it. “You think it’s separate?”
He tilts his head. “I think it overlaps.”
“Helpful,” I tease, but I get what he’s saying.
