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Our plates from dinner the night before are long gone, likely set outside by Augustus and carried away by some servant or another. When I turn to the side, I see a glass of water left for me on the nightstand. A tonic in a small glass bottle, two painkillers next to it.

At first, it warms me, the fact that he thought of me like this. Then, I pick up the tonic and turn it slowly. I read the label, reviewing the warnings on the back.

I recognize the tonic, staring at the thick liquid inside as I tip it back and forth, watching the viscous stuff stuck to the sides of the bottle. My father bought it once, brought it home, and showed it to me before stashing it in the medicine cabinet. Said it was a sort of emergency plan for me, in case something ever happened.

Since omegas—and specifically omegas in heat—are more fertile than the average shifter, we need something much stronger than Plan B for the morning after. And this tonic is that—a mixture of herbs, oils, and drugs that will ensure I can’t get pregnant.

And Augustus left it for me.

He also left water and painkillers, a voice in the back of my head points out. He wasn’t just thinking about the fertility problem. Apparently, his tender care didn’t end the second he left this room, and my heat was finished. He thought far enough ahead to know that I would be in pain, and he cared enough to make sure I’d have something to take the edge off.

But he also made sure to leave the tonic.

Before I can talk myself out of it, I drink it dutifully, wincing at the taste, then chase it down with the painkillers and water. As stinging as it is that he left something like this without a word, I understand. I try to understand. Try not to be bitter about it.

He is a king. His lineage is important.

He would never let it fall to me.

It’s an objective fact. It should not hurt my feelings. I shouldn’t let it hurt my feelings.

Instead of lingering on that, I try to focus, take in the room. Ground myself in the whirlwind of feelings storming through my head. All my thoughts feel like debris in a storm, whipping in the wind. Like I couldn’t possibly reach out and hold them if I wanted to.

This room feels like Augustus. The dark wood throughout the room seems to glow in the sunlight, and the blankets on the bed look roughly straightened, like he tried to fix them before he left.

He left this morning.

It only makes sense. My heat is over. I asked him to stay for my heat, and he said that he would. Maybe I thought I would wake up in his arms again this morning, but he’s busy. He’s the king.

Why would he stay here with me?

The scent of him still hangs in the air, so much aged citrus, but now it’s different. Almost as though it was touched by me.

Mingled with my own scent for long enough that it changed.

That’s not possible—or, at least, nothing I’ve ever read about happening with a fated mate. Maybe it is possible. There’s so little information about it, and since I’ve been here I haven’t had access to the library, let alone a computer to do searching of my own.

I want to know more about this thing. About what it means to be with your fated mate.

But Augustus never actually admitted that’s what’s going on here. While I feel fairly certain it must be the truth—he and I as a fated pair—there are still doubts that linger in the back of my mind.

Why would the goddesses pair us together? An alpha king and a nobody omega from the outskirts. It doesn’t make any sense. Anybody who knew about it would agree that it doesn’t make any sense.

Which, I’m sure, is the reason Augustus is being hesitant about admitting it.

Maybe he never will.

Feeling depressed with this train of thought, I turn my attention to the physical. Sitting criss-cross in the middle of his bed, with the sheets only covering my lap, I observe myself for a moment, taking stock of what I’m feeling. Running triage on my own body, finding and following the sources of pain.

It spreads from the place between my hips and down my thighs, every movement a reminder of the past few days.

Bliss.

Being with the man I’ve dreamed of for years. Touching him. Finding the fulfillment that I’d only ever dreamed of before. Him, inside me, moving against me—

I stop thinking about it before the fantasizing can send me into another heat.

That would not be good. I’m sore inside and out, and not just between my legs. My arms shake, my back aches—every position we tried and held was new for my body. Exhilarating and wonderful and impossibly pleasurable, but a workout, apparently, nonetheless.