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“If I’m worried,” I’d snapped, “it’s because I’m worried that I’m going to end up killing you myself!”
Then I’d stormed out of the cave.
And hadn’t gone back for four days.
I spent those four days busying myself with work. That’s what I’d actually come here for, after all. Towork. To help track and predict the weather in the mountains. I didn’t come here to get distracted by a gorgeous injured Gahn who was giving me a serious case of emotional whiplash. I made use of the equipment we’d brought, and I sent out drones that would be able to send data back to Valeria’s ship and its portable data tablets. Of course, monitoring the weather patterns would have been much easier with access to the orbiting research vessel’s scanners. But considering the people on that vessel might have been planning an attack on us at this very moment, it wasn’t like we could ask them to share it. So, drones and short-range scanners it was.
The work was a welcome distraction. Even if I did it all with a black cloud of rage swirling in my chest.
And the rage just got worse, turned murderous, when I thought about the reason I was so freaking upset with Gahn Errok.
I wasn’t angry at him for being his usual arrogant idiot self. I was angry because it seemed like we’d gotten somewhere. Like I’d glimpsed something more than that inside him.
But now it was gone. He’d pushed me away
And I didn’t know why.
It doesn’t matter why. I never wanted to be with him, anyway. I should be glad that he’s not being so pushy and clingy with his caveman “you’re mine” bullshit anymore.
I should have been happy.
Should have been.
Wasn’t.
Shit.
And that just made me even angrier. Nothing about this – about his reactions, or mine – made any goddamn sense.
I threw myself into work with such intensity, and was so distracted by my extremely annoying feelings, that I’d forgotten about the reason for the taklok. I’d forgotten all about Gahn Thaleo’s underhanded methods of trapping Errok.
Gahn Thaleo didn’t always share the evening meal in his Sky Hall. He was often out assisting his hunters or patrolling parties, or hosting meetings with his closest warriors deep in the mountain. But when he strode into the Sky Hall on the evening of the fourth day after I’d left Errok’s bedside, it all came crashing back. This was the first time I’d seen him since the taklok. Since he’d sent his arrow through Errok’s chest.
“Gahn Thaleo,” I said, jumping to my feet when he entered the Sky Hall. “I have a bone to pick with you.”
Thaleo stopped his precise march into the hall, watching me with expressionless eyes. I could hear Fiona whisper, “Girl, what the fuck?” from the floor where she was seated beside me. Valeria stood, too, obviously uneasy with my proclamation. Grim and Tok both got to their feet as well. Zaria tried to catch my gaze from across the fire, throwing me a very clearstop right now you dumbass humanlook which I ignored.
“Oh?”
That was all he said. He wasn’t telling me to sit down or denying me the chance to speak, I had to give him that. But the simple, almost careless, “Oh?” sent me into a blinding rage.
“What do you mean, ‘Oh?’ You know exactly what I’m talking about!”
Valeria was at my side in an instant.
“What the hell is going on?” she asked, her gaze swinging anxiously between Gahn Thaleo and the group of warriors who now stood around him.
“Ask him,” I said, my hands balling into fists. “He knows exactly what he did.”
“I know everything I have ever done, this is true,” the Gahn said. “But you’ll have to enlighten me about the precise action you speak of.”
“The taklok!” I cried.
Fiona, once again, was asking me, “What the fuck?” from below. Valeria was also looking at me like I’d gone more than a little crazy.
“Errok is the one who started that. He called the taklok,” Valeria said slowly, as if I was fucking stupid.
“Tell them,” I said to Thaleo. “Tell them that you knew this would all happen from the beginning.”
