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Quentin raised his head and gave him a distracted smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’m just trying to answer a few emails before we get in the air. You understand.”
He was already looking back down at the device before he finished talking, so he didn’t see the way Caden’s eyebrows practically hit his hairline.
You understand?
No, he didn’t fucking understand. He didn’t understand what was happening at all. The fact that people were waiting on them to get on this plane was the only thing that stopped him from demanding answers. He would wait until they were stuck a few thousand feet in the air and then tell Quentin to just spit it out and explain what had him acting so weird.
If he needed time to get used to the fact they were mates, that was fine. If he needed longer to come to terms with his feelings for Caden, that was fine too.
But he couldn’t just shut down every time he felt a strong emotion.
Huffing, Caden wrenched open the door, got out, and slammed it behind him. He sent an apologetic look toward Alan when he stared at Caden in shock.
“Sorry.”
Alan smiled and reached into the SUV to grab Caden’s suitcase—well, Quinten’s suitcase full of the clothes Quinten’s housekeeper had bought him.
“Oh, I can get that. You can grab Quin’s since he’ll be a few minutes.”
Alan paused, looked at Dare where he was leaning against the back of the vehicle, and then gave Caden a more forced smile. “I’ve got it. No worries.”
Caden stared after him, wondering why everyone around him was acting insane. He turned back to find Dare watching him, jaw clenched and lips pressed so tightly together they were stark white.
“What’s wrong?”
Dare just shook his head. Stepping closer, he clasped the side of Caden’s neck for the first time, scenting him like a packmate, then turned and stormed away, heading into the open hangar.
“Um. Okay…” Seriously, had they all been hit with a strangeness spell or something?
He walked around to the back to grab Quinten’s stuff to help out Alan and found the space empty.
He frowned. There was no way Alan had had enough time to bring Quinten’s suitcase to the plane and come back to get Caden’s before he’d gotten out of the car.
Which meant…
Caden stared at the plane, the pieces of the puzzle finally sliding together.
He’d been right after all.
He’d thought that because Quentin was in the SUV, that meant he was coming with him, that they were taking the trip together, but he hadn’t packed a single item. He obviously planned on flying down, saying hello to his brother, and then coming right back.
But Caden wasn’t.
Caden had been told to pack for an indefinite length of time. To bring everything he had.
Did the man honestly expect him to stay behind with his brother—an alpha he didn’t know—and his pack of feline shifters just because he said so?
His heart breaking, he tried to focus on the anger surging through him instead.
As he stomped around the SUV, Nero pulled in behind them in a separate vehicle, a couple of extra shifters with him.
Caden wasn’t sure why Quentin had bothered to bring so much manpower, but then again, maybe he wasn’t flying to his brother’s. Maybe that had been a lie, and Caden had just been too love-blind to see it.
He pulled open the door, and Quentin looked up at him distractedly. “I’m almost done.”
“I don’t care,” Caden said, voice wavering. “Why don’t you have any bags?”
Quentin stared at him for a long moment and then ran his tongue over his teeth. “I won’t be staying very long.”
