Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
Blaze
“You’re my mates.”
All I can do is stare at Dalia, her words ricocheting through my mind.
They can’t be true, can they?
Of course not.
Der kopflose Reiters don’t have fated mates.
We’ve already died, and we’re supposed to atone for our sins of the past. Then we move on.
None of that involves a fated mate.
But, damn, do I wish it were true.
“You’re mistaken,” Steel finally answers. “We don’t get fated mates. We’ve already died.”
Dalia scoffs. “So you’re going to argue with one of the Fates about whether you’re my fated mates? That’s really what you’re going with?”
“He’s right,” I tell her. “If we touch you, you’ll die. There’s no way fate would be that cruel.”
She just lifts her eyebrows as she stands. Our eyes are locked on her, and a glance at my brothers shows they’re just as desperate for her words to be true as I am.
But hope is a dangerous thing for men like us.
My eyes find Steel’s, and I can see the pain in his eyes.
We love each other, but we’re drawn to this woman before us. If what she says is true, it explains why I’ve felt drawn to her—why all of us have been drawn to her.
But it doesn’t change what we are, or that we can’t touch her.
She moves so quickly, none of us has time to react—especially since we were looking at each other and not her. One second she’s standing beside her chair, and the next, her lips are on mine.
I freeze, my mind overwhelmed at the fact that she’s touching me.
Wait—she’s touching me.
“No,” I cry as I jerk away from her, tears filling my eyes.
I don’t want to watch her die.
Maybe she didn’t touch me for too long.
Not that her aging before our eyes is better.
Except…she doesn’t.
Dalia throws her head back as she laughs. “I told you we were fated mates.”
“You’re okay?” Steel asks cautiously.
“I feel great. I wasn’t sure how kissing Blaze would go since I can’t see his head.
I mean, I assumed you have heads, and I just can’t see them—but I couldn’t be sure.
I just figured it was better to try.” She laughs again, glancing between the three of us.
“I’m fine. Nothing happened, so what the hell are you waiting for? ”
None of us moves, glancing at one another.
What the hell are we supposed to do?
Steel pushes his chair back and stands, which I take as permission to touch her.
Fuck. I hope that’s what that meant.
I jump to my feet, pull her into my arms, and press my lips to hers.
It’s like my entire world lights up as our tongues tangle.
Kissing a woman is so different from kissing a man, and I haven’t felt a woman’s lips in nearly a thousand years. But this is so much more than a kiss.
Warmth blazes in my chest, while nerve endings I didn’t even know I had light up.
My heart beats, faster and harder than it ever has, with the realization that she’s right.
She’s our mate.
Ours.
Dalia hums, melting into me as Titan and Steel join us, but they hesitate.
She breaks our kiss, turns in my arms, and immediately reaches out for both men. She tugs them closer, and it’s Steel who leans in to kiss her first.
I grind against her ass, and my lips find her neck as I grasp her hips.
Is this really happening right now?
Is she really unaffected by our touch?
Dalia rips her lips away from Steel’s, and Titan is there to catch them with his own.
My cock throbs in my pants as I watch the two of them battle for dominance of the kiss.
I can’t believe this is happening right now.
Suddenly, Dalia pulls back and gasps. My eyes widen as a moment later, she goes completely lax in my arms.
“No. No. No. No.” I slowly lower her to the ground, Titan and Steel dropping to their knees beside us. “Dalia? Wake up, Dalia!”
I lift my hands to her neck as a tear slips down my cheek, but I already know what I’m going to find.
Nothing.
I find nothing.
“We killed our mate.” My head shoots up. “She was our mate. I felt it. You felt it, didn’t you? She was ours, and we killed her.”
At this point, tears are streaming down my cheeks, and I know this is the worst pain I’ll ever feel in my life.
Not just because she was meant to be mine—ours.
Not just because we’re the reason she’s dead.
But because we never had a chance to really know her. We knew her for mere hours, and that will never be enough.
“She was fine,” Steel says softly, his eyes on Dalia’s still form. “She kissed you, and she was fine. She was fine.”
“Clearly not,” Titan growls. “We knew better, and we still touched her. This is on us.”
Devastation claws at me as rage rises.
I throw my head back and bellow, letting out as much of my sorrow and my anger as I can.
“What’s wrong?” Dragon stumbles into the kitchen without a shirt on, his pants undone. Goat is right behind him, looking just as disheveled as his lover.
Both of their eyes fall to Dalia on the floor, her eyes open and unblinking.
Goat shakes his head. “But how?”
The front door flies open, startling all of us, but I can’t even be bothered to stand.
Let whoever is storming in here kill us—if they even can. I don’t know if reiters can be killed, but I’ll be happy to be a guinea pig in this situation.
Morrigan and Phoebe freeze in the doorway, their eyes going straight to Dalia.
“What happened?” Morrigan demands as she kneels down opposite me, nudging Steel out of the way, while Phoebe kneels at her head.
I open my mouth to tell them what happened, but a sob is the only thing that escapes me.
Phoebe presses her hand against both sides of Dalia’s head, while Morrigan lays hers over Dalia’s chest and belly.
“She said she was our mate,” Steel says, his voice full of disbelief.
When I lift my eyes to meet his gaze, I find silent tears coursing down his cheeks.
“She kissed Blaze, and we all freaked out. A reiter’s touch is deadly to the living, but she was fine.
She said she didn’t feel anything. So we all kissed her. ”
“We killed our mate.” Titan’s voice is devoid of emotion as he stares out the kitchen window, having stood to allow her sisters to fall to her side.
Phoebe snorts. “You’re all idiots, including Dalia.”
I jerk back. “What the hell did you just say?”
Except she doesn’t respond because her focus is on her sister.
It’s only then I realize they’re not freaking out like we are.
Why aren’t they freaking out? Their sister is lying dead on the floor.
Where are their tears? Their grief?
My confusion has my tears coming to a stop as I tilt my head, watching them.
What are they doing?