Chapter 3 #3
“Yes. That’s how the bond is triggered. I know that’s what she is to me.”
“I believe you. What I want to know is if this Hyde person knew that as well.” Tanin crossed his arms, looking at the door through which Chee was sitting in an empty room. Just waiting.
“How could he?” Trove, asked, frowning. “No one could possibly know that.”
“How did he know where we were? How did he know about Alred? How did he know to send a human female at all? He knew exactly how to approach us, knew exactly how to tempt us, and knew exactly the right kind of person to send. Is it really just happenstance that the female he chose is mated to one of us?”
“Considering our track record with human females…?” Trove asked sardonically.
Tanin, Sway, and Vytln were three of his seven brothers, and all three of them had mated human females.
Though Alred had not claimed to mate her, he’d made no secret of his desire for Goldie.
Trove wasn’t sure what a technological being could do to mate a biological one, but he certainly didn’t begrudge his brother’s desire for her. He even wished them well.
Yes, indeed, it seemed human females were their weakness. That wouldn’t be hard to figure out since every female on their ship was a human.
But knowing Chee was his mate? No. That was simply impossible.
Sure, there was a way to find mates without meeting each other.
There was technology used by the True Match matchmating service that scanned the souls of people within subspace.
They then used some kind of technology to match souls without ever meeting them.
Trove was aware of the technology, he was aware of how popular it was and how the new industry was growing.
But it had nothing to do with him. He had no desire to have a mate.
He’d never subjected himself to the very deep and detailed scan for such a match to happen.
And that was the only way that someone would know his mate before he laid eyes upon her.
No, this had to be a coincidence. He was sure of that, even as Tanin continued to look doubtful. But his captain let the subject drop as he instead focused on the more immediate problem.
“What do you want to do about her?”
Trove opened his mouth, but there wasn’t an answer waiting on his tongue.
Do with her? He wanted her away from him. He wanted her right beside him. He wanted to drown in her. He wanted to drown himself. He didn’t want this to happen, but it was too late to undo. He had recognized her by sight, and now he was trapped into needing her.
“I don’t know,” he finally said. Because he genuinely didn’t. He was still reeling from the first sight of her. Still grappling with the pain of it, the need for her. Too much, too fast, too new. He couldn’t possibly make a decision right now.
Could he just… leave her?
No. He’d seen her already. Part of him had been irrevocably changed already. They were not mated, not yet. The bond had been triggered. Primed, in a way. He had to go through the mating process in order to actually make her his mate.
The domini mating process was slightly more complex than others – though not nearly close to the most complex of mating procedures.
He had to fight her protector to claim her, he had to gorge her on food to satisfy her, then he had to bring her to their nest and allow her to mate him.
A series of steps that had to be followed in order to seal the bond in place.
A series of steps that, biologically, he would yearn for until they were completed.
It would nag at him constantly. A need in the back of his head that would never fully fade.
He’d only known her for a few moments, but there would never be another moment in his life where she wasn’t going to have a place in his brain.
He’d always want to complete the mating. He’d never be able to forget her.
This female he didn’t know had so much power over him. It was insane. Who even was she? Was she a happy person? A brave person? A cold person?
The mating bond didn’t care who she was any more than it cared who he was. It didn’t matter what they wanted. What he wanted. What he needed.
He couldn’t have a mate. He didn’t want one. This was, possibly, the worst thing that could have happened to him. He would rather she be an enemy of theirs that had come to hunt them down rather than this.
He wished desperately, again, that he’d never seen her.
Tanin said nothing. His captain just watched him silently as those thoughts and feelings ran riot through him. Too new and raw to be easily controlled.
“Fine,” Tanin said, turning. “Let’s go talk to the others.”
Trove grunted and fell in line behind his captain.
Though Tanin ruled them as an ultimate power, that didn’t mean he would not listen to his crew.
They had all agreed to follow him; all agreed to obey his commands.
But Tanin was a fair and just leader, and he would get everyone’s thoughts and opinions on this deal before making his decision for them.
Because even though Trove was now reeling, gobsmacked by the revelation of this stranger, there was still the matter of the deal she had brought them and what they were going to do about it.