Kanik had never been interested in rolling around with men. Zasen? He didn't mind, as long as a woman was in the middle. Usually, that woman had been Lessa, although I refused to point it out. But Kanik? He dated on his own. He didn't drag others into his bed. Worse, he knew what I thought about him!
He knew I was in love with him.
The last thing I needed to do was ruin this partnership we had before we'd even settled into it. Things were still new. That would be what I'd tell him. She didn't know, I'd handle it, and it wouldn't happen again. He should be okay with that, right?
But he must've felt my dick a minute ago. Hell, Ayla kissing me like that had an effect, and then to shove me againsthim?Of all the forbidden fantasies my mind had ever created, that was the one I revisited most - and now it was going to fuck everything up! If my skin could've changed colors, I was pretty sure I'd be as red as Jerlis's stripes right about now, but scales did have some advantages.
As I carried the wood back, I knelt to stack it up, but the other two had fallen quiet again. Worse, Kanik was watching me, and I could feel the awkwardness crawling on my skin.
"So," I said, "when are you planning to deliver that meat to the Moles, Zasen?"
He crossed his arms, watching me for a moment before he answered. "A few more days. Ayla says we need enough to feed five hundred people, otherwise they'll just come back."
"There's five hundred people down there?" Kanik asked.
"More," Zasen said. "But their portions are small, they only eat meat on holidays, and it's not going to taste the same as men."
"Yeah," I mumbled, hearing him but trying hard to care.
Kanik was looking at me again. From the edge of my vision, I could see his brow was furrowed, and his expression proved he was as distracted as me. It was bad enough that even Zasen noticed. But just when he opened his mouth, looking like he was about to ask, the door to the cottage opened again.
"Okay!" Ayla said, hurrying out. "The girls each got half a rabbit. Pepper's clean now. Holly already was, and now I'm hungry too."
"Grab some meat and cheese from the kitchen for everyone," Zasen told her. "Leave Pepper, take Holly. But before you get the food?" He grinned. "You get to tell Eriska where we left the deer. She'll send a cart to pick them up, but I think you deserve to call those kills yours, Ayla."
"Yeah?"
He nodded proudly. "Yep. You spotted them. You got the kill shot on one, and possibly the other. More than that, your dogs made sure we got both, so yes. You killed two bucks. Go brag, Phoenix."
"On my own?" she asked.
"You're a grown woman," he assured her, but one side of his mouth curled with the words.
And Ayla smiled back like they were sharing a secret, but she didn't say anything. Instead, she simply called Holly to her side and headed deeper into camp.
Yeah, I had a feeling that meant we were about to have a little talk while she was gone.
Fifty-Four
Kanik
From the moment Ayla had kissed me, Rymar had gone weird. Was it because it had been so unexpected neither of us had, well, expected it? No, this felt different. The way he'd turned quiet and hurried over to gather wood, ignoring Zasen explaining about the meat they'd collected. Shit, he'd even asked the same question Zasen had already answered, the part about when they'd take it to the compound.
Then there was Zasen's smugness. The man kept smirking like he was a little proud of himself. A few times, his tail had whipped for no reason at all. I felt like I was missing something, so once Ayla was gone, I turned to Rymar and decided to just get this settled.
"Okay, what's going on?" I asked him.
His body stilled, freezing in place. Yeah, that proved something was up, but we'd just been talking about our goals, and now this? Was it because I didn't care about having kids with Ayla? But Rymar had never cared about such things before!
His head moved first, glancing over to the fire. "Kanik, I didn't know Ayla was going to do that."
"Me either," I agreed. "So why did you just turn weird and Zasen's acting like he knows the big reveal?"
"No," Rymar insisted. "He doesn't."
"Well..." Zasen said.
But Rymar's head whipped around, and for a moment those two shared a look. Slowly, Zasen nodded, backing up a step as if he'd just realized he was in the wrong. Then Rymar forced himself to look at me again.
