"I didn't mean sexually, Taz."
I threw up my hands."I'm sorry I'm not a romantic like you and Hope.I agreed to be his mate and we had sex.Am I supposed to fall madly in love with him in a few days?"
"I just don't want you to shut yourself off from the possibility of love."
From anyone else, I would have been disgusted by the sappiness of that statement.But Penny truly believed everyone had a soulmate.Her parents had a great marriage and a bunch of kids, and Penny had emerged from the womb ready for her happily ever after.
She was the sort of person that cried during Hallmark movies and weddings.I was not.How we became friends, I still did not understand.
“Ughh.”I picked at a loose thread on my shorts and tried to find a way to phrase my thoughts.“I’m just not good at the whole interpersonal thing, okay?This mate thing is a lot, and I feel like I’m going to fuck it up and let everyone down.”
Penny didn’t say anything and I looked up at her.
“You’re not going to tell me everything will be fine and to stop overthinking?”
My best friend sighed and carefully placed a folded shirt on the stack of clothes.
“Honestly Taz?I’m not in a position to lecture you about overthinking.”
I wanted to unpack that cryptic statement, but Dargo appeared beside me and handed me an ax.I looked at the weapon and then at him.
“Is this your way of surrendering to my judgment?”I asked.
“What?”He gave me a confused look.“I was going to take you on patrol with me.”
I weighed the ax and eyed him, still resentful of my nude parade through camp.
“You stranded me, naked.I’m still mad.”
Dargo grabbed my free hand and hauled me to my feet.
“I give you permission to kill me after our patrol is over.”Looking pretty confident I wouldn’t behead him, he dragged me away from Penny and toward the edge of camp.I stumbled after him and gave my friend an awkward wave with my ax.
“See you later, I guess,” I called.
Penny cracked a smile when I tripped over a rock and wondered why everyone got a kick out of my suffering.
“Have fun, you two,” she laughed, her expression saying she didn’t expect us to get much ‘patrolling’ done.
***
An hour later I realizedPenny had seriously overestimated how horny my mate was.
All we’d done was walk, peer suspiciously into the distance and walk some more.Dargo hadn’t said one inappropriate thing or tried to get in my pants.He hadn’t said anything.I was confused and very bored.
I paused to poke at a dusty, crumbled beer can, and wondered if the person who left their trash out here had survived the invasion.When I looked up Dargo was several yards ahead of me.Still not talking.Something was up with him.
I trudged after him, swinging my ax like a baton.The sun was blinding, and I wished I had a pair of sunglasses.
"Why do you pester your friend about her mating?"Dargo asked.
I glanced at him in confusion.Almost an hour of dead silence and that's the first thing he says?
"Why do you care?"I asked, doing my best to strangle the thread of hurt I felt that he hadn't said a single thing about yesterday.
"Your words are bothering Adak.He fears you'll try and take his female away from him."
I stopped walking.
