“Why do you smell weird? Can I scent you?”
“Go ahead,” I say, holding up my wrist for him. He breathes deeply before his eyes widen.
“Uhh,” he so helpfully says. “Why are you at the mall when you’re in your pre-heat?”
“I’m sorry, my what now? My huh? Nah, it sounded like you just said I’m in pre-heat, but I must have heard you wrong.”
“Leo,” Bren says with a deep sigh. “You heard what I said! Don’t be an ass!”
“I’m not being an ass! I think I would know if I was about to go into a heat!”
“Would you really? Because I’m pretty sure it’s been like forever and a half since you’ve had a heat. Not since we were on our first life cycle!”
I sit back in my chair, staring at my latte. Fuck. Is Bren right? I remember having my first one when I went through puberty but then I never had another one. There’s been comfort heats, when my body forced me to take a break and sit in my nest, finding comfort in the scents around me. Instead of working myself into burnout, my body forced me to take a break. I’ve never been through a mating heat though.
“Shit,” I say, realization hitting me like a truck. “Fuck. Shit. Ass. Balls. No, this cannot be happening.”
“Have you been nesting without realizing it?”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” I murmur, burying my face in my hands.
Andras clears his throat. “May I jump in?”
I part my fingers, glaring up at him. He holds up his hands in surrender.
“I mean this with all the love and respect in the world. It’s just, you two kinda suck at this.”
I let out a deep growl which lands a cuff against the back of my head from Bren. Right. Don’t growl at someone’s mate even if they’re being an ass while I’m in pre-heat. Can I really be blamed here?
“We suck at what?”
“So, Bren never told me he was a phoenix until after he regenerated. And then he went into a rut because his body was younger and assumed I was his mate. You remember,” he says softly, smiling over at his mate.
“Right,” I say slowly. “His body knew and went into rut to secure you as his mate. I’m following you so far.”
Andras and Bren share a look before they both look at me, like somehow I’m supposed to be putting pieces of a puzzle together. When I don’t say anything, Bren smacks my shoulder.
“Stop beating me up! I’m a poor omega who’s in pre-heat! You’re supposed to be giving me your sweater and being nice to me!”
“Shit,” Bren says. “You can have my coat and scarf when you leave but you have to promise to give it back!”
“I will!”
“Now, back to the more important matter at hand here. Is there someone you’ve been spending a lot of time with who may or may not have your instincts going into overdrive? Is there maybe someone who might be your mate? And that someone might have triggered a mating heat? Just maybe?”
I stare at my best friend for a long moment before my eyes widen. I let out a long groan, burying my face in my hands.
“Oh. My. Gods.”
“There it is,” Andras says with a chuckle. “And now this is the part of the anime where one of two things could happen.”
“What anime?” Sure, in my head I call Jin my anime main character, but what the hell is Andras talking about right now? Is pre-heat melting my brain or is he talking nonsense?
“You know, if you were the main lead of a romance anime! Imagine all the shapes floating around your head while soft music swells around you!”
“Right,” I say slowly, still glaring at Andras. He’s unaffected by the glare, continuing on.
“You can either have a silly misunderstanding where you don’t talk to Jin about being a phoenix and then go into your heat alone, feeling miserable the entire time.Or, and this is the option I hope you’ll go with. You go talk to him, tell him you’re a phoenix, tell him you’re going into heat, and he helps you through it. And then of course you both live happily ever after!”
