Kellan didn’t seem to find it as funny. “It’s not just... that.”
“What else is it?” Sawyer asked. He kept his forehead in the crook of Ciaran’s neck, and Ciaran kept his arms around him. “Needing to be this close? How long does this last? Will I alwaysbe this codependent? Needing to be physically close? To touch him? Because this is going to make my job a little difficult. Are we, like, conjoined twins now? Because honestly, what the fuck is this?”
Fray laughed again, and Ciaran growled at him. “Fray. Can you give us some privacy, please?”
“No,” Sawyer said, sitting up so he could look Ciaran in the eye. “I tried to kill him earlier. I wanted to kill him because he was going to touch you. And if he’s going to be around you, around us, I’m pretty sure he should be in the loop.”
Ciaran wanted to be pissed that Sawyer just admonished him like that in front of his consortium, but he couldn’t. He’d give Sawyer whatever he wanted, but Ciaran knew Sawyer was also right. He relented immediately. “Fine.”
Fray grinned. “I knew I liked you, Sawyer.”
“Almost strangling you aside,” Sawyer mumbled. He settled back into his spot, nuzzling in even closer than before. “I am sorry about that.”
“I know,” Fray said. “Gotta say, I always thought being pinned against the wall by some hot naked guy would be fun, but?—”
Ciaran snarled at him, and Fray put his hands up. “Kidding. Just kidding.”
Sawyer hummed as he pulled back to see Ciaran’s face, his blue eyes on fire. “I like that sound. Do it again.”
Kellan sighed. “Can we focus, please,” he said. “I know this is difficult and strange. But you both need to make a decision. Sawyer, to answer your questions, first I need you to know that the only knowledge we have is what the bond is like for our kind. How it will be for you is unknown. It could be worse, or it could be better. We simply don’t know the effect it will have on a human.”
“So when two octomorphs?—”
“Cephamorphs,” the three corrected him at the same time.
“Cephamorphs, sorry. When two cephamorphs bond, what happens to them? Do they decide yay or nay, then either copulate or part ways? Live happily ever after together? Or just say no and that’s that?”
Kellan took a moment to answer, as if torn over admitting what he knew. “No bond has ever been refused.”
Sawyer sat up. “Ever?”
Kellan shook his head. “No. For our kind, it’s... it’s a revered thing. A privilege.” He swallowed hard. “We should be so lucky to find our one.”
Sawyer turned to Ciaran. “You said it was simple. If one of us didn’t want it, we’d just have to spend some time apart, and the urges would go away.”
“That’s what we’re led to believe.” Ciaran put his hand on Sawyer’s shoulder, his neck. “If you don’t want this, we’ll?—”
“I never said I didn’t. It’s just a lot to get my head around.” He turned to Kellan then. “And what I feel… what I feel for him—is that, like, real? Or just some hormonal attraction that will subside? I mean, if we weren’t bonded, would we even be attracted to each other?”
“That’s...” Kellan made a face. “There’s no way to know that. Ciaran felt a pull toward you from the second he saw you on Tobin’s boat when you first arrived.”
Sawyer turned to Ciaran, his smile wide and breathtaking. “You did?”
Ciaran found himself smiling back at him. “Yes. You looked over at us, and I didn’t know what it was at first. It made me kinda mad because I felt so out of control.”
“Justkindamad?” Sawyer asked. “Because I seem to remember you trying to rip some doors off their hinges.”
Fray laughed at that, and Ciaran couldn’t even bring himself to care. Instead he shrugged it off, not even remotely sorry.
Sawyer laughed. “I remember seeing two guys on the pier, wringing wet in the freezing cold, and wondered if they needed help or if they were just idiots.”
Fray laughed. “Ah, love at first sight.”
Ciaran was a little hurt. “So it wasn’t instant for you, as it was for me.”
Sawyer took his hand out of his blankets and cupped Ciaran’s jaw. “I was acutely aware of you. Where you were, when you were gone for a few days. You’d sneer at me, and I liked that for some reason. You looked at me like you wanted to kill me or fuck me, and I wanted to really piss you off just to see which way it would go. You’d put your hands on me either way, so...”
“Jesus Christ,” Fray mumbled.
