I search her face because there’s excited for your friends, then there’s excited for you. And she’s giving those vibes off. “Firstly, my packing is nothing like Raney’s. Secondly, you better not be getting all glassy eyed about seeing King again, Raney will shove her fist up your ass, Tris, if you so much as look at him.”
“Oh please, really?” She rolls her eyes at me. “I’m excited to go back and see Raney and watch her pack, that’s it.”
“You’re acting dodgy as shit, you’re up to something,” I accuse her, using my finger jabbing into the air for emphasis.
Her lips pull into a fake, bitchy smile. “We can chat about anything you want, Ho, including Alphas that break hearts, or we can do it when we get together with the others.” She skilfully ignores my last comment by kind of blackmailing me.
“We’ll wait,” I snarl back. Although, it’s impossible to be pissed off at her. If anything, I’m super grateful she’s not giving me the third degree. I know she’d listen; I suspect she’d love it if I spill my guts to her but the next couple of days need to be about Raney, and I’d be pretty happy if we left it at that.
“Shit, I need to let my security team know.” I groan.
I spend the next ten minutes updating my security team, swallowing suppressors, and slathering on scent block cream. As soon as I shut my case, Tris opens her overnight bag and gets to work. Within a few minutes I’ve got gold leaf eye masks over my black bags, and she’s massaged me into a completely different state. I can’t move a muscle when the door to my suite knocks.
“Stay there, Ho, or all my hard work will disappear,” she says quietly. I can hear her pounding down towards the door. Honestly, for a model you’d think she wouldn’t walk like an elephant, but she does.
Despite being relaxed, I can hear her talking. I can also hear the change in her voice, and a few heartbeats later I can feel a shift in her mood. Rolling up to standing, I’m about to walk out looking for answers but she’s in my room, and she’s got the reason for her mood flip in her arms.
“What the living fuck is that?” I get out eventually. Although it sounds all slurry because of my relaxed state.
Tristan’s got a goo-goo look on her face completely besotted by something already.
“Special delivery to, rohi?” She says, using her inside voice. And then she goes back to normal volume. “Ho, someone sent you kittens.”
Instead of taking a step closer to look inside the wicker basket, I sprint to my phone.
Of course, Kai picks up on the first ring, but before he can utter a word, I yell, “NO! No! No! No! I am not looking after kittens, Kairo. Get your sneaky ass back here and pick up this basket.”
“And a box of food,” Tristan adds, not looking at me.
“What?” I hiss at her.
“At the door is another box. Pretty easy decision what one I carry. Ho, you’ve got babies!”
“No, they’re Kairo’s.”
Even through the phone, I can hear him smiling. His voice is upbeat and happy. “Rohi, I can’t take them back right now…I’m kind of busy.”
“Kind of busy?” I stutter, closing my eyes and counting to ten to calm down enough to talk coherently. “Clearly, you’ve been busy, Kairo, buying gifts for people who do not need gifts when all they wanted was a fucking reason why their scented-mate would lie to them! Or I mean you could explain to me, why you fuckers drugged me and left me a-fucking-lone! Now someone better look after these things because I’m leaving!”
Maybe I wasn’t as calm as I thought.
Tristan’s eyes are huge, her pretty lips open in horror, because I don’t think she’s ever heard me scream as loudly as I just did.
I disconnect my call with Kai. His silence was loud and clear enough. And then I turn away, hiding from Tris. “Please don’t say anything. The whole thing is a mess.”
“Ho,” she whispers, her voice pitched with emotion.
“I’ll tell the others, but I just need a bit of time. And Raney’s getting packed which is a million times more important. Please, Tris, don’t tell her.” I twist around, and she’s close enough to touch me.
Tris’s eyes are huge, and she’s blinking up a storm. Her bubble-gum scent leaks out as she wallows in my grief.
“They did that to you? Kai drugged you and left you alone?” Tris’s chin wobbles as she asks.
As much as I want to, I can’t very well deny her an answer when I just screamed it at him. “Sadly, that’s exactly what he did.”
“And he’s your scented-mate?”
I let out one of those awful huffs—sadness and fake happiness—and look over at her not really answering her question. “Obviously, I’m not a big believer in scent-matched mates or even mates anymore. Can we leave it at that and focus on Raney?”
