He smirked but said nothing. He had no understanding of what was happening, and just as soon as he felt it, it was gone. He blinked, clapped for Claire who sank the five ball, and tried to process. Claire made another good shot and turned to him for approval. He managed a “Nice!” and a smile. She looked at him strangely for a minute, but returned her attention to the table.
He grimaced when she missed the next one, and tried to shake off the feeling. He took a drink of his soda, needing something cold, feeling hot and antsy all of a sudden. Jonas made some comment that the others laughed at, but Adam ignored him. It was his turn again and he quickly evaluated his options, lined up his shot and slammed the stick home. The cue ball jumped the table and landed on the floor at someone’s feet. Adam growled, then clenched his jaw in an effort to keep from saying something nasty.
The waitress chose that moment to walk behind him, making some comment, running her hand soothingly along his shoulders. He turned sharply, disgusted by the touch, jaw aching with how hard he was working to keep it together.
Zach walked up to him and it took considerable effort not to start a power play with the strong alpha.
“Maybe we should go outside,” Zach suggested.
Not liking being told what to do, but unable to deny that something was wrong and he had no idea what the fuck it was, Adam tossed his stick onto the table, enjoying the sound of balls being knocked out of position, and strode out.
He reached the SUV, circled his shoulders, cracked his neck. “Something’s wrong,” he admitted. He felt hot and angry and…almost out of control. Almost.
“Any idea what happened?” Zach asked.
“I felt…something. It hit me, inside. Now I’m all…frustrated. Fucked up.” He scrubbed his hands over his face.
Zach considered him and Adam had the distinct impression the other man was holding back.
“Tell me,” he growled out.
Nodding, Zach leaned back against the truck, appearing nonthreatening. As-if.
“A few minutes ago, I felt the transfer of power between Myra and Marco. Just before I took my last shot. That’s why I waited a couple of beats, make sure nothing would distract my aim.”
“And?”
“And…seems like too much to be a coincidence that you felt something right after that happened. Has to be related.”
Adam really didn’t want to have this kind of conversation, but he didn’t have much choice. “I want to see her. Myra. Now. And I don’t like hearing you say her name.”
“I see. And that just started?”
Adam ground his teeth together. “She’s only been gone half a day. I talked to her this morning. Okay, fine, I missed her. But this.” He shook his head. “This is fucked up.”
“Well. The good news is we can probably identify the problem. The bad news is that you might not like it.”
“Just tell me what the fuck happened.”
“All right. I’m guessing Myra is your mate. And when she stopped being National President, it triggered for both of you.”
It didn’t seem possible that his brain could be crying outfuck, yesandfuck, noat the same time, but there it was. “Mates are supposed to know each other. And be bonded, once they have sex. We’ve had sex.”
“Yeah. Well, maybe I’m wrong, but it seems to me that the fact Myra was serving as president might have mucked that up a bit. She wasn’t exactly, entirely, herself when you met. It’s sort of like if you meet your mate when you’re in high school, you wouldn’t know it. You might feel a strong attraction, love even, but you wouldn’t feel the actual mate connection until meeting up as adults.” He shrugged. “I’m not saying that’s exactly what’s happened, but it seems to fit.”
“You don’t act like this when Hillary isn’t around. Hell, she’s not around right now.” He wanted to punch the truck, see it dent.
“Yeah, here’s the thing. I can’t think of a time when a mate bond triggered in alphas as strong as you guys, but the two weren’t together to consummate it. Every natural instinct and drive in you right now is to mate with her, but she’s hundreds of miles away. That’s very unusual.”
“Why the fuck are so many things unusual and rare but seem to happen to me?”
“Just lucky, I guess. But think about this—you have a mate. That’s great news. And you already liked Myra. A lot, I’m guessing. You won’t be in the position of trying to get to know someone while also needing to fu— Hm, okay, we won’t go there right now.”
Hearing Zach talking about Myra and fucking was not sitting well with him. Which was ridiculous. Part of him knew that the other man had zero interest in Myra. The bigger part of him didn’t give a rat’s ass.
“She was sad.” He bit the words out, unable to get past that fact, even though he knew she was a lot of other feelings, as well.
Zach frowned.
