Page 251 of Night's Fall
Awesome!
But wait.
“I did a lot of reading this afternoon, and it said sometimes fae don’t recognize their mates right from the jump,”Itold her.
She nodded. “Iknow.Youhave to be open for it.AndwithSirk,I’msoopen for it.I’vesearched deep becauseIreally like him.Buthe’s not the one.”
She lifted a hand our way to stop us speaking, because we all were about to say something, and continued.
“I want to go there.I’mattracted to him.Ithink he’d be great company.”Shegave us a small smile that was a bit melancholy. “Andhe’d feed me well.Butthen, what if he finds his mate?WhatifIdo?Whatif it doesn’t end well?Wecan’t have one ofLaura’sbest buds being weird around one ofAleksei’sbest buds.We’reall in this for a lifetime.Andit shouldn’t be weird.”
It was beautiful she understood we were all in this for a lifetime.Butit still made me sad, as much as it made me proud she was mature enough (TimotheeandErrolcould take lessons) to consider herself,Sirk, their futures, and how something like this might affect them and the beings they cared about.
It still sucked.
“I’m super excited you’re going on your quest,”Isaid.
“Me too,”Moniqueagreed. “OnceIfinish pumping my credit line enough to get the renos done on my flat, and if you haven’t found him yet,I’lljoin you for a month.Though, thenI’dhave to pump my credit line up enough to be away from clients for a month.”
“That would be awesome,”Gaylereplied, her green eyes lighting.
“I’m down with meeting you for some long weekends and mate trawling,”Catput in.
It occurred to me then that the idea the problem withAlekseiandIwas space, actually was part of the problem.
But only part of it.
He needed spaceandtime.
He andIboth worked.Weweren’t together 24/7, but we were together a lot, and that togetherness had been intense from the start.Heenjoyed work, but now he had all of this other stuff weighing on him too.
So perhaps he not only needed space to see to all the things he needed to see to, without having to worry about looking out for or paying attention to me, we also both needed time.
Time to deal with the loss ofAntheme.Timeto get to know one another better.Timeto settle into our lives together.
The thing about that was, all of that made sense, but it didn’t feel right.
And it hurt my heart, and my beast didn’t like it either (at all), to think of giving it to him.
But everyone needed a break.
And they needed those on the regular.
Anyway,Iwanted to supportGayleon her quest too.
“I’m in for long weekends as well,”Isaid. “Andmaybe we can askAlchemyif she could narrow down the search area.”
Alchemy was the witch that had her mystic sanctum in my building.
Gayle scrunched her nose. “Doyou think she’s actually a witch?”
“No, but it doesn’t matter.We’dhave fun wherever we went,”Ireplied. “Shecould just offer vacation suggestions, andI’dbe down.”
“Too true,”Catagreed.
Monique raised her glass. “Suck’em back.Ineed dinner to soak up some of this vodka.”
I should have requested snacks, because she was very correct.
