Page 104 of Puck & Her Blades

“How could anybody not love Ash?” Cygnus replies. “He’s protective and caring. He doesn’t expect or ask for anything back. And he makes me laugh every day. To Lark and Millie — all of us — he’s family. He’s not a servant.”

To hell with the no speaking rule. I can’t help it.

“He fucking is,” I whisper. “He’s a Companion.”

Cygnus flinches. “My treasure, we love each other but we also love you. Jackson and I have jointly wanted you for years. Zev threatened to spank me, if I wrote another poem to you and forced him to listen to a night of romantic recitals entitled My Heart of Ice.”

He wrote me poems…?

Cygnus blushes like he realizes what he’s just said. “Ehm, can you pretend that I didn’t admit that? Especially the title of the recitals? The point is that we found our way to you in the end, and we’ll do the same for Ash. But we have to do it right, or we’ll lose him. Plus legally, Companions are still in a precarious position. It’ll kill us all, if we lost Ash.”

I nod.

He has a point.

Yet won’t it kill Asher to be excluded?

When I watch Asher on the ice and the way that he moves with the Alphas like he’s in tune with them, it’s clear that he should be part of their bonded pack.

I clench my hands at my sides.

Asher has the puck now.

He’s closing in on the goal.

He’s going to shoot…

The crowd are on their feet, screaming for him to score.

Cygnus has let go of his hold on me and wrenched his hand out of mine to jump up and down, excitedly.

All of a sudden, I begin to shake.

My hands are clammy. A fever rips through my body.

What the fuck is happening?

Another wave of heat hits me, stronger than before.

Something is really wrong.

This is more than stress catching up with me or sweating in the suit.

More than going down with the flu.

Is this my first heat, hitting me unexpectedly?

But how’s this possible?

Please, please, don’t let this be happening now.

Not here at such an important game, when I’ve made a promise not to distract my Alphas.

I have to leave.

“Cygnus, I need a break,” I call, not caring about breaking the number one rule.

Right now, nothing matters but getting out of the arena, before I wreck this game.

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