Page 30 of Pregnant Rejected Mate

Kairo giggles nervously. “Are you sure you want to be his karma?”

“I think that’s exactly what I’m here for. Sorry,” I grimace.

“He has it coming,” she offers with a grin. “I guess he resents himself ‘cause he didn’t even tell me about it. I would have slapped him and told him to get it together if he did.”

I giggle, feeling like a weight has been lifted thanks to a listening ear. “Life has a way of coming full circle, doesn’t it?”

Kairo stops giggling and stares speculatively into my eyes. “How do you feel about him now?”

“I—I don’t know,” I shrug. “Seeing him again only reminded me of the pain. Blinding pain, and I can’t see past that.” It’s the raw truth of what I’ve been feeling. Yesterday, for a fleeting moment, I glimpsed the attraction I once felt for him, that mindless attraction that had my arousal flowing just from his presence. Yet, the heartbreak overshadows what I once felt for the man.

Knowing the truth of his identity is a shocker rather than a temptation. However, it makes me wonder if that’s the reason why he left—his unwillingness to reveal the truth until he was forced to face me with his authenticity.

“I’m gonna speak to him,” Kairo declares as she makes to stand up. I grab her wrist to stop her from leaving, shaking my head.

“Don’t,” I plead. If he doesn’t realize the extent of the hurt he’d caused me, having someone else explain it to him is pointless. It’s not like he’s incapable of feeling emotions unless his inability to tell me the truth before only attests to the feelings he never had for me.

I gulp hard, the painful realization almost too harsh to swallow.

“He knows what he did; we don’t have to tell him,” I continue. “It’s bad enough that he lied to me before. If he can’t take responsibility, then he’s not the man I thought he was.”

Kairo accepts this with a gentle nod, taking her seat again just as the sounds of indistinct chatter fill the courtyard. I turn my face in the direction of a child’s laughter to see a man and woman appearing from the back of the castle. A heavily pregnant woman, the man carrying a dark-haired, creamy-skinned child.

Kairo takes a deep breath as she gives my hand a gentle squeeze. “We have visitors,” she says with a smile, leading me to my feet. “Is now a good time?”

“Of course,” I assure her, returning her smile. “If he isn’t planning on letting me leave just yet, I might as well meet the others.”

We face the others just as they approach us, the strawberry-blonde man grinning from ear to ear, his eyes sparkling with jest. The pregnant woman comes skipping forward, cradling her belly with one hand as she flings her arm around me for a hug.

“It’s nice to finally meet you, Sierra,” she says when she pulls back with a light giggle. “I’m Yazmine. And this is Stryder.” She points to the man whose eyes don’t stop twinkling as he stretches an arm out.

“Lovely to meet you, Sierra,” he says, lifting my hand and placing a chaste kiss on my knuckles. The gesture is kind, and I relish the natural charm he exudes. The weredragons are awfully charismatic, having lived for centuries.

Perhaps that’s why I fell in love with Felix so easily. He, too, was as charming as they come. Was it all a lie, a tactic of manipulation to foreshadow what was to come when he flew me out here to demand that I bear his children?

I can’t understand it, brushing aside those rueful thoughts to just live in the moment. To be present.

“You’re one of the twins, right?” I ask, glancing at Kairo, who nods in agreement. She’d given me a complete run-down of the Vulkan gang and her brothers’ respective mates. Turning back to the others, I reach out toward the baby. “And this must be Tyson.”

The baby coos when I stroke his cheek, beaming at me with his bright brown eyes.

“He likes you already,” Yazmine titters. “It took some time for him to get friendly with me.”

Stryder chuckles. “That’s because his favorite uncle was your first real friend on the island,” he teases.

Yazmine rolls her eyes. “I might exchange that friendship for one with Sierra.” She turns to me and winks. “It’s not easy being the only other human in this place.”

“What about Lily?” I ask with a frown.

“Lily?” Yazmine exchanges a glance with Kairo and rolls her eyes again, this time clicking her tongue. “She’s hardly ever around. I think she and Draco are trying for another baby, so they’ve technically moved to Italy. Even when they’re here, they’re locked in their bedroom.”

The two women share a laugh while I feel the heat in my cheeks rise. Stryder seems to notice, passing Tyson to Kairo and turning to me.

He leans in and whispers, “Yaz wasn’t always so forthright until she became pregnant.”

Giggling, I whisper back, “It’s only hard to get over the fact that you’re weredragons.”

He leans back and raises a brow. “I’m guessing that’s something you haven’t gotten over.”

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