Page 8 of Fated to the Alien Rebel

“I’m awake,” I rasp out with a husky note of sleepiness and rub at my gritty eyes.

Maeve and Zara sit on the latter’s pallet staring at me. In Maeve’s hands is a bowl that smells like it’s filled with kokrra, the grain-like food that is served at the morning meal with a sweet syrupy substance I like. Slowly, I push myself to sitting and swipe my hair off my face. “What time is it?”

“Just after breakfast,” Maeve says.

“What? Kyler wasn’t supposed to let me sleep that long. He promised to come get me if Jodah woke up.” I’m scrambling to stand.

Zara reaches over and, with hands on my shoulders, gently pushes me. I collapse onto my butt in my furs. “Sit your ass back down. He stopped by already, and Jodah is fine. He’s woken up a few more times and is alert and talking. He’s fine. But you’re not going to be, if you keep running yourself ragged. As your friends, we’re staging an intervention we should have staged days ago.”

“Exactly. This is us, intervention-ing.” Maeve actually harrumphs and thrusts the bowl into my lap. “Now eat something. You’ve lost too much weight.”

Reluctantly, I grip the wooden utensil and glare. “Intervention-ing isn’t even a word.”

Maeve crosses her arms. “It is now. I just made it up. Now eat.”

I shovel a big bite into my mouth and talk around it. “When did you become the bossy one?”

Zara laughs.“You do realize who she’s mated to, right? I think Benham is rubbing off on her.”

Maeve’s cheeks turn pink. “I want my friend to not get sick, and I’m not going to apologize for it.”

“I appreciate you thinking of me. Thank you for bringing food.” In truth it’s good to have friends who care and aren’t afraid to push me when I truly need it.

“You’re welcome,” she says primly.

“So,” Zara draws out the word for several beats. “How lovestruck was Jodah when he woke up and saw his mating marks? Did he go on and on about how Deeka has blessed him?”

The kokrra gets stuck in my throat like a boulder. It takes a second, but I finally manage to swallow. It’s a painful admission, but these are my friends. “He wasn’t.”

Zara’s forehead creases. “He wasn’t what?”

“Lovestruck.”

She cocks her head in obvious confusion. “How did he react then?”

I give a little shrug and my chest tightens. “Like he didn’t particularly care.”

Both she and Maeve rear back. Of course it’s Zara who reacts the strongest. “What the actual fuck?”

The hurt I tried holding back yesterday bursts out of me. Tears well and my lip quivers. Both of them scramble close, park themselves on either side of me, and grab my hands.

“What happened?” Maeve asks softly, stroking my back.

“Jo—Jodah woke up,”—I stutter—“and when I showed him the mating marks on his arm, his face was blank. No reaction whatsoever. To make it worse, he thanked me for spending a week taking care of him. Kyler thinks it’s just because he’s been so injured and isn’t himself yet, but I know that’s not it.”

Zara tugs down her sleeve, grips the cuff in her palm, and swipes it over my eyes drying my tears. “Then we’ll figure out what the problem is and fix it. Deeka doesn’t give these guys mating marks and then say, ‘Oops, I made a mistake’. Which means something else is going on. Maybe it is his injury or maybe it’s not. And if he’s a giant dick to you, then you don’t want him for a mate anyway. There’s not a warrior here who wouldn’t want you for himself.”

She’s almost got me crying again. “What if Jodah doesn’t want me?”

“Then we’ll find you someone who does.I’m the only one left not mated,” Zara reminds us, “so I’ll go around and touch every single warrior of appropriate age until I find my mate or don’t. Whoever’s left are potential boyfriends, husbands, mates, whatever.”

That all sounds great, but there’s something she’s forgetting. “What about the single females still at the settlement? Or when another ship lands here to drop off more humans? What if one of those women is the mate of the guy we pick?”

Zara scoffs. “The women back at the settlement have had ample opportunity to mingle with the Tavikhi. And if more humans do come, it’ll be too late. Our men won’t be touching anybody else but us.”

As much as I love her for trying to cheer me up, I couldn’t do it. How would I feel if someone had taken the male who was supposed to be my mate? It wouldn’t matter that he didn’t know he was mine. I don’t want to do that to another woman. “Thank you for being such an amazing friend, but if Jodah doesn’t want to be my mate, then he doesn’t want to. I’ll just stay single and maybe try to find a bunch of ketri to be my pets since we don’t have cats here. I’ll be the crazy ketri lady.”

How I can possibly have any type of sense of humor right now, I don’t know. I suppose it’s laugh so I don’t cry.

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