Page 95 of A Warrior's Fate

Isla suddenly felt Jonah’s presence behind her and heard him let out a resigned, defeated breath. “You two better not fuck on my floor.”

CHAPTER 23

A little over one month.

She and Kai had made it only a little over a month before they’d found themselves together again. Isla would laugh if she wasn’t so bewildered by it.

She’d known a reunion could happen—that it likely would happen—when she agreed to come to Deimos. Figured she’d spot him from a distance, maybe in a crowd or a gathering somewhere down the line. There would be a moment, an acknowledgment, and then they’d part, continuing with their lives.

Like they’d planned.

But this? She’d been within Deimos’s borders for no more than five Goddess-forsaken hours—maybe even less than that.

And yet, here she was. And there he was.

“Damn mates.”

She barely heard Jonah grumble and paid little mind to him as he moved past her to go to the counter on the other side of the room.

She felt shameful for glancing to the floor if only to picture, for a moment, what he’d warned against.

Mates.

It took Isla, in her daze, a while to register exactly what Jonah had said. But eventually, the words sunk in—further and further, deeper and deeper—until they hit her full force.

With wide eyes, she looked between him and Kai, just in time to catch the two exchanging a glance. A knowing glance. A glance between acquaintances. Between…friends?

But before she could jump to question, Kai’s attention was on her again. Intent and arresting.

Something familiar blazed behind his eyes, and it pulled at that wretched part of her. The part of her that craved. That skittered through her body and torched her skin in a maddening way that she remembered well. In a way that only he could soothe, that only he could touch and kiss and fuck away. Not a man she pulled into the bathroom or back alley of some bar. Not some random suitor she dragged to her apartment. Only him. And he knew it—how badly she wanted him, for the most dizzying of seconds. And maybe she’d been so blinded by her own desire the first time they’d met, or now she was more in tune with him than she’d realized, but she could feel it from him too.

And it just made things worse.

“I’m not kidding,” Jonah reiterated as he sorted through some books. “I’m sure the binding of an alpha and luna is a beautiful, momentous event, but I want no part in it.”

Isla managed to tear her eyes away from Kai to look towards the shop owner again, hearing the words—her “destined” title—enough to jar her from whatever fantasies had been blooming.

“You two know each other?”

Silence fell.

It didn’t seem like that hard of a question, but Jonah looked at Kai. And then Isla had to.

Sensing her impending irritation, her mate let out a sigh before gesturing between them. “Isla. Jonah. My…well, you could call him my brother.”

“Pleasure,” Jonah said before going back to his work.

Brother.

Isla knew what Kai had meant, but still, a dumbfounded expression cast across her face. She tried to wrap her head around how she’d ended up here, feeling horrified that she’d been with Kai’s “brother” for the past few minutes and had no idea. All the while, he knew exactly who she was the second she introduced herself.

She folded her arms across her chest, very aware that she was about to be a hypocrite. “You told people. We promised to keep this a secret, and you told people.”

Kai took a few gentle steps forward.

Isla retreated the same amount.

He flashed a deadpan look, and she raised her brows, urging him to explain.

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