She’d never been so furious with him.
With one hand he rubbed at the back of his neck, his gaze wary now.
“Did you know about that mating bullshit?” she demanded, watching his face and seeing the total lack of response. Her ire exploded further. “You knew!” she hissed furiously, completely outraged now. “You knew and you still spread those kisses around like kids spread the common cold. What? Do you have a frickin’ harem now?”
Oh, that so wasn’t going to work for her. He could just leave right now.
“Dammit, Chelsea, it doesn’t work that way.” Shooting her an infuriated look, he stomped to the wooden chest at the end of her bed and sat down, jerking one boot off.
“That isn’t what I just heard from Graeme,” she snapped back, her hands going to her hips. “And you can just put that boot right back on because you are not staying here tonight. God only knows how many women you have waiting to be serviced. Don’t let me hold you up.”
Damned alley cat.
He wiped his hand over his face, shaking his head as a grimace pulled at his expression.
“Hasn’t Isabelle told you anything about her mating with Malachi?” His boots thumped on the floor, irritation flashing in his expression.
“My sister’s too busy telling on me to bother telling on anyone else.” She gave a hard flip of her hand as she glared at him furiously.
So much for keeping her sister’s secrets for her when they were younger.
“Breeds only mate once,” he told her then, surprising her. “After they mate they never desire another. It’s actually physically impossible for either a Breed or their mate to have another lover.”
That stopped her cold. And not necessarily in satisfaction.
“What if you die? Or I kill you?” She arched a brow.
Killing him really wasn’t a bad idea at this point.
He shot her a wary look, keeping his gaze on her as she paced to the other side of the room before turning back to him and crossing her arms over her breasts defensively.
She hated feeling this way. Like some damned shrew, completely out of control. But she knew what was coming, she could feel it all the way to the bottom of her soul.
She could feel the cage being assembled as she fought to stay free of it.
“There’s not a lot of information on those who have lost their mates,” he finally answered, resting his arms on his knees and clasping his hands together as he watched her carefully. “But those who have mated have one thing in common. The touch of anyone besides their mate is highly uncomfortable and in some cases painfully so. The injection Graeme gave us will allow impersonal touches. Shaking hands, social hugs. It will prevent conception for the time being and dilute the mating scent. The demand for sex won’t be as extreme, but it will eventually build to the extreme if ignored.”
She inhaled deeply. The cage was coming closer.
“No harem,” he assured her.
Chelsea shot him a disgusted glare.
“And no cure.” She couldn’t believe it. She could not be tied this way to a man who didn’t love her, or respect her, let alone acknowledge the abilities he knew she had.
“No cure,” he agreed softly. “But none of the mates I know are unhappy or dissatisfied, Chelsea.”
Then they weren’t with a mate who considered himself stuck, as Cullen did.
“I’m sorry, honey.” Rising to his feet, he crossed the room, stopping in front of her as she watched him with wary anger.
“Don’t you ‘honey’ me. It was bad enough working with you,” she accused him heatedly. “You treated me like a kid who didn’t know her own mind. You’ll just use this mating thing to try to control me now.”
He had her in his arms before she could turn away from him and retreat once again, her head pulled back and his lips slanting over hers in a wild, feral hunger she was helpless to deny.
Fuck, he loved touching Chelsea, and he knew that the pure sensual joy he found in touching her wasn’t all Mating Heat.
Mating Heat had nothing to do with how silky her skin was, how soft and warm she felt pressed against him. And it wasn’t why the need to touch her over the past years had driven him nearly insane.