Mindy’s face softened. “You mean the world to me!”
“Then why did you treat me like shit?” I countered. “I’ve been worried sick for weeks, Mindy. Eight weeks!”
She frowned. “I’ve only been here for two days. I don’t understand.”
The warden cleared her throat a few feet away. “Time on Trion is slightly different than here on Earth. And Viken. I’m sorry, ladies, but the best I’ve been able to calculate, based on the brides I’ve sent to Trion in the past, is that one day on Trion is equivalent to somewhere between four and five weeks on Earth.”
“What?” Was I yelling? Or was the scream just in my head?
Mindy, in my twin’s typical reaction, waved her hand in front of her face and brushed away what she didn’t consider worth her consideration. Space-time continuum, Star Trek kind of bullshit, evidently fit in that category. “Look, Violet. This isn’t about you, it’s about me. After Josh dumped me, I needed a change. There wasn’t anything left there for me.”
I stepped back as if punched and I ran into a solid body. Big, tall, warm. A hand settled on my shoulder, comforting me. “Nothing left here? So, I’m nothing?”
“Who is that?” Mindy asked, wide eyed, pointing.
I didn’t know which mate it was, so I glanced over my shoulder.
“Calder.” I wasn’t going to tell her more. She hadn’t earned any explanations from me after what she’d just admitted.
Mindy held up a hand. “Wait. Wait! How are you talking to me? There aren’t any comms in Vero Beach.” I could see her brain working. “You’re at the Brides Processing Center. Why?”
“To talk to you.”
She shook her head, her dark hair sliding over her mostly bare shoulders.
“No. They wouldn’t have just let you walk in there and ask to talk to me. What’s going on?”
I let out a deep breath. “Mindy, I’ve been crazy with worry. You left almost two months ago and I haven’t heard a word.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you?” I wondered. “You don’t sound sorry to me. I haven’t slept in weeks, and you’ve been playing house with an alien.”
“I’m not playing anything. I’m falling in love with him. And god, he’s so good in bed. I think I had four orgasms the first couple of hours and—”
“Shut up. Just shut the fuck up.” I wasn’t one to swear, but now was sooooo the time for it. “I can’t believe you right now.”
She sighed and titled her head in that way she had when she was going to placate me and use the twin bond against me. It always worked. I always forgave her for whatever crazy shenanigans she pulled. But this? This was too much.
“I’m sorry. I should have told you in person. But I wouldn’t have been able to go through with it, to go and get tested. I needed to go, to find my mate. I was tired of losers like Josh and I just didn’t want to wait for the next loser and then the next. I wanted him, the One for me. I wouldn’t have been able to say goodbye. It was too hard.”
Tears welled in her eyes and slid down her cheeks. What she said was true, all of it. She’d dated a string of losers. She might have had some good orgasms, but that had been it. No connection. No love. A bunch of assholes. There may have been some decent guys in there, but they hadn’t been the one for her.
I knew now that the test was really good and if she’d been matched to a mate with as much compatibility as I had with Axon, Zed and Calder, then she was probably really, really happy.
“I would have gone with you,” I told her.
She sniffed. “Really? Violet, you’re perfect. Your life is perfect. We might be twins, but you’ve been taking care of me for years. I’m a total fuckup in comparison to you.”
I shook my head. “I don’t like hearing you talk about yourself that way.”
“I don’t either.” A deep voice boomed through the display and Mindy’s eyes widened. At first, she looked a little panicked, then she smiled. Brilliantly.
“Master, please, I very much would like you to meet my sister.”
A big man came into view, stood slightly behind Mindy. He wore armor covered by flowing robes that made him look like he belonged to a medieval desert tribe. The sword on his hip look deadly, but it was the weapon on the other hip I knew was the true threat. Some kind of gun, but all silver. An alien gun. He looked ready for war, which made me nervous.
But Mindy was beaming up at him like he was her everything. I’d never seen her look at anyone like that, and something inside me forgave her, just a little. I’d never seen her that happy. This guy, my sister’s master, was tall, dark and handsome, his hair long enough to brush his shoulders, whiskers on his jaw. He looked like a… a pirate or a sultan. The way he had his hand wrapped around Mindy’s waist, high up so that her breasts rested on his forearm, was blatant indication of possession. Had she really called him Master?