“And?”
“And the fact that you have resorted to making a list regarding your doctors shows me that you feel more attraction for them than you ever had with me. I never even made it to a list. Did I?” Chucking her under her chin, Zane waited until she met his gaze. “Tell me what this is about. Truly.”
“I’m scared that this is too out of the norm for me,” Andi whispered. “When I first met them, it was so chaotic. We had just been kidnapped and some of the women almost died. They were busy taking care of the ones who needed help and I was on emotion overload.”
“Keep going,” Zane instructed.
“Then when I finally get to see them up close and personal, I thought they were just a couple of assholes.” When Zane started laughing, Andi smacked his shoulder with the paper still in her hand. “Seriously, I thought that they had the worst bedside manners I had seen in my life. And of course, I couldn’t keep my mouth closed. I went and started yelling like a crazy person and did something I had never done in my life.”
“Wait a minute, you never mentioned this part. What happened?” Concerned, Zane sat back to listen seriously.
“I hit him.” As she was covering her face with her hands, the words came out garbled.
“Who did you hit?” Zane’s asked in disbelief.
“I hit Rodin. Across the face. With my hand.” Completely ashamed, Andi could only wait for Zane to react to her confession.
His reaction was one she in no way expected. The jerk started laughing at her. Not only laughing but full-out braying mixed with laughter as if he had just heard the funniest joke anyone had ever told.
“What the hell, Zane?” Andi crossed her arms and stuck out her chin. “Want to tell me what the fuck you find so funny?”
“No wonder they want you. Andi, you stood up to them. Tamin and Rodin are accustomed to being listened to by even the highest council members. Very few ever have questioned them. Not only are you gorgeous, but you managed to be different from anyone else they have ever come into contact with,” Zane explained, all the while smiling.
“So, you’re saying he likes me because I hit him?” Andi asked, sure her face showed how ridiculous that sounded.
“What I am saying is that you showed them that you are a strong women. No warrior wants a female who will bow and cower to their every demand. We want a woman who is our equal. They were shown firsthand what you are made of and this is on top of the way you took care of those women during that ordeal.” Winking at Andi, he propped his feet up on the small coffee table. “I am actually surprised that Rodin did not just toss you over his shoulder and carry you away right then and there.”
“Seriously? There will be no tossing, Zane. None. Not until I can figure out what the hell I’m doing here. I honestly feel as if I am losing my mind.” Gripping her hair in her fingers, she gave a tug and then ran her palms down her face.
“Let us talk this through. What are your major concerns with marrying the doctors?”
“I don’t know them, for one. And let’s not forget the fact that there are two of them!” Exasperated that Zane could sound so calm when she was freaking out, Andi kicked one of his legs off the table with her foot.
Zane gave her an offended frown when his foot thudded to the floor. Holding out his hands as if he were explaining something to a toddler, he spoke slowly.
“So, get to know them. You have a contract to work with them. Learn about them. Ask questions. Do the thing that you did when you first got here and started talking to me.”
Andi waved her hand at him. “This is totally different.”
Throwing both of his hands in the air as if he had just won the lottery, Zane let out a loud noise. “Ah-ha! That is exactly my point, Andi. It is different with them.”
“Zane, they want to share me. That’s not normal where I am from. Fuck, that’s not normal, period. There are religious groups where men have more than one wife but I’ve never heard of more than one husband. I take that back. I have read a few books where that was the setup.”
Cocking his eyebrow at her questioningly, Zane asked, “So you have read about relationships like this in the books you are obsessed with?”
“I’m not obsessed…I just like to read. And yes, there are a few books that have two men to one woman,” she admitted reluctantly, her cheeks turning red.
“What about multiple women and one man?” Zane asked, obviously curious.
“No, these are all based on fantasy and there is nothing in my fantasy about sharing a man with another woman. The whole lesbian thing never floated my boat,” she said honestly.
“So this is a fantasy. That is a starting point,” he pointed out.
“But it’s not realistic, Zane. What about jealousy? What happens if I get pregnant and they treat the baby differently because it isn’t their own? There is a reason these relationships don’t happen in real life. Human emotions are all over the place. Hell, I went through about eighty of them simply on the walk to the apartment tonight.” Lying back against the couch, Andi let sadness sweep through her at the thought of trying to make a relationship work only to have it fail.
“There is one thing that you need to remember, Andi,” Zane pointed out.
“What’s that?”
“We are not human. If the men have made the decision to share, you can be surethis is what they want. The Bridal Pact is something that we take very seriously.”
“So you’re saying to give them a shot?” Andi asked, hoping that her close friend wouldn’t steer her wrong.
“I’m saying not to let fear keep you from something that you want. You already took a chance coming up here to begin with. Find that courage again and figure out if you have the guts to go for what you want.” Smacking his palm against her thigh where their legs touched on the couch, Zane stood up. “Our dinner is getting cold. Let’s eat while you think. I have a feeling that you will either mumble through the entire meal or be silent.”
Making a face at his retreating back, Andi stood up to follow him. She studied him as he was setting out their food. “Thanks for talking this through with me.”
“I love you, Andi. I will always be here for you. I want you to do what you came here to do when you signed up for the Bridal Pact.” At her questioning glance, he explained, “Live, Andi. I want you to live.” Sliding her plate to her, he joked, “I just hope that your admirers don’t try to kill me while you figure out what you want to do with them.”
“They wouldn’t do that,” Andi argued. Raising her eyebrow at him when he was silent, she asked, “Would they?”
“I believe every single one of us would stop at nothing to claim the woman whom we were destined for,” Zane replied in a voice that was far too serious for him. “At nothing, Andi.”
Chapter Seven
As Andi walked with Zane to the med center the next morning, her mind kept repeating their conversation from the prior evening. Her friend had made some very good points. Watching Zane as he navigated the corridors, she knew that life would have been so much easier if they had been attracted to each other.
Damn those doctors! When she had met them the first time, she’d been so angry she hadn’t noticed how sexy they were. Many people acted as if they were interchangeable when it came to dealing with them. In the short amount of time that she had talked to the men, Andi had not only noticed they were completely different personality-wise, but they also evoked different emotions from her. Tamin seemed to be easygoing, not unlike Zane. He made her feel automatically comfortable but still managed to send off that sexy vibe. Rodin was the watcher of the pair. He seemed to take in everything before he spoke and was much more serious. Intense. Andi had the urge when she was around him to lower her eyes. She never felt dominated by simply speaking to someone. She still could not believe that she had actually struck Rodin, yet in the time since then, he had made her want to stutter and blush.
She was losing her mind. Literally. Her sanity slipped the more she thought about their
proposed arrangement. Zane had started teasing her at breakfast about the men, using humor to ease the stress that was apparent on her face.
Not realizing that Zane had stopped walking at the med center door, Andi glanced around confused when he wasn’t at her side anymore.
“Hello?” Zane, standing ten feet behind her, sounded like he was going to laugh.
“Dammit!” Turning around to pin him with her best glare, she smiled when she saw he was trying not to chuckle at her. “I meant to walk there.” Waving her hand in the direction she’d been walking, she turned her glare back on when he began to laugh out loud.
“What’s so funny, chuckles?” Stomping in front of him, she popped her hands on her hips and debated giving him a purple nurple.
“You see where you stopped?” He gestured to the doorway in the hall.
“Yeah, what of it?” Hating being teased, Andi eyeballed the front of his leather tunic.
“That is Tamin and Rodin’s apartment. You meant to go to their apartment?” he asked with a smirk. Holding his hands up and backing away, Zane laughed when her face turned red. “Because I can leave if you need some alone time in their private quarters.”
“Fuck you, Zane. Fuck. You.” Smacking her palm on the door before she grabbed his chest and started twisting, Andi waited for the door to open.
“Who am I to stand in the way of true love?” Zane joked as they entered.
Andi closed her eyes in embarrassment. Not only were the two men who currently occupied her thoughts standing in front of her, but so were a couple of the councilmen.
“Oops,” Zane whispered out the side of his mouth as he reached out to shake hands with the other warriors.
“True love? Please tell us more, Andi.” Tamin seemed to find the situation amusing while Andi wanted nothing more than to sink into a crack on the floor and die.
“Umm…no thanks.” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath to collect herself before smiling and nodding at the men in the room. “Gentlemen, how are you doing today?”
Wheaton came forward to shake her hand, “We are well. The councilors wanted to check in with medical to see if there had been any change in the condition of Isabel.”
“I haven’t really had a chance to work with her yet, Wheaton.” When one of the men behind him gasped, she realized that she hadn’t addressed him formally. “I’m sorry. I mean, Councilor Wheaton.”
He shook his head at her. “Please just call me Wheaton. There is no need to be formal since we are not in a council meeting.”
“Andi, I need to get to the docking bay. Do you need anything before I leave?” Zane touched her shoulder as he posed the question and Andi was certain she heard growling coming from somewhere behind him. When her shoulder was squeezed, she looked up into Zane’s smiling face, remembering that he was waiting for a response.
“Not that I can think of.” Patting his hand, Andi leaned up to give him a quick kiss on the cheek. Once again she heard a strange rumbling noise. “Is that your stomach?” she asked Zane.
“No, that is—” Zane started, only to be cut off when he received a strong pat to the back.
Rodin peered around his shoulder at Andi. “We will take care of you from here.” One more whack to the back and Zane was pushed out the door without saying goodbye to anyone else in the room.
As soon as the council members left, Andi shot glares at the men who were driving her nuts.
“That was rude,” Andi muttered as she walked to her newly assigned desk.
“That was me saving him from himself,” Rodin answered with a straight face.
Andi looked up at Rodin, who was leaning with one hip against her desk. Damn the man could really fill out a pair of leather pants. Trying to keep her eyes from tracing the bulge that was straining the front of his pants, Andi rolled her eyes at him. “Saving him from himself? What does that even mean?”
Tamin joined Rodin at her small area. “It means that if he had touched you again, then neither Rodin nor I would have been responsible for what happened next.”
“He is my friend. FRIEND.” Andi enunciated the words as if she were talking to a toddler. “I have one friend other than the brides and it happens to be Zane. Deal with it.” Using her best nurse voice, Andi stood up and folded her arms across her chest. “Since you gave the councilmen information on Isabel’s condition, would you like to enlighten me as well?”
Rodin smirked at her change of subject but, passed her the tablet he had been clicking on when she entered the room. “She is still requesting tranquilizers. She has been asking for them more frequently than we can safely administer them. Her husband was here earlier, but she refused to speak to him or even open her eyes. The monitors showed that she was awake and yet she pretended to sleep until he left the room.”
Tamin looked haggard while Rodin delivered the news of their patient’s condition. “Staci will be in later today for another treatment. Her appointment will be after our physicals with Sector 3.”
“What is Sector 3?” Andi wondered out loud.
“It’s the area of the ship where warriors maintain the ship’s engines. We perform physicals by Sectors to ensure that everyone is rotated through,” he explained.
Reading the information on the screen, Andi looked up at the mention of Staci. “Is there a reason she is getting rescanned?”
Tamin nodded. “Her scarring has almost completely been removed in the regen bed after multiple treatments. We are hoping that she will be able to conceive once it is finished.”
Andi couldn’t contain her excitement. There was a possibility that her friend could have a baby! Bouncing from toe to toe, she smiled widely. “Have either of you mentioned this to Isabel?”
Rodin seemed perplexed at the question. Cocking his eyebrow, he tilted his head and shook it. “Why would we mention it to her?”
“Duh, guys. She thinks she will never be able to give Nixon any baby warriors. If she has hope, then maybe it will knock her out of this funk enough to heal emotionally.”
Disagreeing, Rodin argued, “It would be cruel to give her hope. Staci’s case is still too new. Isabel has also not let us scan her since her original intake when the pregnancy was terminated. We may be unable to eliminate her scar tissue as we did in Staci’s case.”
“Having hope may be the only thing that helps her right now. She is wasting away in that bed, refusing to even talk to her husband because she thinks she has no value. Even if there’s a slight chance she can have a baby, then she needs to know so we can start trying to repair the damage that was done.” Pointing her finger at Isabel’s room, Andi stood her ground. “I think it’s time I talked to her and let her know about Staci’s chances. I won’t tell her that we are sure yet, but giving her just a little speck of sunlight has to be worth something.”
Without waiting for the men to reply, Andi marched into her patient’s room. Noticing immediately that her friend looked even more withdrawn and depleted, she walked quietly to the bedside and reached for Isabel’s hand. It was limp and cool and Andi cupped the fragile fingers in her warm hand.
“Isabel? Are you awake?” Waiting a moment before pulling up a stool, Andi sat beside the bed and took Isabel’s hand again in her own.
“We need to talk,” Andi whispered in case Isabel was truly resting. She really needed to figure out that stupid monitor. It would be able to tell her whether or not Isabel was playing possum.
“I don’t want to talk anymore.” Isabel’s voice came out no more than a whisper, sounding unused and weak.
“Well, buttercup…there is actually a lot you need to hear. So let me do all the talking.” Andi was made from pretty steady stock. She had never allowed anyone to dismiss her and she wasn’t going to start now.
“I don’t want to listen anymore either.” Isabel’s voice seemed slightly stronger this time around, most likely from anger.
“That’s too bad. You haven’t gotten out of this bed in almost a month so I’m pretty sure you won’t be
able to run away from me, and that’s what you’re going to have to do to not hear what I have to say.” Squeezing the fingers she was still holding, Andi smiled when Isabel turned to glare at her.
“That’s what I’m talking about.” Chuckling, Andi winked and patted Isabel’s hand. “If you have enough energy to be pissed at me, then you have some fire left in you after all.”
“Say what you want to say then please leave.” The words were short and curt. Most likely Isabel thought she sounded firm but instead it made Andi even more determined to get her to actually listen.
“Isabel—” she started, only to have her own fingers squeezed.
“Call me Izzie,” Isabel interrupted.
Andi continued, “Izzie, I heard the doctors mention that you may be sterile after you miscarried.” At those words, Izzie’s eyes filled with tears. Rolling her head to look up at the ceiling instead of at Andi made the tears that had collected travel out of the corners of her eyes and into her hairline.
“Yeah, they said that.” Izzie closed her eyes and had started to turn to face the other direction when Andi’s next words stopped her.
“But Staci has been receiving treatments and she may be able to conceive after a few more.” Hoping that the words would penetrate her friend’s fog of misery, Andi waited to be acknowledged again.
“Seriously?”
The word was whispered so quietly that Andi almost didn’t hear it.
“Yes, it has taken multiple trips to the regen bed, but her scar tissue is going away. The doctors are hopeful it will continue to decrease.”
“What about me?” Izzie’s eyes had started streaming, but she was showing no outward signs of crying except for the constant drip from her eyelids.
“They won’t be able to tell unless you start getting your regen scans done. I heard that you refused to continue after the initial treatment?” Andi kept her voice light, not wanting to scare Izzie into going silent again.