"How did Kye deal with it?"
"About as well as me. He doesn't want it any more than I do."
"So where is he?"
"I have no idea." And despite the coldness deep within, I didn't really care. I didn't want to care. Not about him, not ever. "He's probably off somewhere shooting someone in frustration, for all I know."
"If he did, we could hunt him down and-"
"And what?" I interrupted. "Kill him? You know the lore, Rhoan. Kill him, and you kill me."
He gave me a glance. "Ben didn't die when his soul mate died."
"But he wanted to. It was only his sister who kept him alive."
"And you think I wouldn't do the same for you?"
I placed a hand on his knee and squeezed lightly. "I know you would. But I don't ever want to face that decision or that situation. It's better if he's alive and out there somewhere."
Just not in my face. Or in my life.
But would fate let things go on like that? I had a bad feeling the answer would be no.
He blew out a breath and took another sip of his coffee. "So what do we do?"
"Right now?"
"Right now, and later on."
"Well, the first thing I need to do is go talk to Quinn."
"Oh, fuck."
"Yeah," I said, keeping my voice even though everything inside seemed to hurt. Or everything that wasn't half frozen, at least.
"What the hell are you going to say to him?"
I snorted softly. "Why do you think I've been sitting out here for the last two hours?"
"You've got to tell him. You owe him that."
"But he doesn't deserve this." Neither of us deserved it. Not when everything was finally starting to fall into place between us.
He hugged me harder and for several minutes, we didn't say anything. Just sat there contemplating the evilness of the universe. Or at least, that's what I was contemplating.
I drained the remainder of my coffee, then said, "There is one tiny spark of hope."
"Of what?"
"Of me and Quinn not being totally over."
Rhoan snorted. "You may not want Kye as a soul mate, and he may not want you, but trust me, he's not going to be interested in sharing, either."
"Quinn's old enough and powerful enough to take care of himself, even against the likes of Kye." Hell, Quinn had once been a professional killer himself, and for far longer than Kye had been. "Besides, Liander shares you."
"Liander is an amazingly patient and loving person. I get the feeling Kye will be neither of those." Rhoan drained his own cup, then plucked mine from my fingers and tossed both into the nearby trash can. "Besides, what makes you think that Quinn will want to share you with your soul mate, knowing that at any moment he could lose you? You ask a lot of him."
"But what if he's my soul mate, too?"