Mari's Mistake - Ruby Dixon Page 0,50

slashes on the jaw. I grin to myself. Today is getting better and better.

The only thing that would make my smile bigger? If my khui sang. But it is a traitor, and just as silent as ever. I will go around you, then, I vow. Tonight, I will woo my mate with words alone. If you will not sing on your own, perhaps we will convince you.

I like this thought. I like it very much…and I cannot wait for sundown.

"You don't have to look so thrilled to get cut open," Mari grumbles, and I just laugh.

15

MARI

I use the excuse of needing hot, boiled water to clean T'chai's wounds to sit by the fire. In reality, the khui will probably stop most smaller infections, and as long as the cut is clean, he should be okay. But my heart tells me to clean everything fiercely, and twice, and pack it with herbs, all because I remember those long, awful days in which he struggled to breathe, his entire body hot and swollen from infection.

"Pobrecito," I cluck at him as I dab at his wounds.

"Poor little one?" He pulls away from me, stung. "You think I am a kit?"

"It's an expression," I reassure him. "An affectionate one. Now give me your jaw." He looks a bit mulish but does as I say, letting me carefully clean the grit out of the cuts with a bit of softened leather. Gail hands me a bowl of steaming water sprinkled with cleansing herbs, and I shoot her a grateful look, then return to concentrating on my mate. For all that T'chai thinks it's not a big deal, it's a deep cut, and I could kill I'rec for doing this to him. Just walk right over to his big arrogant face and choke him to death.

"You are scowling," T'chai murmurs, his hand trailing up my pants leg to rest on my hip.

"I'm mad at I'rec," I whisper. "And Tia, too. That little shit." I try to put myself in Tia's shoes. I was a huge flirt when I was in high school, too, but I knew better than to flirt with a bunch of older men that had never had a woman before. The testosterone on the beach has been building to a damn crescendo lately. With each pair that resonates, the remaining males get a little more anxious and desperate. Shadow Cat is already full of hotheads and the fact that none of them have resonated to anyone has not been lost on anyone. They're wound up, ready to explode—and it happened today. "She's been playing with fire and now we're all getting burned."

"Everything is all right," T'chai soothes me. "No one was truly hurt."

"Oh, I'm sorry, cabrón, is this not your blood all over my hands?"

"You are very mad," T'chai points out, and there's a hint of wonder in his voice.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"I like that you are so protective of me," he murmurs, trying to nuzzle against my hand.

That sets my cootie off in a jarring way, and it sends a flare of dislike through my body. I ignore it—because fuck that stupid thing anyhow—and continue to tend to my mate. "I just don't like you getting hurt. And look at R'jaal's eye. It's terrible. All because a little girl wanted all the boys to pay attention to her." I cluck my tongue, and then stop myself. Tia is young. I'm not going to attack her for being young and stupid and boy-crazy. I'm just mad because the sight of T'chai with blood all over his face nearly made my heart stop in my chest. "You're not allowed to get wounded," I remind my mate. "Not even a scratch."

He chuckles, his breath warm against my fingers as I dab at his wounds. "If I get this attention, I am going to show up with small cuts all the time."

I mock-scowl at him, but my heart feels lighter at his flirting. Not just because of relief, but because I like talking with him. I like being with him, and flirting. I like when he smiles. Even if everything seems to be falling apart around us, when T'chai smiles, it feels all right.

Then he touches my hand and that feeling of wrongness sweeps over me again, and my happy mood dissipates. Can't it stop for a freaking day? A freaking hour? I clench my jaw and wet the cloth again, focusing on T'chai even as voices rise around us.

"It's not my fault," Tia sobs. "I