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  “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