Page 205 of Sky’s Edge

Cool, calm, collected Gayle.

“You’ve taken it,” I whispered.

“Yes,” she confirmed.

I closed my eyes.

“Taken what?” Cormac asked.

“I’ve spelled myself so I won’t feel our ties,” Gayle told him.

“You what?” Cormac bellowed.

And if I thought the room was sweltering before, I didn’t know the true meaning of what it felt like to swelter.

“You can hardly be upset by this,” Gayle retorted calmly. “You don’t want me. And now, I don’t want you.”

“You allowed this?” Cormac demanded of Sirk.

“Unlike you, when my female makes her mind up about something important, I don’t interfere,” Sirk replied.

Cormac turned to Aleksei. “You allowed it?”

“I have no control over Gayle,” Aleksei replied.

“Who did you source the spell from?” Cormac asked Gayle.

“It’s none of your business,” Gayle didn’t answer.

“My mate took a bespoke potion concocted from an unknown witch, it’s my fucking business,” Cormac returned.

“I don’t see how,” Gayle said casually.

“I think you need to give him that ten second breathing strategy, Nayden,” I suggested.

Nayden’s eyes lit with humor, but he pressed his lips together so it wouldn’t be audible.

“I claim you,” Cormac stated, directing this to Gayle, and we all went still. “You are mine.”

“Too late, Your Highness,” Gayle replied.

I wasn’t the only one who saw the white-hot sparks sizzling from Cormac’s fingers.

Tanyn did too, because he said, “You need to walk this off, Mac.”

I wasn’t a fan of the focus Cormac had on my male when he demanded, “And you tell me you could walk off witnessing another male paw at your mate.”

“I didn’t fuck around in claiming mine, my friend,” Tanyn said calmly. “Now, we need to figure out how you can live with this situation, and feel Gayle’s safe, and how she can live with it, and her emotions are safe. Gayle made the first move. You can figure out how to work with her on that, or I’m going to have to intervene, and you’re not going to like how I do that.”

I was curious how he would do that.

Though, more, I wanted to rush him and kiss him all over for taking Gayle’s back.

But Cormac wasn’t curious, because he simply asked, “Are you threatening me?”

“You’re hurting her,” Tanyn said quietly. “Are you telling me you’re good with doing that?”

Finally, something shut Cormac up.