Page 46 of Bitten By Bloodmoon
Kael grabs my arm, keeping me from walking. I could end his life in a second, but he’s Lumi’s best friend, and I don’t need to do anything else to hurt my relationship with her.
“Is she really safe? Or was that all a load of crap to keep everyone from overthrowing you as alpha?”
“Come into my office, you should hear this too,” I answer.
I lead Kael, Emeric, and Isolde into my office and shut the door. The main reason I’m having this conversation inside instead of out is to keep the rest of the pack and coven fromhearing. But if all of the walls are still intact by the end, it will be a miracle.
I slam the door closed with a flick of my wrist. Kael, who has never seen my magic before, gasps, while Emeric raises an eyebrow at me as if to say we aren’t hiding anything anymore, are we? I want to share everything with both of them, but I have a bigger issue to deal with first.
A blast of my magic shoots from my hand, aimed at Isolde’s chest. She brushes the magic from hitting her body like it’s a bothersome fly.
“I gave you your magic. You really think you have the skills or talent to go up against me, boy?” Isolde says.
A low growl rumbles from deep in my chest, my teeth and claws sharpen into razor points, ready to tear her apart. “If I wanted you dead, you’d be dead.”
“Same,” she says, the fierceness in her eyes cutting through me like a shard of glass.
“Why can’t Lumi control her wolf? Why do I have power over it?”
The room goes so silent I can’t even hear the beat of their hearts or the whiff of their breathing. For a moment, it feels like the entire room has vanished, and it’s just me and Isolde left.
“Why do you think?” she hisses at me.
“I think you intervened! I think you weren’t patient enough for Lumi to figure out how to gain her wolf on her own. I think you tried to control her. I think you didn’t think she could do it on her own before the full moon, so you used your magic to—”
“Ha, you think I forced her to shift? Then why can’t I control her wolf? It’s not me you should be mad at. You were the one who was impatient, not me.”
I growl again, my body beginning to shift into my wolf. I have no control over it at the moment. He wants to rip out her throat.
“I would never do that to my mate!”
“Not even to save yourself? Not even subconsciously?”
“Never!” I snap.
She shakes her head, a cackle in her grin. “And yet, it seems like that’s exactly what happened.”
“I would never do that. I would never control someone like that.”
“And yet, you did.”
My eyes widen in horror. “How do I fix it? How do I give her her wolf back?”How do I make her stop hating me for what I didn’t mean to do?
There’s a pause that extends forever. “You can’t.”
I collapse, falling to my knees, all hope draining from me with her words. The world tilts and blurs around the edges. I know Isolde is telling the truth. There is no fixing this. No giving Lumi back what I took. No healing her. No healing the relationship. She’ll rightfully hate me forever for what I did.
And she’s my mate.
I still know that’s true. It doesn’t matter that she doesn’t love me and that I can’t love her yet. We only get one mate at a time. She’s it until one of us dies; only then will one of us get another.
She’s my mate, and she’ll hate me for the rest of her life. She’ll never stop rejecting the bond. The curse will go stronger instead of us being able to break it. I’ve destroyed everything.
“She’ll forgive you. Tell her the truth. Tell her you didn’t mean to do it. That your magic did it, not you. Never use the power against her. Tell her how much you love her, and she’ll forgive you. Lumi is the most caring, loving person I know. She’s forgiven me countless times. She’ll forgive her mate for this if it means breaking the curse,” Kael says.
I look up at him from where I’m on my knees on the floor. He’s right. But the problem is, I can’t show her that I love her. I can’t tell her. As it is, I’m balancing a very delicate dance, trying to keep myself from loving her.
“Even if that’s true, I think Nyx might be using his mind control against her to convince her to reject our bond and accept him as her mate,” I say.
