Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 77692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
“And it was my right to take you,” I counter. “You are my mate.”
“You just saw me in a bunker and decided that, Halun. It could have been any number of other women who met you standing there—if not me, it could have been someone else.”
“No, it was only ever meant to be you.”
Fate plays no games.
She just shakes her head and decides the fight isn’t worth it at the moment as she finally finds her place on the far side of the bed. I crawl in behind her. It’ll leave my back to the door and not hers.
As it should be.
She huffs happily when her head finally hits the pillow, and I settle in behind her, molding the front of my body along the contours of the back of hers. Just like that, I’m practically frozen at the realization that I have my mate in my bed.
And I’m on my way home.
It’s all a bit surreal.
Using the tips of my claws to clear the stray strands of hair from Luna’s face, I stay slightly raised on my elbow to continue watching her as she begins to fall asleep. I’m not tired yet, and I have the strangest urge to know what her face looks like as she drifts into dreams.
Will she dream of me?
“I do like that even though I give you every reason not to treat me as if you want me,” she breathes, the sleep thick in her voice, “it has no effect on the fact that you do.”
“I know,” I say quietly. “Go to sleep now, Luna.”
“And you know,” she mumbles tiredly, rolling around so that she faces me, and she can curl into my chest where she instantly stills, “you still did a bad thing to me. It’s not okay. Even if maybe, I do sometimes like something about you.”
This tiny admittance also makes my chest swell as I smirk.
“For the right reasons,” I counter back to her.
“Yet to be determined.”
“I promise, no matter what, that won’t ever change between us.”
Luna’s body jerks with a sudden laugh before she asks, “Ha, with what? You making the final decisions about everything under the pretense that it is for my own good or because you think it’s right?”
Never once does she open her eyes. It shouldn’t be such a shock to me that all she needed was a little riling up to almost wake back up again. I bet I could push that button in every way good, if tempted.
If only she could see my grin.
I stroke my fingers through the silky strands of her hair, and tell her, “No, I promise it won’t change how I treat you. Even if there are times when you feel I am not worthy of cherishing, adoring, and protecting you, I will always provide those things to you in the ways you want and need them from me.”
She doesn’t realize it, maybe, because things have happened so fast and she hasn’t processed it all or what it all means, but I am who I am. First in line to my father’s throne, from the oldest family of Hallan blood. This will not be the last time in my lifetime, or hers, where I will be put in positions to make choices that she does not like or approve of.
These are also things that—sometimes—cannot be helped.
“Mmm, so you're saying you’ll basically love me even when I hate you,” Luna says, using Earth words that have started to integrate their way into our translator’s vocabulary.
Her head tips back then, and I find her brown eyes wide open, seeking mine in the dimness of our sleeping bunk. It’s clear that she still needs rest, but I take that moment to imprint the sight of her tame and sweet to the very back of my memory.
For the safest of keeping.
Because I bet tomorrow, when things get settled and she’s less tired, the Luna that tests my every nerve will be back in fine shape and form.
Truthfully, as I want her to be.
“I’ve heard it’s a fine line between love and hate,” she whispers, then.
The dull edge of my claw strokes along her bottom lip that I’d die at this very instant in time to kiss. “Zawla, you tell me.”
SEVEN
I haven’t opened my eyes, and yet, I know his gaze is on me. I can feel it. Throughout my entire body, I can feel it. And not just his eyes. He’s so close to me in the bed, our bed, he keeps calling it but that I refuse to, that I can feel his body heat, that his scent in enveloping me, that I can feel the way his hand comes forward so his fingers brush against my thigh, but then he begins to pull it back.
“Don’t.”
The single word slips past my lips before I even give it permission to. Before I can even begin to figure out why his fingertips make it hard for me to breathe. Before I can reprimand myself wanting his touch at all. But he hears it, that’s clear in the way his fingers that were so soft before, dig into the skin of my thigh now, gripping it as he moves even closer.