Sparks. Intense sparks dancing across my skin are the first thing to pull me toward consciousness. I slowly start to come to. My sense of smell is the next thing to come back, and I'm overwhelmed by lavender and bamboo, like Roman's scent, but a million times more intoxicating and potent. It surrounds me like I'm bathing in it. As soon as I realize what's happening, my eyes snap open, and I shoot up. I must startle Roman because he jumps, waking up immediately. The bond snaps into place as soon as my eyes lock with his."Mate," I whisper, my hands trembling for a second.Then I'm instantly overcome with a hunger for him so unbelievably intense. I need him; I will die without him. I jump at him so fast that I barely even realize what I did and smash my lips against his. I growl and push him back when he takes control of the kiss. I look at him, my eyes clouding over with a black hue. "Amara, baby, come back to me," he whispers, running his hand up and down my body and pinching my nipp
I know she's hurting; I can feel it. I can feel her guilt, her anguish, and the worthlessness she feels. But we have to deal with this now; I can't lose her. We both shower in silence, me washing her and her washing me. I can feel her love through the bond too, which is a nice little silver lining in the turmoil of her feelings. Once we're done, we head downstairs to my office. I had already linked Seth and Aston to be there waiting. Max will be doing training today, so I'll fill him in later. He needs to be up to speed on everything, considering he doesn't even know I'm a hybrid. When we walk into my office, Aston, always the dimwit, speaks. "Hey, Luna!" he says, clapping her shoulder.I have to laugh because I feel confusion, anger, and then realization run through her emotions. I guess she forgot she was mated to an Alpha. She glares at me, probably feeling my amusement, and I pretend to choke on a cough very unconvincingly. She cracks a smile, but any amusement she had dies the
After Roman dropped me off with the girls, I did my best to try and simply hang out with them, talk with them, and enjoy their presence. But the darkness swirling inside me didn't let up; I had to count my breaths a couple times when black started to swirl into my vision. They had asked me a couple times what was wrong, noticing that I wasn't my usual cheerful, goofy self. Each time I'd simply smiled and said all was well, just that I was missing my mate. They would be filled in eventually, by their mates, or in Violet's case, by Gemma or Roman himself. Would they fear me? I wouldn't blame them if they did. I feared myself, feared what I was capable of. When I couldn't take it anymore, I stood up and returned to Roman's room, saying I was feeling unwell and needed to lie down. They probably knew I was lying, but they didn't protest. Tami didn't say anything; I think she was trying to siphon some of the darkness. I laughed bitterly, realizing my inner turmoil would somehow be much w
When I wake up the following day, the bed feels empty, and Roman's scent is faint. I groggily open my eyes and confirm he is indeed not in bed with me. I'm momentarily confused before the smell of bacon reaches my nostrils. I sit up in disbelief; there is no way the big bad Alpha is cooking me breakfast. I throw one of his shirts on and walk downstairs. My eyes widen at the sight before me. Roman is standing shirtless at the stove; a dish towel is thrown over his shoulder, a pile of pancakes and bacon is next to him, Red Hot Chili Peppers is playing on the speaker, and he's singing along. I admire the sight; how long did the Goddess have to spend sculpting this man to perfection for me? "You know you're supposed to have a shirt on when you cook, right?" I tease him as I walk up to him and wrap my arms around him "Good morning to you too, and that rule is for humans who cry over a little tiny grease splatter burning them," he says, leaning down and kissing me. "Well, you're not a
We spent eight days at the cottage, the extra day happening after Amara used her tears and a couple other parts of her to convince me to stay. But unfortunately, we have to get back to regular life. Aston, of course, whined like a little baby whenever I told him we were staying one more day. We spent pretty much the entire eight days having sex, and occasionally Amara would train. She would execute anything I had her do perfectly, so we could have dived a little deeper into the training if we hadn't gotten distracted. Yeah, we might have ended up fucking in the backyard a couple times. After the run back, we're just now walking into the packhouse."I'm gonna go find Violet! I'll stop by your office after." Amara says to me and kisses me quickly before running off.Okay then, I guess she isn't too upset about coming home. I chuckle and walk into my office.My eyes nearly jump out of my head when I see the pile of paperwork sitting on my desk. Fucking Aston! Did he do any paperwork at
My face is drained of color, and I feel dizzy. He knew he knew without me even looking at him. So that means anyone else who knew about this prophecy or whatever would know just by looking at me. I must sway on my feet a little bit because Roman pulls me to his lap. I take a couple deep breaths to calm myself, trying to keep my voice from breaking. "How did you know?" I ask "Your aura. I've never seen anything like it. Fae can read auras; it's like a sixth sense. Yours screams power, royalty, darkness, light, chaos…." Thayer says, pausing to think before continuing "It's safe to say any Fae would know what you were. As for other species, I cannot say. You've been a whispered legend for over a millennium, there's literature, as I said, but some think it's a fairytale. The vampires have had quite some time to think about how and what they will do with you; their wanting you isn't exactly a secret. The vampire king contacted me, asking for the Fae's legends about you." "The vampire k
I'm quite violently woken up by a familiar voice yelling at me and then jumping on top of me. It takes me a minute before realization dawns on me, and then I squeal."What are you doing here?! How?!" I yell as I push Sophie off of me, sit up, and then tackle her again in another hug"Your grumpy Alpha asked me to come a couple days ago. Oh, by the way, he definitely thinks I'm an idiot. I blubbered the whole way up the stairs. I don't know how you're not scared of him; he's much more intimidating in person. Which is saying something because the idea of him was already pretty freaking scary." she says"I've told you a million times he's a softie, and I probably put him in a bad mood because I may or may not have thrown a hissy fit before I came up here," I say and cringe at my earlier behavior."Girl, what did you do?" Sophie says, rolling her eyes and lying beside me on Roman's side. I stifle a growl that she is laying in my mate's scent. She rolls her eyes and punches my shoulder.
I want to stand up, but I know my knees will wobble. So I stay sitting, focusing on my mate's and Sophie's touch to keep me grounded. Roman must mindlink everyone except Seth and Sophie to leave because everyone gets up and quickly evacuates the living room. Honestly, I barely notice. I'm still staring at the man I'm supposed to call Dad and trying not to fall into the abyss of my emotions while I do so. "I…" I start to say but trail off, not really knowing where I am going with it, but I feel like I need to speak. I didn't expect it to be this emotional, ignorantly, I guess. In the abstract, it was much easier to think about him. But with him, my father, standing here in front of me, reminding me that I have a parent who's alive, is bringing up so many feelings. Stupid, stupid feelings. I don't know a damn thing about him. He could be a sadist, he could be a homophobe, he could hate women. I mean, he's the demon overlord from the underworld; he probably has some seriously sadisti