Chapter 11 - Sean
I haven’t slept properly in days. Not real sleep, anyway.
Not the kind that pulls you under and allows your body to forget itself for a few hours.
Forget its shape, forget its strength, forget its exhaustion.
What I get instead are fractured stretches of half-consciousness, jerking awake with my heart racing, my wolf snarling under my skin, the bond humming so loud it feels like static in my skull.
I’m restless, and it’s all because of Emily. It’s always only Emily.
I lie on my back, staring at the ceiling as the wind starts to howl outside, rattling the windows hard enough to make the glass shudder.
The storm has been building all evening, thick clouds rolling over Stowe like a warning.
I should be used to storms by now. They usually calm me.
Tonight, they only make everything worse, and I’ve never been more restless than I am now.
Because I can feel her.
It’s not constant or clear. It comes in waves, and sometimes flashes of sharp spikes of emotion that aren’t mine but settle in my chest like they are.
It’s frustration so tight it burns in my core.
Fear that curls in the pit of my belly, brittle and panicked with every thunderous roar ripping through the skies.
Then there’s the longing she keeps trying to bury, pushing it down with anger and denial until it bleeds into her magic.
And her magic…Goddess…it flares without warning, wild and uncontrolled, like it’s searching for an anchor it’s not allowed to reach for.
Me.
It’s searching for me. I’m supposed to be the steady anchor.
I’m far from it. I hardly even know who I am anymore.
It’s pointless wearing a mask of indifference, of confidence, of charm amongst my friends when the truth has been exposed.
None of them has pried into the details of the history I share with her, but I can’t reclaim my mask of coolness as if I weren’t outed.
Rolling onto my side, I press my forearm over my tired eyes, teeth clenched. She told me she needed space. Boundaries. I heard her. I respected it. I stayed away.
But out of everything she told me, there’s one thing that stuck, pierced me like a dagger through my heart.
“We can never be together.”
I take a deep breath, trying and failing to come to terms with what that means. That’s why she moved back to her cottage. But it only made things worse the moment she did, and the bond shifted. Tightened. Like a wire pulled too taut.
The revelation from the meeting keeps replaying in my head, relentless and haunting.
It wasn’t the ritual. Not really. The lunar binding spell didn’t create anything that wasn’t already there; it just ripped the scab off something that never healed.
Something I denied, ran from, pretended didn’t exist.
The fated mate bond. The one I felt years ago and was too much of a coward to face.
I sit up abruptly when the power flickers, the lights dimming for half a second before stabilizing. My wolf surges, hackles raised, instincts screaming inside my skull.
Something’s wrong. Something’s terribly wrong, and it’s strong enough to raise awareness, stir my wolf instincts from deep within.
I’m on my feet before I think about it, grabbing a jacket and yanking it on as thunder cracks overhead, loud enough to shake the house. Rain starts hammering down in thick sheets outside the window, the wind vicious and unforgiving.
The bond pulls hard on my being, almost paralyzing and alarming at the same time. I don’t even try to fight it because I know the resistance is futile, and that’s why I give in to what my inner wolf demands.
Find Emily….
By the time I reach Emily’s cottage, I’m soaked through, rain plastering my hair to my forehead, my boots sinking into the mud with every step. Lightning splits the sky, illuminating the cottage, and my stomach drops.
There’s a hole in the roof.
Not a small one, but a gaping hole through which rain pours straight into the house like the storm has claimed it for itself.
“Emily!” I shout over the wind, but there’s no answer, so I knock again, sharper this time, and suddenly, the door yanks open violently, slamming against the wall as a burst of gold light flares from inside.
Emily stands there, trembling, fingers spread open as if she’d been using her magic. But she’s soaked and furious, as if she’s the one who caused the hole in the roof. Her magic was what opened the door for me, but she doesn’t appear to want me there.
My eyes flicker to the ceiling, where rain pours into the house, soaking not just Emily, but her kitchen, too.
“Get out!” she snaps, voice shaking. “I didn’t call you here!”
“I know,” I say warily, hands up, rain dripping from my sleeves as I point to the hole. “Your roof—”
“I don’t care!” she shouts. “Leave!”
Another thunderclap shakes the cottage, and the power flickers again. Water streams down her hair, her clothes clinging to her petite frame, magic flickering erratically around her hands like it can’t decide whether to burn or vanish.
“You’re freezing,” I point out, noticing how much she’s trembling.
“Not your problem,” she grumbles as she marches forward and grabs the door. “Just leave.”
She tries to shove the door shut, but a gust of wind slams it back open, rain blowing inside. Her magic surges in response, lashing out instinctively, and when she pushes against my chest to force me back, everything detonates.
White light explodes between us.
The lights inside the cottage flicker violently, the air crackling with energy so thick it buzzes in my ears. The bond snaps tight, roaring to life, and we both freeze, breathless.
Her hand is still on my chest, her eyes wide and panicked. Emily snatches her hand back, pulling it from my chest, but whatever started when she touched my chest has already begun, and there’s no stopping it. The white light pulses between us as her knees buckle when she pulls her hand back.
I catch her without thinking, wrapping my arms around her as she collapses forward before she hits the floor. The moment I do, the magic stabilizes instantly, settling into a steady, radiant glow instead of the chaotic flaring.
She gasps, fingers curling into my jacket like it’s the only solid thing left in the world.
“Put me down…” she demands weakly, her bottom lip trembling.
I don’t listen this time.
“I’m not here to save you, Em,” I whisper gently, carrying her further into the cottage, away from the open door and the rain pouring in. “You don’t need saving.”
She lets out a sharp, bitter laugh. “That’s rich coming from you. You always show up when things fall apart.”
“Only once,” I reply with a lighthearted chuckle that borders on sarcasm as I enter her bedroom.
“But that’s only because I can feel it,” I smile dryly, setting her down carefully but keeping my hands on her arms to steady her.
“I can feel you spiraling through the bond, Emily. It’s like my chest is being ripped open every time you push it down. ”
Her jaw tightens. “That’s not my problem.”
“It is when it’s killing me inside.”
Silence settles between us, heavy and charged as she stares ferociously into my eyes. I see the moment she cracks, her eyes turning from soft blue to icy sapphire.
“I don’t care!” she huffs and spins on her heel to face her bed. “I don’t care what’s going on with you. It doesn’t matter to me.”
“I know you don’t mean that, Em,” I say as I place my hand on her shoulder.
She shrugs me off, glaring at my hand as if it had committed an unforgivable crime. “You don’t get to stand here and pretend this means something when you already made your choice.”
“I was wrong back then, Em. Can’t you see that? Can’t you feel what I feel?”
Emily turns back slowly, shaking her head measuredly. “You don’t get to want me now,” she says finally, her voice raw.
“I never stopped wanting you,” I admit, the words tearing out of me before I can soften them.
“I was broken. I was grieving. I was terrified of losing everything, and I thought if I let myself choose you, I’d destroy you, too.
I would have taken you down with me, and you were always more important than my grief.
I fucked up back then. I know it, and I’m sorry, Emily. I am sorry that I hurt you.”
Emily stares at me in disbelief, eyes wide, a glint of sadness passing through before she hardens herself again. “That’s not an excuse,” she fires back. “You rejected me. You left.”
“I kn-know.” My voice cracks. “And it’s the worst mistake I ever made.”
Her magic flares again, reacting to the truth whether she wants it to or not. Gold light wraps around her like wildfire, too much, too fast.
“Stop…” she whimpers, panic edging her voice as she stares at her palms like she’s talking to her magic. “Please…don’t touch me….”
Emily looks up and meets my eyes, tears building in hers as she appears so soft, so vulnerable, so fragile despite what she just said.
Then, she reaches for me anyway, her fingers latching onto my shirt as her legs give out completely.
This time, I don’t hesitate. I pull her against me, anchoring her, holding her tight as the magic settles, calms, obeys.
She sobs once, the sound sharp and broken, before her hands fist in my jacket and she presses her face into my chest like she’s fighting herself.
“I hate you…” she breathes.
“I know,” I murmur, forehead resting against hers. “I deserve it.”
Her breath shudders, and without warning, her lips are on mine. The kiss catches me by surprise, and it’s not gentle or hesitant. It’s desperate, furious, full of years of hurt and longing colliding all at once.
I kiss her back like I’ve been starving, like my soul recognizes hers and doesn’t care about the consequences. The bond surges, bright and powerful, wrapping around us both as the storm rages outside.
And for one suspended moment, nothing else exists but the taste of Emily’s lips and the warmth of her body pressed against mine.