Chapter 9 - Damian #3
No matter what I do, I’ll always have this dark cloud hanging over my head. I can’t escape it. But I’ll be damned if I do nothing to fix this while she pretends like she doesn’t care that she’s my mate. Or the luna of Valley Walker.
I follow her into the room, every step determined, until she realizes I’ve followed her and she snaps around.
“What are you doing, Damian?!” she yelps, glowering at me.
“We need to talk.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Oh, but there is,” I point out, standing cemented in the doorway.
“Ever since I found you, I have been losing my mind, Poppy.” I press a finger to my temple, closing my eyes.
“You wouldn’t understand, because for some reason, you don’t feel the mate bond the way I do.
And it’s killing me. Everything I did to make you mine is just my wolf acting on impulse. It doesn’t have to be this way.”
Poppy suddenly throws her head back and roars with laughter. “What a convenient excuse, Damian!” The sound of her laughter splutters into a sardonic chuckle. “Blame your wolf, and somehow, that makes everything okay. Right! Is that what happened ten years ago? Your wolf made you indecisive?”
“I wasn’t indecisive, Poppy. I just needed time. If you’d just given—”
“Oh, so it’s my fault, huh?” She laughs again at that. “You know what, Damian? I don’t buy any of your bullshit excuses.”
I sigh defeatedly and hang my head. “I’m not blaming you, Poppy. I know I was wrong, and I’m standing here, telling you I’m sorry.”
“It’s too late, Damian,” Poppy whispers, and when I look up, she’s shaking her head, eyes wide with tears.
“Don’t say that.”
“It’s the truth,” she says as she takes a deep breath and turns toward her bedroom window, crossing her arms. “It’s too late.”
“Stop saying that, Poppy. Please. I will do anything.” I take a cautious step forward, but Poppy doesn’t turn. She just shakes her head, refusing to look at me.
“There’s nothing you can do, Damian. We have been apart for ten years. A lot happens in ten years. I am not the same girl I was back then.”
“Now, you’re not. You’re a woman. And I acted like a monster.”
She huffs. “Maybe that’s all you’ve ever been.”
Her words slice through me like the sharpest blade, and it all comes crashing into me at once.
How I neglected our relationship when I had to take Dorian’s place in Valley Walker.
How I disregarded her feelings and was so self-centered that I neglected her needs.
How angry I’ve been for the past decade, painting myself like a victim and turning out to be a perpetrator.
“Is that why you left Valley Walker…?” I ask quietly, and the confirmation comes when she nods slowly.
“I left because you hesitated to claim me as your mate. Now you think that doing it against my will is how you lessen the blow on your conscience. And you’re wrong.”
I drop to my knees behind her, hanging my head in shame, my shoulders following as I slouch.
“Please forgive me, Poppy. I’ll do anything…anything, I swear.”
Poppy turns around slowly, wearing tears in her eyes like armor as she glares down at me. “I told you, it’s too late. Too much has happened.”
“Why can’t you see it? Why can’t you feel it?” I frown as I cock my head to the side.
She shakes her head slowly. “Even if we are fated mates, it doesn’t justify everything you’ve done. When are you going to get it through your head that there’s nothing between us?”
She’s about to walk away, but I reach out and grab her wrist, stopping her in her tracks as I press her hand against my chest. I look up from clouded eyes and notice the way her breaths come in hot, shallow pants now, her cheeks flushing with heat.
“If there’s really nothing between us, then tell me you feel nothing right now,” I say as the hum of the mate bond explodes from my pores like it’s an integral part of my DNA structure. It’s what rules my very breathing, and it’s her sweet scent that is my sustenance.
“I—I don’t,” she murmurs as she tries to look away, tries to pry her wrist from my grip, but I’m not letting go.
I will never let go.
“You’re lying.” I stand up, flattening one foot at a time on the floor until I’m at eye level with her, her hand still pressed to my chest. “It’s no excuse, but I’m not ignoring what Goddess has set out for us. I was a fool back then, but I am no fool now.”
Poppy reluctantly turns her face to meet my eyes, and her tears make the specks of gold in her eyes glow.
“Damian, let go of me, p-please,” she whimpers, not taking her eyes off mine.
“No. Never.” I take her hand and lift it to my lips, pressing a chaste kiss on her knuckles, watching her lose the fight as she closes her eyes.
Relief washes over me, but it’s quickly replaced with shock when Poppy’s eyes open again, and she does the unfathomable.
After all her resistance, after all her denial, she crushes her lips to mine, and it’s my undoing.
Ten years’ worth of pent-up desire comes crashing into me, and I don’t think Poppy has realized what she’s done to unleash the beast within.