Chapter 33
THIRTY-THREE
VIVIENNE
How could I be so happy and free at the start of the day and then feel so sad and trapped by the end of it?
The question kept circling through my mind as Kor and I drove home from town.
Neither of us had much to say after the disaster at the Council meeting and the unpleasant encounter with Mrs. Broward and her poor daughter.
The cheerful mood we'd shared that morning had vanished completely and in its place was a heavy silence that seemed to press down on both of us.
I sat looking out the window as the mountains rolled by and tried not to think about everything that had happened.
Unfortunately, I wasn't very successful.
The words people had said about me kept replaying in my head. Barren. Old. Useless. A Moon Widow who ought to be in mourning instead of running around town in a pretty sundress with a handsome young Alpha.
I told myself I shouldn't care what they thought. I told myself they were cruel and small-minded and jealous. But cruel words have a way of finding the places where we're already wounded and I couldn't stop hearing them.
When we got back to Wolverton Manor, I went upstairs to change before dinner. As soon as I stepped into my bedroom, my gaze fell on my mirror—on the white sundress I'd so stupidly worn to town.
Earlier, that dress had made me feel beautiful…now it made me feel foolish.
With a sigh, I opened the closet and reached automatically for one of my old dark dresses.
The familiar gray fabric slid through my fingers, and I pulled it on without even thinking about it.
By the time I looked in the mirror again, the woman staring back at me looked much more like the person Blackridge expected me to be—a widow.
A barren widow, my mind whispered cruelly.
I closed my eyes, trying to push the thought away but it remained.
Mrs. Broward hadn't said anything I hadn't heard before.
For years people had whispered about my failure to give Carter an heir.
Sometimes they whispered behind my back and sometimes they didn't bother lowering their voices at all.
I'd spent twenty years trying not to let those comments hurt me and somehow, they still found a way beneath my skin.
Twenty years.
Twenty years of disappointing Carter. Twenty years of doctor visits and fertility tonics and prayers to the Goddess that were never answered. Twenty years of wondering what was wrong with me and why my body refused to do the one thing everyone expected it to do.
And now here I was at forty years old, foolishly imagining that someone like Kor could actually want me.
The worst part was that I knew he did want me—that was what made it hurt so much.
If Kor had only been flirting with me or amusing himself, it would have been easier somehow. But every time he looked at me, every time he smiled at me, every time he called me beautiful, I knew he meant it. I knew he saw something in me worth loving.
The problem was that I couldn't quite see it myself. Why would he want me? I was too old for him, and I could never give him heirs. The plain fact was, I didn’t deserve him.
I didn’t deserve the happiness he offered.
I hadn’t earned it—I had failed in the only thing that mattered in life.
I had never had a baby and according to everything I’d been taught my whole life, that was all that mattered.
Dinner that evening was one of the most uncomfortable meals I could remember.
Not because Kor was angry with me—if anything, he seemed worried. Every now and then I would catch him watching me with concern in his warm brown eyes and then he would quickly look away. The distance between us wasn't coming from him…it was coming from me.
I was the one who had insisted we stop. I was the one who had drawn a line between us. And I couldn’t bring myself to cross that line.
So we sat across from each other at the long dining room table and talked about nothing important.
"Could you pass the salt?"
"Of course."
"Would you like some more tea?"
"No thank you."
That was about the extent of our conversation.
The easy laughter we'd shared over breakfast felt like something that had happened weeks ago instead of that very morning. I picked at my food without really tasting it and noticed that Kor wasn't eating much either.
Finally he pushed his chair back and stood.
"I think I'm going to swim a few laps," he said.
I nodded.
"That sounds nice."
What I wanted to say was, Take me with you.
What I wanted to do was sit by the pool and watch him swim while we bantered and I let the sunlamp warm my skin.
What I wanted was him. But wanting and having were two very different things.
After he left, I sat at the table for a few more minutes before finally going upstairs. The house felt too large and too empty, and every room seemed haunted by thoughts I didn't want to think.
By the time I got ready for bed, the sadness had settled into my bones. My whole body felt heavy with it. Even my breasts ached strangely—a dull soreness that made me frown as I changed into my nightgown.
I told myself it was nothing—probably just stress. After all, the day had certainly given me enough of that. It wasn’t that surprising that I was feeling it in my body and not just my mind.
Climbing into bed alone felt far worse than it should have. Just the night before I had fallen asleep wrapped safely in Kor's arms. I had listened to the steady beat of his heart and felt his warmth surrounding me on every side.
Now the bed felt cold. It was too big…too empty.
I lay awake staring at the ceiling for a long time. My thoughts kept circling back to the same painful truth—Kor deserved more than I could ever give him.
He deserved a young woman—a fertile woman—someone who could stand proudly at his side when he became Pack Leader and give him the heirs everyone expected him to have.
Not a middle-aged widow carrying around twenty years of grief and disappointment.
Not a woman who had already failed one Alpha and would only end up disappointing another.
The thought hurt so much that I pressed my face into the pillow and closed my eyes. At some point, exhaustion finally claimed me.
And then the dream came again.