24. Rosalind
ROSALIND
The moment hangs between truth and lies, between salvation and damnation.
Colonel Frasier’s steady gaze holds mine while Kaelen's thumb strokes possessively over my throat, a reminder of exactly how completely I belong to him. Through our bond, I can feel his desperate need for me to perform, to smile and reassure and send these good men away with comfortable falsehoods.
But I can also feel something else—his absolute certainty that he owns me so completely that I'm incapable of choosing anything but submission to his will.
That certainty breaks something inside me.
"I am..." I begin, then stop as my diplomatic training wars with omega conditioning in the space of a heartbeat.
The safe answer would be simple: I'm well, I'm here voluntarily, thank you for your concern but it's unnecessary. Send my love to Father, tell him the negotiations are proceeding excellently, assure him I'll return home soon with beneficial agreements for all involved.
But looking into Colonel Frasier's weathered face, seeing the genuine concern that brought him across dangerous territory to verify my safety, I realize I can't be complicit in more lies. Not when fifteen people are already dead because of the fantasy Kaelen has woven around us both.
"I need to speak with you privately," I say, the words tumbling out before I can lose my nerve.
Kaelen's hand tightens on my throat—not painfully, but enough to remind me of his strength, his dominance, his absolute authority over every aspect of my existence.
"That won't be necessary," he says smoothly, his voice carrying alpha command that makes my omega biology want to submit immediately. "Lady Rosalind is simply overwhelmed by unexpected visitors. Perhaps you could return tomorrow when?—"
"No," I interrupt, surprised by the steel in my own voice. "Colonel, I need to speak with you now. Alone."
Through our bond, I feel Kaelen's surge of fury at my defiance, followed immediately by something that might be fear. For the first time since my claiming, I'm refusing to obey his direct command, and the precedent terrifies him.
"My lady," Colonel Frasier says carefully, his trained eye noting the way Kaelen holds me, the tension crackling between us. "If you wish privacy for our conversation, I'm certain His Highness will understand the necessity."
"I will not," Kaelen snarls, his antlers flaring with aggressive light that fills the chamber with golden radiance. "Lady Rosalind is my mate, and I will not be excluded from any conversation concerning her welfare."
The possessive declaration should make me melt with satisfaction—it has for weeks. Instead, it makes my skin crawl with the recognition of exactly how thoroughly I've been claimed, how completely my autonomy has been stripped away in the name of love.
"Your mate?" Colonel Frasier's eyebrows rise with professional interest. "I was under the impression Lady Rosalind was here in a diplomatic capacity."
"Both can be true," Kaelen replies with the smooth confidence of someone who's spent centuries navigating political complexities. "Diplomatic service that blossomed into personal connection."
The euphemistic language makes something crack inside my chest. Diplomatic service. Personal connection. As if I'd had any choice in the matter, as if murder and kidnapping could be reframed as courtship with the right words.
"Is that accurate, my lady?" Colonel Frasier asks directly. "Did your diplomatic mission evolve into... personal arrangements?"
The question gives me an opening I'm not sure I'm brave enough to take. Through our bond, Kaelen pours every memory of pleasure, every moment of perfect completion, every promise of the future we could still have if I just say the right words.
But I also remember fifteen graves. Fifteen families who will never know the truth. Fifteen lives ended so that one alpha could satisfy his obsession.
"It's more complicated than that," I say carefully, my diplomatic training helping me navigate between outright lies and dangerous truths.
"Complicated how?" the Colonel presses, and I can see him cataloging details—the way Kaelen holds me, the tension in my voice, the careful phrasing that suggests more than it reveals.
Before I can answer, Kaelen's scent floods the air between us with such concentrated alpha pheromones that my vision blurs with sudden arousal. My knees go weak, my nipples harden against silk, and liquid heat pools between my thighs with desperate need.
"You see how she responds to me," Kaelen murmurs with dark satisfaction, his thumb stroking over my racing pulse while his other hand settles possessively on my hip. "How her body recognizes its alpha despite whatever confusion her mind might harbor."
The casual display of his power over my biology should humiliate me. Instead, it clarifies exactly what kind of choice I'm really facing—not between staying and leaving, but between accepting beautiful captivity and risking everything for the possibility of freedom.
"Lady Rosalind," Colonel Frasier says sharply, his military training recognizing a crisis when he sees one. "Are you being held here against your will?"
The direct question cuts through the haze of pheromone-induced arousal like a blade. This is it—the moment when I either commit to the lie that keeps us comfortable or speak the truth that might destroy everything.
Through our bond, I feel Kaelen's absolute certainty that I won't—that I can't—betray him when the cost would be losing the only source of pleasure and validation I've known for months.
He believes the claiming has made me too dependent, too transformed, too fundamentally altered to choose anything but him.
He's wrong.
"Yes," I whisper, the word barely audible but carrying the weight of mountains. "I am."
The admission shatters something fundamental between us. Through our bond, I feel Kaelen's shock, his fury, his devastating sense of betrayal that I would choose honesty over our perfect love.
"Rosalind," he snarls, his hand tightening on my throat while his antlers blaze with territorial rage. "You don't know what you're saying."
"I know exactly what I'm saying," I reply with growing strength, meeting his green eyes directly for the first time since learning the truth. "I'm saying that love built on murder isn't love at all."
Colonel Frasier moves immediately, his hand dropping to his weapon while his officers flank him with military precision. "Release her, Your Highness. Now."
"She doesn't understand what she's choosing," Kaelen says with desperate authority, his grip on me shifting from possessive to protective. "Without our bond, she'll sicken and die. I'm the only thing keeping her alive."
"Let me go," I say quietly, though my voice carries absolute certainty. "Let me make my own choice, even if it kills me."
For a heartbeat, I think he might refuse. Through our bond, I feel his desperate love, his willingness to destroy anyone who threatens what we have, his absolute conviction that keeping me against my will is preferable to losing me entirely.
Then something in my expression—perhaps the steel that made me brave enough to volunteer for dangerous missions—makes him release me with agonizing reluctance.
"This isn't over," he warns with soft menace as I step away from the wall. "You can't run from what you are, from what we are together. The bond will draw you back."
"Maybe," I admit, because lying would serve no purpose now. "But I have to try."
I turn to Colonel Frasier with the composure that carried me through years of complex negotiations. "I would very much like to leave now."
"Of course, my lady," he says immediately, though his eyes remain fixed on Kaelen with professional wariness. "We have escort waiting."
But even as we move toward the door, I can feel the claiming bond stretching between us like a chain. Each step away from Kaelen sends pain lancing through my chest, makes my omega biology scream for reunion with its alpha.
This is what he meant about the bond's requirements. Not just emotional dependence but physical necessity, biological imperative that makes separation feel like dying by inches.
I don't care.
Some things are worth dying for. Some prices are worth paying for the chance to choose, even if that choice leads to destruction.
"My lady," Colonel Frasier says urgently as we reach the corridor, "we need to move quickly. Can you travel?"
"Yes," I lie, though every step away from Kaelen feels like tearing away pieces of my soul. "I can manage."
Behind us, I hear Kaelen's roar of fury echoing through the chamber, followed by the sound of furniture being destroyed with inhuman strength. Through our bond, I feel his rage and desperation and devastating sense of loss.
But I also feel something else—his absolute determination to get me back, no matter what it takes.
"Faster," I tell the Colonel, though I'm not sure running will help when my alpha has centuries of experience hunting what belongs to him.
As we race through corridors that no longer feel like home, I wonder if I'm brave enough to face what comes next. The sickness that separation will bring. The possibility that freedom might kill me just as surely as captivity was destroying who I used to be.
Either way, I'm about to find out exactly what kind of woman three months of claiming has made me.
And pray that somewhere beneath the omega conditioning, enough of the diplomat remains to survive whatever consequences my choice brings.