Astrid’s POV
We kissed and kissed until we were both half naked.
"We can’t do this here." I caught his hand before he could unhook my bra.
"Yeah." He complied immediately.
We got ready to leave. I made the first move to leave. "Hope this isn’t a one-time thing," he said. I could hear the sincerity in his voice, like he actually wanted me. Staying with one person had always been hard for me ... until Draven. But now that he wasn’t with me anymore, I was slipping back into my old ways.
I couldn’t be with Draven. But I didn’t want to lie either. So I said, "I’ll call you."
He rushed toward me. "I know that’s not true. That’s what you said last time."
"Yes, okay, what do you want from me?" I asked, because he was putting me in a tight spot.
"I don’t want anything from you. I want you, Astrid."
I laughed. He couldn’t be serious. "You can’t be serious, Draven. You, of all people, know you can’t have me."
"What does it take to have you? We’re betrothed mates, for crying out loud." Despair colored his voice. He’d been holding this in for a long time.
"Oh, really? So you think you own me?" He said it venting all his frustration at once.
"I call, you don’t pick up. I text, you don’t respond. Is it a crime to want to be with my own mate?" His eyes welled up as he asked.
He held it back before it fully broke through, but I’d already seen it, and I knew for certain ... he wasn’t an emotionally strong man.
Maybe that was exactly why I’d left him.
"It’s not possible, Draven." I told him. "We are not possible," I added, to make the verdict final.
He faked a smile. "So you came to me because you were lonely, right? I’m just a tool now, something to cure your boredom and loneliness."
"I wish you the best in all your endeavors. Maybe in the next life we can actually be together ... but not in this one." I said it without a shred of apology.
"So you called me over to fuck, is that it?"
"I mean, if you hadn’t brought this up, we would’ve had a nice fuck and gone our separate ways until next time. But you just had to spoil the moment, didn’t you?"
He grabbed my hand. I looked at him like, why is he holding my hand? The audacity of this young wolf. He really had some nerve.
"Please don’t leave me," he started begging.
Something rose in me ... pride, elegance, a sense of self-worth I couldn’t shake. What do these men see in me that makes them chase me at all costs? I really am that special.
I pulled his hand off mine. "Don’t make this harder than it already is."
And I left. This time, I left meaning never to come back.
The moment I stepped into the city, three soldiers were waiting for me.
"The Minister of Information has ordered your arrest, alongside Draven ... he’s already in custody," one of them said.
"What the fuck?" I said, completely blindsided. Draven was already in custody, so I had no choice but to follow them.
"Don’t touch me," I warned, pulling back before they could grab me ... not that they’d tried; they weren’t manhandling me. I walked with them to the car waiting to take me to the station, looking for all the world like I had my own personal escort. I just hoped they hadn’t already jumped to conclusions, because I planned to call my family’s advocate the second I got the chance.
We reached the station, and Draven was already seated in a chair, like they’d been waiting on me to arrive. He wouldn’t even look my way ... just stared at me like I was the one who’d dragged him into this mess. I tried giving him sign language. Nothing. He wasn’t responding.
I sat down.
The Minister of Information walked out and stood behind his desk.
"Welcome, Mrs. Ironheart," he said. I smiled back, unsure whether it was a genuine greeting or the opening line of my own prosecution.
"We’ve spoken with Draven, and we’ve brought him up to speed on our current investigation. Reopening the case revealed something we missed the first time."
My heart started pounding. What could they have possibly dug up that wasn’t already buried for good?
"We discovered that the footage submitted as evidence was doctored."
I gasped, feigning ignorance. "Doctored? That’s not possible ... your people were the ones who pulled that footage from the camera."
"There’s clearly been a misunderstanding here. That footage cannot be fake," Draven cut in. He’d finally decided to speak. Of course he had ... he loved his life too much not to.
"The reason we called you both in is that you were present at the scene the night of Zane’s murder. We wanted you to be aware of the update. The investigation is ongoing, but if it leads back to either of you, we will make an arrest."
"But I have a question," I said. "The real culprit was already caught and exiled. Why the extra stress? Shouldn’t you be focused on more pressing matters?"
He looked at me, smiled, and opened a book on his desk. He said he was just doing his job.
From the way he spoke, this hadn’t reached the Alpha’s ears yet ... it was still just a theory they were chasing. They weren’t certain. But if they kept pushing, they might actually get to the truth. That thought scared me.
"We don’t uphold injustice. Progress will be communicated accordingly. At present, we’re exploring the possibility that Selene may not have been the one who killed Zane. Here’s my card ... call me if you come across anything relevant."
He handed a card to each of us. It read Ethan Allen. He was from Bloodmoon, and he had the look of a wolf who wouldn’t stop until he found the truth.
Fuck. Why does Bloodmoon keep producing people like this? I thought to myself. They were putting me through completely unnecessary stress.
"That will be all for now. Thank you." We stood and walked out of his office.
Is this going to be a daily thing now? If this were a job interview, we’d have been hired three times over by now. Oh, Goddess of Morvaine, this was a mess.
"Draven! Draven!" I called out to him several times before he finally acknowledged me. We were already well past the station by then.
"You’re the reason all of this is happening. Who did you hire to edit that footage? I told you I had someone, but no ... you said yours was better, and now look where we are," he snapped at me.
"He edited it well, I can assure you. This is just a test, and we’re going to pass it, okay, my love?" I reached for his hand. He yanked it away and kept walking.
"Draven! Draven! Don’t you dare walk away from me!" I shouted. He turned a deaf ear. Fuck.