Elora’s POV
Desperate, I leaned in—but this time he pulled back.
He shook his head, dragging a gentle touch along my face.
“You’re making this difficult for me,” he murmured.
“What?”
“Difficult,” he repeated, pulling me in by the waist, his eyes intense.
“Stop flirting with Declan.
I don’t like it.”
It finally clicked.
That was his problem.
The whole time, I hadn’t even caught on.
I wasn’t flirting with Declan—but Varek had plainly decided otherwise.
“I’m not yours,” I said.
“I can do whatever I want.
And for the record, I wasn’t flirting with Declan.”
Varek scoffed, not buying a single word.
Why would it bother him anyway?
It wasn’t like he wanted me.
“It’s called being polite,” I fired back.
“Something I know you’re unfamiliar with.”
Varek chuckled and tilted his head, a smirk curling his mouth.
“You know what I am familiar with?”
“What?”
His hand slid along my waist, a little more possessively.
A tingle spread through me, and I hated myself for it.
He stared into my eyes.
“Should I just take you right here in these woods, against this tree, and show you?”
I swallowed hard, absorbing the words.
“Do you think that would satisfy me?
You?
The both of us?”
It wasn’t a statement.
It was a question.
And I was terrified that if I answered honestly, both of us would be out of our clothes within seconds.
“I don’t know about you,” I said, “but the only thing that’ll satisfy me is you accepting my rejection.”
It was brutally hard to turn him down, but somehow I scraped together every last shred of dignity and held my ground.
All that talk about taking me in these woods?
That wasn’t Varek.
That was the beast running its mind games—exactly like Elysia ran hers on me.
Varek was disgusted by me, every bit as much as I was by him.
This moment, this tension—it wasn’t real.
It was forced on us.
A dark chuckle slipped out of him as he released my body, and I finally let go of the breath I’d been strangling.
“We need to get moving,” he said, serious again.
He walked off, leaving me pinned against the tree, thoroughly confused and thoroughly frustrated.
My body ran hot, my heart nearly clawing out of my chest—and there he was, acting like nothing had happened at all.
Huffing, I kicked a twig and made my way back to the others.
How was I supposed to survive the rest of this mission if this was who he was going to be?
When I got back, Garrett and Declan had already returned.
The golden box sat in Declan’s hands now, which meant my turn was creeping up.
My stomach knotted at the thought of that box working on me the way it had on Varek and Garrett.
“Oh, no—I can carry my own bag,” I cut in the second Declan reached for it on the ground.
He moved faster, snatched it up, and stepped back.
“Beautiful, I’m not weak.”
“And neither is she—” Varek growled, ripping the backpack out of Declan’s grip.
“I get that you’ve got White Knight Syndrome, Declan.
But this isn’t the Four-eyes show.
She puts in real work if she wants a spot on the Elite Team.”
A spot on the Elite Team, my ass.
He knew damn well he’d pull every string he had to keep me off it, because he couldn’t stomach our bond.
Varek hurled the bag at me and I barely caught it in time.
I scrunched my nose at him as he laid a hand on Declan’s back and steered him toward the front.
I didn’t mind carrying my own bag.
What I minded was him deciding he had the right to order everyone around because he was a prince.
Team leader or not.
I slung the backpack over my shoulders, braced for the weight—and, oddly, it didn’t feel half as bad this time.
I wasn’t feeling any of it, actually.
As I walked, I glanced back, confused, and finally understood the moment my eyes met Garrett’s.
He was bracing the backpack from behind, taking all the weight so I didn’t have to.
A small, rare smile tugged at his lips.
I smiled back, awkward, no idea how to handle it—we never smiled at each other.
He held the bag the entire walk, and I was quietly grateful.
Because of him, we could keep moving without me dragging anyone down.
I wanted to say something—anything—to break the awkward silence between us, but I didn’t know where to start.
We hadn’t had a real conversation in years.
“So…” I tried, reaching for his attention.
“You found your mate?”