“Then you can go ahead and mate with him.”
“I wish…” Carys sighed.
Erin rolled her eyes.
“Honestly…I do not understand what everyone sees.”
Carys gave her a look that said she understood exactly what everyone saw and was beginning to question whether Erin’s eyesight was damaged.
“He is handsome, and when he speaks, it sounds like the ocean whispering.”
“I really do not have the patience for him right now,” Erin complained as they walked.
“Father is so fascinated by him, it’s nauseating.” She slowed as they reached the tall double doors of the welcoming room.
She inhaled, forced her face into a smile expected of royal daughters, and buried every messy thought of Garrick.
As expected, her father was swooning over the prince.
His height towering over Magnus’ position on his wheelchair.
“Ah… there she is…” Alpha King Kyllian smiled.
“Father…” Erin said, lowering into a graceful bow.
Kyllian’s eyes narrowed slightly.
Erin’s spine stiffened.
For one dreadful second, she wondered if the perfume had failed.
Her father’s wolf senses were annoyingly sharp.
“What took you forever?” he asked.
I was arguing with the soldier I love because he reenlisted without telling me.
No.
I was fucking the love of my life.
Absolutely not.
Erin chose silence.
Garrick did not want the king to know about them yet, and as furious as she was with him, she would not be the one to throw their secret into her father’s claws.
Not today.
Instead, she turned her attention to the prince.
“Prince Magnus…”
He looked up at her.
Magnus Dragos was beautiful.
He had the grace of his father and the complexion of his mother.
Composed, perfect.
Dark hair brushed neatly away from his face, sharp cheekbones, elegant hands resting over the arms of his wheelchair.
His eyes softened when he saw her.
“I will leave you two alone,” Kyllian announced.
Erin’s head snapped toward him.
“Father—”
Before she could finish, he nudged her forward.
Erin stumbled, and fell straight into Magnus’ lap.
Her hands landed against his shoulders.
His hands lifted, steadying her by the waist.
He was cold beneath his clothes.
Kyllian smiled like a matchmaking demon and winked at Magnus before leaving the room.
She quickly stood, heat flooding her cheeks.
Magnus pursed his lips.
He could smell another man on her but he chose not to point it out.
“Erin…How have you been?”
“Fine…” Erin said.
“I have been fine. You?”
Their conversations were always like this.
Awkward.
Painfully, suffocatingly awkward.
“As fine as I can be,” Magnus said at last.
“I came to discuss the affairs of the war with your father and thought to see you.”
Erin folded her arms.
“You shouldn’t have bothered.”
A faint smile touched his mouth without reaching his eyes.
“It is not a bother.”
“It is to me.”
“I feel at peace when I see you,” Magnus said, ignoring her comment.
Erin closed her eyes briefly.
“Magnus, please stop this,” she said, opening her eyes.
“Stop coming to see me. Stop…”
His face tightened.
“You are my mate, Erin. I have no choice in this matter.”
She let out a humourless laugh.
“So you say. So everyone says. But do I feel like your mate?” Erin asked.
“Yes…” Magnus answered instantly, without even stopping to think about it.
The certainty in his voice annoyed her and unsettled her.
He said it as if the answer was obvious.
As if she was the foolish one for asking.
“I don’t feel anything for you,” she said.
“I don’t.”
Magnus’ jaw tightened.
“That is because you do not have your wolf yet.”
Her expression changed so quickly even Magnus seemed to realise he had stepped on something sharp.
Her wolf.
Everyone always returned to that.
Her missing wolf.
Her silent blood.
Her useless body that could not do the one thing every ordinary werewolf child did by instinct.
Shift.
Feel.
Answer the call.
And now Magnus had decided to use the same old wound as an explanation.
“Listen…” Erin said.
“I know your parents had the epic love story. The vampire-werewolf true love thing that makes everyone swoon and press their hands to their chests. But that is not us.”
“We are Erin and Magnus,” she continued.
“Oil and water. Not Luna and Damien.”
Pain flickered across his face at the mention of his parents.
Magnus looked down at his hands.
He seemed wounded.
“Is this because I cannot walk?” he asked.
“That has nothing to do with anything.”
His mouth tightened, but he said nothing.
“It doesn’t,” she insisted.
“I just don’t feel anything for you.”
He lifted his gaze to hers then.
“I’m not going to stop trying, Erin,” Magnus said.
“Never. You hear me?”
Erin groaned in exasperation, dragging both hands over her face.
“Why are you making me feel like the bad guy here? I’m not a bad person. You want me to pity you into marrying you?”
“No,” Magnus said simply.
“I want you to give me a chance to make you feel how I feel.”
“And how do you feel?”
“I…” He stopped.
His fingers tightened over the armrest of his chair.
His eyes shifted away from her.
“I have loved you since before I can even remember, Erin,” he said.
“I cannot stay too long without seeing you. It feels like my heart is being ripped apart…My life is you. My world is you. Every time my life seems darkest, all I have to do is close my eyes and find your face in the middle of the storm, and I feel the light.”
“Erin…” he whispered.
She looked away.
Her heart was not stone.
If it were, all of this would be easier.
He was a man in love with someone who did not love him back.
Erin exhaled and slowly lowered herself to her knees in front of him.
Now they were eye level.
“I’m sorry, Magnus,” Erin said softly.
“I truly am. I just…”
Magnus interrupted her by taking her hand in his and intertwining their fingers.
The mate string snapped into existence wrapping around their wrists.
“I feel it…I feel this so deep inside of me and my prayer everyday is that someday…you will feel it too.”