DAPHNE
The word was still hanging in the air between us.
Mate.
No.
Goddess no.
My body heard it before my brain could process what was happening. The bond slammed into me with the force of a freight train. Every single nerve ending I had went haywire at once.
My body was still pressed against his. I could feel every inch of him. The solid wall of muscle of his torso. The heat radiating off his skin. The way his chest was heaving against mine.
My wolf surged forward for the first time in a long time, clawing her way to the surface with a howl that rattled through my bones.
Mate. Mate. Mate. Mate.
This couldn't be happening to me.
His arm was locked around my waist like a steel band. And then his other hand slid into my hair, his fingers threading through the strands at the back of my neck. The touch was careful, almost reverent.
Like he was trying to convince himself I was real.
Then his face dropped to my throat and he breathed me in.
The inhale was deep and desperate. Like he'd been suffocating and I was the first breath of air he'd had in years.
The sound he made went straight through me. It was rough and hungry and purely animal. My knees went weak.
If he hadn't been holding me up, I would've collapsed right there in the dirt.
"Goddess," he breathed against my skin, his voice breaking on the word. "You're here. You're real."
His nose dragged along the curve of my neck. He was scenting me like he was trying to memorize every detail. I could feel the muscles in his arms flexing as he pulled me closer. I could feel the tremor running through his hands like he was barely holding himself back.
My body was melting into him. Every instinct I had was screaming at me to tilt my head back, to bare my throat, to let him mark me right here in the ferns and dirt and claim me the way the bond was demanding he should.
The bond was purring with satisfaction. It flooded me with warmth and rightness and this overwhelming sense of home that I hadn't felt since the day everything fell apart.
Then the memories hit.
That day in the courtyard, when he'd returned from his trip.
How he'd looked at me, like I was something disgusting he'd stepped in, after I'd waited for him to come home for weeks.
'Move her things out of my chambers.'
Two years of that life. Two years of dying slowly while the one person I needed to see me treated me worse than anyone else ever had.
The backs of my eyes burned as I remembered what he'd told his senior advisor the day I left.
'She's not suited to do anything beyond playing with her little herbs and being spread open whenever she's called on.'
I shoved him with everything I had.
I caught him off guard. He was too lost in the bond, too busy drowning in my scent that he actually stumbled backward.
I scrambled away before he could recover. I kept going until my back hit a tree trunk and I had something solid behind me.
My chest was heaving. My hands were shaking. The bond was screaming at me to go back, to close the distance, to let him touch me again.
But I ignored it.
Rovian recovered fast. He took a step toward me with his hand outstretched.
I flinched.
The reaction was pure instinct. It was a small movement, barely anything, but he saw it.
Something in his face shattered.
His hand froze mid-reach, as his whole body went rigid. The look on his still handsome face was devastating.
"Daphne, please—"
"Don't." My voice came out shakier than I wanted, but at least the words made it past my lips. "Don't you dare touch me. Don't you dare say my name like it means something to you when we both know it doesn't."
He dropped his hand immediately. He took a careful step back with his palms raised like I was a wild animal he was trying not to spook.
His eyes were flickering. They went from brown to molten gold and back again. His wolf was right there, barely leashed, probably going just as insane as mine was.
The difference was that he looked like he wanted to close the distance and never let go.
I looked like I wanted to bolt.
"You feel it." His voice had gone rough, downright guttural. "You can feel our bond. After all this time... you're actually my—"
"Don't finish that sentence." The laugh that ripped out of me tasted bitter. "Don't you dare stand there and act like this is some gift. Like fate did us a favor by tying me to you."
"This is real, Daphne. This means—"
"It means NOTHING." My voice pitched higher. "You think a bond changes what you did to me? You destroyed me, Rovian. You did it publicly, cruelly, and for reasons I will never understand. And now the goddess has the nerve to tell me you're my mate?"
He looked stricken. "Daphne, if you knew—"
"Knew what? What could you possibly tell me that would justify two years of torture?"
His jaw worked. "I was wrong—"
"You were MONSTROUS." The word came out like venom. "One day you loved me. The next you looked at me like I was dirt under your boot. And you never told me why."
"I know." His voice was barely a whisper.
My hands were shaking. "You didn't just end our marriage. You humiliated me. Made sure everyone in your court knew I was worthless. Called me a whore. Locked me in a closet of a room while you fucked other women loud enough for me to hear. And now you expect me to accept that you're my mate?"
"I know it's not that simple." His voice had dropped an octave, "You are everything I don't deserve, but I'm yours, Daphne. I've been yours since the day I met you."
That words made my wolf want to roll over and show her belly.
But it made me want to claw his eyes out.
"I'm not YOURS," I said through gritted teeth. "I was yours once. And you threw me away. You don't get me back just because the goddess says we're compatible."
"The bond isn't just compatibility—"
"I don't care what it is! I would rather die than be tied to you for the rest of my life."
"No." His voice cracked slightly. "I know words won't fix what I did. But I'm standing here looking at you, reminded of what I never let myself forget. You're still the most beautiful thing I've ever seen and I can't... I can't let you go again. I searched for you for three years, Daphne. And now that I've found you—"
"What? You think you get to keep me?" I laughed bitterly. "I'm not some lost possession you tracked down. I'm a person. A person you destroyed. And I will never, EVER forgive you for it."
I lifted my chin, meeting those golden eyes directly even though every instinct I had was screaming at me to submit, to back down, to yield to my mate like a good little omega should.
Instead I said, "I reject the bond. I reject you. I want nothing to do with this."
The forest around us went silent.
Something dangerous flickered across his face, "You can't reject a fated bond, Daphne."
"Watch me."
Something volatile touched his expression then. Something that looked like thinly concealed panic, "The goddess doesn't give us a choice in this."
"Then I guess the goddess and I are going to have a problem."
I saw the exact moment his control fractured. He took a step toward me.
But I wasn't going to let myself be convinced to go anywhere with Rovian Kaizer ever again.
Because it felt like my life literally depended on it, I spun on my heel and ran.