Chapter 16

Chapter

Sixteen

MIKAEL

I hadn't intended on sleeping myself, but when I woke with a start, I was lying on the ground with Danyal in my arms. I had clutched him to me, and it only took me a second to realize he was holding me back just as tight. When I shifted, he let out a noise of protest, then he buried his face in my neck and began to scent me.

His nose dragged along my skin—along the place my pulse was pounding. It was everything I had been dreaming about for years, and it killed me because he wasn't awake for it. He was being driven by instinct—an exhausted Omega and the Alpha whose pheromones were probably telling him how wanted he was.

"Danyal," I murmured.

He groaned again and held on tighter. "I'm sorry."

I shook my head, though he wasn't looking at me. I couldn't let him keep apologizing for giving me everything I wanted. My hand rose, burying fingers in his hair, and I held tight. "I want you here."

He stiffened, but he didn't move. He didn't pull away. "Please don't try to make me feel better about this."

I eased him back with my other hand, though I didn't fully let him go. His eyes were bright in the dim light of the cave, and I gently brushed curled knuckles along the edge of his jaw. "I would do anything to make sure you never felt another moment of pain in your life. I would rip my own heart out if I knew it would make you happy."

He blinked. Said nothing.

"I hope that's not what you need from me, but you keep saying sorry for something that I want."

After a moment, he cleared his throat and eased back away from me. The miniscule distance felt like a canyon, and it took everything in me not to reach for him again. He sat up, looming over me, his mouth twisted into a frown.

"Several years ago…"

"Danyal," I interrupted.

He shook his head, then slapped a hand over my mouth, and my cock twitched at the look in his eye. "Several years ago, we met. I was in heat, and you took me home…and you knotted me."

I nodded, and he bared his teeth in frustration.

"You remember."

With a gentle touch, I eased his hand away, then licked the taste of his sweat from my lips. It was heaven, but I couldn't let myself get lost in it. "Of course I remember."

There was heartbreak on his face this time as he pulled back, shuffling over the floor of the cave until several feet separated us. "You…you looked at me like I was no one. You pretended like you didn't…"

"I know," I said, halting his flow of words. His jaw snapped shut so hard, I could hear the click. "I was a coward. The worst sort of coward."

His gaze fell to the floor, then he swallowed thickly. "Why? You just…you just left me there, and you treated me like I was a stranger." He looked at me, and his eyes were narrow. "No, worse . You treated me like I was a nuisance."

"The night you went into heat," I told him, the words sticking to the inside of my throat. I had to stop, and I almost laughed at how weak I was in front of this Wolf. I had spent years in battle, years tearing apart the continent, winning the war for Wolves, taking lives, covered in blood. And at the foot of this Omega, I felt small. "The night you went into heat was the first time I had even looked at another Wolf since losing my mate."

He blinked, startled. "You…" He stopped like he'd been slapped. "You had a mate?"

"It was before the war," I told him, my words rough because I never spoke about Galen, which felt so unfair to the man I had once loved with every fiber of my being. "We weren't as compatible as a lot of mates were. Our bond was weak, but I loved him. He was sweet, and he was brave." I closed my eyes and let the old, faded grief spring back to life. "He died believing things would never get this bad. When I lost him, I swore I'd never touch anyone else ever again. I'd never take the risk of losing someone I loved like that. And then you came along, and you were everything I was running from."

Danyal said nothing for so long, I wasn't sure he would ever speak to me again. After a moment, though, he cleared his throat. "It doesn't make it any better. What you did," he added, as though I had no idea how badly my actions hurt him. How stupid they were.

"I'm not…" I began, but I stopped, because anything I was about to say was a lie. I was asking for forgiveness, for absolution, for a second chance. I might not have deserved them, but that didn't mean I wasn't desperate for anything he was willing to give. I dragged a hand down my face, then pushed to my feet and took a single step closer. "I don't know how to explain how sorry I am."

He said nothing—which was more than I deserved.

"I'll spend the rest of my life hating myself for being an idiot and doing everything in my power to make it up to you."

He met my gaze—his eyes blazing, refusing to lower, refusing to submit. Just as it should have been with an Alpha who had so completely betrayed his mate. "And if I never let it go?"

"It won't change anything. That night, I realized what you were to me. Our bond held on for so long."

He let out a shuddering breath. "I remember."

An eternity. Gods, it had lingered so long—feeling him, knowing he was there, knowing I'd hurt him. But I'd been such a fucking coward. "I didn't think I'd see you again."

At that, Danyal stood up, crossing his arms over his middle. It was a defensive position. It prevented me from closing the distance between us. There was still fire in his eyes though—fury and hurt and determination. "No, it wasn't just that. You didn't expect to come back alive. You didn't want to."

I wasn't sure if he knew because there were so many other Wolves like me, or if I was just that transparent, but I had no defense against it. He knew the brutal, honest truth. "I gave it my all. I protected myself and the Wolves who served under me. But I also didn't think it would be the worst idea in the world if I never came back." He shuddered at my words, tense and almost furious, but I couldn't let him re-write what my journey had been. "I had no one, Danyal. I had one Omega that I was too afraid to love because I already knew what it felt like to lose a mate—to lose everyone. My family was killed, my husband was dead, and I didn't think you would be in the business of forgiving me."

He looked at me a long while, but I couldn't read his face. "I don't know if you were wrong or right, Mikael."

I bowed my head. "I know. But here we are. We both survived, and we have a lot more surviving to do."

I didn't look at him, but I heard him take in a breath before he spoke. "What's different this time? Why are you here for me now?"

There was only one answer to this, and saying it was the easiest thing I had ever done. "Because I know that losing what I had isn't nearly as bad as never having it at all."

I expected Danyal to walk away, and when I heard him exit the cave, I didn't stop him. We had days like this—surviving out here with just us, unable to draw attention to ourselves. And then, if I was right about my gut feeling, we'd be heading into Paris in an attempt to flee the country without being caught by Kasher's men.

We also needed information, and if Kor wasn't going to be in touch soon, we'd have to get it ourselves. We couldn't get back home without knowing the landscape—or more likely the landmine—we were walking into. My desire for Danyal needed to take a backseat; I just wasn't sure how to force it.

In spite of the fact that it was my fault we had been separated all of these years, having him this close now, having confessed all of my truths, it was impossible to let go.

I spent the day in my wolf form, lounging by the mouth of the cave. Danyal hadn't gone far, and I could hear him pacing and muttering to himself. I was only able to process a few words here and there, and almost all of them were cursing me. I could live with it, though. I would live with it, if it meant he was still near enough to reach out and pull close.

Stretching out, I yawned loudly and let the late evening sun start to warm my fur just as Danyal's footsteps started back toward the cave. I didn't have it in me to move, but I looked up at him, ears perked up, when he came to a stop a few feet away.

"Mikael." My name on his lips was too easy to understand. He stared a moment longer, then walked over and slid to the ground with his back to the stone wall. When I shuffled closer and let out a low, soft whine, he rolled his eyes, but his fingers curled in toward himself to beckon me over.

I knew he wouldn't have allowed it in human form, but I also knew few Wolves could resist their mates like this. He proved me right when his fingers sank into my fur, and he gave me a delicious scratch behind my ears.

He started speaking after that, but I didn't try and shift my brain to understand him. I just let the words wash over me, letting his tone speak. He was hurt, but he was grateful I was there. He was lost, but he felt brave because we were together.

I gently licked the pads of his fingers as I stared up at him and let his scent overwhelm me.

I loved him. Gods, I had always loved him. It was that rough, feral, instinct that would grow into something more complex as we let ourselves spend time together. But the foundation was there. It had been there the night he had come to me in heat, and in spite of the bond breaking, it had never gone.

"Come back."

I knew those words, and every instinct told me not to. It would shatter the fragile moment where he felt okay touching me and keeping me close. But I couldn't disobey him.

My limbs cracked and reformed, the pain rippling through me—barely noticeable anymore, but a little more profound right here. I stayed on my side, staring up at him, watching his gaze rake up and down my body for a long moment.

It almost felt like aphysical touch.

"I'm afraid," he said after a while. "I never stopped wanting you, and I'm afraid what that's going to mean after we get home."

"I'm not going to make the same mistake again," I began, but he shook his head, and the rest of my promise died.

"After you left me that morning," he started, then swallowed thickly and repeated himself. "After you left me that morning, I never let anyone else touch me."

It took me a long time to process what he was saying, but when it hit me, my entire body lit up like it was on fire. "You mean, no one else has ever…"

He shook his head. "No. You were my first, and so far, you are my last."

"Not even in a heat?" It was a ridiculous thing to hope for. An Omega in heat without a partner meant agony. Long, horrific days of pain and want and need with no release. I'd only met one or two who had ever endured it, and they had refused to let it happen more than once. I felt almost panicked as I rose to my knees. "Danyal…"

"I never had another heat."

I sat back on my heels, and stunned was too small a word to describe what I was feeling. "Never?"

He shook his head again. "No. It was…" He breathed out a soft laugh and shrugged. "It was one of the reasons I threw myself into my research. I wanted to know what the hell was wrong with me. Why I was broken."

I winced at the idea that he considered himself not whole. "I'm sorry."

Danyal gazed at me a moment, then shrugged. "I never did find out why. My first heat was massively delayed. I had already started to suspect I'd never have one until the night I met you. I was able to study a handful of Omegas who went through the same thing, but there was never any one factor. Some of them were mated and never had a heat again. Some had more than one partner. Some just the one, like me. In the end, I realized I was just different."

Pushing up to my knees, I gave into my urge to touch him. I moved slowly, but when he didn't pull away—when he didn't wince at the contact—I let my hand cup his cheek. "You do know you're not broken, right?"

He scoffed a little, but the sound wasn't cruel. "I've moved on from that. At first, I thought maybe you sensed something in me was…wrong, and that's why you left. After the first year passed and not another heat, I thought maybe your Alpha instincts just knew."

"No, I swear…"

He turned his head and nipped at my hand, silencing me. "I know that now. I was young and hurt and trying to find any reason why you hadn't come back for me." He licked his lips, and I choked on more words of apology. "Eventually I realized that whatever it was, it was on you. You were focused on the war, or maybe you had just wanted a single night. Maybe I wasn't your type. Maybe you were already married."

I closed my eyes and said nothing, just feeling the heat of his cheek beneath my palm.

"None of those reasons were my fault though. Just like my body being the way it is."

I gathered my courage, then opened my eyes to look at him. "Why didn't you ever find someone else?"

At that, he did pull away, and in spite of the pain, I let my hand drop into my lap. "Part of it was knowing that not everyone would understand that I wasn't broken—just different. And I wasn't sure I wanted to take rejection after rejection. Eventually, I would start to believe there was something wrong with me."

"Danyal…"

"The other reason was because I still wanted you. I hated myself for it," he said, his voice hard as he met my gaze fully, "but it was what it was." He bit down on his lip, then shrugged one shoulder. "It got easier when you showed up at the base and pretended like you didn't know me. It gave me closure."

I had nothing to say in my defense. I wanted to tell him that of course it had nothing to do with him, but he didn't know that at the time. My actions had given him the closure I didn't want him to have, and it was entirely my doing.

There really was no going back.

I pushed to my feet and stared at him one last time, resolved to let him go. I might pine for the rest of my life, and I'd meant what I said about making it up to him, but I wasn't going to force myself on him. He had wanted to move on, and that was the least I could do.

Saying nothing, I turned and walked back into the cave, and I pretended like it wasn't gutting me when the sound of his footsteps didn't follow mine.