Total pages in book: 182
Estimated words: 171176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 856(@200wpm)___ 685(@250wpm)___ 571(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 171176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 856(@200wpm)___ 685(@250wpm)___ 571(@300wpm)
“But you thought I was evil, a killer. You were taking me captive. To kill me. Why go through the trouble?”
I searched for something to say but came up blank. “I-I don’t know. It just . . . felt right, I guess.”
“Because of the true mate bond.”
“Likely. Should I have it removed? This room is intended to be dressing chambers. If you don’t like it, I can bring back the furniture I had removed. We can get you those dresses, if you want, and we can have dinners in our rooms or out in the garden . . .”
I realized I was basically babbling and stopped the onslaught of words.
She looked at her work on the stands and then skirted along the perimeter of the room, running her finger across one surface and then another. Only once did she push something back a little, just that tiny bit out of place, until she reached one of the containers on the desk. I’d left that one obviously and wildly out of place on purpose. I watched her ear lift, a smile, before she slid it in line with the others. She’d caught the joke.
Finally at the framed pictures, she turned and pointed, eyebrows raised.
I needed to stop clearing my throat. “Those were my favorites. I’d already looked through everything, so I figured the damage was done. It was to show you the framing options for any of the finished pieces you’d like to preserve.”
She turned back to them, four in all, pulling one of the frames away to look at the work behind.
“If it’s too much, I can have it all removed, Aurelia. Just say the word.”
Her emotions were still too frenzied to read. She turned and finally faced me, her lips quivering.
“You organized it all just how I like it. You knew.”
The tension in my shoulders eased a little, though I was beginning to feel a bit sheepish. “Yes. Except the bedroom. I know you prefer a little more chaos there, but, well, that’s kind of hard to stage. It needs to be used, lived in, for the sort of chaos you like.”
She laughed a little, and her eyes filled with tears. “I didn’t even know that about myself. Did you do all this?”
“Yes. Well, no. Sylvester basically put the kitchen together. I didn’t know how to go about that. The garden was there. I wouldn’t have a clue on how to deal with that. Liron, the painting instructor here, helped me with the things you were likely to need. The bed was just ordering the right stuff from the laundry—”
“No, I mean . . .” She licked her lips as a single tear spilled down one cheek. She wiped it away. “No one else went through my cottage in Granny’s village to help you piece all this together?”
“Helped a little, maybe, but no one was allowed to peruse. They took what I told them to grab and they got out. I didn’t let anyone else snoop, Aurelia, I promise.”
She shook her head. I still didn’t understand; I couldn’t tell if she was angry or happy or sad. “You hated everything I stood for, yet you took the time and effort to bring with me the things that meant the most to me in the world.”
“Not technically. I’m sure there were gifts from Granny I missed.”
“You know me so”—her lower lip trembled—“so, so well. You’ve tried so hard to know me and you’ve”—more tears fell—“you’ve nailed it. This is the”—she choked back a sob—“the nicest thing anyone has ever given me. Ever. It’s the most . . . perfect, most magical space I’ve ever had. In a dragon castle, no less.” She laughed through her tears. “My mom would . . .” She choked back another sob. “My mom would be so happy for me,” she whispered, trying to get a hold of herself. “I could die tomorrow, with nothing else in the world, and I would be happy that I could recount all this to my mom.”
I went to her. “You’ll have many more stories to tell her, baby. I promise. But not for a long, long time. She’ll wait for you, happily.”
She put her hands on my chest. “I don’t know you well enough to pull off something like this, and I feel awful about it. Why don’t I have the same instincts with the bond that you do? Why doesn’t it hurt me when someone mentions you’re in pain the way the bond hurts you?”
“She’s too locked in her logic,” my wolf said. “Her wolf is frustrated by it, but I think you’re right—it’s a coping mechanism. She’s trying to limit her wolf’s influence so she doesn’t do things like crawl out second-story windows. But it’s stifling the true mate bond.”
He wasn’t wrong, but I understood. “She’s always used logic. Her feelings—and her magic—were locked away. It’s how she survived Granny. She won’t submit to me simply because her primal urges tell her to; she’ll submit to me because she loves me, all on her own. This space was the first step in showing her how perfect we are together. We now have more time than we thought we would. We just need to keep at it until she finally sees what we’ve known.”