Page 31 of Mate Me

Pinning Styx with a side glare, and I nodded.

“Well. That settles that. You need to go.”

Not without her. Returning to Tartarus wasn’t as off-putting as I thought it would be, but returning without her? Impossible.

“Only if you come with me,” I answered.

Her lips parted and she laughed. “To Hell? No. No way.”

I took a step toward her, coming face-to-face. “I told you, Tartarus isn’t Hell.”

“Fine.” She cleared her throat. “To Tartarus?” she began, using a mocking tone as repeated herself. “No. No way. Better?”

“Then we’re staying here.”

“You can’t,” she said, her brows furrowing . “The grass around the fountain is dead. The magic is moving toward you. Look.” She waved her hands wildly over the area where blackened char was stretching toward me. “If you stay, it will spread, and it’s going to kill what it touches, or turn it into a shadow shifter.”

I couldn’t argue her point. She was right, but that didn’t mean I would just walk away from her. “So, come with me. We can?—”

“I’m not going with you,” she said, clenching her fists. “I don’t trust you. I’m not your mate, no matter what you believe?—”

“Know,” I corrected, feeling my frustration rise.

She shook her head. “Agree to disagree. You said you weren’t going to kill me, right? Then justgo.”

“If I were another man, anyone other than the twat that tried to mark you—would you tell me to leave?”

“If it was killing my world, I would!”

“And if not?”

“That doesn’t matter! There is no point in discussing it because this is our reality. Right now.”

Frustration turned to anger at her outright dismissal. “Our reality is that you’re my mate, and you are stubborn as hell and won’t listen to a word I say. If I weren’t the man you’ve beenconditionedto believe was here to destroy everything—you wouldn’t be doing this.”

That stopped her short, and silence ensued. The audience watching us didn’t whisper or move as they waited for her to speak.

Finally, she spoke, and her voice was even-keeled, lacking all the fire she’d had before. “You’re right,” she said with a sigh. “But you are that man, regardless of what truth is in those stories. You admitted to coming here to kill me, which is why it’ll never work between us.”

I ran my fingers through my hair, nails scraping my scalp sharply. This was getting nowhere.

“I’m not leaving without my mate, so either we set up camp near this portal, or we go to my side.”

Reagan stared at me, eyes watering with anger. It was a confusing reaction and seeing her battle this struggle made me want to reach for her, but she wanted nothing from me.

Then she said the words that shattered every bit of grace I was holding onto.

“Caius, I reject you.”

Shock slapped me only a second before the pain took hold, twisting my insides. I nearly collapsed from it. She didn’t just . . .

Raw emotions tore at my heart. She tried to deny herself and me by proxy, but for a bond to be rejected, I had to accept it. That much I knew.

Nothing I could say or do would make her believe me. In her eyes, I was the Soulless One, and no words could convince her of the truth.

She wanted to see me as the villain? So be it.

I’d be the villain, and she could be the savior.

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