Page 47 of Racing the Storm

I wanted to argue with him, to tell him he was the only Wolf I’d have done this for, but I felt his weight against me, and I heard the way his breathing started to even out. It seemed more cruel to impose my feelings and regret on him, so instead I simply let him lie there and take whatever he needed, in order to get from one moment to the next.

Chapter

Sixteen

MIKAEL

Ihadn’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.”

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