Page 26 of Escalating Alpha

Now if I could just believe it.

7

Maya of all people showed up with the food I’d ordered. I sighed and stepped aside to let her in. I let the door slam behind her, saying a lot with that especially since she was a fairy and could sense a lot from me.

But then I felt like a bully since she worked for me. She was hurrying to fuss about and get dinner set up for me.

“This isn’t fair,” I grumbled.

“No, but I accept your valid anger that I’m butting in,” she said as she kept going. “And I won’t stay. I simply want you to hear a few things from me and I’ll leave you to your night. I would also like to point out that I never get involved.” She cleared her throat. “And the groceries were my idea, so I feel responsible.”

I sighed and grabbed two pops, not caring about the extra sugar or calories right then. I sat down and nodded for her to go ahead. If I had to be subjected to whatever her involvement was, I just wanted to get it over with.

“He was broken so young, Sera,” she whispered. “They—you have no idea how that family broke him. The pain and depth of the suffering he experienced. And then to serve at court for so long—there aren’t words for it. It cannotbeput into words.”

“I get that. I get being broken,” I argued. “But he’s hundreds of years old and has had time to—”

“No, but—”

“I suffered too!” I snapped. “But I still fucking listen to him and what he needs. I don’t dismiss him and treat him like a child!” I swallowed down what else I might have said when she flinched.

“No, you don’t, and I would never, noteverdismiss or be dismissive of all you suffered. You went through more than any should.” She waited until I reached for my sushi, getting that was my acceptance of what she’d said. “But you had years out of it, Sera. You suffered it for sixteen years before you were free. Yes, into another kind of hell, but you were free to learn yourself.”

I took a few bites and met her gaze, confused.

“He was still trapped until you rescued him, Sera. That’s six hundred years being broken. Hundreds of years with his family—thatfamily is—the damage is… And the court is—it’s so much better now. It was better when our queen took over, but he was never free. Every second of every day was court games and him being tossed around like a servant and worse.”

I thought about that as I stuffed a whole maki roll in my mouth. “All I can compare it to is when friends come back from deployment and can’t adjust back or…”

“Except this was a life Dain has never lived. It was all too foreign and—”

“Then he should have fucking asked for help,” I seethed. “All the lectures he gave me about not knowing when to get help and—”

“Yes, he should have,” she agreed, her tone absolute. She let out a slow breath when I backed down. “You are completely right, and I begged him to when even I knew about the kale jokes and heard your comments about yourdadwas going to yell at you for not eating your lunch. I saw how sad you were looking at him. How heartbroken you would be.”

I looked away and blinked back tears. “I thought he saw me, Maya. I don’t think he ever did. I don’t know any of them did. It all hurts so fucking much that I can’t breathe. I can’t go on and keep moving. He only finally got it when all of the guys ganged up on him? Not everything I’ve said to him? All the times I’veaskedhim to cook with me instead?”

“I’ve never heard you ask that,” she admitted.

I chuckled darkly. “I probably gave up by the time you came in the picture.” I frowned. “No, I did when we started having sex again. I offered to make him my mixed burgers and he told me not tobotherbecause he’d had the chefs cook for me.” I met her gaze. “I try. I try more than most realize because I don’t always talk about it or brag.”

“I believe that.”

“I do tell them things, but they never listen,” I choked out. “I’m always that kid standing there ignored or dismissed and a bother to people. He makes me feel that. I’m a bother. A chore. Something to check off his list because we’re mated. It was never fun. It was never…” I covered my face and cried. “I thought he was my soulmate and he saw me. I feel so played.”

“No, I swear it’s—Dain doesn’t have it in him to play someone, child.” She hugged me to her and pet my hair as I cried. “He’s just so broken.”

“I am too, and I got help so I never hurt them. Why can’t they do that for me? Why—he always makes me feel—I’m not always the problem. Even when he walked away from me after he was magically drugged. Everyone told him what I thought and the damage he’d done to us. Why didn’t he learn from that? Why didn’t that cut through his pride or—”

“He is in the wrong and a stupid,stupidman,” she promised me. “I’m not defending him. I’m giving you insight. Also—he loves you, Sera. He has failed to show you that the right way,but he loves you. Everyone knows how broken he was when you were taken—”

I slammed my fist onto the table. “I cannot keep giving them unlimited chances or all the passes to mistreat me because I was abducted.”

“No, no you cannot,” she agreed, her eyes a bit too wide.

“Sorry,” I mumbled and went back to my food.

There was a quick knock on the door before it was unlocked and Dain flew inside with Topher on his hip and darted past us… Our son squealing at the fun.

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