Page 18 of Reclaiming His Lost Mate
The lady’s eyes snapped up from the herb she was grinding to meet mine for a mere second before going back to her chore, speaking without looking up.
“I said she left. She moved away from here.”
My heartbeat faulted, seizing for the next couple of seconds, and agroan filled with denial slipped past my lips as the words settled over me,
“What do you mean by she left? Left to where? When?” I bombarded the young herbalist with questions, my brain scrambling for an explanation as I shook in panic.
Selina couldn’t be gone. Gone as in how? Because of me?
The herbalist shrugged, pausing to stare at me blankly like no one was supposed to care for Selina’s whereabouts. “I do not know.”
She wasn’t going to help me, so I stormed out of the hut, moving fast on my feet in search of someone who would. I breezed past unfamiliar faces as I aimed for Lucian’s royal house. Everyone was going about their business, either unbothered or oblivious to the fact that Selina wasn’t in Nightwing Pack anymore.
As I sped to my destination, gnawing suspicions clawed at me.
Had Selina left because of me?
The thought seized around my heart like a fist. I couldn’t be the one that had driven her away, could I? But then my thoughts crowded in with all I’d done to make her life unbearable in her own home. I’d accused her of drugging and taking advantage of me when all I craved before and after then was exactly that and more—her.
Lucian’s office doors loomed in front of me now, and I forged ahead through a quiet hallway that was in contrast to the buzz of activities that had gone on during my time here, reminding me that my visit to Lucian was unannounced and not scheduled for. But that was the least of my problems.
With my heart thundering furiously against my ribcage and blood roaring in my ears, I would not have thought I could make out the voices coming from behind Lucian’s office door. But the hallway was empty and quiet, and with the help of my heightened senses, I did. The first words I heard rooted me in my spot.
“Selina is not coming back, Daddy, so will you please think about me now?”
Taken aback by the words, I remained unmoving in front of the door.
Did Marissa have something to do with Selina’s disappearance?
My wolf roared to life, thrashing in my head on hearing his mate’sname, but I shut my eyes as I drew one long breath in, my rational side winning the fight. If I was going to hear what Marissa had to say about Selina, I needed to be quiet.
Tuning into my skills as the Alpha of Shadow Moon Pack, Alaska’s known and most skilled concealers, I forced my breathing to drop below normal, taking in slower breaths than a more-than-average supernatural could for their brain to still function. I reached for my wolf, letting him take over our heartbeat, the switch helping to reduce the sound of blood pounding in my veins from a constant thud to almost nothing.
Then, I listened.
Shuffling sounded first, then Lucian’s stern voice. “Don’t say that, Marissa. You know that I only thought of you when I presented you and your sister for Alexis to make his choice. Just as I expected, he chose you, and it’s nobody’s fault but yours that he didn’t take you back to his pack with him. You had one job, and it was to make sure he was locked in, but you let your chance slip.”
I stood there, stunned. Marissa spoke now, and I imagined her face twisting in anger, not in remorse for failing to go through with their vile plan. "I tried to do it, and I got so close. We were supposed to sleep together that night after I laced his drink, and I made sure we were around each other all through the banquet, but I don't know how he managed to slip out of my sight."
So, Marissa was the one who drugged me and not Selina? The confession made me stagger on my feet, not because I was surprised to learn that night was Marissa's doing, but because an invisible hand drove into my chest at her words, twisting my heart till it dislodged from its chamber, yanking it out, just as I had taken it out on Selina.
Marissa, having no idea that I just heard her, continued. "Now I’m thinking he’s having second thoughts because he was supposed to take me back with him. What if he left with that mutt? You have to help me, Daddy. You have to convince Alexis to speed up the marriage. Tell him something important came up. We can have it this week."
That was enough information for me. I got everything I could from them. One was that it was Marissa who tried to take advantage of me,never Selina, and two, both Lucian and Marissa had no idea where Selina was.
Instead of leaving, I gripped the knob, yanked the door open, and slammed it against the wall, shaking the structure to its hinges. I would have reveled in the sight of the horrified looks on both their faces if my mind wasn't so set on another mission.
I spoke.
"I would be telling lies if I said I was surprised that your hands weren't clean since I have come to a close understanding of what kind of woman you are within this short span, Marisa." My voice was calm and controlled, contrary to the turmoil driving in my head, but I spoke regardless. "I do not know what you seek in a Luna title that will push you to this extent, and I do not care to know, but you will not be getting it from me. The engagement is called off," I stated, turning around and not wasting a spare second to hear the fake strings of apologies from Marissa or the palpitating tone of Lucian's voice.
My back was turned to them and Nightwing Pack as a whole, and I could only think of Selina—how short of words she had been when I accused her, throwing horrid names in her face, and just how devastating it must have been for her to pack up her things and abandon the pack she lived in all her life.
Hate was a strong word, one I have never used on anybody, not even on my father, who could not give my mother the life she deserved, but I hated myself right there and then.
I needed to find her. I had to make things right—all of it, and redeem myself enough to deserve even half a quarter of Selina's worth. Falling into my thoughts then, I wondered. ‘Where on Igaluk's green earth am I going to begin?’
Chapter 8
