I expected Mason to stay put.
Instead, he lay down next to me and grabbed my hand. "You won't break me."
The last thing he whispered, "Sweet dreams," was funny because I knew that the next few hours would be nothing but nightmares and wanting something I knew I could never have.
CHAPTER NINE
Ethan
THE PAIN WAS UNBEARABLE — BECAUSE IT was a reminder of why I hated my entire existence — why I had a reason to hate.
Cassius.
Didn't it always come back to him? After all, it had started with him. Or maybe it had just started with Ara.
Another shudder wracked my body. Bones felt like they were twisting around one another before suddenly re
setting themselves over and over again.
I felt her pain.
Because she was a part of me now.
So her pain was my pain.
Only for me, it was worse.
Because it was the second time in my existence I'd experienced it — when it was only supposed to be experienced once. Immortals mated for life. That was, unless someone or something intervened.
Hands shaking, I took another drink of blood. It did nothing, or maybe it did, and I was just too bitter to allow it to heal me.
She'd been naked, inconsolable, and I'd left her.
With Mason, of all creatures. My best friend, the only being other than Alex that I trusted.
My body convulsed. Falling to my knees in front of the fireplace in my room, I lifted my head to the ceiling and listened for her cries.
It was going to be a long evening.
Made longer because I'd refused to give her what she needed to make it better. I'd thought I could do it when I walked out of that room, smug as shit. I had thought I could do it.
But the pain had been too much.
The reminder.
And then the visions I'd shared with her — too personal. She'd seen Ara. She knew the shame that consumed me — or would soon know. There would be no secrets between us, and in order for the mating to continue, I had to make sure that I completely marked her, possessed her, made her mine.
It was the last thing I'd expected this morning when the number had been called.
It had been a normal day.
As normal as my life had been for the past century.
And then Cassius had breathed her name… Genesis. And my world stopped.
His eyes had gone completely white, and then the bastard had smirked at me, like he knew the future before the present had even happened.
It was impossible to describe the need I'd felt when I walked into that throne room. I'd heard her heartbeat on the other side of the door and had given a shaky nod to Alex, who'd seemed more amused than upset at our new circumstances.