Chapter 115
Chapter 115
Elvira
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The bath water is warm and bubbly, and I have no idea how to sit still in it.
Luxury makes me nervous. Silk–wrapped rooms, bath oils that smell like flowers I can’t pronounce. I honestly don’t know how to exist here. I’m used to being dirty after having been Alpha Logan’s prisoner for so long. Being bathed like this? It doesn’t feel like something I deserve.
But Axel insisted.
“You need to relax before dinner,” he said.
So now I’m here, in a tub big enough for three people. My knees are pulled to my chest and I am drowning in steam and nerves.
I cannot get used to this.
From somewhere outside the door, I hear muffled voices. Staff, maybe.
“Why is Axel taking care of the blind one?”
“Are they mates?”
“They can’t be. Axel is a powerful werewolf and that one? She can’t even see.”
“Blind and useless.”
“So useless…”
The words vanish, but they stick to my ribs.
Useless.
Does Axel think that too?
It is true that I am still blind. But I’m not entirely blind anymore. I am definitely healing, but very slowly. I squint at the blur of the room.
How long will it take until I can see perfectly again?
Footsteps.
“Okay if I help?” Axel’s voice.
“S–sure…”
Axel walks in and then kneels by the tub. He doesn’t touch me right away. Just lets his presence settle like warmth in the room.
Then I hear water, the wring of fabric, the slow rhythm of something approaching.
The sponge lands on my arm.
I flinch. Not because it hurts. Because it doesn’t. Because it’s too gentle.
He keeps going. Circles down my forearm, my elbow. Each pass so slow I forget how to breathe.
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17:04 Tue, 5 Aug
Chapter 115
It’s not just a bath. It’s intimacy I didn’t ask for, but maybe needed. The kind of touch that says, “you’re still here, and that matters.”
I love it.
“Too much?” he asks when i stiffen.
“No,” I murmur.
Because if I say more, my heart might crack open.
“Lean back,” he says.
I do.
He gathers my hair and massages my scalp. His fingers feel like magic on my skin. I am having actual goosebumps from his touch.
I turn my face slightly. My cheek brushes his wrist.
He pauses. “You okay?”
I nod. My throat won’t work.
He rinses my hair with water. Gentle. No soap in my eyes. No splashes. Like he has done this before or practiced it in dreams.
Then he moves to help me up. His hand skims along my arm. Pauses at a scar.
“How did you get this?” he asks.
“Oh, it came from my crazy days with Eden… We were playing in the woods. Pretending we knew how to shift like everyone else. We were
playing too close to this hill and…yeah.”
He chuckles. “You tumbled down?”
“Sure did.”
His fingertip skims over a few more scars. “They all from playing with Eden?”
I nod.
“You have so many.”
“I know…”
“You’re still beautiful.”
I snort. “You’re the only one who thinks so.”
“Good. I don’t like sharing.”
My heart doesn’t know what to do with that.
He helps me out of the bath. Wraps me up in a towel like I will fall apart without it. Guides me into the bedroom, hands always close, never pushy.
The dress on the bed makes my stomach tighten. I can only just make it out with my blind ass eyes.
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Chapter 115
“You want help?” Axel asks.
I nod again.
He slides the dress up my legs, over my hips, around my waist. His fingers linger at the zipper.
My fingers accidentally graze his stomach as he works. Hard muscle. Warm skin.
I freeze, halfway through breathing.
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It wasn’t on purpose. But it wasn’t an accident either. Part of me just wanted to know if he really felt like that. If I’m allowed to want this. If I’m allowed to want him.
“You know,” he says, voice closer now. “Your hair looked like gold in the candlelight last night.”
I snort. “It was tangled.”
“Still made me want to bury my face in it.”
I almost drop dead on the spot.
“You keep talking like that and I’m going to think you actually like me,” I mumble.
His breath hits the back of my neck. “Too late.”
He finishes the ties. Kisses the base of my neck like it’s nothing. Like it’s everything.
I freeze.
“Too much?”
“No.”
The moment is sweet, but I ruin it by saying something I probably shouldn’t.
“I’ve been thinking about going back,” I say. “To the human realm. Just for a while. To see my family. They aren’t in Logan’s pack anymore, so I should be safe visiting them.” If they let me inside their house, that is.
Axel stills. “Oh… You don’t plan on staying.”
His hands drop away from the dress.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
I hate the way the room gets quiet after that. Hate the way my chest tightens.
“Would you like to come with me?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer right away, but soon mutters, “I’m Eden’s bodyguard and the Dream Court needs me.”
My chest aches, but this is what I expected. Axel might be my mate, but he is right about being needed here. What was I thinking, asking if he would come with me to the human realm?
A knock at the door makes me jump.
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Chapter 115
Axel stands.
“Who is it?”
“Dinner is ready. The king awaits.”
A servant. Male. Polished voice. Fae.
My spine locks.
The king.
Azriel.
The last time I walked these halls, the dream bells dropped me to my knees.
What will it be this time?
Axel turns to me. Offers his hand. “Ready?”
“Ready,” I whisper back, even if I’m not.
Meeting the fae king is going to be a nightmare. Azriel is Eden’s mate and I don’t think he is going to like me very much.
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