AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I’m not going to forgive you for something that wasn’t your fault. Celeste was a wildcard I should’ve foreseen and didn’t; your wolf is possessive. I can’t blame you for that. I won’t.”
Two hands gripped his shirt roughly, yanking him toward her so that their eyes met. “I can’t stand the fact that I hurt you. You’re bleeding.”
It wasn’t the first time someone he cared for had hurt him, and it wouldn’t be the last. Only a year ago, Kaien had beaten him to a bloody pulp when he’d found his future mate testing a theory. Incidentally, Blair’s theory had centered on her reaction to Remmus’ kiss, but it’d still stung when Kaien had nearly smashed his face in once he found them in an embrace.
Remmus was accustomed to the feeling of betrayal by friends or family. In fact, he was only surprised Ava was so broken up about it. His parents had taken great joy in reminding him of his place, and he’d accepted it as a fact of life before he’d even made it past the first decade of life. The fact that Ava was apologizing for it—when it was clearly not her fault—made her the odd one out.
But as she stood there, tears misting with the pain of what she’d done, there was no way he couldn’t say the words. “I could never be mad at you for that, Ava. Of course you’re forgiven.”
Forgiveness.
The debilitating need for penance slammed into his mind. Threads of coercion began to tighten around his throat, clawing at his free will as he fought against their reach.
Jerking away from her, Remmus pivoted on his heel and closed his eyes while he murmured some tragic excuse for leaving. His legs barely held as he sprinted back to his personal quarters in the den, unable to heed her calls to stop. Palm slapping the door open, Remmus kicked it shut behind him and lunged for where the dagger was concealed in his bag.
Trembling hands fisted around the blade, the bite of the metal sinking into his palm before he could stop himself. As he closed his eyes, he dragged the sharp end over the inked flesh of his left arm again and again. Blood beaded against the intricately detailed canvas of his skin, the grey-blue ink broken once more.
Numb to it after all these years, he sighed in relief as the strokes against his opposite arm brought respite from the urges that laced his mind like arsenic. With each red line he scored, a thread of coercion loosened its chokehold, but the invading darkness seemed only to grow in his mind.
Even after all these years, his mother’s voice never left him. You’ll take it from your flesh when you fail.
When his arm no longer had the real estate to appease the remainder of his penance, he stripped out of his shirt. Digging deeper, Remmus scored grooves into the snake on his side, cutting off the head of the serpent over and over in a blind effort to remove her influence.
It never worked.
His mother, dead all these years, still managed to make him suffer. After his due was paid, blood coated his skin in a macabre painting. Remmus breathed freely once more, but his mind felt heavier than ever.
Chapter Twenty-One
Ava had watched him run and didn’t follow. She’d stood in stunned confusion as he spun, leaving her alone in the great hall surrounded by her pack mates. The animal beneath her skin had known something was wrong before the human part of her had recognized it.
Something guilty, something dark, had slithered through their mating bond on the heels of his exit. What it was, she couldn’t tell, but it felt other, not intrinsic to the man she hoped to call mate. It felt removed from him, foreign even.
And when the emotions jumbled together on her end, there was one thing she felt more keenly than anything else: shame.
That was why she’d given him the time he needed and went to her quarters to bake the stress away.
When it’d cleared from their ghosting bond and relief washed through their connection like a cleansing breath, she’d started toward her door to seek him out. Fortunately, she didn’t have to go too far.
A knock announced his arrival. Ava gave him her best scowl. “Tied to a chair, slathered in wet cat food, and fed to ravenous kittens.”
“What a perfectly terrible way to go.”
“Be happy it wasn’t catnip and snow leopards.” She popped a hip and fisted a hand on it. “You gonna tell me why you took off?”
“Where would be the mystery in that? Besides, I have a—wait. Are those brownies I smell?"
He brushed past her into the kitchen, beaming when he got a good look at what was waiting on her counter.
“You made brownies!”
Ava nodded. “Just for you, dear Remmus.”
Instead of delighting him, it had the exact opposite effect. “You made them for me? Why? What do you want?”
The suspicious reaction tore at her heart. Though she longed to know why he’d changed so suddenly, she didn’t want to have a confrontation until she got to the bottom of his emotional state.
“I can’t make them for you because I wanted to?”
