And then another one.
Me: I’ve missed you for years.
Every minute of every year. I hadn’t even realized how consuming the emptiness inside of me had been without Elizabeth. Being back with her now, it was showing me.
She didn’t reply, but I could feel strong emotions through our bond. I refrained from writing her again, even though I was still holding my phone like a damn lifeline.
“You coming, Louis?” Jessa asked from the doorway. Everyone had started to move out, but I was still in the kitchen, frozen.
I nodded. “Yep, be right there.”
Shelves rocked around me as my power swelled. Tee’s emotions were growing stronger, and there was so much pain and grief in them that my control disappeared in a flash. I needed to go to her. I needed to fucking see her. Practicing every single mental calming technique I knew, I breathed in and out deeply.
“Are you okay?” Jessa was right in my face now, and I focused on her for a moment.
Swallowing roughly, I shook my head. “Not really. Tee is hurting right now, dealing with ghosts of the past, and I can’t be there with her.”
Jessa’s smile was sad. “I love that you call her Tee. It’s so different from the formality of her name. It suits her. Even more than Lizzie, and I really like it too.”
She was babbling, which was very unlike her, and I figured it was because she wanted to distract me and didn’t know how. Reaching out, I wrapped my free arm around her and pulled her in to my chest. “Thank you,” I murmured. “For everything you’ve done.”
She squeezed me back tightly, and I could hear the rumble of her dragon from outside, but he didn’t venture in. Apparently I was just trustworthy enough now, or maybe it was that I had my own true mate. He knew the strength of that bond.
Following them out to the sanctuary, I tried to ignore the sorrow floating through my bond with Tee. Focusing on the chiefs and elders helped distract me a little, but I was a loose cannon trying to deal with my mate’s pain. I should be with her. I needed to be with her.
I sent her one more text that night, needing her to know that she was always on my mind. She replied, and I felt better knowing that it was only memories paining her. Memories she was determined to deal with. Alone.
That nightI slept like shit. After a few hours, I pulled myself from the bed and ventured out into the forest near the main town. I let my energy drift from me, releasing some of the darkness, while I thought about Tee. I’d had her in my arms—and bed—for one night, and now I couldn’t imagine being able to sleep without her again.
When the false light of this world rose, I ventured back to my room, showering and changing before grabbing some breakfast. Sometime later, when it was early morning back in America, I felt another hot surge of pain through the bond, and I almost blew up a small market stall as I lost control of my energy.
Before anything else could happen, my phone rang.
“Tee?” I said immediately.
She made a choked sound, and everything around me shook as supes watched me warily.
I kept my voice calm though. “Tee, are you okay?”
She choked out some words. “I … just … please talk to me.”
Some of the tension inside eased because she clearly wasn’t in any sort of trouble. I let out a low breath, and the rattling of the buildings slowed as I calmed. I needed to see her. This distance was not good for either of us. “Let me come to you, please. You’re killing me. Your pain is … more than I can handle.”
It was worse than my own pain. I would be tortured in the land between for an eternity before I’d have her feel like this. “Soon,” she promised me. “But for now, tell me something … anything. Distract me.”
Working hard to push down my own worry and anger, I tried to decide which of the millions of things I could say to her. There was so much unsaid between us still, but I understood her need for distraction.
I went with the first thing on my mind: “Your hair drives me crazy.”
There was a pause and then a chuckle escaped from her.
A smile tilted up my lips. “Seriously,” I continued, “I have actual dreams about running my hands through it, and how the hell does it smell like wildflowers. Even when we were kids you smelled of wildflowers. I figured it’s because you were always out in the fields, but there were no fields in Alaska, and you still have the same scent.”
Another chuckle burst from her. “Of all the things you could have said, you want to talk about your weird obsessions.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle in return. “It made you laugh,” I said, before my voice went a lot lower. “And honestly, if I’d heard one more choked breath from you, I was coming for you. Whether you wanted me to or not. I think you underestimate my control.”
“I’m with Regina,” she whispered, sorrow creeping in again. “I felt her here with me. I think … I think she forgives me.”
