“You know Philip is your mate,” I whispered.
Her eyes widened; she didn’t know that I knew.
“Yes.” She nodded.
“Do you want him, or do you want me?” I asked, the question strangling me. My body shook slightly.
Please choose me.
“Tell him that you would never pick someone over yourfated mate,”Philip demanded.
Elowyn looked at him for a long time before looking at me. I could see the worry in her eyes the longer she stared at me.
“But Loma is your mate,” she whispered.
She wanted to know that I didn’t want my mate either, and I was happy to oblige.
“I don’t want Loma. I want you. Do you want me or Philip?”
Elowyn’s silent tears streamed down her face when she looked at me. I was about to ask her what was wrong but she started talking before I could.
“But you already finished your marriage bond with her. You gave her your star and finished your mating bond.” She was talking so fast and through tears that I almost didn’t catch what she said.
I stilled and turned to Philip who gave me a cocky smile.
“Did he tell you that?” I asked her.
She nodded, and I gripped Philip’s hair in my fingers and slammed his head into the table over and over until he cried loudly. My red eyes flickered to her.
“I did no such thing. I don’t want Loma. I’ve had no feelings toward her. I would not touch her, marry her, or give her the star that clearly is yours. He lied to you.”
Her eyes widened as she stared at me. Gods, she was so pretty when she looked like this… happy but confused about how I could want her when she wasn’t my mate.
“Tell him he’s fucking crazy, Elowyn, now.” He was barely conscious.
I turned my murderous glare to Philip, not liking the way he was speaking to her. I used my star mist to wrap around his mouth and shut him up. My gaze moved back to Elowyn who was still watching me.
“You’d pick me over Loma?” she asked.
“I already did.” I didn’t hesitate.
“Why?”
“Because I love you, Elowyn,” I confessed.
I watched her reaction to the words I never said to her. Her chest rose and fell quickly. Her cheeks flushed as her lips parted.
“But if you love him, I will not stand in your way.” It was a lie.
Philip was dying even if she thought she loved him. I couldn’t let him live. She moved so quickly that her arms wrapping around my neck had me stumbling into the table. Her lips crashed into mine.
Elowyn’s fingers gripped my ripped tunic, yanking me closer to her. Relief and desperation collided in my chest, and I could feel my pulse thundering as I pulled her to me. Philip’s muffled screams echoed faintly in the background, but I tuned them out, focusing solely on her. Every instinct in me screamed that I couldn’t lose her, that I wouldn’t. I deepened the kiss as I turned her so she was against the table, my heart hammering in my chest like it wanted to escape. My hand wrapped around the back of her neck and yanked her into me, and I felt the raw intensity of her surrender.
My eyes snapped open, and Philip’s glare cut through the room. He was watching us, his fury and disbelief written across his features. I smiled, a dark thrill curling through me, letting him see exactly what he’d lost. Something primal surged inside me—I needed him to know that she was mine, and had never been his. The heavens themselves could not tear her from me, and neither could Philip.
Elowyn was mine but more importantly, I was hers.
That thought alone made my chest tighten, made the air around us almost electric. My hand ran up her thighs, and as I lifted her onto the table, I felt a strange mix of protectiveness and possession, a desire to show her that nothing, no one, could touch what was ours. Her dress bunched at her hips as I spread her legs and stepped forward, and her gaze met mine with quiet certainty. She didn’t hesitate, didn’t question, because she understood the depth of what I was claiming.
