Chapter 30
Damien let out a low, frustrated growl, tossing the heavy covers aside. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t lie there in luxury while she broke apart on the floor like a discarded doll.
He slid out of bed and knelt beside her. Up close, she looked even smaller, her lush curves pressed tight as she shuddered in the grip of the dream. Her skin was ice-cold to the touch.
“Sofia,” he muttered, but she didn’t wake. She only whimpered again, a sound that sliced right through his mind.
Without another thought, he slid one arm beneath her knees and the other behind her back, lifting her with effortless strength. Her head fell naturally into the hollow of his shoulder, her damp hair brushing against his skin. She was soft and heavy in his arms, her body molding against his hard chest. Even in his irritation, he couldn’t help but notice how perfectly she seemed to fit there.
He stood up and laid her gently in the center of the bed.
The moment her body hit the mattress, she scrambled instinctively toward the heat he had left behind in the pillows. Damien climbed back in beside her, intending to stay on his side, but the second he was within reach, Sofia gravitated toward him like a moth to a flame.
Still trapped in her nightmare, she sought the only source of warmth in her frozen world. She curled into his side, her rounded hip pressing against his thigh and her face tucking into his neck.
Damien froze. His heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs. He could feel the soft weight of her, the way her breathing began to slow as his werewolf heat seeped into her skin. His wolf hummed with dark, possessive satisfaction, finally having her exactly where he wanted.
He knew he should push her away. He knew this was a mistake. But as her shivering finally stopped and her tiny sighs of relief fanned across his skin, his arm moved on its own, settling over the curve of her waist and pulling her flush against him.
“Just for tonight,” he whispered into the darkness, his voice thick with a lie he didn’t even believe. “Just so you don’t freeze p>
He closed his eyes, his senses filled with the scent of her, finally drifting into a sleep that was far more peaceful than he deserved.
The morning sun filtered through the heavy velvet curtains in slivers of gold, dancing across the tangled sheets. Damien stirred, the unfamiliar weight against his chest hitting him instantly. As consciousness returned, he realized he wasn’t alone.
Sofia was still fast asleep, her breathing deep and even for the first time in days. She had drifted during the night, her head now resting squarely on his bicep, her soft, plush body tucked firmly into the crook of his side. His large hand was still splayed across the small of her back, the heat of his palm seeping through the thin cotton of his shirt.
He looked down at her, his eyes tracing the gentle curve of her cheek and the fullness of her lips, parted slightly in sleep. She looked so innocent—so much like the girl he had spent years watching from the shadows of his own heart.
A bitter tang rose in his throat.
What would life have been like if she hadn’t betrayed him?
The question was a jagged blade in his mind. He closed his eyes, for a moment allowing himself to drift into a world that didn’t exist. In that world, they would have woken up like this every morning, but with smiles instead of scars. He would have spent the early hours tracing her curves with adoration rather than possessive anger. He would have finally confessed the feelings he’d harbored for years—the secret, aching love he’d been too afraid to voice because he feared she only saw him as a friend.
They could have been lovers. They could have been happy.
But then, the memory of what she had done hit him. He didn’t need rumors or lies. He had seen it with his own eyes. He had stood in the shadows, watched the betrayal unfold, and felt his soul shatter into a million pieces. She had done the one thing he thought she was incapable of, and she didn’t even know he had been there to witness what she did.
His jaw tightened, the muscles corded and hard. He looked at her now—this beautiful, soft woman who felt like heaven in his arms—and saw the ghost of the girl who had broken him.
The “Master and Slave” dynamic was a shield, a way to punish her for the future she had stolen from them both. He wanted to hate her. He needed to hate her. But as she shifted in her sleep, murmuring something unintelligible and pressing her face deeper into his neck, Damien felt his resolve crumble even more. The heat of her body was a reminder of everything he wanted to possess, and everything he could never truly have again.
Slowly, painfully, he began to untangle himself from her, his movements stiff. He needed to get out before she woke up. He couldn’t let her see the longing in his eyes before he had the chance to mask it back into ice.
Damien began to slide his arm from beneath her, but the moment the contact broke, Sofia let out a small, needy whimper in her sleep. Instead of letting him go, her arms reached out blindly, her fingers hooking into his shirt and pulling him back toward her.
He froze, his heart slamming against his ribs. She was still deep in sleep, her long lashes fanning against her flushed cheeks, but her body was acting on a primal instinct for heat and safety.
Then, her hand began to wander.
Her palm slid upward, her soft fingers splaying across his bare chest, tracing the hard muscles and the scar tissue he carried. Damien’s breath hitched. He tried to seize her wrist, to stop the torturous movements, but his own body betrayed him, leaning into her touch.
Sofia shifted, her leg hooking over his hip, pulling their lower bodies flush together. Her hand wandered lower, moving past his stomach until her fingers slipped beneath the waistband of his joggers. When her warm palm closed around his cock, Damien’s vision went white.
He gritted his teeth so hard his jaw ached, a low, guttural vibration starting in his throat. He should move. He should stop this. But as she began to stroke him with a slow, rhythmic curiosity—still lost in the haze of her dreams—the pleasure of it overwhelmed his logic.
“Sofia he groaned, his head falling back against the headboard. His eyes fluttered shut, his body arching into her hand as a ragged moan escaped him.
She leaned closer, her lips brushing against his collarbone, and then it happened.
“Matthew she whispered into his skin.
The word hit him like ice water, extinguishing everything inside him. Damien’s eyes snapped open, glowing with a fierce, amber light.
Sofia was lost in a wet dream—but it wasn’t of him. It was of Mathew.