Chapter 6 She’s Mine
Chapter 6 She’s Mine
AIDAN
+5 Free Coins
Coming to Vermont Pack against my will, I had expected bloodshed to follow. This pack was an enemy of mine. Cohabiting was never an option, but I’d been receiving threatening notes for the past week, and this pack held the key to uncovering what it was all about, so I was here.
I couldn’t wait to find out and maim whoever was toying with me, and all that seemed appealing until I set my eyes on her. On them.
At first, I thought the resemblance to the little girl was nothing more than a coincidence, but then she told me her name, and she wouldn’t stop talking about her mother who sounded like the woman who still held the key to my heart after all these years.
Pieces started forming in my head, but I pushed them to the side because it was impossible that after all this time, Tara was still alive and here.
Those were my thoughts, but I also couldn’t ignore the familiarity I felt with this place, and the intense need to protect the little child. Call it intuition, but it felt like a huge piece of me was here. I couldn’t deny it if I tried.
Finally stepping into her mother’s office, my world stopped revolving.
“Tara,” I muttered, sounding far more calmer than I was.
She stood there, amidst empty boxes, muttering apologies while looking distorted, but still by far the most beautiful woman to ever walk the planet for me. Parts of me that had been left dead since the moment Kayla and my father told me that Tara had died roared to life like full current wires.
How was this possible? Tara. This child, Nadia. She was mine, and I denied her. I denied them both, and I left them alone to fend for themselves.
Christ.
I’d messed up.
Oh my goodness.
My eyes must have shown how I felt because even the child who was unwilling to let go of my hand for the last ten minutes tensed up beside me. Tara too.
She must have seen me but saw the devil in my stead. I pushed her away, and all this time, she was left to raise our child alone.
My confusion and disappointment multiplied, and I found it harder to draw each passing breath or even stand upright. My stomach churned in disgust at myself, and bile rose in my throat.
“How?” I asked myself, expecting no answer from anyone. I looked between Tara and Nadia, both of them, my flesh and blood, and an invisible hand punched me in my gut. I failed. “She’s mine,” I said, rather than asked, with a choked voice, and I couldn’t ignore how Tara tensed up.
I could see the wheels turning in her head, her motherly instincts kicking in, and her forgetting her fears for a minute.
Ignoring me, she gestured to Nadia. “Come here, baby.”
I spoke, but I also reluctantly released my hold on Nadia’s hand. I didn’t want to scare them further. “We should talk, Tara,” I said softly with a small crack in my voice.
If I was asked, I wouldn’t know the first thing to say to either of them, but I knew we had to talk.
“No!” Tara bellowed, and I could see the confusion multiplying in Nadia’s eyes. “Stay away from us,” she said, fury coating each word, but fear also evident in them.
Her eyes darted between us three and the door, and I knew that all she wanted to do was flee. She would rather be anywhere
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Chapter 6 She’s Mine
than in the same room as me. I fucked up big time.
+5 Free Coins
Tara closed the small gap between us and grabbed Nadia by the hand, pulling her away from me and closer to herself. As she did that, her ambrosia scent trickled into my lungs, and I could swear that her being close to me like this topped everything that had happened in my life since her absence.
Tara picked Nadia up and cradled her close to her chest, resting the little girl’s small head in the crook of her neck, and in doing so, shielding Nadia from my view.
My heart physically hurt with each passing second even though I could understand her emotions.
There was so much to say. There was so much more to fix, and I was going to do exactly that or die trying, but now was not the right time.
This was overwhelming for both of us, and the last thing I wanted to do was add to Tara’s turmoil in an attempt to make her see me differently. If it was going to take ten years for her to want to listen to me, I would wait.
“I’m so sorry, Tara. God, I’m sorry. I swear it to you, I will fix this,” I said with all the resolve I could muster.
I was clueless about how I was going to fix almost nine broken years, but I was going to.
Tara echoed a humorless laugh and quickly sidestepped me to get to the door behind me. I let her pass even if every nerve within me screamed to touch her, hold her, and tie them both to me for the rest of our lives.
Once Tara was on the other side of the opened door with a confused–looking Nadia in her arms and having the eyes of the public on us, some of the tension eased from her features, but she was still cautious.
“We don’t need you. I’m better off dead, remember?” My heart broke into a million fucking pieces from the pained look in her eyes and the ice in her tone. “Well, I’m not dead, but we’re sure as heck better off without you in our lives.”
And with that, she abandoned her office, her diner, and fled without so much as a second glance at me.
Even if I tried, I wouldn’t have been able to move an inch from my spot.
I lost track of how much time I spent transfixed by the door thinking of what a monster I was for Tara to look at me and run on instinct. I thought about what she went through carrying our baby on her own right after I rebuked her, and how she raised our child alone for eight years.
How the hell did I fuck things up like this? I thought… I thought…
God, I missed everything.
I screwed up.
My legs lost strength, and I lowered myself to the floor on my eleven thousand–dollar Brioni suit. I sat there, staring inta nothingness until a concerned voice cut through my thoughts.
“Alpha Aidan?” It was Jace, my beta, who accompanied me to Vermont pack on the mission to find out where the threatening notes were from and why.
A mission that was stale to me now.
I turned to him but didn’t say a word.
“Did you find something?” He asked, his eyes darting around the space in confusion.
I couldn’t form words, so I gave him a single shake of my head.
He went on. “We have a problem. The pack’s Alpha, Alpha Collin, is aware that we are here, and he is furious.” Jace shifted on his feet as he considered his next words. “He wants us out.”
I rose to my feet as the meaning of Jace’s words settled. Collin wanting us out meant either dead or alive. And before the moon goddess, I would be dead before leaving this pack without Tara and our daughter.
