365 Days Apart

Chapter Four

Safira

“Little one,

I’ve lived for decades, but you are the most gorgeous woman I’ve ever seen, the best investment I’ve ever made. But the agency didn’t tell me I was paying for a soul that already belonged to me.

Consider yourself done with them. You are finished with the agency because, from this moment on, you belong to me. And I hate to share to what is mine, I will rip apart any man who dares to steal even a glance at you.

You bear my mark, which makes you mine and joined to me, in every way, little one.

I would have loved to hold you in my arms until you woke, but I had to step out for something urgent.

I’ll be back to claim you, to make you completely mine, and to fuck you exactly the way I promised… hard, fast, and rough.

Wait for me.”

I sniffled, fighting back the tears stinging the back of my eyes. Today makes it exactly one year since that mind-blowing moment in the bar—the night that promised a life of pleasure, a future with my mate, and an end to my loneliness.

But by the time my eyes came open, he was gone, leaving me with this note that I had read every single day since, until the words were etched in my memory.

The man who made me feel everything I had only dreamt of…everything I never thought I could feel was nowhere to be found.

It felt like a dream birthed out of my wildest fantasies, like it never happened, but the ache in my legs, the vivid memory of the press of his lips against me, and the tiny spark that still moved through my neck from the mark he left there were all proof that what happened was real. The way my nipples hardened whenever I thought of him—it was all real.

Yet, I couldn’t find him that morning.

I had waited, for long hours, hoping he’d come back like his note said, but he didn’t. I had gone back to the bar over and over again, hoping to see him. I had spent almost my entire savings booking the VIP suite, hoping that one day, just one day, we would cross paths. I had passed more nights in that bar over the last twelve months than I had in my own room.

But a man who doesn’t want to be seen can never be found.

And I had tried… I really tried to forget him. I tried to cut him out, but how could I forget a man who had effectively ruined me for anyone else? Even for myself?

Every time I undressed, what rang in my head were his words, his eyes, the way they trail over me that night, and the way they took me in like I was the world’s greatest masterpiece.

I could still feel the ghost of his beard grazing the inside of my thighs, the sharp, electric sting of his teeth on me that sent a fresh wave of wetness between my legs even now, a year later. Hell, I had touched myself multiple nights to the thought of him. I was pathetically chasing a ghost, yet I couldn’t bring myself to stop.

I had tried to force myself out of this pathetic haze, but I kept failing. I had become a woman who was lit up for one glorious night, only to be left to burn in the cold for three hundred and sixty-five fucking days.

Everything reminded me of him. Every. Damn. Thing.

Even now, as I was forced to watch my stepmother get exactly what I had been searching for, I was pulled back to that moment in the suite where he called me his mate. If it had been true— if I hadn’t blacked out, if he hadn’t walked away that morning—maybe this could have been me.

Maybe I wouldn’t have to watch my stepmother get mated for the third time. First, it was her ex-husband who died tragically, then my father, and now, she wasn't just getting any man—she was being mated to the Alpha King. Meanwhile, I couldn’t even get half a man. The only one who ever claimed me had fled before the sun could witness his… mistake.

Maybe I really was cursed, just like my stepmother always said.

“Safira, you’re wasting my time!” Her voice cut through my thoughts like a whip.

The orb I was holding nearly slipped from my hands, but I caught it just in time, clutching it tightly against my chest. It was cold and lifeless, just as it had been since the day my mother died.

I could still remember holding it to my heart on that rainy morning when she was lowered into the ground. Tears had rolled down my face as fear and agony pulsed through my veins, and I’d wondered how I would ever live without her. I wondered if anyone—even my own father—could ever love the cursed Safira, the wolfless mistake. I wondered if anyone would ever look at me with the same precious gaze my mother once had.

When I got home that day, my father introduced me to Clarissa. She had smiled warmly then, holding my hands and promising to take care of me, but she turned out to be the right hand of the devil himself—sent into this world just to prove that I was, indeed, a curse.

I had always wished that she met her own devil, that she gets the things she had done to me back in folds, and the goddess answered me by getting her mated to the Alpha king—a man whose reputation for cruelty was the only thing more legendary than the ancient werewolf and vampire war.

Alpha Azrael Fairwyn, popularly called the Devil’s son, the Casanova Alpha without a Luna but with long list of concubines or bed-warmers as the park called them. Rumor had it that he’d traded his soul and emotions for power and strength, they said if you were unfortunate enough to look into his eyes, you’d be dead before the next moon cycle, your heart simply giving up from the terror of being seen by him.

He was the perfect match for Clarissa. I couldn't wait for her to realize that being a Queen meant being trapped in a cage with a beast like Alpha Azrael. I hoped he’d look her right in the eyes on their wedding night. After all, what better gift for a stepmother like her than a thirty-day countdown to her own funeral?

Man, I’d be so glad to see her gone.

I packed the last of my belongings—my own orb, which was as dead and pale as my mother’s, even while I was still standing and breathing. It was often said that the wolfless were no different from the dead, and the orb was a constant reminder of that.

I took a deep breath, dragging my bags out of the crooked corner Clarissa had thrown me into. She’d moved me to the house’s storage room after my father’s death because she wanted the house to herself; she’d said being in the same space as me would jinx her plan to get mated again.

I guess she was right, because now she was getting mated again while I was still stuck with the note from a man I didn’t even know if he really existed.

I finally reached the living room, where she was pacing back and forth. The moment she saw me, her face contorted into a tight ball of fury. “What have you been doing?” she barked.

I said nothing, my head hung low. Talking back to Rissa always ended in a worse fate.

“Get yourself into the car outside,” she ordered, turning toward the door.

But before we left, I couldn’t help but speak up. “Mrs. Clarissa…”

She turned around, and my breath hitched, the rest of my words trapping themselves in my throat. “Did you call me just to stare like you’ve seen a ghost?”

I shook my head, closing my eyes to avoid her gaze before I continued. “What are we going to do with the house? You… you could just leave me here,” I murmured.

There was nothing I wanted more in the world than to be away from her. She could go get mated to whoever she wanted, but I wanted to stay here, in my father’s house, the only place that held the good memories I had left.

“I have told you over and over again that we will both be moving to the castle.” She stepped closer, and I froze. “And when we get there, you will call me Mother. Is that clear?”

I couldn’t speak. That was the first thing I’d called her when she arrived at this house, until she pulled my hair—as she was always so quick to do—and warned me never to call her that, lest I kill her just like I’d killed my mom. What had changed now?

Before I could respond, her fingers were in my hair, gripping a handful and forcing my head up to meet her gaze. “Is. That. Clear?”

“Yes,” I winced, trying to pull away. “Yes… Mother.”

A sinister smile curled her lips as she turned away. “Get in the car.”

I stood there for a moment, my eyes scanning the corners of the room. Every beautiful memory spent here reeled through my mind. My eyes clouded with tears and my heart thumped with pain; I was leaving everything behind—the house, and the only traces of my mother and father that remained.

“Safira!” Rissa’s voice sent me scurrying out the door toward the car.

The drive to the castle was cold and quiet, except for Rissa’s constant rehearsal of what she would say to the Alpha King. I leaned against the window, watching the familiar streets blur past. The paths I had walked for twenty-two years were fading away, and I was unsure when, or if, I’d ever walk them again.

I closed my eyes, sucking in a breath, and once again, my mind took me back to that night—to the man who had left me aching, needing, searching. He had thrown me into an ocean of longing and left me drowning. For months, I had been searching for him, my anchor, but every moment without him only pulled me deeper and deeper into the dark water.

I was supposed to hate him. I was supposed to never think of him again after the way he’d left, but each day spent without him only fueled my hunger. I couldn’t explain it. I couldn’t tell why it felt this way. Was it because he’d called me mate? Because of the burning mark on my neck? Because I couldn't shake the thought that I really could be his?

“Won’t you get down?”

It was Rissa again.

It was then I realized we were at the castle—a place I never thought I’d set foot in. I pushed the door open, stepping out to face the tallest building I had ever seen in my life.

It stood tall, carved from white marble and gold designs, a spectacular fortress that looked more like a sanctuary than a tyrant’s den. If not for the blood-chilling rumors of the Alpha Azrael’s cruelty, it was a place anyone would have sold their soul to live, even me.

Everything and everyone moved with a terrifying and silent orderliness. There was a level of coordination that felt unmatched in the world. There were uniformed maids moving through the hallways, their eyes down and footsteps soft, while uniformed guards stood at every junction with a rigid, frozen posture.

It was… breathtaking.

For the first time since this nightmare of a move began, I thought that maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea after all. The palace was so big, so wide, that there were a thousand places to hide. It was a huge playground where I could easily get lost to avoid my stepmother, the devil’s right hand, and the Alpha King—the devil’s son.

“We have been sent to serve you, the Lady-Designate.”

I jerked at the voice, turning to see a line of maids behind us. Their heads were bowed low, hands clasped together in front of them in perfect unison.

“What did you just say?” Rissa barked, her hand shooting out to grip the lead maid’s collar. “Lady-Designate? I am going to be your fucking Luna, and I expect to be referred to as Your Highness!”

The maids scurried back, their voices trembling as they echoed one another. “Your… Your Highness. We have been sent to serve you.”

“That’s right.” Rissa smiled, her shoulders squaring as she turned to me. A cold shiver ran down my spine. “Did you hear that? I am the Luna to be!”

She smiled victoriously and swept her fan open, the gold-leafed ribs spreading in a perfect, shimmering arc.

She turned and marched toward the hallway. We followed, matching her pace like sheep behind a shepherd. After walking for minutes and passing several wings of the castle, we finally stopped in front of a pair of massive double doors—doors so huge they could have admitted a family of elephants at once.

The doors squeaked open, and Rissa signaled for me to follow while the maids remained outside like statues.

“We will be meeting the Alpha King here,” she whispered as we took a position in the wide hall.

Uh-oh! I wanted to turn and take to my heels. I didn’t want to meet his gaze and spend the next thirty days counting down the moments I had left to live.

“Don’t forget,” she hissed, “call me Mother.”

I barely managed a nod, the terror finally overtaking me. If the Alpha King was truly the monster they said he was, then this moment would be the last time I’d ever be a whole person.

Finally, I heard the soft, rhythmic click of shoes descending the long staircase.

The Alpha King.

As he reached the bottom, I saw the smooth, glowing leather of his boots, polished to such a high mirror-sheen that I could surely see my own terrified reflection in them. His long, powerful legs became more visible as he moved closer, but I kept my head tucked low, desperate to avoid the gaze that was supposed to be a death sentence.

As he stepped closer, a familiar scent hit me, rushing into my brain like an intoxicant. It was the same sandalwood, the same spicy oud that had lived in my dreams for a year, the same one I had spread my legs and dug my fingers into myself to, for hundreds of night.

My entire body felt like it was on fire, every nerve screaming at me to look up, to see who was triggering this impossible memory. I fought the urge with everything I had, my chin tucked against my chest, until his voice hit us.

“My Queen, you’re here.”

My head swung up, my heart rolling into my stomach as my eyes met his.

I froze.

A sudden paralysis seized my limbs, my breath caught somewhere in between my throat.

Was I seeing right? Or was I only seeing him because of the quiet ache that had refused to leave my chest? Because of this something in me that kept reaching for him?

I wanted to pinch myself, to scream, to reach out and touch him just to prove he wasn’t a hallucination born of a year-long obsession.

But it was him.

“And this must be your daughter,” he said, his gaze sliding over me with a terrifying, icy politeness that made my insides churn with a mix of disbelief and pain.

Does he not remember me?

The hot stranger I met at the bar, the one I was dared to kiss; the same man who had pinned my knees wide and pressed his cold tongue against me, worshiping me with a hunger that had nearly shattered my soul, was the Alpha King. The man who made me feel something I didn’t know how to come back from, whom I mounted and grind against like my life depended on it—who left me aching, wanting more, and searching for a year—was my stepmother’s mate.

The man I had touched myself to for three hundred and sixty-five nights was about to be my stepfather.

And now, he was acting like we had never met.

How worse could my fate be?