27 - First Time

GIDEON

The silence in the room was thick, the only sound filling the empty air being my mate's heartbeat that had drastically sped up.

I swallowed down the anxiety that was seeping through every pore of my body. The thought of sharing one of the most intimate moments with him inside the temple where so many could hear us gave me flashbacks.

Flashbacks to all the times a council member would force me to shapeshift into Emily and chain me down for some brute to have his way. All while many of the medical members watched me sob and beg for them to stop. Just so they could take notes on if I'd been properly mated or not. What hurt the worst was when they would try to forcefull