TEN: Not Beside Me, Between Us

MINTHE

Not Beside Me, Between Us

* * *

I stare at him from the doorway, cold air still clinging to my cloak from outside. Lyria shifts weakly beneath my blankets—my fucking blankets—and Pierre stays beside her bed with that wet cloth still in his hand. The room smells faintly of medicine herbs and lavender oil.

I used to sleep here every night. Funny.

“I visited my family,” I say quietly.

Pierre’s brows pull together instantly. “Your family?”

“Mm.”

“You haven’t visited House Vale in years.”

I shrug one shoulder carefully, suddenly too tired to hold my own body upright. “People do strange things after almost dying in a mountain ravine.”

His jaw flexes. His eyes move over me again—slow this time. The black imperial cloak. The silver stitching at my cuffs. The bandage wrapped around my throat. Recognition flickers across his face, then suspicion follows right after.

“You went to the Imperial Pack.”

I don’t answer.

“Minthe.”

I laugh softly under my breath because of course this is happening. Of fucking course. “You know,” I murmur, “most people usually start with are you alright?”

His expression hardens immediately. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“This.” He gestures vaguely toward me. “Disappear after the ceremony, return in the Alpha King’s carriage wearing imperial colors, then act as though nobody’s allowed to question it.”

I blink at him slowly. There’s dried blood still under my fingernails from yesterday. My ankle still hurts every time I put weight on it. I almost died. And somehow I’m being interrogated for my poor communication skills.

I actually want to laugh.

“You knew the carriage overturned,” I say.

Pierre exhales sharply through his nose. “I heard there was an accident.”

“And?”

“And what?”

I stare at him. God. Three years. Three whole fucking years and I still kept hoping one day he’d look at me first.

This isn’t the second male lead I tried so hard to save.

Or maybe it is. Maybe it’s exactly the second male lead who’s so obsessed with the heroine that he’d go so much as to try and kill himself for her.

“You didn’t come,” I say softly.

Something flickers across his face before irritation covers it again. “Lyria was ill.”

Right. There it is, simple, clean, easy. Lyria was ill. Not Minthe could be dead somewhere under a collapsed carriage in the middle of a storm. Not Minthe disappeared overnight bleeding into snow. Just—Lyria was ill.

Before I can answer, movement stirs behind him.

“Pierre . . .” Lyria’s voice comes out weak and breathy from the bed, and Pierre turns immediately. Immediately. It happens so naturally it hurts worse than if he’d hesitated first. He kneels beside the bed without even looking at me again, one hand sliding gently behind her neck while the other brushes pale hair from her damp forehead.

“It’s alright,” he murmurs softly. “Go back to sleep.”

Lyria blinks slowly up at him. Her eyes find me over his shoulder for half a second before turning watery again. “I didn’t mean to cause trouble for Minthe . . .” she whispers.

“You didn’t,” Pierre says instantly.

I stand there watching him adjust the blankets around her shoulders with careful hands—careful, tender, familiar. The same hands that used to pull me closer at night when winters got too cold in Ashbourne. The same voice that once told me I was home.

Is this a heroine buff? I sure hope it is. I hope this isn’t Pierre’s actual feelings. Maybe if I knew this was just the book’s plot controlling him, then maybe I’d be able to let everything go with an open heart.

Something inside me finally gives up, and it doesn’t snap loudly, nor dramatically. It just stops—the hope, the excuses, the stupid fucking part of me that kept trying to understand him. I step backward quietly. Neither of them notices.

The hallway feels colder when I leave their room. I walk slowly toward my chambers, exhaustion dragging against my bones with every step, my ankle throbbing harder now from the long carriage ride. I barely register it anymore. I just want five minutes alone. That’s it. Five fucking minutes.

But the moment I push open my bedroom door, I stop cold.

Servants fill the room. My wardrobe stands wide open—dresses folded into traveling trunks, jewelry boxes disappearing into velvet wrapping, shelves half-empty already. One maid nearly jumps when she notices me standing there.

“Luna Minthe—“

“What’s happening?”

Nobody answers immediately, and the silence tells me enough. A younger servant lowers her eyes nervously while clutching one of my gowns against her chest. “Alpha Pierre ordered the suite prepared for Lady Lyria’s recovery. The physicians said this room receives more sunlight during the afternoon and retains heat better at night and—“

“Oh.” My voice sounds strangely calm. “I see.”

The girl looks seconds away from crying. God, now I feel bad for her too. I really am pathetic.

My gaze drifts around the room slowly. The vanity where I used to sit while Pierre brushed my hair after baths. The bookshelf we built together because he kept hammering the shelves unevenly. The cracked corner table from when we got drunk during winter festival and danced badly enough to knock furniture over. Three years shoved into boxes in under an hour. Efficient.

The doorway creaks softly behind me. I turn.

Lyria stands there wrapped in my ivory robe—mine, the one Pierre bought me during our second winter together because I kept stealing his clothes in the cold.

I look behind her and Pierre is nowhere to be found.

Her pale fingers tighten around the fabric delicately. “Minthe . . .” she says softly. “I told him this wasn’t necessary.”

Bullshit.

“But Pierre insisted,” she continues gently. “He was worried about my condition.”

Of course he was. I nod once. “That makes sense.”

Lyria blinks, probably expecting more resistance than that. Honestly, I’m too fucking tired.

I walk past the servants and crouch beside the last trunk myself. My ankle protests immediately, sharp pain shooting upward, but I ignore it and grip the handles anyway.

“Luna Minthe, we can carry that—“

“It’s fine.”

I lift it. Or try to. Halfway upright, pain buckles through my leg unexpectedly, my balance slips, and the trunk jerks sideways out of my hands.

Everything crashes—the trunk slamming against marble flooring hard enough to echo through the room, perfume bottles shattering instantly, glass spraying across the floor while gowns spill everywhere in tangled fabric and jewelry scatters beneath furniture.

I hit the ground hard on my palms. “Ah—fuck . . .”

Pain burns across my scraped skin. For a second, nobody moves.

Then I look up and catch the exact moment Lyria pulls her foot backward beneath the hem of her dress. It was a mall movement, easy to deny, impossible to miss.

The room goes very quiet.

Lyria gasps softly. “Minthe, are you alright?”

I stare at her. She stares back with wide innocent eyes.

You scheming little bitch.

One of the shattered perfume bottles leaks across the marble beside me, sweet floral scent filling the room sharply. Then something blue catches the sunlight—my mother’s necklace, the sapphire pendant lying tangled between spilled dresses. Lyria bends immediately and picks it up before I can move.

“Oh,” she breathes softly, the gemstones gleaming against her pale fingers. “It’s beautiful. Can I borrow this?” Before I can answer, she lifts her hair and fastens it around her own throat.

Something sharp finally snaps inside me.

“No.” The word comes out harsher than intended. I rise too quickly, ankle protesting violently beneath me. “Take it off.”

Lyria blinks. “I only wanted to—“

“Take. It. Off.”

I cross the room toward her. Lyria suddenly recoils with a startled sound, then stumbles backward directly into the hallway. “Pierre—“

His footsteps appear almost instantly. Of course they do.

Pierre rounds the corner fast enough that his coat swings behind him. His gaze lands on Lyria first—standing there trembling with tears gathering in her eyes—then on me, then on the necklace. Lyria clutches the sapphire pendant protectively against her chest. “I didn’t mean to upset her,” she whispers shakily. “I only said it was pretty . . .”

Pierre moves between us immediately. One arm shields Lyria behind his back while his other hand catches my wrist before I can step closer. The motion hits harder than the actual grip.

I freeze.

Pierre’s fingers tighten around my wrist as he glares down at me. “What the hell are you doing?”

I stare at him—at the way his body blocks her instinctively, at the way he positioned himself between us without hesitation.

“That necklace belonged to my mother,” I say quietly.

His expression doesn’t soften. If anything, it gets worse. “For fuck’s sake, Minthe,” he snaps. “It’s a necklace. You own enough jewels to fill entire rooms while Lyria has almost nothing. If you cared about anyone besides yourself for once, maybe you’d learn how to share.”

The words land so hard my ears ring afterward.

Share?

I sold my inheritance for this pack. I gave up my title, my home, my pride. I spent three years rebuilding Ashbourne Pack beside him while noble families laughed at me for throwing my life away over a man who was never supposed to choose me.

And somehow—somehow—I’m selfish.

Behind Pierre’s shoulder, I catch it. Just for one second—the tiny upward curve of Lyria’s lips before she hides it behind trembling breaths again.

Pierre releases my wrist abruptly. “Apologize,” he says coldly. “You frightened her.”

I stare at him silently. And behind his protective frame, Lyria touches my mother’s necklace at her throat while Pierre stands between us exactly where he’s always been.

Not beside me. Between us.

Ah, I really wanna go home.