Bad Love an Alpha’s Regret by Elise Sinclair

Chapter 345

I can’t bring myself to name what I’m feeling.

If I do, it’s putting too much power behind the emotion.

“Axel, why did you break the bond?”

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I didn’t mean to blurt that out, but once the words are out there, I

watch him flinch.

But he keeps walking.

Axel?” I try again.

He doesn’t answer right away, and I swallow down the lump in

my throat. But I don’t turn back. I follow him into the annex. To the

far end, pushing into the bathroom after him and not caring if he

wants his privacy or not.

He washes himself in the sink. The blood sluicing off his arms and

chest.

I wait as he cleanses away the remnants of the fighting. I want to

help him. To take the towel from his hand and care for him myself,

but I know it’s not what he wants right now.

“Why, Axel?” I repeat. “Is it because of what happened to me?

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Because you knew I would be some broken, fragile mess?”

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He hurls the last of the rags aside and steps forward. He catches. my upper arms, his expression fierce.

“I don’t think that about you at all, Emily,” he says in an intense tone. “I think you’re strong and resilient. I think you’re amazing. Instead of being broken by what you went through, you let it make

you stronger. Not many people can claim that.”

I let a wan smile tug at my lips.

Not many people have been through what I went through, and I

with Axel’s assessment of

I whisper this time, looking

for the truth.

looks torn for a second and I

me after

know where to go from here if he can’t be

then he seems to give in to whatever

inside his head.

all, Emily,” he says gently, pulling me closer still, holding me properly now, his touch tender. “Well, it was, just not in the

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to me,” I say, daring to lift my

chest, enjoying how I’m in his embrace in

mate,” he says, and a shadow enters his gaze, one that’s sad and haunted. “I’m centuries old, and in all the time, the Moon Goddess never once granted me a mate. I understood why. I live a dangerous existence. And I’m immortal. What good would it do to have a mate for a single, mortal lifetime, only to lose. her and then maybe lose

never considered things from this

perspective.

makes total sense

both of us from the inevitable pain.

in a quiet voice, and a

all,” he continues. “I’ve

no doubt make

mate, any of them could easily threaten or use her

me in countless

I realize that

been selfish, that he was

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who simply didn’t want to

like I am.

he was trying to protect me.

for rejecting me were the least selfish ones he could

come up

realize it

position, and there’s nothing I

him.

if he can’t quite

do with

I nod emphatically.

I want to do is make your life harder, and that’s

doing these past weeks.”

replies. “I played

well.”

a moment, we stand

the new trust and depth of

between us.

won’t be in

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