Mated to My Fiancé’s Alpha King Brother

82 Chapter 82

82 Chapter 82

Damien’s POV 1

I returned to my vigil by Sera’s bedside, settling into the chair that had become my second home. Her hand

lay motionless on the white hospital blanket, and I reached out to cover it with mine, desperately searching

for some sign that she was still fighting to come back to me.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered into the silence, the words scraping my throat raw. “God, Sera, I’m so fucking sorry.

This is all my fault.”

The confession spilled out of me like poison from a wound. Every fear, every regret, every moment of self-

loathing I’d been carrying for the past week.

“I never gave you a chance to just be happy, did I?” I traced my thumb over her knuckles, memorizing the feel

of her skin. “From the moment you walked into my office, there was always some crisis, some danger, some

fucking emergency that put you at risk.”

My voice broke on the last word, and I had to stop talking before the emotion completely overwhelmed me.

But the silence was worse than my rambling confessions, so I forced myself to continue.

“You wanted to prove you were worthy of being Luna,” I said, laughing bitterly. “As if there was ever any

question. You’ve been more Luna than I deserved since the day you told me off over the phone.”

The memory of that first conversation brought a ghost of a smile to my face. Sera, righteously indignant and

completely unimpressed by my alpha authority, had been exactly what I’d needed even when I was too stupid.

to realize it.

“You should have told me to go to hell,” I continued, lifting her hand to press it against my cheek. “Should

have taken Adrian and run as far away from me as possible. You’d both be safer, Happier.”

A soft knock at the door interrupted my self-recrimination. I looked up to see Lucas entering with someone I

hadn’t expected-Ophelia, her usually bright demeanor subdued by worry, and a small figure I recognized as

Adrian.

My son looked impossibly young in the sterile hospital environment, his silver-blue eyes wide with confusion

sight of his mother surrounded by

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small it barely qualified as

physical blow. How did you explain to a five-year-old that his mother might never wake up? That

voice thick with emotion. “The doctors are trying to help her

up.”

the bed,

if I tell her about my day at school, she’ll want

tears as she watched Adrian climb carefully onto the edge of the hospital bed. She’d been crying, I realized. Probably more than I had, since I’d been too

to properly process what

to her, sweetheart,” Ophelia said softly, her voice only

hear everything you say.”

said, settling himself next to Sera with the careful reverence of a child who

of the situation even if he didn’t fully understand it. “I missed you

as yours.

shattered what was left of my composure. He continued chattering about his day-his friends at school, a book they’d read,

they’d played-with the unshakeable faith that his mother was listening to

guess what?” Adrian’s voice dropped to an excited whisper. “Mrs. Peterson said we

I’m gonna tell them all about how my

is the strongest person in

“why don’t you and Aunt Ophelia go get some dinner from the cafeteria? I’ll

Mommy”

I want to stay here,” Adrian protested, his small jaw

and I’m not here?”

though the words tasted

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solemnly. “Okay. But tell her I love her really,

being

“I will, buddy.”

into its familiar, oppressive silence.

Sera’s limp form

hair, breathing in the fading

strongest person in the world. And he’s right. You are. So why

to us?”

of medical

grinding fear that each breath might be her last conscious

filling the sterile

would be okay.

was beginning to accept