Chapter 108\u00a0<\/p>\n
A\u00a0<\/p>\n
Just one night. The first of many nights where she wouldn\u2019t be in the room next to mine, where 1 soudert be able to hear her stowag\u00a0<\/p>\n
around or know that she was safe.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I thought Orion would back me up, insist she come stay with him at least until the was more settled. But be Sidert.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s probably a good idea,\u201d he said, kissing her forehead. \u2018Start making it feel like home\u00a0<\/p>\n
Another betrayal, even though I knew it wasn\u2019t intentional. Orion was being supportive, encouraging her legaler ta\u00a0<\/p>\n
a good brother.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I was just being selfish.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The four of us walked outside together, and I caught myself automatically heading toward my motorcycle, waiting for the familiar\u00a0<\/p>\n
sound of Athena\u2019s footsteps behind me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When I reached my bike and turned around, she was still standing by the building entrance with Sarah and Leaf\u00a0<\/p>\n
That\u2019s when it really hit me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Athena had left me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Not dramatically, not with tears or accusations or slamming doors. She\u2019d just quietly, calmly created a life that didn\u2019t include\u00a0<\/p>\n
the center of it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I wouldn\u2019t carry her on my bike anymore. She wouldn\u2019t wrap her arms around my waist or rest her head against my back during long rides. She wouldn\u2019t be there when I got home from work or when I woke up in the morning.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She\u2019d moved on.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cSee you tomorrow,\u201d I said to everyone, my voice coming out rougher than I\u2019d intended.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The ride home felt endless. Every mile that stretched between my bike and her new apartment felt like another piece of my chest being carved away, By the time I pulled into my driveway, I could barely breathe.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When I opened my front door, the silence hit me like a physical force.\u00a0<\/p>\n
My house had never felt this empty. Not even right after I\u2019d lost Jess, when grief had made everything feel hollow and meaningless.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This was different. This was the emptiness of something that had been there and was now gone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I walked through the rooms like a ghost, touching surfaces that still held traces of her presence. The kitchen counter where we\u2019d\u00a0<\/p>\n
1\/3\u00a0<\/p>\n
8:48 Wed, Jan 7\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chapter 108\u00a0<\/p>\n
made breakfast together, where I\u2019d lifted her up and kissed her and eaten her up until we both forgot everything else.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The dining room where she\u2019d insisted we eat meals together, slowly breaking down the walls I\u2019d built around myself.\u00a0<\/p>\n
(100\u00a0<\/p>\n
Her room was the last place I went. I sat on the edge of her bed, still unmade from her last night here, and let the faint scent of her\u00a0<\/p>\n
shampoo wash over me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This was what I\u2019d wanted, wasn\u2019t it? Space. Distance. A return to the carefully controlled life I\u2019d built around my grief and guilt.\u00a0<\/p>\n
So why did it feel like I was dying inside?\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou pushed her away,\u201d my wolf said, his voice cutting through my misery like a blade.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t want to hear this. Not tonight. Not when the house felt so empty I could hear my own heartbeat echoing off the walls.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cFive years ago too,\u201d he continued, relentless.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cNow isn\u2019t the time,\u201d I growled internally, but he wasn\u2019t finished.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen is the time, Tristan? You let our mate go five years ago.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The words I\u2019d been dreading for years, the truth I\u2019d buried so deep I\u2019d almost convinced myself it wasn\u2019t real.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou felt it too, didn\u2019t you?\u201d my wolf pressed. \u201cThat night at her eighteenth birthday party, when she shifted for the first time. You\u00a0<\/p>\n
felt the bond snap into place.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
I had felt it. God help me, I had felt it. The moment her wolf had emerged, beautiful and fierce and unmistakably mine, something deep in my chest had recognized her. Had claimed her.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But I\u2019d killed it immediately, told myself it was lust and she wasn\u2019t and couldn\u2019t be my mate. I needed someone safer, someone who wouldn\u2019t complicate my life or make me feel things I shouldn\u2019t feel.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Told myself she was my little sister, my little sister can\u2019t be my mate.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou knew,\u201d my wolf said, his voice heavy with years of accumulated pain. \u201cYou knew she was ours, and you rejected her without a word. Then five years ago, you let her think she wasn\u2019t good enough, that she wasn\u2019t worthy of being loved. And that was why she ended\u00a0<\/p>\n
in the harms of that good for nothing Alpha.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cStop,\u201d I whispered aloud, but the words kept coming.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve broken her heart multiple times. And then you did it five night ago too.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
I buried my face in my hands, breathing in the lingering scent of Athena\u2019s presence and feeling like I was suffocating.\u00a0<\/p>\n
8:48 Wed, Jan 7\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chapter 108\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018She\u2019s better off without me,\u201d I said finally, the words scraping my throat raw.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cShe deserves the truth,\u201d my wolf shot back.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no truth. Jess was, and is my chosen mate.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Memories Drifted Into Soft Silence by Kyx Frost 108 Chapter 108\u00a0 A\u00a0 Just one night. The first of many nights […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-second-gear-of-love-novel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26265\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}