Ethan just smiled.
“Sarah and I are practically an old married couple. It doesn’t matter what she wears… Kira is different. She needs this more.”
I stood at the door, a bitter smile touching my lips. My ceremony necklace was from a local jewelry store.
The day I tried it on, my old wounds were still aching. I asked Ethan for his opinion.
After I had tried on three, he just waved me off.
“They all look good. Let’s just get this one. You don’t know anything about jewelry anyway.”
He was in a hurry to pay. The receipt came to $20,000.
So, he was capable of planning thoughtful surprises. Just not for me.
On the way home, I bit my lip so hard it almost bled, but tears streamed down my face regardless.
Six years.
For six whole years, I had naively believed that he understood me.
When I first told him I wanted our bonding ceremony at Aurora Peak, he smiled, ruffled my hair, and said, “Okay.”
I was so moved in that moment.
He remembers, I told myself. He had to.
He remembered it was where we first met. He remembered I fell and was covered in blood for him. He remembered how I held his hand tightly in a blizzard and said, “Don’t be afraid.”
But it turned out he didn’t remember at all.
Or rather, he had never truly cared.
I remembered the healer’s warning that emotional turmoil would affect my recovery. I tilted my head back, trying to force the tears back, but my throat was tight with sobs.
Ethan contacted me through our mind-link. The background was a wall of sound, the music deafening.
“Sarah, Leo and the guys are throwing me a bachelor party tonight. I won’t be home.”
I paused for two seconds.
“Okay.”
This “bachelor party” had been going on for three days.
At 1 a.m., I couldn’t sleep and scrolled through social media.
Leo had posted a nine-photo grid with the caption: The Alpha’s Last Night of Freedom.
In the center photo, Kira, her cheeks flushed, was leaning drunkenly in Ethan’s arms. Ethan’s hand was pressed firmly against her bare waist.
There were plenty of comments below:
“They look so good together. What a shame.”
“They grew up together, don’t start rumors.”
“Ethan Thornfield, watch yourself! Don’t make Sarah mad!”
Ethan had replied to that one.
“Sarah won’t mind. If she makes a fuss over something this small, then we shouldn’t even be getting mated.”
I quietly liked his comment, then turned off my phone and went to sleep.
