He growled. “We've had this conversation before. I don't think it, I know it. I spent four years thinking I was in love with Amanda Thistle, four years waiting for her to realize it too. I was told that one day I would look into the eyes of my true mate and forget what Amanda looked like. I didn't believe it then but now I do. Zandria, I couldn't tell you the last time I saw her, what she was wearing or what she was doing, but I can recite to you everything about you going all the way back to the day you first arrived here. I know what color hair band you wore last week. I can tell you that your toes were painted pale pink for three days and you had a small spot on your pinky toe on your right foot. The cutoff shorts you wore yesterday had one string that was twice as long as the others. I notice everything about you.” He leaned in and touched her knee. “Everything about you interests me. It interested me even before you finally let me look in your eyes!”
She swallowed and tried a different line of reasoning. “But Amanda...”
“Wasn't my mate. She knew it, her family knew it, my family knew it. By Luna, everyone knew it. Even my own wolf - he knew she wasn't right for me, for us, but he knows you are. It's nature. We are made for each other.”
She shook her head. “Your wolf is wrong. I don't have one. I'm a freak, a human born to wolf parents. I'm just a.. a..” She swallowed then forced herself to say the hateful word. “ a cur.” She lowered her head hiding her face behind a curtain of blonde. “I'm nothing,” she finished softly.
The tone of his voice steeled. “You aren't 'nothing', and you damn well are not a cur. Don't let me ever hear you call yourself such a filthy word again!” He took a breath and softened a bit when she flinched. “You are a wolf. Humans and wolves can't be life mates. The link that forms between them is a doubled connection – human to human and animal to animal. You are a wolf, a beautiful, wonderful, exciting one and you are my mate. We are trying to find out more about your gift and maybe explain why your beast is repressed, but one thing I know as much as I know my own name, you definitely have one. Maybe it's your gift? It's so special, there hasn't been one like you in centuries and we aren't sure what all it means.”
She looked up, tears welling in her eyes. “I don't want to be special. I want to be normal just like everyone else. This isn't a gift, it's a curse and I hate it. My whole life I've had to deal with it. You don't know what I've gone through,” she spat out bitterly.
“Then tell me. Zandria, let me in. Let me help you.” Using his gift of empathy, he gently pushed love and sincerity through his hand on her knee. She was hurting so badly, and he was totally locked out of her heart, unable to help her. Just the thought of it felt like a dagger slicing through his chest.
She felt him in her mind, begging with her to share her pain with him. She gasped and jumped up, breaking the contact. “I.. I think you need to go.” She took a step back, tossed the pillow back onto the couch and pointed at the door.
“Zan, please let me help.”
“You can't help. Please go before I.. call the Enforcers.” Her hands had begun to shake. Looking into his eyes, she barely kept from falling into them again. “Please,” she pleaded. She looked at him, the slight illumination from the moon shining through her window causing the tears to sparkle brightly in her eyes. The sight of his Zandria, standing so boldly with her lip trembling and eyes so full of pain broke him.
He sighed and got up. Putting his hand on the knob, he turned back and gazed at her again. He began to say something but with a wince, changed his mind. Shaking his head sadly, he opened the door and walked out, closing it quietly behind him. She watched him go and once she was sure he was out of hearing, dropped to the floor and threw her face into her hands, finally letting the floodgate down and bitterly weeping for the life she wanted but could never have; a life as Cayson's mate.
Shattered Dreams (Luna's Children) Page 20