CHAPTER 10 — The Rejection
1080 Words
Ella’s POV
The moon kept me uneasy.
Not because of its brightness, nor the sounds of wolves shifting outside … but because of the bond.
It pulsed beneath my skin like a heartbeat that didn’t belong to me. Even after leaving the courtyard, Rylan’s touch lingered on my wrist, impossible to dismiss.
I paced slowly around my room.
What was I supposed to do with the truth I had sensed earlier? The spark. The pull. The way my entire being reacted to him as if I was created for that moment?
I placed my hand on my chest, right where that invisible connection linked us.
Mate.
That word terrified me more than the entire Silverfang pack.
A knock resonated at my door.
Firm. Controlled.
Rylan.
My heart raced.
I swallowed hard before opening the door.
He stood there, still dressed in dark clothing, the moonlight creating silver highlights in his hair. Yet his golden, blazing gaze was colder than I had ever witnessed.
“Come with me,” he ordered.
No emotion. No warmth. Only authority.
I followed him down the hall, each step tightening the knot in my chest. He led me to his office, the one room in this house that felt entirely his own.
He didn’t sit down. He didn’t invite me to take a seat.
He simply stood behind the desk, his arms tense, knuckles white against the wood.
“Rylan… what is this about?”
His jaw was clenched. “The bond.”
My stomach dropped.
He took a deep breath, steadying himself. “Whatever you believe happened tonight, whatever you felt, it was a mistake.”
I stared at him in disbelief. “A… mistake?”
His gaze averted, as if the words physically wounded him. “Yes.”
“But we both felt it,” I whispered. “You can’t deny that.”
“I can,” he snapped sharply.
The harshness of his tone made me flinch.
Rylan shut his eyes for a moment, fighting through a personal battle. When he opened them again, they were cold once more.
“I will not accept it,” he stated quietly. “This bond. This fate. Whatever the moon is trying to impose on us.”
My throat constricted painfully. “Why? Is it because you don’t want a mate? Or because you don’t want… me?”
His silence was worse than any answer.
A few heavy, suffocating moments passed.
Finally, he spoke. Slowly. Deliberately. Like he was extracting a blade from his own chest.
“I had a mate once.”
Selena.
The name landed like a knife through the air, even unspoken.
“She betrayed me,” he continued. “She destroyed everything. My pack. My trust. My life.”
He finally looked at me and truly saw me.
“I won’t love again,” he said. “I won’t take that risk. And I will not allow the moon, fate, or instinct to tie me to someone I did not choose.”
The weight of his words hit me like a physical blow.
“Rylan…” I gasped.
“You’re here because of a contract,” he said. “Nothing more.”
He moved around the desk, closing the gap. Too close. His scent surrounded me cedar, smoke, stormand the bond within me surged, frantic and confused.
He forced himself to stop an arm’s length away.
“I am telling you this now to prevent any misunderstandings,” he said, each word clear and slicing. “The bond is trivial to me.”
My chest ached. Burned. Tightened to the point where I struggled to breathe. “Trivial?”
His throat contracted as he swallowed quietly. For a fleeting moment, I caught something in his gaze. regret? yearning? before he blinked it away.
“I don’t want a mate. I don’t need one. I will never accept another again.”
A pause.
“And definitely not you.”
Those final words shattered me.
Completely.
I stepped back as the pain surged through me. The room felt smaller. Inescapably cold.
“I understand,” I whispered, forcing my voice to remain steady with sheer willpower.
I faced the exit.
“Ella.”
His voice stopped me.
But I didn’t look back.
He drew a gentle breath, as if wanting to say something more, something different, but when he finally spoke, his voice was again firm.
“This is for your own good too. Bonds cause pain. I’m shielding you from mine.”
“No,” I gasped, my hand trembling on the doorknob. “You’re just afraid.”
He stiffened.
“Not of me,” I pressed on. “Of yourself.”
And then I exited, leaving him frozen in his office with his memories.
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Rylan’s POV
The moment she walked away, something inside me broke.
My wolf flared to the surface, furious, howling, desperate to chase after her, to claim her, protect her, hold her tightly.
Yet, I restrained him.
I struck my fist against the desk with such force that the wood splintered.
Why did she have to say it like that?
You’re scared of yourself.
Because she was right.
And that terrified me more than the bond itself.
The vision of her standing in the moonlight radiant, breathless, drawn to me flashed through my mind, and I gritted my teeth.
No.
No.
No.
I wouldn’t allow fate to take control of my life again. I wouldn’t let instinct bind me to another woman who could destroy me.
I refused to let myself crave her.
But gods help me…
The bond pulsed within my chest, burning and furious.
I spoke to the empty room, my voice cracking in ways I despised:
“I can’t love you, Ella. Even if a part of me already does.”
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Ella’s POV
I didn’t let tears fall until I reached my room.
Once the door closed behind me, the floodgates burst open. Quiet tears at first, then sobs that racked through me before I could hold them back.
I pressed a hand to my chest where the bond pulsed sharp, painful, and confusing.
Mate.
He was my mate.
And he rejected me.
The pain wasn’t merely emotional. It felt physical, like claws dragging across my heart.
But as I cried, something within me solidified.
Rylan Wolfe could deny fate as much as he liked.
Yet fate never stopped for anyone.
Not even an Alpha who thought he could run from the moon.
- Writer
