His Isolated Omega Luna

Chapter Thirteen

The first false memory I remembered when my eyes shot open in the dark was the pain.

I awoke in a state of terror with the images from my nightmares still haunting me. Without even thinking, I breathed in Axel’s scent that still hung on the bed and closed my eyes again.

It calmed me almost immediately and I consciously tried to shut out the fear that relentlessly persecuted me. Lucas’ huge shadow appeared in the doorway as I tried to get oxygen into my lungs.

“Everything alright?” Lucas asked quietly. He sounded very tired, and I felt guilty for disturbing him again.

Lucas already lost count of how many times he had been up and down in the night every time Cassandra cried out for Axel.

“I’m sorry, Lucas...” I breathed in a husky whisper. I was trying to focus on the light streaming in around the edges of the silhouette where it flooded through the doorway. I felt like crying. “I had another nightmare, I think. I’ll be alright in a minute.”

I saw Lucas’ grey shadow nod in response but he didn’t move away. I wasn’t even entirely convinced our relative definitions of alright were even in the same ball park.

“Do you want me to sit with you?” Lucas asked softly. Now I knew I was going to cry.

I couldn’t even explain to Lucas how grateful I was for looking after me. Lucas hardly knew me, and yet he had given me unconditional care and understanding. I tried to bite back a sob, but it spilled out anyway and echoed as it cut through the silence around us.

“No. Thank you. I’m okay, I promise…” I called back, trying to keep my voice steady so I could pretend I didn’t have unstoppable streams of desperate tears flooding down both of my cheeks.

***

“Cas? Do you… do you want me to fetch Axel?” Lucas asked hesitantly.

Lucas was fairly sure his brother had probably managed to get his baser impulses under control by now, but he still didn’t know if the whole sordid encounter had been too much for someone as sensitive as Cassandra.

He waited for Cassandra to make an independent decision. It seemed cruel to keep them apart if she really needed him. There was an empty pause while Cassandra moved restlessly under the sheets.

***

I made a selfless choice.

“No. Please don’t bother him, Lucas.” I muttered at last. It was a wicked lie. I wanted Axel more than anything. “I’m sure he must be asleep by now.” I added quietly, turning onto my side to rub my wet eyes against the pillow.

***

Lucas doubted that very much.

He pulled the door closed a bit so it was dark enough for Cassandra to go back to sleep, but not too dark it would make her feel isolated and scared.

He went back to his computer and opened another can of caffeine and sugar - subtly packaged as energy drink. His eyes had already started to close several times while he had been reading through the almost endless supply of information in front of him. He waited until he could hear Cassandra’s soft regular breaths again before he slid his finger between the paper and a chewed up straw currently serving as a bookmark. He started again.

***

When Lucas opened one eye, he realized he had a sideways view of the back wall. He had fallen asleep with his head resting on the pages that were now creased and damp with sleep drool. He wiped his hand across his mouth before slowly sitting up.

His neck was stiff, his senses still dulled from tiredness, and his eyes hurt from spending far too many hours squinting at seemingly microscopic text.

He kept the light level low deliberately for Cassandra, but his eyesight had taken a hit as a result. He had to keep blinking to try and focus properly when he looked back towards Axel’s bedroom to see if Cassandra was still asleep.

When Lucas stood up, he realized he must have actually been roused from his own dream by an insistent tapping on the door. It seemed to get progressively louder, but that could have just been because consciousness was now starting to fill his mind. He stretched lazily and shook all the feeling back into his legs.

“Lucas?!” Axel called impatiently, banging one fist against the door to try and get his brother's attention. Lucas looked at his watch and made his way over to let him in.

Lucas groaned. It wasn’t even six a.m.!

When he finally pulled the door open, Axel was leaning in towards him with hope reflected in his eyes. Lucas could tell straight away he was absolutely exhausted and his hair was so mussed up, Lucas briefly wondered if Axel had actually spent the last few hours just running his hands through it. He looked like he had maybe tried to sleep at one point, but it just hadn’t happened, and Lucas could have taken a pretty good guess as to what had kept him up all night.

Axel was demanding answers before Lucas even had the chance to tell him what he was starting to remember while the last trace of sleep haze disappeared.

“Well? Did you find anything?” Axel asked expectantly, resting his tired body against the wall.

“Yes, actually. That you’re a f*****g moron.”

Axel jerked his head back.

“Good morning to you too, Lucas. I can tell you missed me.”

Lucas sighed and kicked the door shut, pulling Axel inside and making a grab for the book. “I thought you’d read this.” He said in despair. He waved it in front of Axel’s face while his brother continued to stare at him in confusion.

“I have.” The way Lucas was glaring at him made him give in to the pressure almost immediately, and he bit into his lip.

“Alright…” Axel conceded with a sigh. “I might have skipped over some of the more boring bits.”

“Oh, you mean like anything other than the pictures?” Axel resented that but he didn’t say anything. He thought Lucas knew him better than that. It was all just semantics anyway.

“Axel.” Lucas said harshly. Even after all this time, Lucas could still make his name sound like a dirty word. He grabbed his brother by the elbow and dragged him as far away from the bedroom door as was physically possible in such a tiny apartment.

He didn’t want Cassandra to overhear them, and she would probably get up as soon as she heard Axel anyway. Lucas knew Cassandra had been desperate for him to fetch Axel during the night, and had only refused out of some stupid sense of irrational pride.

“Yeah, well I have and I can’t believe you could miss something like that.” He whispered. Axel hadn't got a clue what Lucas was on about, and it showed. “You have no idea what you’ve done.”

***

Before Lucas could explain exactly what the f**k he meant by that, they both heard Cassandra calling out for Axel again and his attention was instantly gone. Axel couldn’t stop himself from going to her.

“Hey…” He breathed quietly, sticking his head round the corner of the door and giving Cassandra a small smile. He wasn’t sure how his presence would be received now the raw burn of passion had been locked away again.

Cassandra was sitting up in bed and rubbing nervously at the tops of her arms while she watched the alpha approach, her eyes never leaving Axel's face.

***

I wanted to say so many things to him, but the only word that seemed to want to come out at all was a weak sorry.

My eyes soon dropped down to my hands when the submissiveness started to rise up again. It seemed to happen a lot when Axel was staring at me like that.

“You got nothing to be sorry for,” Axel sighed. “I’m just glad that happened when Lucas was here 'cause… Cas - ” He stopped and took in a sharp breath, trying not to visualize all the terrible things that might have happened if Cassandra had been alone when her heat had come over her without warning like that. “I can’t even think about what would have happened to you if you'd been somewhere else...”

**

Axel consciously nipped his canines against the inside of his cheek. Attempting to subdue the unexpected burn of jealousy at the thought of anyone else ever touching Cassandra like that.

He would defend Cassandra with his dying breath. “Not everyone feels the same as me.”

“I know, Axel…” Cassandra said sadly, completely misinterpreting what he was trying to say. “Maybe I should start trying to accept I have a place. I’m not the same as you.”

Axel looked at her closely.

“No. You’re right.” He whispered.

***

My eyes slid back up.

An alpha would think that of course, but I had hoped it might have taken him a little longer to admit it.

My heart sank, but Axel continued his words.

“We’re not equals,” I stared at him in silence. Maybe Axel wasn’t so different after all…

Axel reached for my hands, but I pulled away. “You're much better than I could ever be.”

“Axel. You’re an alpha, you mustn’t say things like that. It’s not true.” Axel quickly grabbed for me again, and this time I allowed him to take my hands in his own. I let Axel stroke the inside of one palm with his thumb as our eyes met.

“It is true, Cas. You don’t realize how important you are to me. How important you’ve always been.”

“What do you mean?” I managed at last. I had no concept of how long Axel had looked for me.

“Ever since I was expected to mate, I knew I wanted someone just like you. Now I know you, nothing else could ever come close.”

I was battling the building desire to pull Axel in. I wasn’t sure how long I would be able to fight it.

“But my whole life, I’ve thought nobody would ever want someone like me. I only ran away when I was young because I didn’t want to be mated to a person I didn’t love. You’re the only one who ever made me feel safe, and I can’t let myself get used to that feeling... I can't. I suppose I just don’t want to need you so much.” I admitted at last.

“It would be so easy to let myself trust you, and then everything I've done to try and stay safe will have been meaningless,” I stopped and took a well-needed breath.

I could feel my resolve weakening with every passing second while Axel’s green gaze was burning into me, hot streams of breath flitting tenderly over my sensitive skin.

“I don’t want my life to mean nothing...” I tried one last time, but I knew it sounded hollow.

“Neither do I,” Axel smiled. He moved forward and slid one hand slowly up my body, leaning in closer until our mouths were almost touching. There were no words to express how much I wanted to kiss him again. “But my life will mean nothing if I’m not with you.”

I was pretty certain I actually stopped breathing completely several minutes into the conversation. I absorbed every word of devotion as Axel’s promises flowed over me and made me feel warm and sheltered from everything that existed outside the four walled haven of Axel’s bedroom.

I still couldn’t believe an unmated alpha could be compassionate enough to have been able to restrain himself from just screwing me open the night before. My own awareness might have been altered at the time, but I knew in my heart it had taken Axel every single drop of resolution he had.

I had seen it on his face just before Axel pulled himself away and fled from the apartment in distress. The want, the need, the instinctual biological demand to show his dominance and mate me, but he had done nothing to hurt me and I still wasn’t entirely sure how he had managed to stop himself.

I had also been at a loss to control my own body. The evidence of how much I had wanted to submit to Axel and stop the pain was still drying on the sheets. I forced myself to stop thinking like that. Axel was just being kind out of pity, most likely.

I was still really struggling to accept that anyone so desirable would have the slightest interest in me at all.

“Axel...” I managed eventually, finally taking another breath. Gabriel had schooled me well in the art of mistrust and anyone who wasn’t family was fair game, and even then it was a fine line. Axel must want something from me. That was the way it worked, and I knew that. There was no way Axel wanted me just because.

I had long since resigned myself to the fact things like that didn’t happen to people like me. That’s what I had always been told anyway.

“I really wish you would stop saying things like that. I don’t know what you want from me, but whatever it is, I doubt very much that I have it to give, Axel.” I sighed, but I didn’t move my hands away and Axel continued to press his thumb in small circles into my palm. The movement seemed to be growing more forceful with every seductive loop and I felt a disturbing pulse of renewed enthusiasm between my legs when Axel continued to stroke me.

“Why do you always think I want something from you?” Axel asked quietly. He moved even closer. Perhaps his alpha confidence had been strengthened by the fact that I hadn't pulled away and my mouth might have been saying one thing, but my eyes and my lips were definitely saying something else.

“I’m not special, Axel,” I breathed against his mouth. “I know you think I am, but I’m really not.”

***

“You are to me.” Axel said, with another smile. He spread open the hand that was snaking up Cassandra’s shoulder. When he reached the dip of her neck, it formed a gentle v shape with his finger and thumb and Cassandra closed her eyes in response to the sentiment of such a tender touch.

There were many things conveyed in that simple brush of Axel’s hand against the skin of her throat and the room suddenly felt too warm and airless again when Axel leaned towards her.

“Not everyone is bad, Cas...” Axel whispered. “And you’re wrong. I can think of a hundred and one things that make me want you.”

Axel ran his fingertips up the side of Cassandra’s jaw, lightly playing with the lines of her jaw. His heart was pounding when he attempted to press an uncertain kiss to Cassandra’s lips. Axel had a sudden surge of empathy at how it must feel to be so scared all the time. He didn’t think he would be able to handle another crushing rejection, but Cassandra didn’t even attempt to pull back while Axel waited for a reaction.

Cassandra remained almost impossibly still. Her eyes were closed and her mouth was flushed pink and shining with moisture. Axel murmured words of veneration into her mouth and separated every single one with a soft kiss that hardly touched her, but it made Cassandra feel hopelessly weak anyway.

Axel subconsciously edged a little closer every time he dared to touch their lips together in between the string of whispered praises about how beautiful she was, and how much he wanted to take care of her.

On the last one he waited, exhaled breath hanging in the small space between them. Cassandra opened her eyes slowly and Axel could see the bright blue filtering out from underneath her heavy lids while she watched the movement of Axel’s mouth in expectant silence.

Axel lifted one arm and gently held Cassandra's face in his hand. Cassandra realized at once what Axel was going to do and he gave her the chance to pull away, but she didn’t think she could have moved… even if she wanted to.