Rejected By One, Claimed By Four

chapter 4

It was the late afternoon, and in the pack house, Lyra was wandering downthe mansion's less travelled corridors. Following the storm of confessions with Asher and Orion, she wanted a pause, a chance to think. Her head buzzed with questions, and her heart felt torn, tangled in threads she hadn’t woven. Every mate bond seemed to demand a part of her, each of them offering a new mystery, a new complication, all without answers she could grasp.

As she turned the corner into one of the wide, empty corridors, she felt a presence—dark and imposing. A chill skated down her spine. She knew without looking who it was. The air to her felt to be dense, and a hushed tension settled over the room like fog.

Demitrius.

She’d seen him in passing, felt the cold, commanding energy that surrounded him, heard the murmured warnings and the subtle fear he inspired in the pack members. Demitrius, whose flawless, imposingly serene contours and unreadable look was like a phantom at the border of every space, was a being that could be observed while never actually being there. The others seemed to avoid him, as if his presence alone was enough to turn their blood cold.

However, as soon as she turned around, her breath stopped in her chest.

He stood a couple of feet down the hall way, frame nearly taking over the entire hallway and in that moment, that was like she was facing a specter. His face—a face so familiar it made her chest ache—was the face of her lost lover. The resemblance was haunting. The high cheek bones, the sensual dark eyes, the assured line of his mouth. She couldn’t tear her gaze away.

He shifted his head, and his silvery-black eyes focused in turn on her. His hair, in dark long cascading strands bleached to midnight black, fell back from his erect back, framing his chiseled features. His lips—the cool red, lovely, and tightly formed lips—were very thin and sealed his feelings in secret. His perfectly sculpted muscles and his flawless, aristocratic features made him look like something from another world.

“Lyra," he purred, his voice mellow, like silk, but tempered with a cutting edge like glass. She could feel the weight of his gaze, as if he were peeling back her defenses, layer by layer.

The sound of her name in his voice made her heart race. She felt exposed, stripped bare under his gaze, and she hated it.

“Demitrius,” she managed, keeping her voice steady despite the way he unsettled her. She tried to tear her gaze away from him, but her body seemed unwilling to obey, trapped in the intensity of his stare.

He moved closer, and she sensed that the space between them became heavier. “You seem… startled,” he observed, a ghost of a smirk touching his lips. “Am I that unpleasant to look at?”

She swallowed, trying to steady herself. “No. It’s not that.” She barely whispered the words, her gaze fixed on his face, searching for the familiarity she couldn’t ignore. “It’s just… you look like someone I used to know.”

His smirk faded, and his expression turned unreadable. “Someone important?” He inquired, his voice deep, but sharp, piercing right through her chaos.

Lyra bit her lip, unable to contain the feelings rising within her. She wasn't prepared to show him all the details of her history, of the person she had lost, yet it appears, her silence, somehow provided its own answer to his query.

Demitrius didn’t press her, but he held her gaze, his silver-black eyes narrowing as if considering her carefully, as if he were deciding what to do with the vulnerability he’d glimpsed. “The past has a way of haunting us, doesn’t it?” he murmured, his voice taking on a detached, almost cruel edge.

Before she could answer back, something in the air between them changed, a soft electrical static, unmistakable. She experienced a bizarre pull inside her, an association she never thought she'd find, something hot and animalistic that she could almost smell.

The mate bond.

Her heart hammered as the realization struck her. He wasn’t just a haunting memory. He was her mate. Her fourth mate.

The weight of it fell upon her and she could hardly get her breath with its power. Demitrius stood there, calm and unmoved, his face betraying none of the shock that was tearing her apart from within.

“You feel it, don’t you?” he said quietly, as if confirming what she already knew.

Lyra clenched her fists, fighting to keep her composure. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Demitrius’s smirk returned, colder this time. “And spoil the surprise?” He gave a slight shrug, his gaze mocking. “Besides, I was curious. I wanted to see how long it would take you to figure it out.”

Her fists clenched tighter. His arrogance, his cold amusement—it was infuriating! However she could not refuse the feeling, the unity that throbbed in their midst as a dark, sinister vow.

“I don’t know who you think you are, she said, forcing steel into her voice, “but I won’t be toyed with. Not by you, not by anyone.”

He then another step into the opening, his grin vanishing as he looked down at her, his look as unforgiving and cold as the point of an ice pick. “Toyed with?” he repeated, his voice laced with disdain. “I don’t think you realize what I am, Lyra.”

Her pulse raced, her instinct urging her to flee, but she held her ground, meeting his gaze with all the defiance she could muster. “Then enlighten me.”

He stopped, and his eyes were so hard and unflinching that she got the sensation of his gaze. Something sinister, something dangerous, lurking at his back. “I am not a man you can control,” he said softly. “I am not here to cater to your whims or to fall in line with the rest of your… mates.”

The words stung, but she refused to show weakness. “Then why even bother? Why pretend to care about the bond?”

Demitrius's eyes flashed with a dark something, a blaze of anger which flickered before he choked it. As I have no choice so do you," he said, in a voice like ice. It could be fate's cruel joke, but I mean to never take it for granted.”

Her heart pounded, her thoughts racing as she struggled to process his words. He was dangerous, yes, but there was more to him, something hidden beneath the arrogance and cruelty—a pain he kept buried, locked behind walls she couldn’t penetrate.

“Why do you look so much like him?” she asked, the question slipping out before she could stop herself. Her voice now was softer, with taste of the sorrow which she had long to repress.

He stood still for a brief second, his face closed up, an impenetrable mask. Then, his expression shifted, and she saw a flicker of something raw in his gaze, something vulnerable and fleeting and familiar. Again however, as quickly as it came, it vanished, leaving only his usual sense of detachment.

“That’s something you’ll have to figure out for yourself,” he replied, his voice hard as steel. He turned, his dark hair sweeping behind him as he walked past her, his steps echoing down the hallway.

Lyra stood there, her heart pounding, her mind spinning as she watched him disappear around the corner. The resemblance, the mate bond, the mystery he embodied—it was all too much, and she knew she couldn’t ignore it. She'd have to unspool it, no matter how scary or treacherous it is.

Demitrius was more than just a mate. He was a spectre from her former life, a symbol of the man she had unwaveringly lost and the enigma of his whereabouts held her captive, while his glacial demeanour repulsed her.

Lyra took a deep breath, steeling herself. She would find out the truth about Demitrius—who he really was, and why he bore the face of the man she had loved and lost. And she would do it on her own terms.