Mate I never wanted

Price of a win and damage you cannot see (I)

Vivian

Without even realizing it, I stepped forward and my fingers carefully traced the dark blue marks on his chest.

"What... When did this happen?"

He looked down at the dark marks on his upper body as I slowly traced them. As my fingers lightly traced the smooth, painfully dark skin, his breathing changed a bit and he whispered really out of breath.

"Ummm... when the explosion from the doors hit, I stood quite close."

"Why didn't you say something? You should get checked out by the medic, there might be more damage to your internal organs."

"There is no need, I'm fine."

He said as he took a step back.

"No it's not, the bruising is really bad, I'm sure that it hurts really badly. Why didn't you say anything?"

He just shook his head and stepped away.

"Lucien?"

He just shook his head and walked away further from me. Putting even more distance between the two of us.

Completely confused by his reaction to all this, I tried asking again.

"Lucien, what's going on? Can I get you some pain medicine?"

"NO!"

The sharpness of his tone made me stop for a second and freeze in place.

"What? What's going on? Why are you refusing my help? And why are you moving away from me? You are in full heat, you should crave to be close to me right now... What's going on?"

I stared at his naked back, which also had a few mean-looking dark bruises and even a few scratches from the fights he had with the beasts.

"It doesn't matter. You should get some sleep, we have another mission test tomorrow and it will be even harder than today."

Confused, I stared at him as he stood on the other side of the room, his back tense and almost shaking. Him staying away from me like this while he was in heat was so strange.

"Lucien?"

"I SAID GO!"

His sudden outburst of emotions made me shiver completely in instinct.

"Lucien?"

I tried again, this time softer and could not stop my voice from shaking. The tension and exhaustion from today's mission, mixed with this anger that was radiating from it, was getting to me.

The slight shiver in my voice probably got to him, because a moment later he was next to me. Not sure how or why, but my emotional reaction to him got through to his animal and he released a little cry of concern as he wrapped his hands around me, pulling my head to his chest, and only now did I notice that my eyes were suspiciously moist.

"Shh... little wolf... I'm sorry..."

I said nothing to him, just let him hold me while I was waiting for his answer.

"I'm sorry for scaring you... it's just that I am angry with myself."

"Angry with yourself? Why?"

"Because I failed you... I messed up on the mission. You got hurt in the explosion. I could barely keep all the beasts away from you."

I blinked a few times and pulled back from his chest so I could look him in the eyes.

"I should have done better... I should have been better. You are my mate, I have to protect you."

"Stop."

I quietly whispered to him as I pulled even further back from him, giving us both space and enough distance so I could look him in his eyes.

"You did not fail, we won, our score is great. We are second on the score board."

"I don't care about the score. The explosion could have hurt you..."

"But it didn't, it hurt you. Now please sit down, so I can check if there is no serious damage that we need to get real medical attention for."

Gently, I forced him to sit down on the bed and I saw the familiar puppy dog look in his eyes, but this time the puppy looked really hurt.

"But... but..."

"NO. Stop Lucien. You did your job and, if I'm honest, the only reason why we got to the artifact all in one piece was because of you. There should not have been any sort of explosions on the plant, but... but it's clear that the pirates did not listen to the trainers. Not only that, but you saved that girl from James's team. You did great... we were the ones that more or less failed..."

"NO."

His sharp no, forced me to freeze.

"It was all your first time on a mission and you all did better than good. I have seen multiple soldiers freeze and almost die on their first mission. Sure it took you a moment to get going, but after you did good... I was the one that failed... I was the one that had experience with this sort of things... this was not my first mission and I messed up... I should have known..."

I stopped him in the only way that I knew it would work. I crashed my lips into his and it did stop him from spiraling.

Our lips moved against one another, but the kiss did not grow deeper like it usually did and so I pulled back a moment later.

"No, you did good. Now let me check over your bruising."

I did not give him the chance to say no, as I carefully checked each bruise and to both of our luck there was no serious damage done to his body. As I was about to finish, my fingers became slower and they started to linger on his soft naked skin. I noticed him leaning more and more into my touch with each moment.

"It's seems like you are all good. There is no broken bones or even swelling, just some bruising."

He grabbed my hands and pulled them to his lips laying soft kisses on each of my fingers.

"Are you sure that you don't want any pain killers?"

I asked him again and he answered me just by shaking his head.

"No, I want to feel the pain... but I would like for you to spend the night here..."

My body froze for a moment as I tried to take a step back.

"Lucien, I don't think that is such a good idea... you are hurt..."

He shook his head and carefully pulled me back closer.

"I am not saying that we should do something... I just want to hold you."

Slowly, my eyes looked at his face and traveled down his body. The angry-looking markings on his body made my stomach turn as I stared at him. The need to be next to him as he was clearly in pain lingered deep in me, but I tried to ignore it. But the thing that pushed me over the edge was the look in his eyes. When I met his gaze, I knew that I could not say no to him.

"Fine."

I whispered and he gently pulled me to bed along side him. His hands wrapped around me and he pulled my head over his chest. For a second I froze, afraid to hurt him, but as if he could read my mind, he stopped me.

"It's okay... actually it will make the pain feel better. Your touch has this affect on me."

My answer was a small nod as I let my head rest on his chest and my whole body relax. To no surprise in a few moments we were both out.

The next morning came way to quickly and we both were awoken by the notification that our next mission was decided and we knew who our next opponent was. Just as I expected as our score is second best in the whole year, we were paired with the team at the very top... with Matthew's team.