Sienna:
The moment I stepped into the infirmary, I felt the shift in the air.
I felt the weight that it carried, no matter how hard I wanted to deny it.
It was subtle, too subtle, perhaps, but undeniable.
Something was off.
Damon stood near the bed, his back straight, his hands behind him in a stance I’d seen him use with board members, not with patients. His expression was unreadable. Focused. Guarded.
I looked down at my feet, refusing to meet his eyes. After last night, I had expected him to come to at least apologize or spend the night with me, but I spent the night alone, even our daughter was in her nursery.
I took a deep breath before I forced myself to look up. I was not going to look weak and I was not going to allow him to think or understand that he had an effect on me. His words were harsh, but I knew that I needed to maintain my ground. I knew that I needed to stand strong.
And then my eyes landed on her.
The woman.
She was sitting up now, her posture graceful despite the bruises painting her collarbone and the faint scar trailing just below her left eye. Her dark lashes framed wide, doe-like eyes. There was a softness to her… and yet something that felt practiced. Measured. As if she was already calculating every word, every breath.
The two of them were talking before staying quiet, I assumed. Damon was already aware that I was by his side and yet he did not turn to face me. And I could tell that it was because he might not want to look me in the eye. Whatever it was that he was trying to hide, he did not want me to see it.
Her eyes flicked to me the second I entered the room, and I caught the slightest twitch of her lips.
A smile.
Polite. Controlled.
“Alpha,” she said softly, her voice as smooth as silk. “I didn’t expect company. I apologize, I would not be able to greet you the way that I would supposed to be.”
Damon cleared his throat, turning toward me. His shoulders eased slightly as our eyes met, but I still caught it, that flicker of hesitation in his gaze. The flicker of pain, of trying to hide a secret.”
“Sienna,” he said, voice lower now. “This is Delilah. She was the one we found in the woods. She woke up a while ago, I figured to come and check on her myself, considering the fact that I’m the one who found her.”
I kept my expression calm, even as my stomach twisted. Even as my chest ached, I still managed to stand quiet, to not react. There was something about her. Something I couldn’t place, something that wasn’t settling right with me. But I pushed the feeling aside. Now is not the time for it. She was injured and if she was here it was because my mates brought her here. I did not know whether or not to like it, but I knew that since she was injured I should not be overreacting.
Delilah turned to me, her eyes scanning me like she was trying to memorize every detail. Then she gave a soft nod. ”
It’s a pleasure to meet you… you must be Damon’s…”
“My mate,” Damon said firmly, stepping beside me, his hand grazing the small of my back as he looked directly at Delilah. “The mother of my child and my woman, my pride and my glory.”
I blinked, stunned by how quickly, and decisively, he said it. He had never addressed to me as his mate, not directly at least before him to acknowledge me as. So for him to introduce me to someone who is a stranger herself, I found myself being surprised. But the way they hated it so quickly, that did not settle well with me. The shift in his tone. Even the tensity in his shoulders.
Delilah paused, a flicker of something unspoken crossing her face before she dipped her head again. “Of course. You’re his mate… it’s an honor. I was not aware that you had a child.”
It was hard to miss the way she lingered on the word mate, as if she was tasting it for herself.
Not rough. Not desperate.
Just soft.
Just present.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured, pressing his forehead to mine. “About last night. I shouldn’t have brushed you off like that. I wasn’t thinking clearly. There was a lot on my mind with the meetings and all the work that we had to take care of yesterday.”
I nodded slowly, accepting his words, but even as he held me close, my thoughts were elsewhere.
Because I’d seen it.
That moment, barely a breath, when Delilah looked at him like he was hers.
And though he kissed me now, though he apologized, though his arms were around me… I couldn’t shake the way his eyes had hesitated when he first saw her.
It wasn’t jealousy.
It was instinct.
And it scared me.
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