My Second Chance Mate is a Barbarian (Sera and Fenris) novel Chapter 410

Nadia

The phone glowed on my bedside table the moment I sank into the mattress, its pale light cutting through the gloom. I was already on my feet, snatching it up almost instinctively. Lyra's name flared across the screen, and I froze. Speak of the devil.

I stood there, watching the phone ring once, twice, before it finally stopped and Lyra's name faded to a missed call. I let the phone fall back onto the table and collapsed onto the bed.

I loved Lyra, completely and utterly, but six days of silence had planted a seed of doubt in my mind. I'd begun to wonder if Lyra felt the same way about me. This last fight had been different, rawer than any before. We'd both said things we couldn't take back, things that laid bare the cracks in the facade we'd built around each other. And now the only way I knew she was still breathing was this call, missed because my hand had been too slow.

I stared at her name until it blurred, my mind slipping back in time to another night. I'd been at Valdris once when Sera was away, a rare occurrence. Sera had been my best friend, the one person I'd loved without ever voicing it aloud. Loving a woman was not an option for a noble's daughter like me, not even one as well-liked as I was. There was no happy ending waiting for that particular secret.

But that night it had been Lyra in Sera's place, sprawled across the large bed in her nightgown. I'd been nervous at first, unsure what to say or do in Lyra's company without Sera as a buffer. But Lyra had turned to me with that quick smile of hers and said, "I'm glad it's you." Then she'd pulled a bottle of wine from her nightstand drawer and said, "Let's get drunk."

I'd drunk before, but never in the way Lyra drank, downing glass after glass until the room spun and my words slurred. Lyra matched me shot for shot, laughing at my attempts to keep pace, until finally she leaned forward and kissed me.

I froze, my mind screaming at me even through the haze of alcohol. I was in love with Sera, not Lyra. Sera, who would never love me back. I stared at Lyra, trying to make sense of it all, but Lyra only smiled, something a little wild in her eyes. Then she kissed me again, and I was lost.

That night was the best I'd ever had. Lyra's body was a revelation, her fingers sure and knowing, her mouth blazing a trail down my throat. I was a virgin, but I'd spent years dreaming of this, yearning for it, and Lyra knew exactly how to make me feel good. She became my first, my only, the only one I ever wanted.

And Lyra, in turn, understood me in a way no one ever had before. No one had ever truly seen me, not even Sera. But Lyra, from that very first night, had looked at me and known me. She'd known I loved women, and she didn't flinch. She didn't judge.

The phone lit up again, shrill ringing cutting through the room. This time I swallowed and picked it up on the third ring.

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