Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 144

Chapter 144

Skye

Dimitri wanders in while I’in working in the office. He has something on his mind but hasn’t figured out how to open the conversation. I know this by the way he shifts his weight from foot to foot and shuffles papers around without really looking at them.

“Spit it out.” I tell him without looking up from the report I’m reading.

“What makes you think I have something to say?” He hedges, but the faint red tinge to his cheeks gives him away.

“I’ve learned your tell. You fidget.” I wave my hand in a “get on with it” motion.

He sighs, then launches into his topic, seemingly grateful for the invitation. “There’s talk among some of the pack members. About the new living arrangement.” He says pointedly.

“What kind of talk?”

“The usual kind. Some say you moved on too fast. Whispers about your baby’s father living under the same roof as the man you’re sleeping with.” He blushes harder at that. “One woman compared you to Cassandra, suggesting you’re manipulating them just like your sister, which I’ve addressed.”

“Addressed how?” I ask, horrified at the insinuation.

“Firmly,” he says, and doesn’t elaborate. I nod, deciding I don’t want to know the details.

I think about what I would have done with this information six months ago. I’m no stranger to people whispering behind my back. It happened all the time at Ironwood.

I think about how I would have attempted to manage the situation carefully. The explanations I would have given, shaping people’s perceptions so nobody was too uncomfortable.

“Thank you for telling me,” I say, and hand him the report I just finished, moving on to the next one.

He blinks. “That’s it?”

“That’s it.” I shrug, dismissing the subject.

He looks at me for a moment with the bewildered expression he gets when he’s surprised someone can still surprise him. “Right,” he says. “Good.”

He leaves. I go back to what I was doing.

I spent too long worrying what other people thought of me, always trying to be Jaxon’s perfect Luna. Not anymore. The opinions of people who weren’t in my marriage don’t have jurisdiction over my life. This is a new development in how I think about such things. I’m not sorry about it.

Unfortunately, Dimitri’s news is not the only uncomfortable information I have to face today. It’s barely an hour later when I’m hit with another undeniable truth I’m not sure I’m ready to face. Only this one doesn’t just involve virtual strangers. It’s about Jaxon.

What I didn’t anticipate about having him in the house… he’s actually good company. Not in any way that changes the way I see my life moving forward. Purely practical sense, but it surprises me all the same. The way he reads a difficult day and responds to it without me asking. The way he’s learned the expression I wear when I’ve been trying to soothe Benji for ninety minutes and I need someone to take him for thirty.

He just takes him. No discussion. Like we’re a team, a well-oiled machine, completely in sync.

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“I’ve got him,” he says, and he does, and I can go drink water and stand in the bathroom for five minutes and be a person rather than a feeding mechanism.

“Thank you,” I said the first time it happened.

“You don’t have to thank me,” he said. “He’s my son.”

There was something clean about that. No agenda in it. And it made me feel grateful in a way I wasn’t prepared for after being angry and hurt for so long.

I watch him with Benji, the way he points things out to him and talks to him like he’s completely convinced he’s listening. Benji’s little face lights up and he babbles back like they’re having a private conversation in some secret language. It’s actually… heartwarming. And I’m not sure what to do with that.

“He’s really good with him,” Nicolai observes from beside me.

“He is.” I agree.

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“Like he is now.”

colai is quiet for a moment. “Yes,” he admits. “It would have been simpler.” He presses a kiss to my temple. ” Also, you wouldn’t be here. And I wouldn’t have you. So I’m trying to hold a complicated relationship with that particular alternate timeline.”

He says the words with a straight face in his accented English, letting me off the hook for a comment he easily could have taken offense at. And I laugh. I can’t help it. “You’re terrible, “.

“I’m honest,” he shrugs. “Different thing.”

Then he carries me to bed and does a very thorough job of chasing all thoughts of Jaxon from my mind.

Cara Anderson Author

Thank you for reading!

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