Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 158

Chapter 158

Nicolai

She said yes.

I’ve been saying this to myself at irregular intervals for three days. Not because I doubted she would say yes. But – since the moment she did, life has taken on this dreamlike quality, all soft and fuzzy around the edges. So it seems the reality of it keeps needing to be confirmed.

She said yes. She’s wearing the ring. I’m going to sink my teeth into her neck and she’s going to be my mate in every sense of the word, in front of everyone who matters, in a ceremony I’m going to make certain sends a message that doesn’t require interpretation. She’s mine!

I’m a man who controls rooms with his presence and manages an empire and does not, as a rule, allow things to show that aren’t meant to be shown. But I have been insufferably happy for three days.

And unfortunately, Dimitri has absolutely noticed.

“You’re smiling,” he says it like an accusation.

We’re reviewing shipping manifests. Or I’m supposed to be reviewing shipping manifests. Dimitri has apparently been watching my face instead of his own documents.

“I’m not.” I grunt, refusing to look at him.

“You were thirty seconds ago. When you thought no one was looking.”

“That’s not relevant.” I shrug, internally berating myself for being so transparent. Especially in front of him.

“It’s extremely relevant.” He laughs, closing his folder in a move that says “I’m neglecting my job in favor of harassing you. “How does it feel?”

I finally admit defeat and look at him.

Dimitri has been with me for fifteen years. He’s been present for the things I’m proud of and the things I’m not, for the decisions that required clarity and the ones that required something harder. He has never once, in fifteen years, asked me how something feels.

“Like something I’ve been building toward for years,” I say. “Something I didn’t know how badly I needed until it was right in front of me.”

He’s quiet for a moment, which usually precedes something he thinks is profound.

“Your father would have liked her,” he says.

I go still.

Dimitri never speaks about my father. It’s not a rule-it’s just something that exists between us, the kind of silence you develop around a subject when you both knew the person and the loss is mutual.

“Yes,” I agree. “He would have.”

My father wasn’t a man of many words. Most days, I wasn’t entirely sure where I stood with him. But one thing I’m certain of… he would have loved Skye.

Dimitri picks his folder back up like the conversation never happened. “The shipping manifests won’t review themselves.”

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“No. They won’t.” We return to the manifests.

quietly, suffused with something I don’t have a precise word for.

Later that night, I’m dressing for dinner when a startling thought occurs to me. A mate-bond ceremony requires planning.

I do not plan ceremonies. I employ people to plan them for me. But suddenly, the idea of handing this off to someone else makes something in my chest squeeze with an emotion I won’t name. It feels too personal to leave to someone else.

This is not something I’m willing to do halfway, or quietly, or in the minimalist way that might suggest this is simply the next logical step in an existing arrangement.

I want it large. Public. Clear.

Skye is going to be the mate of the head of the Woolf family, and anyone who might have opinions about her- enemies who might see her as leverage, rivals who might consider testing the perimeters of what I’d protect- should understand what that means. She becomes, on the day we mate, untouchable in a very specific way. Not because she isn’t already under Woolf protection, but because the ceremony formalizes something that my world takes seriously: this woman is mine and I am hers and the full weight of everything that means comes with that.

I want that communicated without ambiguity.

I also understand that the woman I’m mating is not a decorative element of the ceremony. She will have opinions. She will exercise them. I would be a foolish man not to ask for her help.

Deciding this is an excellent topic for dinner conversation, I launch into my carefully curated ideas the minute the first course is served. I lay out the broad parameters-the estate grounds, the guest list I’m considering, the general scale I have in mind.

She listens to my enthusiastic description with the slightest upward curve to her lips. Not enough to openly admit she finds me amusing, but enough for me to infer.

“That’s a lot of people,” she points out.

“Yes.” I reply, deadpan.

“Do all of them really need to be there?” She questions.

“Most of them. Some of them are political necessities. Some of them are there to receive the message.” I admit openly.

“What message?” I thought that part would be clear but she seems genuinely perplexed.

“That you’re the wife of the head of the Woolf family. That this is permanent. That anyone who considers you accessible as leverage should reconsider.” I meet her eyes. “My enemies are not always reasonable people. But they respond to demonstrations. This will be one.”

She’s quiet for a moment.

“Okay,” she draws out the word. “Large but meaningful, I’m okay with. But Nicolai, I’m not standing in front of five hundred people saying vows that feel like a press release.”

“No press release.” I agree easily..

“And I want to write part of the ceremony myself.” That surprises me, but it’s an easy request to agree to.

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“Of course.”

And the flowers should be-“The flowers are definitely her domain.

“Tell me what you want. We’ll get it.” I assure her.

She looks at me with the expression she gets when she’s deciding whether I’m being sincere or strategic. She has. good instincts for that distinction.

“You’re just going to agree to everything?” She doesn’t hide her suspicion.

“I’m going to agree to everything that doesn’t compromise the ceremony’s core purpose.”

“Which is?” She raises a brow, waiting for my response.

“Telling the world you’re mine,” I say, “and making sure you feel that’s true.”

She’s quiet for a moment. Then her face breaks out in a huge smile as she picks up the notepad on the table beside her and starts writing.

I watch her. The way she focuses when something matters to her-complete attention, no peripheral awareness, utterly present in what she’s doing. And I think about how lucky I am that I get to watch her do this for the rest of my life.

I find, sitting here, that I have absolutely no quarrel with this fact.

Cara Anderson Author

Thank you for reading!

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