When You Were My Mate (Demetra and Emris) novel Chapter 107

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“It’s healing up nicely…so stop worrying so much.”

Elena snaps her laptop shut with the satisfaction of someone who has just finished the most indulgent afternoon of her life. On screen, barely two minutes ago, the rom- com’s lead couple had finally kissed in the rain.

She hasn’t even made it to the credits before Regan’s hovering became too irritating to ignore.

He rolls his eyes but she doesn’t care. She’s, already in love with this suite.

It’s not the Luna chambers but it’s far better than the other wing where she had to cook her own scrambled eggs every morning like some common omega.

Here, there is a private chef. Someone draws her bath at the exact temperature and a

masseur on call.

She yawns.

“I miss being Luna.”

Regan stares at her.

“You got your leg chewed up because you wanted back in the pack house that badly?”

“You’ve lived here your entire life. Of course, you don’t appreciate what you have. Regan.”

She sits up slightly.

“Look at this place. It was worth every single bite. Do you have any idea how difficult that was? I had to physically provoke those animals. I threw stones at them, I hurt them first just so they’d hurt me back. That takes commitment.”

Regan looks but he doesn’t say he’s surprised. He has known his mate long enough to understand that the word insane doesn’t quite cover her, but it’s the closest approximation available.

“So.” Elena shifts. “What’s going on between Demetra and Emris? Say it from the beginning. All over again. I mean, it’s been two days. Did they have an argument this morning? Oh, please tell me he pushed her on the ground again. That bitch deserves-‘ Regan’s eyes drift to the shopping bags on the floor. Prada. Gucci. Chanel. At least fifteen of them, spilling tissue paper and receipt slips. Then he sees the platinum card resting on the laptop keyboard…the one that Elena has been using to shop again. And again. And again.

“Regan!”

“Shit! I don’t know anything. All I know is I can’t stand that woman.”

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“Really?” Elena pouts, shifting on the bed in a way that makes the robe slide off one shoulder. The movement is deliberate. Inviting. “She’s quite pretty though. Are you sure you hate her?”

Elena curves her body in a seductive way.

They’re mates after all. And he’s been the one servicing her all the years Emris didn’t

touch her.

“Oh please.” Elena laughs throatily. “We did it constantly when I was actually Luna here. What’s different about today?”

“What’s different is that you’re supposed to be resting.” He gives her a look. “If unusual sounds start coming from this room, how exactly are you planning to explain that?”

“Ugh. You are so boring. I have been lying in this bed for two entire days-”

There’s a knock at the door.

Elena stops talking mid-sentence as Regan holds up one finger toward her and she drops back against the pillows, arranging her face into something tired and fragile.

He straightens, clears his throat.

‘Who is it?”

The door opens slowly and Regan sees her first.

‘What the fuck are you doing here?”

Demetra steps inside, and her legs immediately connect with the nearest tower of shopping bags. She looks down at them and registers the sheer volume of them.

Regan moves close enough that she would have to push past him to go any further

nto the room.

‘Like I said. What are you doing here? Did you come to finish the job? You hiding any

yenas behind you? Say what you came to say and get out.”

‘I’m the Luna of this pack.” Demetra meets his stare without looking away. “I can go wherever I want.”

Regan is surprised. When she was a maid in this house, she never held eye contact with him for more than a second so he was expecting that submission. Oh… is it the Alpha blood in her that’s giving her false confidence? Is that what this is?

Demetra moves further into the room, toward the bed, where Elena is laying with her eyes closed.

‘Elena?”

Nothing.

Demetra glances back at Regan, then forward again.

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“Elena.”

Still nothing. The performance is committed, she’ll give her that.

“The shopping bags that just arrived came off a delivery van twenty minutes ago. And you placed another order exactly two minutes before I knocked. So I know you’re awake.”

Elena opens her eyes lazily and smiles the way cats smile at things they’re planning to bat off a shelf.

“Morning.”

“It was a good day before you walked in but I suppose it can’t last forever.”

“I’m sure it was.” Demetra steps closer to the bed and twists her fingers, wondering how to get this done.

She wants to apologize for what happened. She didn’t think it would turn out this way. She hoped to spook Elena…maybe with the howls and growls of animals in the distance, maybe with the fear of being alone in the dark. But not that. Never that.

She had not imagined this. Nor did she calculate for four deep wounds and a small boy standing in a doorway screaming at her with red-rimmed eyes.

She’s been trying to get to him these past two days. Bringing him his favourite snacks. Knocking on his door. Sitting outside it, hoping he’d come out. But Milo doesn’t even want to look at her. When she walks into a room, he walks out. When she says his name, he covers his ears.

And Amira who has spent weeks learning to share her space and her toys and her nother with this boy she’s slowly come to call a friend has been bearing the quiet, confused hurt of a child who doesn’t understand why her playmate has suddenly gone

cold.

f Elena would simply talk to him…. if she could find it in herself to release Milo from whatever version of this story she’s already told him… it would help. It would fix the one part of this that Demetra genuinely cannot fix herself.

‘I didn’t mean for you to get hurt.”

Elena pushes her hair back from her face to illuminate the diamond ring on her finger.

Demetra’s eyes stop on it.

New.

t’s the kind of thing that gets purchased when someone has unlimited access to a platinum card and no one currently telling them no. Which brings Demetra’s mind to he meeting she sat through yesterday morning with the pack accountant about unnecessary expenditure.

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She exhales quietly through her nose.

One thing at a time.

“Did Emris ask you to come and apologize?”

“No. It’s common sense to apologize. In all honesty, I never thought it would go this far. I wanted to frighten you. I’ll admit that. You aggravated me, and I reacted in a way that I shouldn’t have but this?” Her eyes move briefly to the Elena’s leg under the sheet. ” That was never what I wanted. So I’m sorry, Elena. I mean that.”

“She’s heard you.” Regan’s voice comes from behind her. “You can leave.”

“I don’t believe I was speaking to you, Regan.”

He squints at her.

“Your apology is two days late.” Elena says from the bed, “and frankly, I don’t feel much like accepting it.”

“I don’t expect you to. Not quickly, and honestly… not ever, if that’s what you decide. I didn’t come here expecting forgiveness. I just needed you to know that I’m sorry.”

“Aw…aren’t you just the most sweet-hearted little Luna.” Elena’s smile dims by precisely one degree.

And when Demetra doesn’t leave, she scoffs.

“What else do you want from me? I’m a weak, wounded, bitten woman recovering in bed. Would you like me to get up and dance for you? Why are you still here?”

Demetra takes one step closer to the bed.

“Could you please speak to Milo?”

“What about Milo?” Regan asks fast like a reflex.

Demetra notices it.

“Um…just…he and Amira have stopped playing together. He won’t speak to me either and I understand why…I do but if you could just tell him it was a misunderstanding, that I never meant for you to be hurt, it might help them find their way back to each other and-” She stops herself,

Exhales. “You know what, forget it.”

“You want me to tell my son not to hate you?” Elena’s eyebrows rise, and chuckles.” You think I care that he’s not playing with your daughter?”

“He shouldn’t be playing with her anyway.” Regan adds. “She’s beneath him. She’s just a girl.”

Demetra turns to look at him slowly.

“Excuse me?”

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“You heard me. She’s just a girl and not anything that matters in the line of this pack. What are you going to do about it. Hit me the way you apparently do Emris? Try it. I’ll break your hand.”

Elena smiles patiently on the bed as she watches Demetra back away a little. Watches the pale look spread across her face from Regan’s threat. That’ll teach her, Elena thinks.

‘Why are you so defensive when it comes to Milo?”

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