Chapter 43

Eden shrugged out of his coat as quickly as he could manage and wrapped it around Laurel before lifting her from the ground and hurrying back to his room at the inn. He didn't know what had set her off and he wasn't entirely sure that she could answer him. She wasn't responding to anything he said, so he stopped asking.

When he arrived at the inn, he went quickly up to his room and set her at the table in the center of the room. She seemed calmer, wrung out from sobbing as she sat with her head bowed, staring out into nothing.

He poured a glass of water and sat it beside her as she sniffled and waited for her to come back to the world.

"I'm sorry..." Laurel gasped. "I stained your clothes..."

Eden frowned before looking down and chuckled. There was a bit of dirt on his clothes, but he wouldn't call them stained.

"You didn't do anything wrong." Eden shook his head. "Do you want to talk about what happened?"

Laurel worried her lip, averting her gaze as she pulled his jacket closer around her. Eden's gaze was so earnest, drawing her in and making her want to tell him everything. Eden had seen her in her most miserable state but still treated her so well. Perhaps she should trust Eden, but she was hesitant to do so.

Noticing her hesitation, Eden gently asked, "Let me guess. It's the king?"

She flinched at the mention of Adolph. Her eyes burned and filled with tears again before she could recognize the pang of pain in her chest. Eden reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder, rubbing gently.

"It's okay," Eden said softly. "It's okay, you're safe now."

"I... I don't know what to do." Laurel sobbed, "All this time, I've tried so hard to keep my distance from him because I know I don't deserve him, but now my worst fear has happened! That's why I'm... But he's so good to me. There's no way I can... control myself from falling in love with him! He's my mate!"

Eden gasped, stilling for a moment, "Adolph Raymond is your mate?"

Laurel wasn't sure what to make of Eden's tone. She couldn't manage to parse out what he could be thinking around all of her emotions storming through her.

"A king and a country girl-- what a match!" She sobbed, laughing a bit hysterically. "Why does the moon goddess always have to do this to me? Is it my duty to exist merely to be a joke? And all those words that Adolph said to me, all that tenderness... Were they all lies? Did he do everything just to make me a substitute for his ex-wife? I can't tell anymore"

Every lesson on dignity she'd learned as Laura seemed forgotten. Laurel, the orphaned seventeen-year-old girl sobbed.

Eden wiped her tears gently, "I-Is it painful? I'm sorry that I can't share the pain with you. Humans don't have bonds between mates, so I have no way of knowing how important mates are to werewolves..."

"I'd rather not have a mate!" She cried. "This bond only ties me to tragedy, and if I don't have a mate-"

She drew up short as Alice huffed, cutting off her thoughts and Laurel shuddered at the possibility, not wanting to imagine a future without a mate now that she had met Adolph.

Adolph wasn't perfect exactly. His ruthlessness and violence were troubling, but he was everything that a little girl could have dreamed of when she thought of a mate. He had been her ideal since she was a child: handsome, strong, and loyal. Seeing more of who he was had changed some of those feelings, but it hadn't destroyed them.

If only she hadn't met Adolph, she wouldn't have had her heart broken again. She might have lived her second life without ever knowing her fated mate, but she could have been happy with some other man in some pack far away from the Imperial City! She would have at least avoided being back here among the people that had driven Laura to her death. She wouldn't be sobbing here.

She wanted to regret it, but meeting Adolph had also brought her so much joy. He'd soothed some of the wounds she'd carried with her from Laura with his kindness and faith in her. She loved him. There was no way she could deny that she did no matter how much it hurt.

She wiped away her tears and sighed, hopeless and troubled as she tried to calm down and be rational. She had made every decision. She'd accepted Adolph's invitation to come to the Imperial City to find out the truth about her death in her previous life. When she accepted the invitation, she should have realized the possibility that she would fall in love with him. It had been terrifyingly easy. Adolph had been good to her. He had given the best he could to a country girl with a dead father: a job, a place to stay, and respect. Even if he may have simply been pursuing the shadow of his late wife in her, he still treated her well.

She straightened her spine and lifted her head to look at Eden.

"Thank you, Eden, for always comforting me when I'm sad, but I'm fine now. Just leave me alone for a while."

Eden stared at her for a few moments as if he had something to say to her, but finally, he nodded with a tight smile.

"You are such a strong girl. Get some rest, get a good sleep and forget about all the things that bother you! I'll see you tomorrow."

Eden escorted her back to her room at the inn. Laurel took the chance to wash her face once he left. Eden was right; she needed a good night's sleep. Although she didn't know what she could do next, she had a lot of things to think about before making a decision. Resting first was the best decision she could make now.

With a sigh of exhaustion, she collapsed on her bed. Her eyes caught on the familiar frame on the table. The portrait of young Adolph smiled at him. She smiled a bit though she felt a little guilty. She had she liked it so much, she had snuck it out of the palace to keep at her bedside. She picked up the frame and considered breaking the frame and ripping the picture apart, but the thought made her uncomfortable.

She chuckled. Maybe it was enchanted, still carrying Olivia's love for Adolph. She wondered if they would have gotten along. They seemed to have similar tastes if they could both love the same man.

Tears burned her eyes and spilled down her face as she pressed the frame to her chest and curled up in bed.

If only she had been old enough to have met Adolph before he met Olivia, or at least met him before she met Basil Things would have been so very different. Laura wouldn't have died such a wretched death. She would have been Adolph's luna and the heroine of the great romance that circulated the kingdom in place of Olivia. She would have been happy.

The thought was heartbreaking and spurred more tears to fall.

She loved him.

She'd tried so damned hard to not love him, yet her heart ached at the idea of not loving him.

Alice moaned and languished in despair at the idea and all she could do was hold the framed portrait of him because she couldn't hold him.

She may love him, but she had to hold herself back from him as there was no way he would ever love her the same way. Olivia would always be first in his heart.

She would never be good enough to have his love though there was no one else who would ever be able to earn her love.

She'd thought being rejected by Basil had been bad. She'd thought she had mourned a fairytale for those three years before she died as Laura, but she had been so wrong.

She fell asleep with tears rolling down her face and a broken heart.

*For a moment, she didn't know where she was. It was a dream, she knew, but she didn't recognize the forest. The sound of galloping horse hooves came from behind her. She frowned, turning and searching for the source of the sound.*

*"Laurel!"*

*Her heart fluttered as she turned to see Adolph. His voice was the same, but he looked younger as if he had ridden out of his portrait into her dreams. His gaze was warm and loving. He seemed overjoyed to see her as he drew his horse to a stop and leaped down before the horse had stopped moving.*

*He reached her and swept her up into his arms with a laugh.*

*The world moved quickly as he whirled her around, laughing. She laughed with him, holding onto him tightly.*

*"I found you!" Adolph said, squeezing her close. "You're safe now"*

*She wanted to agree with him, but this was a dream, and there was nothing safe about being in love with someone who would never love you.*

A strange sound woke her. Maybe the fluttering of a cloak or a bird tapping on a glass pane. She groaned and turned lifting her head and freezing. Moonlight poured through the window around the figure standing outside looking down at her. A scream bubbled up and pushed at her teeth in panic as the figure knocked on her window.

It died as she recognized the man's features in the shadow of his cloak.

"Adolph?"