Page 77 of The Ice Prince's Fated Mate
“You look happy,” Dirk remarked, running a hand up my leg to produce pleasant trembles without the earlier eroticism.
Did I? I smiled. The truth was, I felt happy and at ease. Everything with Dirk was exactly what I needed as long as I didn’t fight it.
I could just see fate, if it were a person, smirking wildly and saying, “I told you so.”
“I am,” I said, and there was no accompanying tightness, no sense that I wasn’t being completely honest with myself. I was. Being with Dirk, and around Dirk, was slowly filling a hole in me I had assumed would always go empty.
“Good,” he said as I snuggled in tightly to his side. I pulled one of his arms over my shoulder, feeling the firmness of his muscles underneath my fingertips. “You deserve to be happy.”
I sighed contentedly.
“You know that was ridiculous to make me look out the window. Right?” he growled playfully a moment later. “I wanted nothing more than to stare at you.”
“I know,” I replied lightly. “But I needed it to be that way, Dirk. I had to be in control the first time.”
Dirk shifted, looking away from the window to snare my gaze and hold it firmly.
“You will always control me. My heart, my mind, my soul. Today, tomorrow, and for eternity you will have me, Ella. I willneverbe anyone else’s. Only yours.”
I shivered as his statement resonated through me. I was his. He was mine. Even if we had yet to sink our fangs into one another and complete the bond, it was only a matter of time.
“So what now?” he asked, switching so easily to a lighter topic as men do.
“Now we wait, I guess. See if something happens out there.”
I knew he meant between us, but I didn’t have an answer yet. Despite it still not happening, a large part of me kept insistingthe hammer had yet to drop. That I would be filled with regret and pain, and need to pull away.
Dirk grunted an agreement. “Well then, good thing you don’t mind being locked up in here with me,” he joked, leaning down for a kiss.
I frowned at him, pulling away as my mood soured.
“What?” Dirk paused and then pulled away when I still didn’t come forward. “What did I do wrong?”
I sighed. “Dirk, I know you didn’t mean it that way, but …”
He twitched as realization hit, his face clouding over, eyes dull and unhappy. “Crap. I wasn’t thinking, El. It was just supposed to be a joke about us stuck in this room. Not actually locked up.”
“I know,” I repeated, taking his hand, giving it a squeeze, and trying to remind myself he’d only been joking. “I’m your mate, so I know you didn’t mean it. But I can’t help but have my mind go there. And not everyone might be so understanding. Milly, okay probably not Milly, but others like us would be upset, thinking you mean cages and shackles, like the hunters.”
Dirk nodded emphatically. “Of course. I understand. Leave it up to me to screw things up after such a good time,” he growled. “Idiot.”
“I’m not mad. I promise. I’m not. Besides, it’s not your fault, you didn’t grow up like us. You always had your freedom. You don’t know what it’s like to have it taken.” I kissed his arm, right where the mate marks stopped, but Dirk remained oddly stiff.
“That’s not really true,” he said, staring out the hole unblinking. “My life has never truly been free, either. It just hasn’t had the outline that Caz’s did. I’ve always been the heir. The spare, the backup. Expected and demanded to be his clone, nothing more.”
I clenched my jaw in frustration. He wasn’t really trying to compare. Was he? Did he not have the slightest idea what life as a Clippy was like?
“Yeah. Sounds really rough. Having everything in life,” I muttered. “Never having to pin all your hopes on Cerberus killing the Hunters before they get you.”
Dirk pulled away, his mouth and eyes flat. “You have no idea what I’ve had, or not had, Ella. I’m not trying to play a game of who had it worse. Or to say that your life was somehow easy in comparison. I’m an idiot sometimes, but I’m not that dumb. All I’m saying is please don’t pretend like my life was all orblight and laughter. It very much was not.”
“Oh, come on. It can’t have beenthathard,” I said, my hackles rising. “You had money. A constant roof over your head. You could sleep at night without keeping one eye open. Clothing that didn’t have holes. Food that tasted good. Abyss, you had a family who didn’t disown you the moment they knew what you were.”
Dirk took a deep, shuddering breath. His features were like granite, unmoving and stiff, frozen. “I would much rather have had a family who disowned me and was still alive than a father who killed a mother. Or a brother who killed a father.”
My jaw dropped, and I sat back onto the floorboards heavily. “What? Dirk!”
He sighed and turned to me at last. “I amnottrying to one-up you, Ella. I am incredibly sorry for everything you’ve gone through in life. I really, really am. I regret the part I’ve played in it. All I’m saying is you don’t know everything about me or what my life has been like until now.”
