Cold moonlight spilled through the window, clashing with the memory of the fire. Jaden tossed and turned.
Three years ago, the same day repeating, Ranulf's brutal, staged, and senseless death. He remembered the desperate scramble to hold Ranulf's lifeless body, the way the warmth bled from his skin as if time was being stolen, and the numbness when the assassins left. He lifted the heavy body all the way to Marcus's camp, with hope that justice would come, that someone would care. But waiting for him were the hard eyes of the top military officials who were already there.
Somewhere inside, Jaden had believed Marcus would look at him and see the truth, his pain and their innocence.
But instead, the rush of accusations swallowed him whole while his own voice shouted, begging to be heard, the words tumbling uselessly against a wall of steel.
And Marcus, his mate, was there. Unmoved and cold, without an ounce of care. He hadn't bothered to find out the truth because if he did, Jaden wouldn't be here. The alpha hadn't even thought about the pregnancy Jaden carried behind bars. The fragile hope burned out in the shadows of the cell.
Ranulf's snore brought him back to reality. Jaden blinked, realizing he was sobbing, the tears hot on his cheeks.
Loneliness tightened around his chest each day in that prison. He knew he had no one who would come to save him.
When even strength abandoned him, and his soul faltered, it was the voice of a fellow omega, Member Z, that comforted him. Z had been strange and quiet.
Later, Member Z was jailbroken by his friends, and Jaden was asked to tag along. The feeling of being nothing but a burden never left him.
Three years later, Marcus found him again, but this time the mate bond was severed, and Jaden was left to rot there. The same kind souls still came to get him out of prison, out of love for him. If only he wasn't a burden.
If Marcus hadn't severed the mate bond, then he would have had his powers to save his friends. The prison was set ablaze, and despite Darius's efforts as a powerful tier 2 fire wielder, he couldn't control the flames. All Jaden could do was cry and shamefully watch the people who took care of him, and still risked everything to get him out of there, pay the price. He remembered the suffocating air and the sweat and tears running together as his life slipped away. He remembered the cool of Member Z's hand and that whisper, "I'll send you back." And he remembered failing, again and again, to be anything other than the cause of everyone else's suffering and death.
Now, the moon was high up, staring down so intently.
Jaden's hand drifted to his stomach.
If this was really three years back, then that meant he was still pregnant.
Marcus.
Jaden would never forgive him. Even if their paths were twisted together, he would run until the world ended, just to keep his body, his heart, and the things and ones he had lost far from that man.
The mental stress had cost him the baby, despite Darius providing alpha's pheromones as a trusted alpha he desperately needed. Even Z, for all his comfort, had kept Jaden at arm's length.
Only now did Jaden realize why. Z showed weird time manipulation powers, while a shocking revelation, it was clear he was mated, and it had to be to Darius.
Jaden kept turning and tossing.
Jaden had been lost in his memories just moments ago.
But now, warmth coursed through him. Every instinct in him screamed to reach out, to feel safe and wanted again. He turned to see a figure not illuminated by the moonlight staring at him with an unreadable expression.
Jaden felt a rush of heat spread through him, igniting a desperate need that had been buried for so long. Ranulf. Ranulf's scent was overbearingly everywhere.
And Jaden could sniff it and even his own, which was not supposed to be so. Mated omegas can only scent and be scented by their mate, and worse, Jaden was pregnant. Why was he going into heat? What happened to his scent? Why could he release scent and why was he able to inhale Ranulf's own? Right, he just hadn't noticed it, ever since he woke up after his death, he had always perceived scents.
And it seemed the mental stress and the overexposure to alpha pheromones had affected him? Within seconds the bed dipped with the new weight, the heated body flaring so violently it stole his breath. His every cell screamed to be touched. His body jolted from his skin being brushed. Ranulf's body hurriedly crashed into him.