Chapter One Hundred and Neen


    -Riley, meet me in my room now.


    Mom.


    That was alf the letter said. A maid had dropped by to pass me the written note clearly from my mother. I wondered why she wanted to see me.


    I quickly got dressed and headed for my mother''


    The door to her apartment had been left wide open, and so I walked in, mming the door shut after I did..


    "Mom," I called, walking into the apartment. "Mom, I saw the letter," I called out again.


    Is


    Finally I saw her; she sat on one of the cushions, tears streaming down her eyes. I rushed towards her.


    "Mom, what''s wrong?" I asked.


    "Riley"


    "Yes, I am here, mom. What happened?"


    "Seat down with me, would you?" she asked.


    I stared at her, puzzled. Still I sat.


    "Riley, I want to talk to you, and all I need you to do is listen to me."


    "Okay, I can do that." I said, hiding the panic I felt. I knew something was wrong.


    "Good," she says, and it took a minute before she started. "Do you know I once loved de?"


    "What?"


    That I didn''t expect.


    "I... maybe the problem was me. How could I love the man who had kidnapped me and cleared out my pack forever... but at least he let me live? thought there had been a reason, I thought I was special to him. I had been so young, and he was handsome and charming in every manner. He was just the type ever girl wanted, but he wanted me. I couldn''t understand why, but at some point I stopped thinking, at some point I stopped trying to understand him, instead I fell for him. We were making progress; he was changing for me until... he brought in Freya as


    his mate.


    That''s when the true torments started."


    I remembered de telling me how he had broken her by giving her hope, making her fall for


    his petty lies, and only to shatter the little glitter of hope he left with her. He said it was more fun this way.


    He deserved to die, in the worst way possible.


    "When I left, Freya said he never did stopparing me to her; when he was drunk, he spoke about me too. So maybe it hadn''t all been a lie, but his brutality has gotten the best of him, and I was his weakness, one he needed to get rid of. Maybe he did let me escape; there was no way; I could have gotten out of this pack without him noticing, so maybe he thought I had suffered enough and he let me go."


    "Mom, what are you trying to say?"


    "What I am trying to say was that even in the beast of a man called de, there was still another part of him, that tiny, little, and almost inexistent part of him I fell in love with. But what he valued more was power."


    "de is dead, mother, and he deserved to die; what are you heading at?"


    "How many times have you asked, or rather... begged Thane to step out of his line of ambition, just so he would be safe?" She asks, and her questions for some reasons hits hard.


    "I don''t know."


    "Tell me the truth, Riley," she says, her voice silent.


    I remember those times. I had begged him to not go against the elders, but he did more than once. I had begged him to not challenge his father because I was afraid I would lose him, but he had said he never settles for less. I had begged him not to take the crown; it would have killed him, but again he did.


    "Did he listen?" Mother questions.


    "He spared you that once."


    so that''s the little hope you hang unto?"


    "Stop this right now, mother. What is your problem? You said you would let me be. Why are you bringing all this up after all this time?"


    "Riley, you lied to me. About the contract, you told me that this was temporary; you never told me you loved him. Why would you do this to me, Riley?"


    She was right. I hadn''t realized I didn''t tell her that the contract would not stand any longer.


    "Mom..."


    "You told me, Riley, you said we would leave this ce together."


    "I am sorry."


    "Why?"


    Chapter One Hundred and Neen


    "This is not a big deal, mother. If you don''t want to stay here, then I could arrange something


    you; you could be happy elsewhere."


    "And you would remain here?"


    "I am his mate..."


    "No, you are not."


    "Listen to me, mother. I can never leave him; in him I had found the happiness I had long sorted for; he is nothing like his father; just stopparing them; de is dead; we need to move on; why do you always have to dig into past memories?"


    "I never wanted to tell you this," she muttered again to herself. "I never thought I would have to; we were supposed to leave; you weren''t supposed to love him; he was never supposed to make you his queen."


    "Mom, you are scaring me." I said, but she kept muttering those words again and again to herself.


    "You don''t understand."


    "Then make me."


    "When I left this pack... I discovered that I was pregnant." "Pregnant. You never told me anything about losing a child."


    "I never lost the child, Riley. You were the baby I had with de."