Alpha King's Playmates

EIGHT

Knox

I released Lyanna and stepped back.  Don't hate me.  Don't hate me.  I try to tell her this with my eyes.

"I didn't mean to hurt you.  I would never deliberately hurt you.  Please forgive me, Lyanna.  I had do idea of my own strength."  I sounded panicking.  My Lyanna's tears kept falling.  

"I went looking for you here to apologize about the awkward incident you witnessed at the pack house, it never occurred to me that I will be apologizing for something far worse.  Lyanna...."  This time I am pleading with all my heart.

"A-are you going to take Harper away?"  Her voice trembled.

"What?  No. No!  Why would I do that my little bunny?"  

"In the woods, you said that if I disrespect you that I'll never see my sister again,"  another tear fell.  My heart was crushed.  She was not crying out of the pain that I inflicted but because of fear and the belief that I can truly make her suffer emotionally.

I moved closer and bravely enveloped her in my arms.  She would probably won't let me but I had to hold her.  

"I never meant those threats, my love."  I whispered the words in her ear and kissed her temple. 

Unbelievably, she remained calm.  But she never reciprocated the embrace.  I got alarmed.  She is shutting herself off.  I opened the gap between us, looked into her wet eyes, and shook her.

"Dammit, Lyanna!  Hit me.  Push me away.  Scream at me.  Offend me.  Anything but this silence!"   

"I wanted to!  I wanted to do all that you've just said, but it's not what I need,"  she sobbed.

"What do you need love? Tell me, please." I have never felt this vulnerable in my entire life.  It was as if my life hang on this woman in front of me.  I wait nervously for her reply.   Please not your freedom, please do not ask me to let you go.  I hang my head low.

Lyanna lightly lifted my chin with her hand.  She looked into my eyes.  "For now, I just need you to hold me."  

I sighed out of relief and was dumbfounded by her reply.  Quickly I gathered her in my arms again.  She cried louder but this time she held on to my back.  Oh my sweet little bunny.  This is where she belongs, within my arms.  I gently rub her back to soothe her.

"Why?" She softly asked.

I stopped moving.

"Why do you crave women so much?  Why do you take so many random women to your bed?  Do you know how badly I feel about it?"

I held her at arms length so we could talk face to face.  "Lyanna, that part of my life is in the past.  I know my reputation is beyond repair but I will never stop proving to you that I am trying to change my ways now.  There is only you in my life from now  until I die.  The Moon Goddess gifted you to me and I will honor that gift."

I hesitated and an internal battle is happening in my heart and mind as to whether I will answer her question "why".  I could lose her if she knew my abhorrent and violent past.  

She must have seen my struggle because she sweetly said, "You do not need to tell me things that you are not ready to share yet. I am practically still a stranger to you."

"You are not a stranger to me!  You and Harper are my family now.  Come, I will answer your question, but not here.  You might as well learn the story from me than from others."  With that I kiss her forehead,  kiss the already healing bruise in her arm, held her hand, and led her out of the hospital.

..............................................

Lyanna

The arena looked run down.  It is like a shadow from a distant era.  It is haunting and desolate.  I do not understand why Knox took me here, right in the center of this forsaken edifice. 

Knox faced me and started to narrate his past life starting from his younger days when his father told him that it is his brother who will ascend to the throne and not him until the part where he lived a carefree, violent, and wanton life.  He is choosing his words carefully with the intention of shielding my feelings.  I am thankful he did not go so descriptive in the part where he entertained numerous women over the years.

Little by little, it is making sense now;  why we are here in this arena, what Rhett meant by poetic justice, and just how unbelievable it was for the playboy alpha king to have discovered that the Moon Goddess gave him a mate after all these long long years.

I appreciated the courage he showed because it is not easy to relieve one's ugly past.  However, I just learnt is not easy to take in everything.  I myself could not stomach some of his decisions and how he threw his life into a life of senseless sex escapades.  

But I am his mate.  The king is trying to pull himself together and the best I could do is give him a chance.