Page 29 of Forever My Siren Luna (The Hidden Cove #2)

Hearing his side of things made me so much more conflicted. I can’t blame him for not trusting my uncle. I can’t find it in me to blame him for trying to safeguard his pack by making me an outsider. I would likely have thought the same in his situation.

But that still doesn’t take away all the hurt and pain I endured.

I wonder if he knows everything that I went through.

“Did you know?” I asked softly after a painfully quiet span of time passed. “Did you know all that I had to endure in those two years?”

His face turned grim. “No. Not the extent of your suffering, no.”

I nodded, looking down at the ground before meeting his eyes again. “Do you want to know?”

I don’t know why it is so important to me to tell him in detail, without anger or trying to guilt him for what I had to endure. I really don’t want his guilt or pity. I just wanted him to own up to his wrongdoings.

If he chooses not to listen to my side of things, I don’t know if I can truly trust that he is sorry for what happened. I don’t know if we can move forward.

I don’t want him to try to hide what happened in our first life under a rug and pretend it never occurred. That life changed me. It brought me to where I am today. Pretending it never happened would just be denying who I am.

If he can stand to know that side of me, then I won’t accept him. It’s as easy as that. I know that we truly won’t have a future, because my past is still a vital part of me.

His past changed him, and I listened to his story to understand him more. I need the same courtesy.

“I am scared to know,” Lachlan admitted, and my soul plummeted thinking he was about to reject hearing my story.

“I need to know, though. I have to know the consequences of what I’ve done.

That is the only way I can ever understand.

” He dared to reach out and rest his hand over mine.

“My love for you isn’t just empty words.

Neither is my regret. I want to know you completely, Lira. Everything.”

Val was holding her breath, in fear of what he would say. At his words, she breathed out in relief.

I tell Lachlan everything. I started by telling him about the years before I came to Hidden Cove, about the abuse towards women in my Uncle’s pack. My mom sheltered me from most of it, but I was still treated poorly up until I came to Hidden Cove for our marriage.

I told him about feeling the mate bond the moment I saw him, and the pain I felt later that night when I felt betrayal for the first time.

His face when I described that first night of pain looked tortured, but he still listened quietly, letting me say my peace.

I told him about trying to seek him out, to tell him about the bond, and not trusting anyone else with that part of me because of the pack’s views of other races.

I feared being locked in the dungeon or worse if he didn’t believe me or if his men thought of me as one of the demonic races from the North.

I couldn’t help but to tell him of the nightly pain I endured, and how nothing numbed the pain.

It wasn’t until I numbed myself to the bond that I finally was able to endure, and by then the Northern Clans had attacked.

He was off fighting while I was suffering a dwindling bond and then the death of the only person in the pack that truly cared about me. Niomi, my Mimi.

I remember him coming to see me the day he returned, but I was stuck with grief and closed myself off to the world. I didn’t want our bond anymore and was just waiting for the day to leave. I wanted to be rejected. I wanted the pain to end. I wanted to finally find a place I belonged.

Lachlan was silently crying as I told him of the hardships I faced once I was truly alone in the castle without Mimi’s support.

I told him about the true intentions of my frequent trips up the rocky stream, and that sometimes I would go for long stretches without eating because the staff in the packhouse were so loyal to him and wary of me.

He let out an ugly sob when I mentioned trying to get my own firewood, because the one time I asked for help I was accused of trying to seduce the man. I learned to live with the cold, dreariness of the tower where I was kept. I became numb to all the hardships in life.

The day that I rejected him was when I finally broke out of that shell of coldness to be free. Val was so broken, knowing she could never have her mate, but we both knew there was no future there for us. She never even caught a glimpse of her mate, and mine we had written off a year prior.

Lachlan’s eyes were red and he had claw marks on his leg from where he was gripping it so hard. Killian was flashing on his face, but he remained quiet, listening intently, though it was torturing him.

I asked if he wanted me to continue. I didn’t know if he or Killian could make it through much more. Lachlan looked ready to tear himself apart if Killian didn’t do it first.

I was now almost indifferent to my own story.

This would have been impossible for me to tell just months ago, but now, after I learned to channel my hardship and use it to fuel my vengeance.

I am fairly proud of the strength I have and how I endured it all.

Running away again and finding people who suffered similarly to me helped me to find a reason for the pain.

I feel dignified of what I endured and who I am.

Lachlan, after a somber moment of reflection, urged me to keep going. He said he needed to know. He needed to hear it all.

That’s when I told him about searching for my father and going back to my old pack to look for clues. I didn’t make it far into the pack before my uncle’s men captured me, torturing and raping me for weeks.

As I described the abuse, my broken jaw, the millions of ways my body was broken and used, so similarly to Yasmin, only my assault lasted so long that I’m surprised I had to kill myself to make it end.

At the end, there is a long, solemn silence that passes between us.

“Were any of the men that…. that hurt you during that time here? Were they among the men who came to the docks that day?”

My silence spoke volumes. As much as I would love to deny it to save his state of mind, I can’t.

“There were very few men in my Uncle’s ranks who didn’t hurt me, Lachlan.”

Angry tears filled his eyes and started rolling down his face as Killian snarls fiercely through him.

“I should have made them suffer more.”

I nodded, in agreement. I don’t know exactly what those men suffered at the end of their lives, but I can guarantee it was not enough to atone for their sins. Not just against me, but all the other women they have assaulted.

The arm of the chair Lachlan is sitting in snaps under the strain in his grip.

“They’re going to die. Every fucking one of them.

I will burn them alive. I will tear their flesh from their bones, making them eat their own hearts, and then revive them while they are on the brink of death to do it all over again. ”

“I plan on making them pay myself,” I huffed, Val in agreement with me. “I have come to enjoy their screams.”

Lachlan stared at me in amazement, or maybe shock. He has yet to see what Val can do, but once this war starts, he will find out very soon.

The silence stretched, the energy in the air shifting as time passed to a strained mood.

There it is. Everything is on the table. The air feels heavy, but my soul feels lighter. There are no more secrets between us. All the pain. All the hurt. Everything is on the table.

He loves me. I love him. The bond is still there, trying to pull us together again.

Is that enough to save us? Is that enough to restore what was once broken beyond repair?

“I don’t deserve you,” Lachlan stated, his voice sounding almost dead. “I don’t deserve anything from you.”

“No,” I stared back at him and his haunted, tear-stained eyes. “You don’t.”

He bit his lip, his jaw ticking and his eyes clouding over. “I know,” he cried, “I know I don’t deserve you and I don’t deserve your forgiveness. I just…. I don’t know what to do. I can’t make this right. There is no way. I should…. I should just….”

He doesn’t say it, but he doesn’t have to. I can feel it. I can feel his never-ending guilt and his fatal solution to make all the guilt and pain cease.

I won’t let him off that easily though.

“You will serve me,” I lift my chin, setting my jaw with stubborn ambition.

“This person to blame is still living high, protected in his packhouse and manipulating others to do his dirty work. You will serve me, Lachlan, and you will help me to rid the world of that filth so no other victims fall prey to his depravity. You said you wanted to atone for the past? Do this with me. For me. Help me defeat the one who holds the most guilt. He needs to die.” I leaned forward, lifting his face up to stare at me.

“You are a victim as much as I am. Your death is meaningless, and the only way you will never earn my forgiveness is if you ever follow through with that line of thinking. This pack would be worse off without you, but not his. Help me, Lachlan. This is how you can start atoning for the past. Fall in line under me.”

He is an alpha. A powerful one. This goes against everything in him. This is against our Lycan nature itself. The Alpha leads, not the Luna. The Luna is supposed to fall in line behind her mate.

But…. His submission to me in helping me achieve my goal is the only way I see myself ever allowing us to move on, because I know I can never submit to a man ever again. I am not that scared little girl. I am no longer haunted by my past. I am a warrior on a mission.

“You want my submission?” he asked, staring back into my eyes, the bond making sparks dance across my hand.

“I do.”

“You have it,” Lachlan stated desperately, placing his hand over mine. “My very life is yours, Lira. You have my submission and my devotion. You have all of me. Use me as you see fit.”