CHAPTER 363: 363-THEY WANT HER LIKE A TROPHY

Ian:

The scene of Joshua kissing her kept repeating in my head. The problem was not my ego.

It was my wolf. Seeing my mate being kissed by someone who was not her mate sent me through a rush of emotions, one of them being abandonment.

I felt as if she was going to leave me.

Things were already getting rough between us, and if someone else tried to get in the way, I felt like I would lose her.

In the last few days she had found out I was the headmaster’s son, something I had planned to tell her, but she discovered it another way.

And then, as always, my anger and my pride got in the way. Instead of showing guilt, I chose anger because that was how it worked for me.

Every time I made a mistake, I got angry so I would not have to admit it or face the consequences.

But she had been so upset with me for something I had no control over, yet she stood so comfortably with Joshua so close to her.

The same person who was the reason we were all still in the academy.

My jaw stayed tight as I stepped into the car. I shook my leg anxiously and aggressively.

I waited for the other crusaders to come in while my mind refused to work properly.

I knew I should not have acted this way.

This was the moment I should have stepped out of the car and spoken with Clementine, apologized for not telling her sooner, and explained everything I knew.

But I was so angry that I kept telling myself to wait a few more seconds, maybe two more, maybe one more.

And then it was too late. All the other crusaders had gotten inside.

The moment the car began to move, I told myself that once we returned to the academy, I would go talk to her.

But when I saw Clementine fall to the ground and cry in the mud, her face buried in her hands, my heart dropped faster than it ever had.

"Stop the car," I ordered, making several heads snap toward me.

"I said stop the car!" I yelled at the driver.

He did not respond at first, then answered calmly,

"Those are not the orders. Once we start the car, we are not supposed to stop," he replied calmly, his words making my blood pressure rise.

"Are you serious?" I shouted, then leaned back and turned as far as I could to look at Clementine.

She looked so broken, all because of me. I had never seen her cry like that.

Not even a monster had ever affected her the way I had.

And the guilt hit me harder than ever.

"You are so full of yourself," Yorick scoffed from the backseat, commenting at me.

"She was there for you," he remarked, "every time, no matter what. And now you walked away like that? You have the nerve to look angry at her?"

He leaned forward and tapped my shoulder, making my fist clench instantly.

"We were jealous too when Joshua kissed her. Anyone would be. But it was nothing, just a peck. And that was because they had both almost died. They came out of the monster’s mouth. That kiss meant nothing," he continued.

"If she comes to me after all this, I will still accept her," Haiden added, making my heartbeat slow in my chest.

I did not know she had been inside the monster’s mouth.

"You do not even deserve her. You are only playing with her because she is beautiful and powerful. You are fascinated with her, that is all," Troy remarked with his arms crossed, acting superior.

"You should be the last one to speak. All of you were under Oriana’s control too easily," I shot back, finally speaking because they kept reminding me that I did not deserve Clementine.

"Well, it was a powerful spell, was it not?" Haiden answered quickly, trying to defend himself.

"That is not the truth," I replied. "I did not fall for her spell because I love Clementine more than you all do."

The moment they heard that, Yorick began to laugh.

"No, you did not fall because you were never there to spend time with Oriana. You were not in the room. It was Zian, and he was not going to get affected," Yorick tried to explain.

"That is not the case," I retorted. "In the long run, yes, maybe I would have been affected if I had stayed longer. But whenever she looked at her targets and touched her chain on her stomach, there would be a delayed response. It was not the same for me. I was able to break from it easily."

As soon as I said that, I saw Troy narrow his eyes. He looked genuinely upset.

"You are going to use that excuse again to turn Clementine against me, are you not?" Troy pointed at himself, singling his own name out.

He sat on the opposite side of the car, facing me.

"If you do not stop going after her, I will have to eliminate the competition," Troy added.

"Is that a threat?" I asked, raising my eyebrow.

"Yes," Troy replied. "This trophy is too important for me to let go."

Hearing him call her that made something inside me snap.

I could have attacked him, but I had already caused enough problems.

I needed to return to the academy, find a way to speak to her, apologize and explain why it had taken me so long to tell her I was the headmaster’s son.

As we reached the academy, the storm grew stronger again.

It was going to stay for three days. The monster had nothing to do with it.

That creature had been a separate problem we had just dealt with.

Still, I wondered why it had come out at all. My grandfather had told me about it.

It was called the Water Bride, but I had never known it truly existed until now.

That was something I needed to tell Clementine. She would be the only one who understood.