Chapter 783 Please forgive me, Jasmine, but I can’t stop loving you
Earlier, as soon as Seraphine sent everyone out of the emergency ward, Kael’s gaze settled on Jasmine, his eyes tracing the lines of her face, the stillness of her body, the terrible peace that had settled over her features. Pure grief and love warred inside him until every breath ached.
There weren’t any casualties, so the environment was quiet, with no doctors or nurses loitering around, no footsteps echoing in the hallway, no voices cutting through the silence.
Just the two of them, alone in the sterile glow of the emergency ward, the weight of everything unsaid pressing down on him.
Jasmine’s lifeless body in the ice ached Kael’s heart, a dull, persistent throb that refused to fade. It was supposed to be a romantic night, candles and flowers and the words he had rehearsed a hundred times in his head. And yet, the Lycans had ruined it for him, had shattered everything with their cruelty and their greed, leaving him with nothing but this quiet, desperate vigil.
“Jasmine.” He called out, his voice as soft as a feather, barely a whisper in the empty room, pure longing in every syllable. “I know that you can hear me.”
He pressed his hand on the ice around her, and it went through like a fog, dissolving at his touch. He got to hold her hands, though they were cold, too cold to the touch, the warmth of life stolen from them, and the contrast left a fresh ache in his chest.
“Tonight, I was going to confess everything, but I never expected to do it like this.” He began to say, his gaze not leaving her closed eyes and pale face, memorizing every line, every curve, every detail as if this might be the last time.
“I arranged to tell you under a candlelit dinner, but it seems to me that luck wasn’t on my side. Or perhaps, it was due to my being a coward and sacrificing the only woman I loved for the fulfillment of the mate bond because I was jealous. Jealous of the fact that you fell in love with Corvine, and not me.”
Shame rang in his voice. “Even after your explanation, I lost the boldness to pursue love, and maybe, this is my punishment for not choosing you.”
He pursed his lips bitterly, the taste of regret sharp on his tongue, pure self-blame rising hard and fast.
“I felt it the moment I made the decision that something wasn’t right. When you ran away that night, I tried to get to you, but Voren stopped me. He insisted that we both needed the space, even after my mate cheated on me.”
He paused, his breath turning heavy, his chest tight with the weight of everything he had held back for so long, pure vulnerability cracking through his usual strength.
“I’ll tell you the details if you want to hear it, but trust me, it’s too nasty.” His voice was rough, raw with the pain of those memories. “And please, don’t think that I’m only telling you this because the mate bond failed me. No. The fact remains that I’ve always loved you, mate bond or not. I was just desperate to also be loved as I have loved but now, I see that none of that matters.”
“Love must be without conditions so even if you fell out of love for me along the way in Paris, it changes nothing. The fact remains that I would never stop loving you.”
He had waited so long to say these words to her, had carried them in his heart for years, and now, he wasn’t sure if it was having any effect, if she could even hear him, if his words were reaching her through the veil of ice and silence. The uncertainty left him desperate.
“Jasmine, I know I hurt you when I couldn’t reject my mate as you did, but I can make it up to you if only you’ll give me a chance.” His voice cracked, just slightly, just enough to show the depth of his feeling, pure hope and fear tangled together. “Mate bond or not, I’ll only choose you this time. You have no idea about how I felt when you left for Paris all these months.”
He swallowed tightly, the lump in his throat refusing to budge, pure emotion rising until it threatened to choke him.
“And you have no idea of how broken I was when I saw you in that bloody state. It was as if my soul left my body, and everything else felt so meaningless.” He paused, his hand tightening around hers, pure desperation in the grip. “But it also became clear that I couldn’t live without you.”
A tear slid down his cheek, tracing a path through the grime of battle, and his fingers tightened around hers, holding on like she was the only thing keeping him tethered to the earth. Pure love and terror of losing her flooded every nerve.
“Please forgive me, Jasmine, but I can’t stop loving you.”
His voice was a broken whisper, a confession torn from the deepest part of him, raw and unguarded.
“If you die, then I’ll be the most pitiable man in the world because you know what?” He looked up at her face, at the peace that had settled there, and felt his heart shatter all over again.
“I’ll never be able to love again, and I won’t even be able to continue living when you aren’t in it.”
He kept talking, not knowing if he was even making sense, the words tumbling out of him like water from a cracked vessel, pure need driving every confession. Until his head rested on the bed, his body finally succumbing to exhaustion, his eyes closing against his will.
Kael didn’t know that he had fallen asleep. He had no idea that Voren had even come in and left, his footsteps quiet, his presence brief. He only woke up to a cold hand in his hair, squeezing it tightly, a touch that was both familiar and impossible, pure shock and hope exploding through him at once.
“Kael, it’s freezing.”
Kael’s eyes fluttered open, shock registering on his face, his heart leaping into his throat with pure, overwhelming relief. But he had no idea about how to stop the freezing process, how to pull her back from the edge of the ice, and the helplessness of it left him momentarily frozen himself.
“Jasmine, you’re awake. Hang in there, okay?”
He quickly mindlinked Seraphine, his voice desperate and breaking with urgency.
’Sera, she’s awake. Can you stop the freezing process?’
’Coming.’ Seraphine mindlinked back, her response immediate, pure focus in the single word.
Kael let out a tired smile, the relief flooding through him like a wave that left him almost dizzy with gratitude.
“Sera is coming.”
Jasmine looked pale and was shivering from the cold around her, her body trembling, her lips tinged with blue, pure weakness written in every line of her form.
“Did you mean everything you said? About the candle light dinner?”
She had heard his words as if she was dreaming, had felt them wrap around her like a blanket, pulling her back from the edge of something dark and endless.
Once upon a time, she had wished for all those romantic kinds of dinners but thought it was beyond reach. She expected him to ask what she was talking about, to deflect, to retreat. But rather, he confirmed it, pure honesty in his eyes.
“You heard me?” Though Voren had said that she could hear him, Kael wasn’t sure and had only used the same line to encourage himself to send his message across, to pour out his heart. “Jasmine, I meant every single word and even when I asked you to meet me on the night you arrived, I had a candlelight dinner waiting but…” he stopped, not wanting to sound accusing.
Luckily, the door pushed open before Jasmine could utter another word. Seraphine walked in with Voren behind her, and instantly pressed a hand to Jasmine’s chest.
This time, the blue light did not fizzle away, did not dissolve into nothing. Pure healing energy flooded through her.
It brought warmth to Jasmine as the ice fizzled away, melting into steam, leaving her body free and whole, and the return of sensation left her gasping with quiet relief.
Seraphine did her usual checks and smiled, her eyes warm with relief that mirrored the joy in the room.
“Can you try to walk?”
Jasmine nodded and tried to get up from the bed, but dizziness swayed her, the world tilting, and she sat back down, her body weak, her strength depleted, pure exhaustion pulling at every muscle.
“I’ll run a few tests, though I’m sure it’s anemia. You lost too much blood, and the fastest way to recoup is a blood transfusion.”
“Take mine.” Kael said before Seraphine could even ask, his voice firm, brooking no argument, pure protectiveness and love driving the offer.
But Jasmine frowned, her brow furrowing, her eyes searching for something that wasn’t there, pure confusion and rising alarm in her gaze.
“I can’t feel my wolf.”