Page 31 of Awakening His Mate

He means a lot to me, too.

So I have to fix this. For us.

He believes, as do the others, that I am so broken that all that remains is a husk of who I used to be, but they're wrong.

My mind isn’t broken; it is protecting itself.

What I need is a reset, and I know only one way to do that.

I’d tried before, but Jackson interfered. This time, I have to make sure he doesn’t stop me from completing my plan.

I urge my body to move, knowing now might be the only opportunity I have to get away from him. I know he's going to be glued to my side, refusing to leave me alone, in case I end up in the lake again.

What I did scared him, and I hate that it did, but it has to happen.

His soft, even breaths tell me he is asleep, and considering he has barely allowed himself to rest since this whole thing started, I don’t think he will wake before I’m ready.

Move.

My body doesn’t always respond when I want it to, but luck is on my side. My legs twitch, and I control them enough to slip out from under him, slowly sitting up as if I were a robot on autopilot.

Jackson doesn’t stir from his position, and I’m grateful for that as I stand and make my way across the room in the dark. I can only hope my body will keep responding until I have completed my task.

Somehow, I make it out of the cabin and into the freezing night air. I half expect someone to be watching the cabin, since it’s clear no one here trusts me, but there’s no one. The moon is full, casting a silvery light across the ground. The cabins surrounding us are dark, as is the main house. I walk down the steps of the porch as if pulled by an invisible string and make my way across the grass, down to the banks of the lake.

I have to die. It is the only thing that can save me.

In death, I will be reborn.

As the water splashes over my bare feet, pins and needles race through my lower limbs. It is so cold that it almost stops me in my tracks, but I keep walking. The water rises over my knees, up to my thighs, and then settles around my hips. Every step feels impossible, but I can’t stop.

The water comes over the top of my breasts and up to my shoulders, lapping against my face. I swallow a mouthful of bitter water, coughing, and a tendril of uncertainty makes me waver.

What if I’m wrong? What if this is my broken mind playing tricks on me?

But I keep going, because although death is final, even for my kind, it might free Jackson if this doesn’t work.

He is chained to me the same way I am to him.

I feel the surge of magic as I draw on the spell that will allow my limbs to loosen so I can drown. My legs fold beneath me as I flop into the water.

As I go under, I swallow a mouthful of freezing liquid, feeling everything as it floods my lungs and stops air from getting into my body. Darkness shrouds me as the water swallows me whole.

I should panic, thrash, try to live, but I am paralyzed as more water spills down my throat.

Pain fills every inch of me as my body is still fighting to live, and my wolf howls as darkness swamps us.

Chapter 7

Jackson

Icatapult upright in bed, a feeling like I’ve never experienced crushing my chest. Before I reach for the light, I know I’m alone in the bed, but it still stuns me to see the empty space where she’d been sleeping.

“Fuck.”

Kicking the blankets off, I stumble out of bed and stagger as emotions flood me so violently it almost drives me to my knees.

Find her, my wolf roars in my ears.

Source: www.allfreenovel.com