The matebond hummed warm and content every time we touched.
Magic sparked lazily beneath my skin too, brighter now than it had ever been in my entire life.
Like my power had spent years dormant beneath layers of insecurity and exhaustion waiting for the exact right catalyst to awaken it fully.
Menon.
The answer was Menon.
Not just sexually.
Not just emotionally.
Magically.
He completed me.
That one truth should have terrified me.
Instead it felt right.
Perfectly, wondrously right.
I squeezed his hand tighter as we neared the carnival rides overlooking the cliffs.
“Dr. Childs should be somewhere near the rides,” I explained quietly.
Menon nodded immediately.
“If she troubles you, we leave.”
The protective certainty in his voice warmed something deep inside me.
“She won’t.”
I hoped.
Honestly, Dr. Childs had always been one of the few adults in my life who treated me like I wasn’t broken beyond repair.
Then I spotted her.
The usual green sweater.
Same horn-rimmed glasses.
Same warm brown eyes.
Relief fluttered briefly through me.
Then I saw her.
And everything inside me stopped cold.
No.
Absolutely not.
Recognition slammed into me instantly alongside years of old emotional bruises.
