<h4>Chapter 190: Etta James - Something’s Got A Hold On Me</h4>


    "You are merely confirming that there is something wrong and I am right."


    "Luna... please..."


    "Damien... tell me. We promised each other to stop hiding things."


    Her hand hovered briefly, almost reaching for him, before curling back against herp.


    Damien sighed.


    Yes, they had made that promise. They had vowed no more lies. But he’d broken that vow. First with her daily blood supplements, designed to keep their child strong. But he did it to save them. What else could he do?


    "Damien... whatever it is... we can face it together."


    Her eyes shone with certainty. Her loyalty was unwavering.


    "What if I don’t want to?"


    The words tumbled out before he could catch them.


    "Then we ignore it together." She chuckled, but it was a sad kind ofugh. Her shoulders rose and fell in a shrug that was far too nonchnt for the tension in the air.


    Damien exhaled heavily, rubbing a hand over his face.


    "I found her."


    "Who?" Luna asked.


    Damien raised a brow—an answer without saying the word.


    It took Luna all of ten seconds.


    "Oh."


    A beat passed.


    "Oh."


    Another.


    And then a third.


    "Oh..."


    Each oh carried a different weight. The first—a reflexive gasp of surprise. The second—sinkingprehension that Damien, her Damien, wasn’t going to die after all. And thest—an invisible dagger of realization: she would have to share him. Again.


    Her lips parted slightly, then pressed together as if she could seal away the grief. But it was already bleeding from her eyes.


    Luna swallowed, her throat tight, her heart tighter. She didn’t know whether to be relieved that Damien would live, or to weep knowing that his life might now belong to someone else.


    His true mate.


    "Yes... oh..." Damien said, his voice almost breaking under the weight of confession. He couldn’t even look at her. He stared instead at the crimson threads of the tapestry hanging by the window—something safe.


    "Who is she?" Luna asked curiously, though there was a tremor in her tone she couldn’t hide. Curiosity was only a fraction of what she felt. Beneath it swirled dread, a slow-building storm tightening around her chest.


    Damien shifted uneasily, then exhaled and answered, "A maid. Lady Sharona’s maid specifically."


    The name rang clear and sour in her memory. "The Lady Sharona Gabriel spoke of at the coronation party?"


    "Yes," Damien responded quietly, his eyes meeting hers atst—but only for a second before guilt pulled them away again.


    Luna leaned back slightly, processing the information, her brows knitting together in suspicion. "Sounds fishy if Gabriel is already sniffing around. Are you sure?"


    Damien rubbed the bridge of his nose, then clenched his jaw. "Everything about it feels like a setup, Luna... if I’m being honest. That was why I waste for the coronation. I felt a sudden pull to her. That is unnatural. Gabriel has something to do with this, but I just don’t know how."


    The tension between them thickened. It wasn’t just about another woman. It was about everything they had been through to get here. It was about the life forming inside her, and the cruel irony that the solution to his life-threatening bond now stood wrapped in mystery—and possibly deception.


    He reached into his pocket and pulled out a delicate ne, the one he had taken from Isolde that morning. "She was wearing this," Damien said solemnly. "I felt the pull from this... but when I touched her..."


    "The mate bond then activated," Luna finished for him, her voice barely above a whisper.


    Her eyes didn’t leave the ne. "This... this is good news."


    "Is it?" Damien snapped slightly, before softening his tone. "It feels like Gabriel handing me the one thing that can save my life when all he wants is a free pass to the throne. It makes no sense."


    Luna’s mind raced. She thought of Gabriel’s calcted smiles, the veiled threatsced with courtly charm. "Another question... if Gabriel indeed gave this to her... how did he find out? How did he have ess to this kind of magic?"


    "That’s what’s haunting me."


    Luna reached out, her hand brushing Damien’s. It was an instinctive gesture, one that had always tethered him to reality.


    "I don’t know what’s going on," she said softly, "but whatever this is... if Gabriel thinks he can y god with our lives, he has no idea who he’s up against."


    Damien turned to her, his jaw clenched. "I just don’t want to lose you in the process, Luna."


    "You won’t," she whispered, though the doubt crawled up her spine. "But if this woman is truly your mate, and she’s being used as a pawn, we have no choice but to figure out why... and fast."


    "The only other person that knows is Morvakar and he wouldn’t betray us like that."


    "No... he hates Gabriel even more than I do," Damien replied with a sigh.


    He raked a hand through his tousled hair, the movement betraying just how tired he was emotionally.


    "But the point is, you found her," Luna said quietly, a fragile smile forming on her lips despite the storm churning in her chest. She turned to face him fully. "Now you are not going to die."


    Damien flinched at her words. "Luna..."


    "You promised me!" Her voice cracked—sharp and hurt.


    "Actually, I didn’t," he confessed, eyes flickering away from hers. "I would rather embrace death than betray you like that."


    "And I don’t want you to die!" she snapped, her voice dropping to a whisper at the end. "Damien... we’ve been through too much. Fought too hard. You’re all I have."


    "I guess we are at an impasse," Damien said with a weary shrug. But his eyes, those deep, haunted eyes, betrayed him. They screamed with longing and guilt. "Either I spend the rest of my life loving you, or I keep breathing. I can’t seem to do both."


    "Where is she?" Luna asked, suddenly cold, clipped,posed. But he could see it—the silent tremble in her fingertips, the effort it took not to scream.


    (Whats your favourite line in this Chapter?)