<h4>Chapter 461: 461-The Ritual To Make Him Mine</h4>


    <strong>Charlotte:</strong>


    I hid outside the door while his mother greeted him. My heart pounded louder whenever I heard him speak.


    Then she asked me to join them. I noticed Maximus looking very uneasy with my presence.


    "What is she doing here?" It was as if he ignored whatever his mother had said and asked for an exnation again.


    "She is your mate," Lady Darcy announced, causing Maximus to not even look surprised. Instead, he looked disgusted by the idea.


    My smile started to fade. Seeing disgust in the eyes of someone you love dearly is heartbreaking. Maximus’ love was all I had ever wanted. But he avoided me like I was a disease. Even when he used to date around, he never chose me. I wasn’t even worth flirting with.


    "Mom, I’m not here to be part of some joke," he hissed, waving his hand at me, silently telling me to leave.


    "We are not joking. Charlotte will fill you in on the truth," Lady Darcy nced at me, signaling for me to step forward and speak for myself. It wasn’t easy to look into Maximus’ angry eyes and talk to him about being mated to him.


    I could tell he wouldn’t want to hear it.


    "It’s true. I felt the mate bond with you in the woods," I tried to sound like Hnie, even copying her bodynguage. Maybe if he saw Hnie in me, he would date me to get over her.


    "Bullshit," Maximus hissed.


    "Well then, how do you exin her knowing you felt the mate bond with someone in the woods?" Lady Darcy folded her arms over her chest, making Maximus look slightly uncertain. He was already hurting, so he didn’t realize his mother could have filled me in.


    "I can’t ept her," he said softly but firmly.


    "Don’t you want to be free from this curse? Just ept her and be free—you know you can’t love like this forever," his mother used the same excuse about his curse and stepped closer to him. "Your mate isn’t even afraid of you. Can you imagine that? If someone else found out their mate was a lycan, they would have quickly dumped you and moved on."


    Lady Darcy knew exactly what she was doing. We had to nt seeds of doubt in his heart about Hnie.


    "Besides, I’m not asking you to marry her forever. You need to break the curse, remember? Or else—you will be a danger to your brothers. Do you want that?" I watched Maximus’ face pale.


    Everyone knew the brothers meant everything to each other. And Maximus, no matter how hard he tried to act carefree, wasn’t as detached as he pretended to be. He loved his brothers and took pride in the fact that they loved him too.


    "Or do you have someone in mind who would ept you? Someone who is your fated mate? There is only one, and that is her," she continued.


    I could tell Maximus was struggling with the thought of epting me because it would upset Hnie.


    "I mean, even Hnie—you see how she once lived as a rogue, but now she’s dating better people," I didn’t know why I slid that in, but it was my way of reminding him that Hnie wasn’t in love with him. Given the chance, Hnie would go after anyone and date them without thinking about how it would make Maximus feel.


    For Maximus, he had an excuse to ept me. I was his fated mate.


    "And my son cares about his brothers. How long can they keep looking after him?" Lady Darcy asked Maximus.


    "Kane and Norman have put their lives on hold for you. You owe them this much. You don’t want to be a danger to them, do you?" she continued. With careful thought, Maximus finally nodded.


    "It’s not like I have someone else who loves me," he muttered.


    Thankfully, this was exactly what I wanted to hear from Maximus.


    Now he had a reason to ept me without feeling guilty about betraying Hnie.


    After nodding his head, he rushed out, probably to go for a run. He didn’t even say out loud that he would ept me—just gave us a hint.


    "Now, it’s up to you to make him fall in love with you," Darcy turned to me, giving me a sharp look, as if telling me to be ready for whatever challenges came my way.


    "What about Hnie?" I asked, still wondering how we could get rid of her.


    "Ugh! That slut, I’ll take care of her and her mother," Darcy punched her palm, probably remembering how Hnie’s mother once stole her mate.


    "But your work isn’t done yet. We’ll need to perform some rituals to show Maximus that epting you will truly break his curse," Darcy added.


    She had already told me that Maximus would have to take part in some strange rituals with his mate to be freed from the curse.


    In this case, Maximus would have to give arge amount of his blood to his mother for her to perform a ritual. That scared me.


    I didn’t know Darcy could do something like that. Did she have a witch on her side? That was terrifying.


    "Do I need to give my blood too?" I asked.


    "No! We’re not actually doing any ritual. Your blood is insignificant. We’ll just make it look like we took your blood. Since you aren’t needed at the start, I’ll take the blood ande back saying we’ve started the ritual," she exined.


    She was talking in a way I didn’t fully understand, but I trusted her. Especially because I didn’t care about anything else as long as I got Maximus.


    However, I couldn’t wait to tell Hnie that Maximus was mine now.


    Oh, sweet goddess, she was just his girlfriend, while I would be his mate.


    And thanks to his mother, who somehow found out that he had felt a mate bond in the woods—with some random girl he probably killed and ate.