Frozen Bonds, Broken Heart Chapter 09
The ritual was dangerous.
The spirit had warned me clearly.
To drag Damon back from the brink of his total breakdown, I had to anchor him to the living world again.
And the only anchor strong enough was the very thing I had sacrificed-the frayed leftover thread of our mate bond.
For three days, I sat by his bed, holding his hand, focusing my mind.
I stopped fighting against surging memories and let them wash over me entirely.
The raw, painful truths of what we had been through pricked through my long-dead heart like fine needles.
Using our mind link, I forced him to feel my anger, my pain, and the vast, empty void inside me.
On the fourth night, a storm raged outside.
In the room, Damon’s body bowed sharply and arched upward, as though an unseen force hauled
him off the mattress.
I clung tighter and bore my weight to pin him steady in place.
“Come back to me, Damon. Own up to everything you’ve done, and face me.”
His eyes flew open. A strangled, inhuman scream tore from his throat.
He looked at me-first blank, then his golden eyes filled with tears.
The scream filled the whole room. I could feel his heart trembling like a caged wild beast.
The pack doctor rushed in.
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I didn’t move. I kept holding his struggling hand.
Once the sedative hit his vein, he sank back onto the pillow, exhausted and crying like a child.
“It’s all coming back,” he choked out, his voice shattered. “God, Elena… every last memory has hit
me.”
“Good,” I said coldly, letting go of his hand and standing up. “Now you’ll have to live with the consequences of your choices.”
He was awake.
I’d held up my end of the bargain with the spirit.
The balance was restored.
I was finally free and clear.
I boarded a plane to a tropical island.
I ordered a tropical cocktail garnished with a tiny paper umbrella in it and sat down on the pale pristine beach sand.
Warm sunlight settled across my skin, a genuine sensation I hadn’t known in years.
Sometimes, in the quiet of the night, I still hear whispers on the wind.
I can still feel that broken bond, like a lingering phantom, plucking gently at my soul.
But I’d made up my mind never to turn back.
The woman who loved him died in the Arctic sea.
From then on, I answered to no one but myself.
