PLEASE READ THIS MESSAGE - VERY IMPORTANT!

Hey everyone!

Just to clarify. Paul is NOT dead. Some people got confused and thought he was dead. He is NOT dead.

Okay, now that's all cleared up, enjoy the chapter!

Rose x

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~Yasmin’s POV~

      I opened my eyes slowly and let my vision adjust to the surroundings. I was in a room full of light. It was the first time in three years that I hadn’t woken up in the dark. My eyes hurt at the glare of the lights above me but it was a good hurt.

      I looked around and found myself in a small bedroom. The bed I was lying on was soft and felt like heaven on my skin. Am I in heaven? I thought. Did I finally die?

      The door opened and a woman walked in. No, I’m definitely not dead.

      “Oh, you’re finally awake,” she said as she came over to the bed.

      I slowly sat up, wincing at the pain that spread through my body. “Where am I?” I asked her.

      “Oh honey, you’re in the Light Pack’s village in the infirmary house,” she explained. “My name’s Opal, I’ve been looking after you.”

      “Oh,” I said, unable to think of anything to say. “Thank you.”

      She gave me a kind smile. “There’s no need to thank me. I was just doing my job,” she said. “What’s your name, honey?”

      “Yasmin,” I answered. “How did I get here?”

      “Oh, Alpha Blake found you unconscious in the forest,” she said grimly. “He said that Alpha Paul was…” she left the sentence hanging.

      Tears formed in my eyes at her words and I looked away. “He saw what Paul was doing to me?” I asked, embarrassed that someone had actually witnessed that.

      “Oh sweetheart, don’t cry,” she said as she pulled me into a warm hug. It felt strange to be held so lovingly but so full of comfort. “Blake’s a good boy, he pulled Paul off of you the second he stumbled across you and nearly killed him.”

      I pulled away from her. “Paul got away?”

      She nodded bleakly. “The pack looked for him but he was long gone.”

      Disappointment washed over me at the thought of Paul still being able to find and hurt me.

      “Your wounds healed a couple of days ago,” Opal told me.

      “How long have I been unconscious for?”

      “About a week.”

      My eyebrows rose in surprise and then my stomach rumbled. I flushed in embarrassment.

      Opal laughed softly. “Come on, let’s go get you some food.”

      I slipped off the bed and realised that I was dressed in jeans and a tank top. “Wait, I need the toilet first.”

      She pointed to a door on the left and I quickly went inside. After peeing and washing my face, I looked at my reflection in the mirror. My skin was quite pale and my hair smelled fresh like someone had washed it. I lifted up my tank top and saw fading yellow bruises on my stomach and breasts. I let my top fall back into place and sighed at my horrible reflection. It has been so long since I had actually looked in the mirror. There was a small bathroom and sink in the cellar where I was held but no mirror. The only reflection I had was a window in the compound and I was always too worried about what Paul would do to me to focus on what I looked like. I quickly went back into the bedroom and saw Opal smiling at me.

      “Ready to eat?” she asked.

      I nodded as I realised how hungry I was.

      I followed Opal out of the room and into the hallway. Immediately, I heard the sound of small feet padding on hardwood floors and then at least 15 little children rushed past me to the end of the hallway. I watched as Opal led me in the same direction as the children. Going down a flight of stairs, we reached the ground floor.

      “Opal!” I heard someone call.

      Opal turned to me apologetically. “I’m sorry, I better see who that is.”

      “No no, that’s fine,” I assured her.

      She hurried off, leaving me standing at the foot of the stairs. I heard the sound of children laughing and followed the sound to a large room a few metres away. Standing in the doorway, I smiled. There were around 30 children of all different ages playing around in the room. It was so nice to see kids just being kids.

      I stepped back and felt a hard body against my back. Gasping, I quickly turned around and saw the most amazing guy that I had ever seen in my entire life. His hair was a mass of soft dark curls, which was styled naturally around his beautiful tanned face. He had a strong jawline and stubble across his face that made him look ruggedly handsome. His eyes were so alluring - deep blue with long lashes which seemed to darken them slightly as he looked down at me. He was wearing a pair of faded blue jeans and a white t-shirt that didn’t do a very good job of hiding his broad chest, six pack-abs or toned muscles. I felt like running my hands along the hard muscle and pressing kisses to his chest. Shit! How the hell can he have this effect on me?

      “I…” I had no idea what to say to him. Just the sight of him had left me speechless.

      A smile made its way onto his face as he looked down at me. “You must be Yasmin,” he said. Oh God, his voice. It was deep but soft, rough but smooth. I felt like his words were wrapping around me and the way he said my name sounded amazing: like a whisper, a caress.

      “Erm… yes… yeah, I’m Yasmin,” I mumbled.

      He chuckled softly. “You sure? You don’t sound very certain.”

      “No… I’m sure… very sure.”

      He laughed again. “I’m Blake.”

      I froze. “The Alpha?”

      He nodded.

     “You… you’re the one that saved me... from Paul?” I whispered.

      His face hardened at my words. “That bastard,” he spat the words out with so much venom that they could’ve been poison.

      Then I remembered something. “You saw what he was doing to me…?” my voice trailed off at the end as tears filled my eyes.

      “I…” he started to say but I knew what the answer was, I could see it in his eyes.

      I turned around before he could say anything more. Pressing my hand to my mouth, I let fresh tears fall down my cheeks. He saw. He saw. He saw, was all my brain was telling me. He saw me when I was weak and defenceless. Oh God.

      “Yasmin, please don’t embarrassed.”

      I snapped and turned around then. “How can I not be embarrassed?!” I cried. “You were there when he raped me! You actually saw everything he was doing to me and you’re telling me not to be embarrassed!”

      “Yasmin, calm down,” he said. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking.”

      He cupped my cheek with his hand and I felt millions of sparks run through my body where our skin met. I quickly stepped away from him to stop the strange feeling.

      “What did you do?” I asked.

      “I didn’t do anything.”

      “Yes you did,” I said, touching the cheek where his hand was a moment ago. “I felt… I don’t know… something, when you touched me.”

      He smiled. “You don’t know?”

      “Know what?”

      “That you’re my mate,” he said.

      My world stopped. “What?”

      “You. Are. My. Mate.”

      “No.”

      He frowned and I saw anger flash through his eyes. “No?” he repeated.

      “No,” I said. “I can’t be your mate.”

      “Why not?” he asked, irritated.

      “No, I don’t want a mate!”

      “What?!”

      “I don’t want a mate,” I repeated.

      “Why?” he asked.

      I looked away from him.

      He took my chin and forced me to look at him. I ignored the sparks that I felt and looked straight into those captivating eyes. “Why don’t you want a mate Yasmin?”

      I pulled away from his grip and looked away. “Because I don’t want to get hurt,” I whispered.

      I gasped when I felt an arm wrap around my waist. My body was pulled into his and there was no chance of escape.

      “I will never hurt you,” he whispered, his breath tickling my skin.

      “Let go of me,” I told him.

      He didn’t make any move to do anything.

      “Let me go,” I said. I looked up into his eyes which were slowly filling with tears. God, I am such a cry baby! “Please Blake.”

      Blake immediately let go of me and stepped away. “Yasmin, please. I promise you that I will never hurt you. You can’t deny the signs. We’re mates. I can’t stop thinking about you. I’m unusually possessive of you – when you were unconscious, I wouldn’t let anyone except Opal enter your room and when I carried you to my compound, I brought your straight to your room without letting anyone touch you. I want to see you smile and laugh all the time and it breaks my heart to see you crying or in pain. Please Yasmin. Please, I won’t hurt you.”

      I was genuinely blown away by the speech. I couldn’t believe that he cared about me so much when he didn’t even know me that well! “Blake, I don’t think you’ll ever hurt me intentionally. I just don’t think you’ll be able to help it.”

      “I won’t hurt you!” he snapped. “Whether it’s intentionally or otherwise!”

      I got angry too. “Do you think you could deal with everything that’s happened while I was with Paul?”

      He opened his mouth to speak but I wouldn’t let him get a word in.

      “You have no idea how much I’ve been through in the past three years,” I told him. “I was locked in a cold, dark and disgusting cellar and made to sleep on the ground. He came into the cellar every night and dragged me to his room where he would tie me to the bed and raped me over and over again. I begged and screamed and cried but he would never stop.” I knew that I was telling him absolutely everything - something I had never done before - but I couldn’t seem to stop. I also realised that I was shouting at an Alpha and that no-one ever shouted at an Alpha. I opened my mouth and continued though. “He never stopped, not even when I became pregnant with his child!” I cried, letting the tears fall without even trying to hide them. “He was too rough and I had a miscarriage. He blamed it on me and then hurt me even more because he thought that I purposely didn’t look after myself so that the baby would die!”

      I looked at the look on Blake’s face. It was a mixture of shock and despair.

      “Do you think you can deal with all of that?” I asked him. “How can you even consider wanting me as your mate when I’ve been used in so many different ways?” I looked away from him as I asked the question, not wanting to know the answer.

      “Yasmin,” he whispered in that deep, seductive voice of his.

      I had to look up at him then. He captured my lips immediately, sending a million electric waves running through my body. His lips moved perfectly in sync against mine. His kiss was so soft and loving that it made my heart beat faster and I crushed my lips harder against his, causing him to moan. Running his hands down my body, he gripped my hips and pushed me backwards against the wall. Our lips where still connected but now his lips were demanding and I let out a small moan as he gently bit down on my bottom lips, asking for entrance. I opened for him, loving the feeling that I was getting and his tongue swept inside my mouth. My hands run up his shoulders and circled his neck before tangling themselves in his dark hair. I kissed him harder even though I knew that I was running out of air and I would need to pull away eventually to breathe. His responded by groaning and pressing the front of his body into mine so there was nowhere for me to go, not that I wanted to at that moment. My lips left his after another moment and I gasped for precious air. Blake was panting for breath too and he smiled when our eyes met.

      “Wow,” he whispered.

      I flushed under his gaze. I couldn’t believe that I had actually just kissed him back. I pushed against his chest and he stumbled back, not expecting it. I needed to get away from him to figure out what had just happened.

      “Don’t kiss me again,” I told him as I walked away.

      He caught my wrist, swung me around and pulled me closer to him. We stood there frozen as we gazed into each other’s eyes.

      “I promise to show you how much I will care for you,” he said solemnly. He pressed a light kiss to my forehead and then let my hand go.

      As I walked away, I heard him whisper again: “I promise.”

~Blake’s POV~

      I watched as she walked away from me and then sighed. She thought that she wasn’t good enough for me and I hated that. I still couldn’t believe that I was lucky enough to have such a strong and beautiful woman as my mate. I wanted to do everything to assure her that she was more than good enough for me and that I would do everything I could to keep her safe and happy all the time.

      When I saw her looking to the children’s room smiling my heart had stopped. Her smile, even though it was small, was beautiful. She looked genuinely happy seeing all the kids having fun and I made it my mission to make her smile like that. I wanted to be the reason that she smiled everyday. I wanted to do something to make her laugh, even if I had to make a fool of myself in order to do it.

      The second she had turned around to face me, my mind had gone blank. She was absolutely breath taking. She was about a head shorter than me with long brunette hair and warm brown eyes. Her body looked so tempting when she was wearing the tank top that stuck to her body, showing off her curves. Her skinny jeans clung to her hips and followed the shape of her rounded bottom. I wanted to grab onto her ass and pull her into my body, just to feel her body next to mine.

      She looked so damn hot when she was angry but then I heard what she was saying and I wanted to rip Paul to shreds. That bastard had gotten her pregnant! He had gotten my mate pregnant! It took all of my self-control not to burst into my wolf form, hunt him down and rip his fucking dick off!

      When I saw her so upset with tears trailing down her face I did the only thing I could think of, I kissed her. And I loved every second of it. It was a million times better than I expected. Sparks of electricity were running through my whole body and my wolf was screaming at me, ordering me to mate her. I didn’t want to rush her into anything though so I supressed the feelings of my wolf and deepened the kiss, backing her up against the wall and plastering the front of my body onto hers. The feel of her soft breasts against my chest caused me to moan and fantasise about her lying on my bed while I kissed every inch of her body. I could feel myself getting a little excited and decided that I had to pull away before my animal instincts took over. It was only then that I realised that we had been kissing for a while and I panted to regain my breath.

      It had felt like a dagger in my heart, when she told me not to kiss her again. I couldn’t not kiss her again. Now that I had kissed her once, I had to do it again and again and again. I don’t think I would ever get enough of her kisses.

      I would keep to my promise. I will make her feel loved and happy and safe. I’ll make her accept me as a mate.

      I had to do it for her and I had to do it for myself. I had to.