Chapter 279 The Angel I Chose to Hold Hands With

Chapter 279: Chapter 279 The Angel I Chose to Hold Hands With

Damien’s POV

"Abigail," I said wearily. "When did you become this selfish?"

I stared at Abigail sitting beside me, at the face that still looked exactly like the girl I’d fallen for all those years ago, and something in my chest twisted into a knot I couldn’t loosen.

When had she become this? This bitter, hollowed-out creature clawing at a man who no longer wanted her?

The first time I ever laid eyes on Abigail, I was still running with my old band, playing a charity gala one snowy winter. Some fundraiser for kids from broken packs. She’d been a volunteer that night, kneeling in the cold to help a little pup who’d lost his mittens, her smile so gentle it could’ve thawed the whole city.

I remember thinking she carried a kind of warmth most wolves never had. That if a woman like that ever became a Luna, she’d love every member of a pack as if they were her own blood.

I remember thinking she’d make someone impossibly lucky.

Fate has a cruel sense of humor. The second time I saw her, she was already my cousin’s girl. Not long after, his fiancée.

I’ve asked myself a thousand times whether I made the right choice the night before their wedding, when she showed up at my door soaked in tears, begging me to run away with her.

I couldn’t answer it then. I can’t answer it now.

But those desperate, glistening eyes of hers burned straight through me and branded themselves onto my soul. Moon Goddess knows I’d spent months watching her lean into Sebastian’s side, laughing, glowing, while jealousy ate me alive. She should have been mine. I knew what I was doing was unforgivable. I knew loving her would scorch me and everyone around me to ash.

And the moment I took her hand and walked her out into the night, I swore to myself I’d never regret it. That I would love her, and only her, for the rest of my life.

Three years in France, living under false names, hunted like rogues, and I never once regretted it.

Especially not after I learned the truth about why she’d fled Sebastian in the first place. All of it only made me ache for her more.

But this woman in front of me now, twisted up with hatred and envy and this sick, grinding need for revenge, who was she?

In my mind, Abigail had always stayed frozen as that angel in the snow. Even as she began to change, I kept picturing her the way she used to be. I kept believing the softness was still buried in there somewhere.

"It’s not that I’m being selfish," she said, her voice sharp. "The universe owes me this. You of all people should understand what I clawed my way through these past three years. And you know exactly why I came back."

"Yeah, I know," I said. "But do you remember what you told me before we ever set foot back in Silverlake? You said if he still loved you, you’d fight through hell to be with him. But if he didn’t, you’d let him go with grace. You’d walk away with your head high. That’s what you said, Abigail."

"That’s what I said," she snapped, her tears spilling over all at once. "But back then, did I know my parents were dead? Did I know that your aunt was the one who had them killed? I didn’t know any of it! If I had, I’d never have made you that promise. Even the gentlest soul turns to stone when reality is that cruel!"

I dragged in a long breath and let it out slow. When I spoke again, my voice came out flat and tired.

"So you’re really set on wrecking someone else’s marriage."

She broke then, sobbing openly, the sound catching in her throat. "You think I want this? I don’t have another way out, Damien. Every time I think about my parents dying alone, dying for nothing, I can’t breathe. If I don’t get back the one thing I want, then they died for nothing. Do you understand? Nothing."

"And what do your parents’ deaths have to do with my cousin?" My patience frayed. "Be honest with me for once. Is this really about loving Sebastian? Or is it about punishing his family, and he’s just the weapon you’re using to do it?"

"Because I still love him!" she screamed, her whole body shaking.

"If that were true, you never should have left him. And having left, you sure as hell shouldn’t have come back to burn down innocent people to get him."

I was shouting now too. This was the first real fight we’d ever had, in all the years I’d known her, and I hated that it was happening on some empty roadside with the smell of wet earth drifting.

I couldn’t deny it any longer. Every word out of her mouth carved a fresh crack into the image I’d been guarding for so long.