Breed Me. Daddy Alpha novel Chapter 188

His jaw clenched.

His shoulders jerked once, like something inside him didn’t agree. Like the beast didn’t want to listen. Like it wanted vengeance. Carnage. Death.

But I kept talking.

I had to.

“You didn’t lose me,” I whispered. “You didn’t. I’m still breathing. I’m still here. I’m yours, Damon. I never stopped being yours. And I don’t want the first thing you do after saving me to be something that haunts you.”

His claws flexed.

I took another step.

My hand finally reached his chest. The moment my fingers touched him, he let out a sound-somewhere between a gasp and a growl. His skin was burning hot beneath his shirt, his heart pounding wild and furious against my palm.

I kept my hand there. Steady. Firm. Letting him feel me. Letting him know I was real.

“She doesn’t get to have this,” I said. “She doesn’t get to break you.”

His lips parted.

For a second, no words came out.

Just that rough, ragged breathing.

Then slowly-so slowly it felt like watching a glacier melt-his shoulders began to relax. His fingers curled in toward his palms. His claws retracted, not fully, but enough. His jaw eased. His chest rose and fell in a different rhythm. Less deadly.

And then his eyes began to change.

It was subtle at first. A shimmer. A flicker of gold bleeding into the black like sunlight trying to pierce through ink. But it grew. Gradually. The gold returned. The beast receded. The man I loved-my Damon-was crawling back to the surface.

I felt his hand close around my wrist.

Not hard. Not possessive.

Just enough to hold on.

His eyes finally locked on mine, and this time, they saw me.

“Lyra,” he rasped, his voice rough with strain. “She almost-“

“She didn’t,” I whispered, my eyes stinging. “Because you didn’t let her.”

He dropped to his knees.

Right there. In front of me.

His arms wrapped around my waist and pulled me into him, his head pressing against my stomach, his whole body shaking. Not from the shift anymore. From everything else. From the weight of almost losing. From the relief of still having.

I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, burying my fingers in his hair, holding him like he was the most fragile, furious thing in the world. His breath was warm against my belly. His grip was tight. And for the first time since I whispered his name.

He trembled.

“I thought she took you from me,” he said, his voice cracking. “I felt it, Lyra. I felt it.”

I knelt with him, dragging him down with me, pressing my lips to his temple, rocking with him on the floor like we were the only two people who existed.

“I’m always yours,” I whispered into his skin, my lips barely brushing the side of his face, and for the first time since this whole thing started, I felt him exhale.

My stomach dropped.

Camilla’s eyes snapped to mine, venom flooding her voice now.

“Who the fuck do you think you are Lyra!”

“Camilla ” I tried to speak, but my voice cracked again.

She cut me off.

“What the fuck is so special about her, Damon?!” she shouted, staggering to her feet, pointing at me with shaking fingers.

“Why do you always protect her? Why do you defend her like she’s worth anything? Why did you tell the whole school she’s yours? She’s eighteen, Damon. You are like a father figure to her! You bastard! That’s child abuse. That’s sick. You’re a fucking pedo!”

And then he looked at her.

Right at her.

“I am not a father to her,” he said, low and clear.

“You wanna know why she is so important”

“She is my mate.”

Camilla froze.

To be fucking continued.