To ruin an Omega - Chapter 282: The Dreamer

Chapter 282: The Dreamer

LYSANDER

The bed dipped with her weight. I felt it before I saw her. The shift of the mattress and the whisper of fabric against skin. My eyes opened to find Fia moving toward me through the dim lamplight of my room, her dark hair falling loose around her shoulders.

She climbed on top of me, straddling my hips. Her hands pressed against my chest.

“Miss me?”

Goddess yes. Every waking moment and all the sleeping ones too.

“I dream about you every night,” I said.

The words came out rough and honest. I couldn’t help the chuckle that followed, couldn’t stop my hand from reaching up to trace the line of her jaw. “It’s nice to really have your envisioned face perfectly molded this time around.”

Her eyebrow arched. “Dream?”

“I know I’m dreaming.”

“Well.” She leaned down closer, her breath warm against my mouth. “It would be a pleasant dream, wouldn’t it? Given you can never have me in the waking world.”

Her fingers found the buttons of my shirt. One by one, she worked them open. The fabric parted. Her hand grazed my bare chest, fingers spreading across my pecs, and I felt the touch down to my bones even though I knew none of this was real.

Her eyes stayed locked on mine. Dark, knowing and sad in a way that made my chest ache.

I smiled anyway. “Who says I can’t?”

“I am a creation of your mind.” Fia tilted her head, studying me like I was a puzzle she’d given up trying to solve. “I would like to think that I would know.”

I grabbed her hand before she could pull away and drew her closer until there was no space left between us. “Most marriages don’t last, you know.”

Dream Fia, my Fia, the version of her that lived only in these stolen moments of sleep, looked at me with something that might have been pity. “I think we both know mine will last.”

The certainty in her voice cut deeper than any blade. I wanted to argue, wanted to tell her she was wrong, wanted to shake her and kiss her and make her understand that what we had, even here in this false world, was more real than anything waiting for us when we woke.

Her eyes held mine. “You should focus on more important matters. You will be a married man yourself soon.”

I knew that. Goddess, I knew that better than anyone.

“It’s time you stop dreaming of other girls.”

Other girls. Like she was just one name on a list, one face among many. Like I hadn’t scoured half different territories looking for her. Like I didn’t carry the memory of her touch, her voice, her blood from that one time in the meadows with me everywhere I went.

“Why didn’t I find you sooner?”

The question came out broken and goddess was it desperate. I hated the sound of my own voice in that moment. I hated the weakness in it even more, but I couldn’t take it back.

Fia’s expression softened. She held my face in her hands, and the tenderness of it nearly destroyed me. “It isn’t like you didn’t try.”

“Perhaps I didn’t try enough.”

“Lysander.” She said my name like a prayer that had an ending. Then she leaned down and kissed me.

Her lips were soft against mine. It was sweet, as it as sad and final. I kissed her back like I could keep her there, like I could make this moment last forever, like the force of my wanting could somehow reshape reality itself.

She pulled away too soon. Always too soon.

“It’s time you stop dreaming now.” Her thumb brushed across my cheekbone. “We can’t always have what we want.”

The words hung in the air between us. A truth and lie all at once. We couldn’t have what we wanted, but that had never stopped me from wanting it anyway.

I opened my mouth to respond, to argue, to beg her to stay just a little longer.

And that was when the sunlight hit my face.

I blinked against the brightness, disoriented. The drawn curtains let in the morning in full glory. The sun was harsh and unforgiving. My room materialized around me in sharp detail. The heavy furniture. The tapestries on the walls. The empty bed.

But there was no Fia.

Of course, there was no Fia.

I sat up slowly, running a hand through my hair. The sheets had tangled around my legs during the night. I kicked them off and stood, naked in the cool morning air. My skin prickled with goosebumps, but I didn’t reach for a robe. Not yet.

My feet carried me across the room without conscious thought. I’d made this walk so many times before that my body knew the path by heart. Three steps to the left. Two forward. Stop at the drawer.

The gold-plated box sat exactly where I’d left it. Small and unassuming. But to me, worth more than all the treasure in my father’s vaults.

I picked it up. The metal was cold against my palms. For a long moment, I just held it, feeling the weight of it. Then I lifted the lid.

The hinges creaked softly. Inside, nestled against the velvet lining, lay a scrap of cloth. Old and stained. It was evident that it had been torn from a larger piece of fabric that had long since been lost to time and distance.

The staining which was blood had dried into the fibers years ago. It was brown now instead of red. But I remembered what it had looked like fresh. I remembered the meadows. I remembered how the sun had kissed her skin and eyes even if she was in pain.

I’d torn off a piece of my sleeve to use as a bandage and it was all I had left of her when she disappeared.

I reached into the box now. My fingers closed around the fabric. It was rough and stiff with old blood, nothing like the smooth silk of the clothes she’d worn in my dream. But this actually had her essence in it.

I brought it to my face and breathed in. The scent had faded almost completely, but I could still catch the faintest trace of her beneath the copper smell of blood. Lavender and something sharper. Medicine, maybe. Or just the particular smell of her skin.

I stood there for a long time, breathing in that ghost of her, letting myself remember. The way she’d looked at me in that meadow and thanked me.

And when I had gone to get my personal sentinels to get her all the help she deserved… She had vanished.

I’d spent weeks after that trying to find her. Sending out inquiries. Offering rewards. Following every lead that came my way. Some of them might have been legitimate. But most had been people looking to profit off a Alpha’s obsession and father eventually got convinced it was all in my head. A byproduct of grief.

And what had it gotten me?

To let go of my obsession.

Only for that shit to come back and bite me in the ass. She had been real. She was still as beautiful. And now she was married. She belonged to someone else.

I placed it back in the box carefully. Like it was made of glass instead of cloth.

Then I closed the lid.

The click of the latch sounded loud in the quiet room.

I set the box back on the drawer and turned away and started getting dressed for the day.

I had responsibilities. Meetings to attend and eventually, wedding plans to finalize. A future to prepare for that didn’t include the woman who haunted my dreams.

Dream Fia had been right about one thing. I was going to be a married man soon. It was time to stop dreaming of other girls.

But even as I pulled on my clothes, even as I tried to focus my mind on the day ahead, I could still feel her weight on top of me. I could still taste her false kiss. I could still hear her voice telling me we couldn’t always have what we wanted.

She was right.

We couldn’t.

But I’d wanted her anyway. I still wanted her. I would probably always want her, in the secret places of my heart where reason couldn’t reach.

I finished dressing and moved to the window. The sun had fully risen now. The sight from where I stood of Lily of the valley was beautiful but it also reminded me that I was just another piece in that machine. An Alpha with duties, obligations and a marriage alliance to uphold.

But in my dreams, I was still just a man. And she was still just a woman. And the space between us was something I could cross with nothing more than reaching out my hand.

The dreams were all I had left of her.

I wasn’t ready to give them up yet.

Even if I should.

Even if it would be easier.

Even if holding on to something I could never have was slowly tearing me apart from the inside.

I pressed my palm against the somehow cool glass of the window and watched the world wake up around me, already counting the hours until I could sleep again.