Accidental Surrogate for Alpha Chapter 270
Ella’s Dream
Sinclair
I throw out my hand, grasping for her arm – her skirt – anything – as she disappears from my sight.in a blink. A growl grows in my chest. God damnit, why can’t she just stay still? I put my hands in my pockets and look around at the familiar dream forest, this place we’ve come so many times. But there’s something just slightly… off about it. A haze, an… indistinctness to the details. As if Ella can’t put the pieces together quite well enough.
I’m still here, though, which means some part of her wants me to be. I hold on to this knowledge, desperately, and begin to prowl through the forest. Where the hell is she?
I hear her giggling somewhere and spin my head, looking everywhere for my mate. But then – god damn it, is it coming from above me? I stop, looking up at the canopy of leaves and the clouds, listening hard. Yes there is she in the sky? I cup my hands to my mouth and shout her name upwards.
“Ela!” I cry. “Ella! Come back here!” There’s no response, just more of that giggling. My inner wolf prowls within me, hungry, worried, ready for the chase. But now is not the time to be playing hide and seek. I let my anger and my alpha demand infuse my voice, trying again. “Ella!” I command. I hear the giggling cease. “Get your ass down here! Now!”
And then, suddenly, she’s there again, standing in front of me. I keep my face stern, not letting any of the relief I feel slip through. “Bossy,” she quips, crossing her arms over her chest and pouting. “Big bully wolf.”
“Ella,” I sigh, shaking my head and closing the distance between us, putting my hands on each of her cheeks. Her tiny face is so small, so fragile between my palms. And so, so incredibly precious. I let my eyes rove over her, savoring every detail. “Baby,” I murmur. “Come back to me.”
“But I’m right here,” she giggles, wrinkling her nose at me, confused but not dismayed. Her form flickers like a lamp with a bad bulb – now bright, now hazy, struggling to keep alight.
“Please, baby,” I beg, moving my arms to take her by the shoulders, to bring her closer to me. Please try.”
“Sinclair,” she whines. “I don’t understand.”
I shake my head, panicking a little. Ella’s innocence is one of the things I love about her, but talking to her now…it’s like she’s a little child, like she really doesn’t understand, doesn’t remember what happened to her. And frankly, I don’t know what to do – I hadn’t thought through the possibility of meeting my mate in her dreams, but finding only part of her, an indistinct facsimile at best.
I feel Ella relax in my arms, though, as I press her close to me, nuzzling her face against my chest. My wrack my mind, trying to figure out what to do to bring her back.
But I come up with nothing – nothing logical, nothing real. And so I fall back on the thing that has always brought us together, without fail. I tip her face up to mine and kiss her.
My mate responds instantly, giving me a little gasp and taking a step closer to me. But our kiss quickly intensifies. Suddenly, she’s pulling my face down to her, kissing me with abandon. Another moment passes and she’s gasping, as if my kiss is air to her, bringing her life. Her hands sink in my hair, her nails rake against my scalp as she brings me closer, urges me on with her need. My body responds instantly despite my mind’s protest that I need to do something – that I should be talking to her – convincing her – Shut up I think to myself. Because right now, she is the only thing that matters, and this seems to be what she needs.
I feel my knees start to weaken and I let them, falling to them, bringing Ella down with me, on top of me, her legs straddling my lap as I go to my knees on the forest floor. She moans, grinding her hips against me, pressing herself closer so that my head bends back on my neck. She takes control of our kiss, sliding her tongue into my mouth and pressing it against mine, desperate, hungry.
And I let her. I let her take charge of the moment, of me, of everything. Let her have me, all of me. And as she does, I realize, suddenly, that her flickering has stopped. That in my arms she’s substantial…real.
My eyes fly open and I draw a deep breath, pulling my face away from hers – needing to see, but desperately scared that if we stop – if I interrupt this, that she’ll fade away –
But no. I freeze, my arms wrapped tight around her body, pressing her to me, staring up at her shocked face which is vivid and warm and real. “Dominic,” she whispers, her eyes suddenly filled with a clarity and knowledge and horror that tells me, without doubt, that she’s back.
“Oh my god, Ella,” I cry, my voice muffled as I bury my face against her, fighting the tears that spring to my eyes, that have been pressing there for hours.
“Dominic, Dominic,” she whispers, her voice increasingly frantic, her hands loosening their grip in my hair and scrabbling to turn my face up to hers. I can’t help the two tears that slide down my cheeks as I look up at her. “What’s happening,” she asks, her voice still no more than a whisper. Where –” she looks around, increasingly frantic, “where are we –”
“We’re dreaming,” I reply, working to keep my voice steady, my arms still tight around her. “You’re in the hospital, Ella
“What?” She gasps, her eyes wide and terrified. “The hospital? What happened the baby?” I see her eyes fill with the utter panic only a mother can feel.
“It’s okay –“I hurriedly whisper, shaking my head, desperate to calm her. “He’s still – he’s still there.” I can see that my words only bring her anxiety down a notch, though.
“We have to get out of here –” she hisses in her panic, staring around at the dream forest I know she loves so much. “We have to help
“Shhh, shhh,” I say, working hard to calm my own heartbeat, to pass that calm on to her. “It’s all right, sweetheart,” I say, my voice level, soft. “The world is steady, for the moment. We have have time. You can relax.”
Her gaze snaps back to me, her hands pressed against my cheeks. “It’s it’s done? The war? The peace? The gift?”
I nod slowly, begging her with my eyes to rest. “Please, Ella,” I whisper. “Don’t worry about any of that right now. All you need to do is heal. We need you to focus on getting better.”
“Getting better,” she murmurs, shaking her head at me, though I feel her body relax a little on top of me, her muscles loosening, her panic slowly leaving her. “But what’s wrong with me?”
I wait a moment before I reply, holding her gaze, letting her muscles unwind a little more into this solid dream frame that I remember. I’m worried, terribly worried, that when I tell her…that she’ll flit off again. And worse, push me out of the dream.
“Please, Dominic,” she begs, her eyes making it clear that she needs to know. “Please. What’s wrong?”
“You gave the Goddess‘ gift to the earth, Ella. You changed the world.” I shake my head a little, still marveling at my incredible mate. “But it was too much for your body. You had to undergo surgery – you’ve been asleep for days.” I see her eyes go wide again with shock and fear, but she presses her lips into a tight line, letting me continue. “And the baby…”
I close my eyes, hardly able to mutter it. But her voice is hard, strong, carrying me through my weakness. “The baby?” she demands.
“He’s alive, Ella, but I…I can’t feel him. I’m worried the connection is gone, and that…”
She drops a hand from her face, swiftly pressing it to her stomach. I wait a moment, desperate to know, but when she doesn’t speak…
…I know the answer before she says it. “Dominic,” she whispers. “I can’t feel him either. I haven’t felt him since that night in the desert.”
My dear readers, Thank you for stopping by and reading this story. I hope you enjoyed it.
