My Fated Mate Can Have Her-Chapter 185: Don’t Say It!

Violet

We were in a forest and it looked far denser.

I pushed myself up slowly, my body stiff from sleeping in such an awkward position. I paused to find a fabric rolled out on the ground underneath me.

The trees were taller, their trunks thick and gnarled, and their branches were woven together overhead to block out most of the light from the sun. Only scattered fragments of light broke through and their air was cooler and drier.

I turned to find him in his human form, crouched a short distance away as he had a similar material spread out, along with a bit of food he was taking out from his bag.

"I hope I didn’t wake you," he said without looking up.

"Oh... no." I sat up, looking around and stretched my aching limbs.

Just when had I fallen asleep?

"That’s good. We can rest here for the evening."

"Where are we?" I asked him.

He stood up and finally turned towards me. I was surprised as he handed me a small box made of paper, along with a waterskin.

I could smell pastry from the box and my mouth involuntarily watered.

I glanced up at him. "I... have food—"

"Take it. I have more than enough. And I got this for you." He offered me a small smile.

My attention returned to the box and something in my chest shifted.

He got this for me?

My fingers tightened around the box.

"Thank you," I murmured, my voice softer than I intended.

He just nodded and returned to his spot, leaning back against a tree as he dragged his bag closer to rummage through it.

I opened the box carefully. Inside were six small pastries, golden and flaky, dusted with fine sugar. I stilled. They looked like the ones I had tried at the festival.

How did he...?

I realised he might have seen some from what had been left in my bag earlier in the capital.

But even at that, the warmth in my chest spread further, and I quickly looked away, unsettled by how much such a small thing affected me.

I bit into one of the pastries.

"We have left the territory," he finally said.

I stared at him.

"What?"

He glanced up at me again. "We are out of Ascalone. Have been for a few hours now."

I was speechless.

I knew we had been travelling for a long time, maybe a little over a day... Then again, how long was I asleep for?

"I didn’t expect to have already made it out of the nation so quickly," I whispered.

"Well, we went straight for two days and two nights without rest." He pulled out a waterskin and added it to the food beside him. "Aside from me being fast, we did move non-stop. And Ascalone’s territory is like a large strip of land. We just went across it. The shorter route, vertically."

Two days...

He had run without stopping aside from when we stopped for water?

And he hadn’t complained once.

We ate in silence and my mind was reeling throughout.

There was no sign of exhaustion as he ate. No indication that he had just run for two days straight carrying my weight.

But still...

My hand drifted up absently, fingers brushing against the unfamiliar shortness of my hair.

I needed to do this now.

Before I lost my nerve.

He had finished his food and had just taken some water when I called out to him.

"Rowan?"

He looked up at me, his expression open and patient.

"Would you be alright," I started slowly, forcing the words out, "If I were to reject—"

He moved so fast I didn’t even see it until it was too late.

His hand clamped over my lips, cutting off the rest of my sentence. He was on me, his body pressing mine back against the ground and partly on the roots of the tree behind me. His weight pinned me in place.

His voice was low, urgent, and his green eyes bore into mine with a subtle glow.

"Don’t."

I went rigid, my heart slamming against my ribs. My breath came in sharp, panicked gasps against his palm, and I could feel my pulse hammering so hard I thought it might burst through my chest.

But then I felt it.

His heart was thrashing just as violently.

The wild, erratic rhythm pounded against my chest where our bodies pressed together, matching the frantic pace of my own.

"Don’t," he repeated, softer this time but no less urgent. His eyes searched mine with an intensity that nearly made me hold my breath. "Please. Don’t say that."

His eyes searched my mine. "Is this about him?"

Annoyance flared through my shock. I shifted beneath him, and grabbed his wrist. I pulled, using more strength than I normally would. His hand shifted away from my mouth, and I glared up at him.

"Why would you just jump on me like that?!" I snapped, my voice shaking with a mix of anger and lingering shock.

Rowan pulled back slightly but didn’t move off me completely. His jaw worked, tension radiating through every line of his body.

"It would not be a good idea to do that here," he said, his tone still low and steady despite the heavy rise and fall of his chest. "Both for you and for me. I don’t know how severe the rejection sickness would be, but it would still affect me. We are not even in a safe environment to do that. And I..." He stopped, his eyes closing briefly as he brought his breathing under control. "I don’t want you to end it."

My anger wavered.

"I... I don’t want to either," I quietly admitted. "I know how it feels, but I also believe it would be better. You are right. Now is not the time, and I am sorry, I was being hasty. But I don’t want to drag this out unnecessarily. It would not be fair to you, knowing that I—"

"Knowing that you care for Kael?" His voice dropping lower.

I opened my mouth to respond, but the words died in my throat when he opened his eyes.