Chapter 72

Darren

I watched Aria dart away, disappearing into the crowd with her gown trailing behind her like a fleeting shadow. My heart pounded in my chest, a tornado of emotions swirling around inside of me.

What the hell had I just done? Again?

“Dammit,” I muttered under my breath, raking a hand through my hair. My wolf was silent for the moment, but I could feel his smug satisfaction simmering at the back of my mind.

“You can’t keep taking control like that,” I hissed internally. “It’s not fair to either of us. Especially not her.”

A low chuckle echoed in my skull. “I’ll admit I went too far in making you rush over there. But I didn’t take control when you kissed her... That was entirely you.”

I stopped in my tracks, stunned. “You lying little—”

“I’m not lying,” my wolf retorted. “Face it, Darren. You wanted to kiss her.”

I clenched my jaw, memories of the kiss flooding back—the softness of her lips, the way she fit so perfectly in my arms. It had been far too short, and yet it had felt like an eternity with her. And the fact that she had picked up my scent…

“No. I refuse to believe that that was me,” I replied bitterly. “Maybe a bit of her wolf DNA slipped out, made her push me to kiss her—”

“Just face it: you kissed her on purpose because you’re a jealous wreck. And you enjoyed every second of it,” my wolf retorted before I could answer.

I couldn’t deny it. Seeing her with that panther shifter had ignited a jealousy I wasn’t proud of, but the kiss… “I have more self control than that,” I remarked, although I knew it was a hollow statement.

“Hmph. Keep telling yourself that,” my wolf murmured before retreating to the back of my mind once more.

I let out a frustrated sigh, trying to steady myself. My gaze drifted downward, and I realized I had kicked something across the floor. Bending down, I picked up a delicate black cat mask—the one Aria had been wearing.

A surge of worry propelled me forward. I couldn’t just leave her there after that. I needed to find her and make sure she was okay.

Pushing through the throng of elegantly dressed guests, I searched every corner of the ballroom. When she wasn’t there, I headed toward the quieter corridors off the main hall, where the restrooms were.

“Aria?” I called out softly.

A faint sound caught my attention—the echo of soft footsteps. Following the sound, I turned a corner and found her standing alone, gazing out a large window overlooking the city lights.

“Hey,” I said gently, approaching her.

She spun around, her eyes wide with surprise. She looked angry at first, but then relief flickered across her face when she saw the mask in my hand. “Oh. You found it,” she whispered.

I extended it to her. “You dropped it back there.”

“Thank you,” she said, taking it and holding it close to her chest. “I bumped into someone. Must have knocked it off.”

An awkward silence settled between us for a moment. I wanted to say something about the kiss, to apologize or maybe even explain myself, but the words tangled in my throat.

“Are you okay?” I finally managed.

She shook her head, a worried crease forming on her brow. “No, not really.”

I turned to face her. Her jaw was set hard, her eyes slightly narrowed as she stared out the window. It was difficult to see her like this, especially knowing that it was because of me.

“I’m… sorry,” I said after a moment, reaching out to touch her arm. “I really didn’t mean to—”

She abruptly pulled away before I could touch her. “That’s what you always say,” she said quietly. “We have these magical moments, and then you say you didn’t mean it, that your wolf took over, that it wasn’t really you who I kissed…”

“Aria—”

“No. Let me finish,” Aria said, turning to face me. There was a fire in her eyes that I had only seen once before, that day that she showed the scar Sarah had given her to everyone. I immediately fell silent.

She took a deep breath. “I like you, Darren,” she admitted. “And I… I like kissing you. Hell, I want it to go further, but I know it can’t. And oddly, that doesn’t bother me all that much. I’d be okay with that, under… normal circumstances.”

I remained silent, letting her finish.

“What really gets to me, though, is that I genuinely don’t know how you feel about me. I don’t know if you do like me, deep down, and it’s simply that our differences in DNA are keeping us apart—which I could understand completely—or if you don’t like me and every moment we’ve shared together is fabricated by strange werewolf hormones or whatever.”

She looked away again, shaking her head and blinking quickly. I could see tears forming in her eyes like a fine mist, her chin quivering slightly, but she kept her posture straight and her voice steady.

“I just want to know,” she murmured. “That’s all. I just feel like I’m in the dark, and I want to know what I’m up against.”

There was a long silence after that. Truthfully, I didn’t know how to answer; maybe because, in all my years worrying about Lucas and my pack and nothing else, I had never… had the time for things like romance. Especially not to this degree. And maybe my wolf was right; maybe I did want to kiss her, maybe I did like her, and I didn’t know what the fuck to do with those emotions.

Suddenly, before I could answer, the sound of a shrill voice cut me off.

“Aria! Oh, thank goodness, there you are!”

We both turned, shocked, to see Aria’s friend running toward us. Her mask was pushed up on her head, her eyes frantic. She skidded to a stop when she saw me, glaring at me for a moment, but then turned to Aria.

“Bella,” Aria said, “what’s wrong?”

Bella took a deep breath and opened her mouth to speak, but no words came. She shook her head and slipped out her phone, tapping on the screen. Aria and I exchanged a confused glance as she navigated to some webpage or another.

But then she thrust her phone into our faces.

And there it was—a headline splashed across the top: “Mystery Couple Steals the Spotlight at Masquerade Gala!” Underneath was a photo of us dancing together, our masks in place, followed by another photo of the kiss.

Aria’s eyes scanned the screen frantically. “Oh no,” she whispered, taking the phone from Bella’s hand. I leaned in, a little confused. Both of our faces were fully obscured between the masks and the angle, so it should have been okay, right?

Wrong.

As we scrolled down, another image appeared. It showed Aria rushing away, her mask off, her face clearly visible. And it depicted me in the background, my heterochromatic eyes on full display—not enough to reveal my identity to the average person, but to anyone who knew me well enough, such as my pack, I would be easily identifiable.

And the caption beneath read: “Who Is the Real-Life Cinderella?”