"Now, please tell me how you were a young boy."

Ace hesitated in his reply as his eyes shifted constantly from mine to the ground and back again, "I never wanted a mate . . ."

I glared at him for his idiotic reply, "I already knew that. That was why you fucking rejected me in the first place."

Shaking his head, he reached for my hand with a pleading look blossoming in his eyes. I yanked my hand away from his, instantly killing any hope he once had in his eyes. 

"That wasn't the only reason I rejected you," Ace tried to explain himself.

My forehead scrunched up in confusion but a sardonic laugh came out, "Nice! So there are several reasons to why you rejected me."

Ace, realizing his mistake, tried to pull an excuse or reply out of thin air to cover up or even take back his mistake, but we both knew he wouldn't be able to. He didn't only reject a part of me as his own, but he rejected several parts of me. He might have even rejected all of me. 

I shouldn't have been surprised at his statement, but I was. I comforted myself throughout the time I was living in Ace's pack after he rejected me with the thought that Ace only rejected me because I was human. I played myself by thinking he only hated a part of me, that he would have loved and accepted me if I was born a werewolf. Now, it seemed like he wouldn't have accepted me for any other fact other than that I was simply me. 

A grimace fell upon my face, which contradicted the playful tone I used to hide the pain that one sentence brought, "Way to make a girl feel special."

Ace flinched back upon hearing the pain in my voice that I hadn't done as good of a job concealing as I thought I had. 

"You wouldn't have . . .", he seemed to pause in finishing as if thinking better about it, but he continued when he couldn't find a way around stating it bluntly, ". . . been a good Luna."

I felt a liquid fire flow through my veins as I jumped up from the couch, "I wouldn't have been a good Luna?"

Trying to let the anger flowing through me escape without violence, I began pacing. 

"I wouldn't have been a good Luna," pointing to myself I turned to Ace in utter disbelief. 

Ace's eyes flashed yellow as his wolf showed itself from the disrespect he heard in my voice, "No, you wouldn't have."

The grin I gave him was menacing, "How would you have known that?"

I yelled at him while stalking towards his trembling form, "I was made to be your mate by the moon goddess. I was meant to be the Luna of this pack. You took that away from me!"

Ace didn't back down at my words instead he screamed back at me, "You were weak and pathetic. You couldn't protect yourself let alone my pack."

His eyes turned to slits and he growled out, "You made the pack weak. I'm an alpha before I'm a mate. I chose my pack over you, and I will always choose the pack."

His words burned through me like acid, but I didn't feel the pain his words were meant to cause me. I only felt a sense of determination to put the final nails into this coffin we called the mate bond. 

Lowing my voice I spoke to him, "You had no idea if I was going to be a good Luna or not. I know I would have grown to be one. I would have done anything to survive, to thrive, and to protect this pack if I was given a chance."

His eyes softened as he realized the unspoken truths in my words. He never gave me a chance to prove myself to him and his pack. I was already set to fail the test he would give me before I had even got the test in the first place.

I looked down at my fingers and saw a ring on my index finger that Ryan had given me, "I would have done what I needed to do."

I looked at the ring on my finger. It was a promise Ryan made to me that he would do right by me in every situation and no matter what consequences he would be forced to face for his actions. He always did what he thought would be right for me, even if it ended up hurting him. 

He had told me that the emerald stone on the ring he had given me was just the stone of the Dark pack, but as I stared into it I saw Ryan's eyes. The color of the emerald was the exact shade Ryan's eyes turned when he looked at me. It was also the exact shade of emerald that adored the necklace around my neck that I was told my parents had given me on my birthday to represent my birth month. I thought the color of the stones had all been a coincidence, but it wasn't. 

Ryan knew all along what the emerald symbolized. He knew the color would remind me of him every time I looked in the mirror. It wasn't a coincidence that the necklace laid on my neck a couple of inches away from where the mark of a mate should be. 

The color was us. The color was a combination of us and the things that we loved. It was our pack, the people who made up it. For him, it was me in my entirety, all my flaws and through all my triumphs. For me, it was his eyes, his leadership, his kindness, and his whole being. 

The same color that shone with sadness yesterday as he continued to think of what was best for me, what he thought was best for me. Ryan knew he was standing in the way of this moment between Ace and me. He was holding me back from the decision I needed to make. 

My love for Ryan blinded me from the fact that I was running away from my past. I was running from the broken pieces of my heart that Ace had caused. I was burying the questions I had. I was dodging the discussion I had to have with Ace. 

This what Ryan wanted. He knew that only I could decide what was to happen for my future. I had to do this on my own. 

I collapsed on the glass coffee table in front of Ace, "I would have done what I need to do."

I bite my lip as the truth of that overwhelmed me.

I lifted my head against the weight of the untaken path of a possible life hit me and I met Ace's hesitant eyes that wondered about the same possibilities that would never happen, "I would have stayed with you. I would have made myself into an obedient luna, wife, and mother of our children. I would have learned to love you and I would have never left."

I felt a tear slid down my check, but I felt a soft touch brush it away before it could fall to the floor. I saw Ace's arm retreat back to his side from the corner of my eyes, but my eyes never left his. Every emotion that passed through me was reflected in his eyes, the pain and the hurt. I could see that he felt those emotions for the place we were in right now in our lives, but it wasn't the same for me. It was the pain and hurt from years back. 

I was finally allowing the emotions that I had buried, after I left this pack, to be experienced. I allowed myself to finally acknowledge a past that I had longed for years ago, but it was a future that I did not wish for anymore. The hurt and pain turned to acceptance for the years I had lived away from Ace. 

I closed my eyes from the longing I saw in Ace's eyes, "I became a pack warrior before I was given the opportunity to train and fight among the people within Ryan's pack. I made something of myself. I became more than my title as a human. I became more than your rejected mate or the rejected Luna, I became a pack warrior. It wasn't a title given to me through birth, bloodline, or mate bond, it was earned by me through blood, sweat, and tears."

I looked at Ace, really looked at him. I looked at him for what felt like the first time. I dug deeper into the appearance of the man I had grown to hate. I pushed past the pain and the anger, wondering if I could give him another chance.

I thought of the pain that his pack and he had put me through. I thought of the many bad memories I had here and the rare good memory that interrupted the bad ones. I imaged the future we could have. How if we did take the long journey to accept each other, it would be overshadowed by all the bad. I pictured returning to a pack that once hated me and hurt me. I willed myself to think any good that could come of a future together, but all I could draw up was a blank canvas. 

The blank canvas didn't last as unintentionally it filled with people from the Dark pack. The canvas filled with the twins, Evan, Victor, and most importantly Ryan. The good memories layered on the canvas overwhelmed the bad memories from this pack, my old pack. There was no bad memory in sight, and one memory, or rather one person, took over the majority of the canvas. 

Ryan was the person I wanted. He was in every good memory. I was in the Dark pack because of him. I had this wonderful, amazing, magical life because he chose to give me a chance. He gave me the chance that Ace never did. His pack and its members accepted me in a way that no one in the Blood Moon pack did. 

I would always choose the Dark pack over any other pack. I would choose the members of the Dark pack, my pack mates, over anyone, and I would protect them with everything in me. I loved the family that I had now. I love Ryan. He chose me a long time ago when I was no one, when I was a waitress in a restaurant located in the middle of nowhere, and now it was me choosing him over anything else.

Ryan was my past, present, and future. He was my alpha, my family, and my love. He was my forever.

I raised my hand and rested it on Ace's check. I saw a flutter of happiness and hope flash in his eyes, but I shook my head. The happiness and hope faded upon the realization that I was not given us a chance. This was my goodbye. 

I felt a genuine smile reach my lips for the first time in a long time that would be directed towards him, "I'm going to let you go."

I began to pull my hand away from his check, but his hand flew to grab it as desperation flew into his eyes, "You can't!"

Ace clung to my hand as his desperation grew, "I love you."

I grabbed his other hand that was not holding onto mine with my other hand, "No, you don't love me. You love the idea of me."

I watched as his eyes flashed with realization and at that moment I knew that we had both accepted what was to come. There was no bitterness between us anymore. There was no hatred, pettiness, or anger. There was never love or feelings mates should feel towards one another. All that was left was acceptance and sadness for a future that was lost before it could even be discovered. 

"I, Kathryn Steele, reject Ace Midnight as my mate."

I watched as pain crossed his expression, before he uttered, "I, Ace Midnight, accept the rejection of Kathryn Steele as my mate."

A burning pain erupted in my heart and spread throughout my whole being as the bond between us started to tear and decompose upon itself. I watched as the same pain was experienced by Ace before it all stopped and a feeling of calm swept through me. 

I no longer had a mate. I was no longer Ace's mate or his rejected mate. I was only Kathryn Steele. I was the Kathryn Steele, head warrior of the Dark pack and the only human head warrior in existence. 

Overwhelming emotions of freedom erupted from within me, I finally knew what I wanted. My past no longer would haunt me or would stop me from being with those I loved. My past was my past, but it would not dictate my future anymore.