The Sickened Luna's Last Chance novel Chapter 296

Chapter 296

Chapter 296

Alexander’s POV

+25 BONUS

I wasn’t sure why I suddenly felt the urge to open up to Stella, but it happened before I could stop myself. Maybe it was the wine loosening my tongue. Maybe it was the romantic atmosphere making me foolish.

Or maybe it was the fact that Stella had made it abundantly clear she didn’t want to win the trial, didn’t want to be my Luna, and she certainly didn’t seem to care about impressing me.

Goddess, that made her seem even more like Ella. For a moment, as I looked at her bundled up in my jacket, her face illuminated by the candlelight, I swore it was her. The Ella I had only had a brief few months to get to know between my five–years–long distance and her ultimate death.

Stubborn, blunt Ella. Ella, who never minced her words and who burst into my office unannounced and yelled at my Beta and…

Just… Ella.

“You seem to miss her a lot,” Stella pointed out. She was giving me a look I couldn’t quite read, although I thought I saw a note of shock in her expression.

Miss Ella. Well, that was the understatement of the century, wasn’t it?

“Miss her? I think about her every day.” The words came out in a rush. “Every single fucking day. When I wake up in the morning and she’s not there. When I’m working in my office and the door unexpectedly opens and I expect it to be her bursting in unannounced.” I chuckled wryly. “Instead, lately, it’s usually you.”

Stella didn’t say anything. Somehow, even though I probably should have shut my mouth, that silence made me want to keep talking.

“You act a lot like her, you know?” I blurted out. This wine must have been stronger than I thought, but it was too late to stop now, and honestly, it felt so fucking good to let it out. “You already kind of look like her, and that’s one thing, but your attitude is exactly the same. You carry yourself like she did. Speak like she did. It’s a little weird.”

I felt Stella shift uncomfortably beside me, and when I looked up at her, I saw that her face had gone red.

“I’m sorry,” I said, leaning back. “I didn’t mean to get so… intense.”

Silver eyes flicked to mine. “No.” Her voice was low and soft. “I don’t mind. Others have told me that I bear a… passing resemblance to the late Luna, so I’m getting use to it.”

“Passing resemblance,” I laughed. “You’re sure you’re not the reincarnation of her?”

Stella stiffened briefly, but then chuckled along with me and popped a cracker into her mouth. “Reincarnation isn’t real, but if it were and I were your dead wife, don’t you think I would have told you the truth by now?”

“Knowing Ella, she’d probably keep me in the dark just to spite me.” My throat bobbed as I thought back to how I’d locked her up in her room during those final hours of her life, all because I had evidence that she was a spy.

“But maybe,” I added, “if I apologized for the… things that happened between us leading up to her death, and

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Chapter 296

+25 BONUS

admitted that I just want het back and I don’t care about everything else, she’d finally reveal herself.”

Stella was silent again.

“I don’t know.” I shook my head and refilled my wine glass, taking a long sip before I went on. “I’ll move on eventually. I have to–for Lucien’s sake and for the pack. But it’s not easy when I keep feeling our mate bond Dare to life.”

Stella went very still. I noticed her hands tightening around her wine glass.

“I know it’s not real, of course,” I said quickly, fearing I’d said too much already. “I’ve already seen the doctor about it, and she says I’m in perfect health. It’s probably just phantom pains due to losing my mate. Something that will fade in time.”

I expected Stella to agree with me, but instead, she said softly, “Or perhaps your mate bond transcended death.”

A wry laugh escaped my lips. “You’re right. Maybe Ella’s ghost is hovering around me and I just can’t see it.”

“You never know.” Stella took a sip of her wine. When I looked at her, I thought I saw her silver eyes shimmering with unshed tears, but they were gone in an instant. Must have been a trick of the candlelight.

A brief silence fell over us, and I felt some of the tension I’d been holding in my shoulders for weeks slip away. Thank you,” I murmured. “For listening to me ramble like a madman. I’m sure it’s… disconcerting hearing your employer speak so openly like this. Maybe I’ve had too much wine.”

“Or maybe you’ve had just enough, and you needed to let it out.‘

I looked at Stella when she said that, and there was a tenderness in her gaze that I’d never seen from her before. I couldn’t tell if she was on the verge of smiling or crying. Maybe both.

And for a moment, a brief and impossible moment, it felt like I wasn’t talking to Stella at all.

It felt like I really was talking to Ella.

It wasn’t just the way she looked or the way she held herself. It was her very essence, as if Ella has truly materialized before me–as if my dead wife had never truly left at all but had instead been reborn into this new body.

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