Leland's eyes were still focused on the tiny twinkling star in the sky while he remembered the figure of Nicholas Hanenbergh who met him at Princess Karenina's birthday party.
At the party, Leland could clearly see the king was interested in Sophie. Heck, even a blind man would be able to see it too. The way his eyes looked droopy and in awe at the sight of Leland's mate, and his overly-enthusiastic voice when he introduced himself to Sophie.. they said it all.
The king was obviously attracted to or even... in love with Sophie.
Thinking about it made Leland clench his fist in annoyance. Ugh... If Nicholas was nearby, Leland would have jumped down and attacked him again. How dare he...!
However... Leland then furrowed his brows, if King Nicholas Hannenbergh was really the same Nicholas that Sophie married six years ago, why was he acting like he didn't know her?
Was the man pretending he didn't know Sophie because he didn't want his fiancée to know he was married? Was he ashamed to admit Sophie was his wife?
Leland's heart desperately hoped that his conjecture was correct. Because then Sophie had a good reason not to go back to Nicholas Hanenbergh, and Leland didn't have to worry anymore that Sophie would leave him.
Sophie wouldn't possibly want to go back to the man who had dumped her, would she?
However, even though Leland's heart hoped so, his mind refused and denied that the conjecture was true.
Nicholas Hanenbergh didn't dump Sophie. There must be another reason. If Nicholas really dumped Sophie, then he should have avoided Sophie when he saw Sophie at the party.
However, in fact, what happened was that Nicholas, without hesitation, even seemed enthusiastic about approaching Sophie to introduce himself. Did Nicholas really not remember Sophie?
Leland closed his eyes and struggled to understand what had really happened to Nicholas Hannenbergh.
Just as Nicholas had many questions about Duke Romanov, Leland also had many questions about Nicholas Hanenbergh.
In his mind, Leland tried to sequence each incident from the beginning to the latest ones. He hoped to find answers to his questions in these events.
After he recalled the events at the party, Leland turned to remember the incident when he fought with Nicholas. In the middle of the fight, Nicholas actually asked Leland to stop the fight, then said that he wanted to free the two lycan children who were held captive by 'Duke Romanov'.
It meant that Nicholas had absolutely no idea that Jan and Luciel were his children, and it seemed that Nicholas didn't even have an idea that he had children.
Leland's memory flashed back to when Nicholas and Sophie stood face to face. At that time, Nicholas was either so fascinated by Sophie that he didn't pay attention to Jan and Luciel who were standing beside her, or he did see the two children but he ignored them.
Maybe Nicholas ignored them because he thought that the two children were Sophie's and Duke Romanov's children.
If Nicholas only pretended not to remember Sophie, Nicholas would have been surprised when he saw Luciel and Jan, as he should be able to immediately conclude that the two children were his children because their faces were very similar to his.
Leland remembered very clearly every expression the king had when he stood opposite Sophie. The king never showed the slightest bit of surprise except when Sophie suddenly fell unconscious. His look was innocent and clearly enamored by her.
Leland now started to believe that King Nicholas Hanenbergh really didn't remember Sophie, but how could that be? What caused Nicholas to lose his memory?
Leland's memory continued to travel through time. Until finally, his memory reached the moment when Leland found a pot filled with the remains of wolfsbane that he found in the Blackwoods Forest several years ago.
Was it the wolfsbane that caused Nicholas Hanenbergh to lose his memory? If so, then Nicholas was not to blame for having left Sophie. It was a very unfortunate accident on his part.
If she found out that he lost his memory when trying to cure himself of lycanthropy, Sophie would be understanding. Leland had witnessed Sophie talk in her dreams, pleading Nicholas not to take the wolfsbane and just accept himself for who he was.
She was very bothered by the fact that Nicholas hated himself so much that she begged Leland to help make her sons love and accept themselves. She didn't want Luciel and Jan to grow up hating their lycan sides, unlike their father.
So... Sophie was separated from Nicholas by accident. One that was caused by his efforts to become completely human. Surely, she would understand and forgive him for leaving?
In fact... she might return to Nicholas once she knew he never meant to leave her all alone. If Nicholas got his memory back, he would definitely claim his wife and children. And they might choose to go back to him. They would be reunited and become family again.
Leland's chest tightened at the thought of this. What should he do? He didn't want to lose Sophie and his children. If he could keep them by fighting to the death, he would.
However, at this point, he must think about what would Sophie and the boys think and want. He couldn't make that decision for them.
All this time, he and Sophie had never talked about Nicholas. He wanted to avoid drama, and he felt Sophie wanted the same way. She didn't know that Leland knew her husband because he had seen her with Nicholas in the Blackwoods Forest.
It seemed that Sophie also didn't feel comfortable talking about Nicholas' death because she thought Leland was responsible for the deaths of Baron Ferdinand and Nicholas.
The woman chose to bury her own sorrow rather than blame Leland which could eventually make Luciel and Jan hate Leland for killing their biological father.
"Aarrrghh!" Leland exhaled roughly. His chest was filled with heavy clouds. Now he felt it was time for him and Sophie to have a heart-to-heart conversation about Sophie's and Nicholas' past and her status as Leland's wife and mate.
He also needed to ask what Sophie wanted in this situation. It was the most important thing after all, even though Leland was actually afraid that if he asked Sophie what she wanted… she would reply that she wanted to go back to Nicholas.
.
.
___________________________
From Missrealitybites:
My heart ached for Leland. Luckily, I know that this story will have a happy ending for all three of them. So... pfew..!
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