Chapter 148: The Villain for Her

“Mi Ravial!”

Leitana leaped off the bed the moment she heard the familiar deep voice. Her heart pounded wildly in her chest as she rushed forward.

Ravial strode quickly toward her, meeting her in the middle of the room. His arms wrapped around her small frame, lifting her effortlessly off the ground. He buried his face deep in the curve of her neck, breathing in deeply.

His breath left him in a shaky exhale as he took in her familiar scent—the warmth of her skin and the faint sweetness of their shampoo lingering in her hair.

“Mi Ravial, where did yu go, leaving me alone?” Leitana asked.

Her arms wrapped tightly around his neck as she hung in his hold, her face pressed against his throat. Tears rolled down her soft cheeks, falling onto his skin.

Then she looked down at the exposed flesh of his neck.

Without warning, she bit down with a sharp chomp.

Ravial only smiled against her neck, completely unconcerned with the pain.

“Do it again, darlin’,” he murmured, his hand coming up to palm the back of her head.

Leitana pulled away slightly, releasing his flesh from between her teeth. She leaned back to look at his face, tears streaking down her cheeks, her expression full of hurt.

“Not funny, mi Ravial.”

He looked at her, still holding her easily with one arm against his chest, her feet dangling off the ground. With his free hand, he gently wiped the tears from her cheeks.

“I’m not joking, mi lamb,” he said softly. “You can bite me as much as you want. I don’t care. Let it hurt as much as I’ve hurt you.”

He gave her a small smile—one that made him look so unfairly handsome that it was difficult for her to remain properly angry with him.

Leitana only stared at him as he continued wiping her tears.

“Not fair,” she muttered, her pout deepening.

“What’s not fair, darling?” he asked.

He carried her over to the bed and sat down at the edge, settling her on his left thigh. His hand immediately returned to her hair, gently stroking the strands.

No matter how he tried, Ravial simply could not stop touching her. He needed the reassurance that she was truly there—that she wasn’t some illusion his mind had conjured to ease the endless loneliness of his existence after being cast down from the heavens.

She had to be real.

And yet, before he met her, he had lived for thousands of years.

But now, with her sitting in his lap, it felt as though he hadn’t truly lived at all… not until the day she walked down that aisle toward him.

SMACK.

The sharp hit snapped him out of his thoughts.

He blinked and looked down to find Leitana frowning even harder at him.

It took him a moment to realize she had just smacked his shoulder.

“Yu not even listening to mi!” she scolded. “Yu left me here for two days. Where did yu go?”

She stared straight into his face.

Even without seeing her eyes behind his blindfold, Ravial knew the hurt that must be there.

Of course he had hurt her.

She had only just learned the terrible news from the hospital, and after bringing her home… he had simply left.

Confusion, fear, anger—it was only natural she would feel abandoned.

Ravial gently took the hand she had used to smack him and pressed a slow kiss to the center of her palm.

“I’m sorry, my love,” he murmured. “I did not mean to leave you alone…”

“But yu did.”

Leitana’s voice cracked on the last word, small and raw, the pout dissolving into something sharper, and more wounded. Her fingers curled into the fabric of his shirt, not pushing him away but holding on like she was afraid he’d vanish again if she let go.

Ravial felt it, the sting of her accusation, the tremor in her grip, like a blade sliding clean between his ribs. He didn’t flinch. He never flinched from her pain; he drank it instead, let it settle heavy in his chest where it belonged.

“I did,” he admitted, voice low, stripped of every defense. No excuses, no pretty lies. Just the truth, rough and unpolished.

He shifted her slightly on his thigh so he could cup her face with both hands now, thumbs brushing the fresh tears that kept falling. The blindfold stayed in place, but she could feel the heat of his gaze behind it, fierce and unblinking.

“I…..am afraid, my lamb” he said, the confession tasting like rust on his tongue.

Leitana’s eyes widened at his words. She stared at him as though truly seeing him for the first time, really seeing him. She could scarcely believe what she’d just heard. Though the cover hid his eyes, she felt the raw truth in every syllable, the quiet cost of admitting something so fragile. Ravial had always been an impenetrable wall: towering, strong, surrounding her with fierce warmth yet impossible to scale, its surface revealing nothing of what lay behind. Until now. Now she could see the cracks—fine, jagged lines spidering through the stone he’d built so carefully.

“Fear of watching you choose the baby over yourself.”

Leitana’s breath caught sharply in her throat. She searched what little she could see of his face: the rigid line of his jaw, tight with restraint; the way his lips pressed into a thin, trembling seam, as though he were biting back a flood of words he’d never meant to speak.

“Yu were gone so long,” she whispered. “And mi kept thinking… maybe you didn’t want this anymore. Maybe the baby changed everything for you too.”

Ravial’s thumbs stilled on her cheeks.

“It changed everything,” he said quietly. “But not the way you think.”

She waited, eyes searching his face.

“I said I could stand by,” he continued, voice dropping lower. “That whatever you decide, to keep it, and let it split what time we have left, I would let it be, Guard your choice. Let you have every second on your terms.”

He exhaled, shaky, almost a growl.

“But when I walked in here and saw you…” Ravial’s voice dropped, rough around the edges. “Saw you smile at me, carrying what we made… even though I can’t wrap my head around how this is possible when I’m…” He trailed off, the unfinished sentence hanging heavy between them.

Leitana frowned, confusion flickering across her face. What did he mean bynhe couldn’t wrap his head around it? The words felt loaded, like they carried a deeper wound she hadn’t seen coming. She pushed the question to the back of her mind for now; it didn’t feel important—not compared to the way his shoulders had tensed, the way his gaze kept dropping to her belly as though afraid to linger too long.

He exhaled slowly, the sound almost a shudder. “I knew I couldn’t.”

The three small words landed like stones in still water. Couldn’t what? Stay? Believe? Hope? She searched his face again—the faint tremor in his jaw, the way his fingers flexed at his sides like he was fighting the urge to reach for her and pull away at the same time.

Leitana’s eyes widened slightly. “Couldn’t what?”

“I couldn't let the baby kill you. Not even if you begged to keep it. Not even if it was your choice.” His hands tightened on her face. “If this pregnancy starts carving you open faster, if your heart falters, if the pain becomes more than you can bear, if the doctors say one more week will be your last—I won’t stand by. I’ll take the decision from you. I’ll end it and I’ll make you hate me if that’s what it takes to keep air in your lungs one more day.”

Silence wrapped around them, thick and trembling.

Leitana went very still in his arms. For a long moment she said nothing, just stared at him.

Then, softly: “You’d betray me.”

“Yes.” No hesitation. “I’d betray every promise, every rule we made, every scrap of trust you’ve given me. Because I love you more than I love being the man you think I am.”

She pulled back just enough to look at him, really look, even though the blindfold hid his eyes from her.

“And if mi fight you?” Her voice was small, but there was steel in it now. “If mi say I want to give our baby every chance? If mi say I’d rather die holding it than live without ever knowing it?”

Ravial’s grip didn’t waver.

“Then I’ll still do it,” he said. “And after… if there’s anything left of me when you look at me with hate instead of love… I’ll spend whatever years I have left earning back the right to breathe the same air as you.”

Leitana lifted one trembling hand and traced the edge of his blindfold with her fingertips, then slid them down to rest over his heart.

“You’re a bad man, mi Ravial.”

“I know.”

She leaned in and pressed her lips to the corner of his mouth, soft, and lingering.

“But you’re mine.”

He closed his eyes behind the fabric and pulled her closer, burying his face in her hair again, inhaling like a drowning man finally breaking the surface.

“And you’re my reason,” he whispered. “The only one and always will be to the end.”

Her arms slid around his neck, holding tight.

“Then stay with mi,” she said against his skin. “Whatever comes… we face it together. Even if you have to be the villain in mi story.”

Ravial’s grip on her turned fierce, almost bruising.

“I already am, my lamb.”

And for the first time in two days, the knot in his chest loosened just enough to let him breathe her in without the taste of panic underneath.

He wasn’t pretending anymore.

Whatever came next, he’d guard her life with everything he had even if it meant guarding it from her own heart.