Page 10 of The Alpha King's Curse: Part Two

But now, she only wanted to scrub and polish until her heart didn’t hurt anymore. She stripped the cot of the dusty bedding and then ripped a few strips from one of the sheets. As she started to wipe, dust and scrub, she focused on the task at hand.

But that niggling thing in her head kept trying to bring everything back. She briefly wondered why that imaginary red wolf had said she would be safe with Jackson when she was stuck in the middle of some sort of war. The thing in the back of her mind made her think it was because she belonged with Jackson and would never be complete without him.

When she tried to think happy thoughts, like when she would see her sister again and return to her real life, the thing in her head told her this was her life now. Her world. There was no going back.

When she wondered how she could have so easily taken a life, the thing in her head told her it was because she was a monster, just like Jackson.

And the scary part? She could now hear those thoughts the same way she had heard the imaginary wolf. They were so loud. Maybe it was due to the trauma of what had happened.

There was a voice in her head.

And it was cursing her out for trying to leave Jackson in the first place.

Maybe she didn’t have to worry about what would happen once she left this place. She would be sectioned until the doctors got the voices under control. The school counsellor had been right after all. She had schizophrenia, and it was time she got help.

Chapter 6

Dawn was breaking when the soft cry of a baby drifted to the balcony, thankfully taking Jackson’s attention away from everything in his head.

But the reality wasn’t much better. Every time that the baby cried reminded him of what he had lost, what he wouldn’t get to enjoy because he’d fucked up and Fate was punishing him.

He looked over at the tents on the ground below him and felt the guilt again. Though the number of those they had lost was less than he had first imagined, it was still one too many. He didn’t want them to return to their homes because they would be unprotected, so he had to deal with the witch first. And the Circle.

The Circle had a lot to answer for. He shouldn’t have trusted them. Their wards had been breached initially, but they had still been somewhat intact. They shouldn’t have fallen entirely the way they had done. Having them had made his pack more relaxed after their troubles and had made them vulnerable. After he found the witch, he would find those three Circle members and deal with them, too.

The soft wail increased in volume as the little girl demanded attention. There didn’t seem to be anyone waking up to deal with her. With a tired sigh, he stood from the chair he had sat in all night and stretched his stiff muscles before he walked into his bedroom.

Two children had become ten by the time Dylan and Micah had gone around the grounds looking for unsupervised pups. Six of them were sprawled on his bed, and the rest on his sofas. Another group had been placed in Layla’s old room. Some children were waiting for their parents or guardians to recover, but a couple had become orphans.

His heart hurt when he looked at his bed and saw the two little boys huddled together for comfort. Cain howled in his head for them. The beast had been doing nothing but crying for weeks, and now they were both raw.

He walked over to the small cot that had been placed next to the bed because the little boy, Max, was too anxious to be separated from his sister. An Omega was fast asleep on a recliner next to it, assigned to watch over the children. But they had all been rushed off their feet, looking after everyone after the attack. He couldn’t fault her for not waking up for the baby.

“Shh,” he whispered as he picked the little girl up. “I’ve got you. I’m here.”

The baby was only three months old. She stopped crying instantly and looked up at his face. Her cheeks were rosy and chubby, and her big blue eyes looked at him hopefully as if he was supposed to know what to do.

He remembered the day he had news of the new addition to his pack, and he’d felt jealous that it seemed so easy for everyone else. It had taken him months of trying before he realised his only hope would be to find his mate. Everyone else could father children with whoever they wanted, but he’d been stuck with the most unsuitable woman. If not for the damned curse, he would have had several heirs running around his territory by now. He would never have had to look for the woman who’d ended up destroying him.

“Are you hungry?” he whispered. “Do you need to change?”

His nose had already picked up that she did. That was not a job he wanted to do.

The baby’s face changed as if she now understood that her rescuer was probably the most useless wolf in the pack when it came to such delicate tasks. He was an only child, and from the moment he could walk, his father had started training him for his role. He had only seen babies from a distance.

The baby opened her mouth and started crying again. He put her against his shoulder and started rubbing her back the way he had seen some mothers do. It calmed her a little, but he knew it would be temporary until he did what the baby wanted.

A trolley had been set up along one wall with baby accessories, so he walked over to it and laid the baby on the changing mat. He knew absolutely nothing but he had to at least try. It was his fault that such a young pup didn’t have her mother to comfort her.

By the time he had found out how to get her clothes off and undone her nappy, the girl was screaming and kicking her legs. The smell made his eyes water. Goddess! What the fuck did babies eat? A look back at the Omega showed she was still passed out, so no help was coming. It took too long to get her cleaned up and just as long to figure out how to put the nappy back on her.

When he picked her back up and took her with him to the bathroom to wash his hands, her little face was redder, and her lungs were working harder. How was anyone else not waking up for this?

When he left the bathroom, he found Max sitting in bed and looking at them. There was more sadness hanging over him than when he had found him.

“She’s hungry,” Max stated.

A quick look at the table next to the Omega showed a couple of bottles already made in the warmer. He reached for one quickly and then sat down next to Max.

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