Page 69 of The Broken Aztec Princesses

‘Yeah, but she barely looks at me. Maybe it’s more than just not wanting to hook up with a visiting alpha. Maybe she really doesn’t see me that way. Maybe I’m not enough.’I felt a clod of dirt hit me in the back of the head, knocking off my Stetson.

“What the hell, John,” I growled.

“That was a warning shot. I told you what would happen next time you said those words.”

“This isn’t about me being alpha!” I countered. The earth was dry and cold right now and it fucking hurt. I picked up my hat and placed it back on my head.

“The same general rule applies,” he growled, grabbing his basket to go turn it in. “You’re enough.”

I rolled my eyes and grabbed my own basket. We dumped it and returned to our area of work.

‘Have you told her you’re leaving?’

‘Not yet. I will after the full moon.’

‘I’m rooting for the Moon Goddess to get this one right for you.’

‘Me, too.’

‘You think she’d consider taking you as a chosen mate if it isn’t? Second-chance mates are rare. Maybe she’d go for it.’

‘I don’t know. I hope. If I can’t find the woman destined for me... fuck, man, you know me. The only woman I ever thought about was her. I was a fucking little monster growing up. Pulling on those fucking curls to get her to notice me.’

Not that she had curls anymore. Bells kept straightening her hair for some reason.

I was a stupid little kid until well into my teenage years. I didn’t grow up with them, but it was fucking close enough. Mom was never fond of a lot of lunas. Luna Celeste won her over though and became one of her closest friends. Even though visiting required taking a flight to Arizona from Cali, they both made a huge effort to visit at least once a month. John wasn’t part of the pack back then. But once he gained the title of my best friend in our teens, all I could talk about whenever I was back from a visit to Crescent Moon, was how pretty I thought Bells was with her wild curls and grey eyes, and how I wished she was my mate.

Bells in her teens was a stubborn child who was easy to push into a wild fury that always left me in awe of her. Now she was a fucking woman who drove me crazy with her inability to take help without arguing she didn’t need it. It still left me in awe of her.

After I turned nineteen, I waited so patiently until she came of age. I saved myself and trained hard, hoping it would be enough for the Moon Goddess to grant her to me. Then on the very first full moon after she and Cory turned nineteen, my dreams were crushed when I watched her bond with another alpha.

I didn’t bother to do a full moon for months after. Nyko and I fell into a depression. Thoughts of not being good enough for the daughter of a blood alpha, when I was adopted, hit hard then. Ittook a while before I went back to looking for my mate, and that was at the request of Dad and John, who wanted me to go with him and look for his own.

Over the years, the yearning and feelings for Bells got a little easier to deal with. Mom sometimes gave me updates but I didn’t see her again until I arrived here, and the feelings hit me full in the face and heart when I hugged her. It felt like coming home.

I knew it was terrible, but knowing her mate was dead, I felt hope again. I’ve tried to squash that budding hope after she rejected me the morning after we’d made out against the door of my room, but I was thoroughly fucked. No part of my body, heart or mind listened to the warnings I gave.

Tonight, we would see. See if the Moon Goddess thought I was finally worthy enough of a woman like Bells, or if I would have to fight for my place by her side. Because if the Moon Goddess didn’t give her a second chance mate tonight, I was going to fight like hell to convince Bells to give me a chance. After getting a taste of her the other night, I was only waiting until tonight to see what I had to do to get her back into my arms. The only one who could stop me was Bells, and I hoped by the few looks I caught over the last two weeks, that she wouldn’t want to.

“Alpha,” Ada’s sugary voice pushed all thought from my head and made Nyko gag.

“Yes?” I asked curtly.

I couldn’t even pretend with her anymore. She kept pushing and I was getting sick of it.

“I was wondering how the pack grounds hunt is going. We haven’t heard anything for a while and some of us are getting homesick.”

How can you get homesick of a place we haven’t bought yet?Nyko asked.

“I’m working on it, Ada. If I have something to share, I’ll let you know.”

“But others—”

“If people have questions on how I run the pack and this process, they can come to me. You’re not a spokesperson for any of them,” I interrupted through gritted teeth. “Please go back to work.

‘She’d like to be the spokesperson alright. She wants to be the one telling everyone what to do,’John teased as we watched her stomping away.

‘Over my dead body.’

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