Page 140 of The Alpha King's Fate

She set the hair dryer aside and piled her hair up to keep it out of the way. Her eyes automatically searched for that spot that comforted her whenever she saw it in the mirror. Her hands paused in the middle of styling her hair, and her breath hitched.

It was gone.

The mark that showed everyone that she belonged to Jax—mind, body, and soul—completely vanished.

She dropped her hands, and her hair fell back, covering her neck. The tears started falling again. She’d lost Jax. She’d lost everything.

“Layla?”

She sniffed and wiped her tears.

“I’ll be right out,” she called out.

Her face was blotchy again so she washed it in the sink and grabbed another towel to dry herself. Her face still didn’t look right. Maybe it was her imagination, but her eyes looked plain green. Like a human’s.

She looked away before she broke down again and threw her used towels into the laundry basket. Jax was in his boxers and sitting on the edge of their bed when she walked out.

“All yours,” she said with a bright smile. “I’ll dress quickly and then make us something to eat.”

“Layla—”

“I won’t be long,” she cut in. “Maybe we can eat outside, so hurry up.”

She shut the dressing room door and blinked back her tears. Jax was going to want to talk. She could see the questions she wasn’t ready to answer in his eyes. He would know about her time in the Hunters’ base soon enough but losing Nia... She wasn’t ready to say it out loud yet.

She found a pair of jeans and a T-shirt and didn’t bother with shoes. The sooner she left the room, the better.

Jax was still on the bed when she rushed out of the room. She froze when she met his ice-blue gaze. She had seen a lot of expressions on his face during their time together, but she had never seen the one he had on now. He looked devastated. Lost. His mouth parted, and his chest rose and fell in shaky breaths.

If their bond was still intact, she would have felt a lot of pain.

“I thought you were going to shower,” she whispered.

“I can’t... How did you... How?”

She looked away from the pain in his eyes while contemplating his words. The only person who could have told her how was dead, and she wouldn’t have spared him just for that answer. Even if it meant Jax would walk out of her life without the bond.

“I’m hungry. Wash up and meet me downstairs,” she said instead of answering.

The hallway was just the same as she left it only a few days before, yet it felt completely different. Too wide. Too quiet. Too empty. She’d just walked past the Brit’s empty room when a thought struck her and made her blood run cold.

Everyone believed Brit would shift any day now. Once she returned, she would be stuck in training like everyone else. She didn’t have a chance to tell Jax everything before the Hunters took her. Without Nia, she wouldn’t be able to protect her sister.

And she wouldn’t be able to protect Hope, the future Queen.

Her heart hurt so much it felt like it was exploding.

The life she built for herself depended solely on the fact that she had a wolf and her bond with Jax. Without that, she had nothing. She had no one.

She brought her hand up to her chest when her heart started to pound. It felt like it would break out of her chest. What was she meant to do now? She couldn’t possibly leave Hope, but after coming face to face with Hunters, she knew she would never be able to protect her on her own. She couldn’t breathe. Her throat closed as a fear she had not known even in the cage welled inside her.

She could not raise Hope. Her baby. The child she had been dead set to take with her before Jax told her how he felt.

She could not be the mother the future Queen needed.

The sound of the door opening behind her brought her out of that devastating thought.

“Layla?”

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