Page 115 of The Alpha's Cursed Queen

Oh, fuck!

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“I already said I’m sorry!” I sit on the edge of the bed as Alice paces before me. “It was the heat of the moment, Alice. I wouldn’t—I tried to stop it.”

She stops in her tracks, turning around to point a finger at me. “The heat of the moment? You shouldn’t have put your hands on me in the first place!”

“Woah, woah, woah!” I hold up my palms. “You weren’t exactly saying no, either!”

She glares at me. “I’m not the one who gave you the mating mark, Darian! If you have such poor control over your wolf, you had no business doing all that to me!”

“It wasn’t on purpose!” I attempt to pacify her, trying really hard to feel bad about what I’ve done and not succeeding. “Alice…”

She’s pacing again, her expression ranging from frantic to angry to upset. My heart sinks.

“Do you really despise me that much?”

She turns to face me a second time, her lips parting. I brace myself for whatever cruel words will spill from her tongue, but she snaps her mouth back together as if she doesn’t quite trust herself to speak. I watch and wait, and when she finally does say something, her shoulders droop.

“You have no idea of the position you have put me in, Darian. Why? What did I do to you? Why do you always have to corner me without leaving so much as a way out? Why can’t you just let me live my life?”

Her eyes are sparkling with tears, and I feel like a monster.

“Alice, I’m sorry.” I’m on my feet now. Placing my hands on her shoulders, I try to plead my case. “I didn’t do it deliberately. My wolf was desperate. It seized the opportunity. I tried to resist, but there was nothing I could do. But I learned my lesson thefirst time around. I want to win you back, but not like this. Never against your will.”

“But now, you’ve tied us together for life.” She looks up at me, a tear spilling down her cheek. “I don’t want to go back there. I want my normal life, where I have some control. I worked hard to get here, Darian. You took everything from me once, and now you’re taking it again. Where am I supposed to go at this point? You got what you wanted, and like always, I’m the one who has to bear the consequences.”

My heart breaks, and my voice is uneven. “I just thought, when I came here tonight, that maybe the two of us could finally be happy. I didn’t—You don’t have to come back with me. I won’t force you. I promise. You can stay here. You and Mira both.” I stagger away from her, my wolf finally realizing that she really doesn’t want me. “I thought—I didn’t know your hatred of me ran so deep.”

I can’t look her in the eye. I’ll break if I do. To be hated and despised by my own fated mate to the extent that the bond, which should have been a source of happiness for us both, is distressing her to the point of tears makes me feel sick to my stomach. I should have resisted harder.

“I’ll figure out a way,” I say roughly. “I won’t disrupt your life, Alice. You have my word.”

It feels like everything has slipped from my grasp, like sand through my fingers. All the plans I was laying out in my head, the hopes I was building of the chance at a new life with the woman I love, seem like a faraway dream now. I want to blame my wolf, but I can understand why it acted the way it did. It didn’t wantto let Alice get away a second time. At its very core, my wolf is a beast. It understands animalistic instincts.

Wolves mark their mates and spend a lifetime together. The females follow the males. My wolf wanted that. How could it have accounted for the fact that Alice’s hatred of me would make her resist the bond?

Alice just looks at me, and I walk out of the bedroom, numb.

She doesn’t stop me, and at this point I no longer expect her to.

I was so cocky, so arrogant to assume that there was a chance to fix things. But what does this mean for us? What does it mean for me?

Will I spend the rest of my life alone because I gave in to Willow’s threats so many years ago? Will I constantly pine for Alice, knowing that no matter what I do, I will never be able to carve a space in her heart for myself?

I exit the apartment, needing to think, needing to grieve.

My mate doesn’t want me.

In trying to protect her, I pushed her so far away that even if she’s within my physical reach, I can’t touch her, I can’t draw comfort from her.

And if that isn’t the loneliest existence imaginable, I don’t know what is.

Outside, in front of her building, I stand under the streetlight. The night is dark and empty. Tilting my head back, I feel the hole in my heart grow larger and colder.

This is my existence now.

Because, as I’ve learned, not all damage can be undone.

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